@q-girl wrote:
@hckynut Again, a very thoughtful and personal post. Understand, my response is in no way to challenge you, or is it directed at you. I respect your choice tolerate pain rather than further jeopardize your health. I have been a chronic pain patient for close to twenty years. At no time has my goal, my expectation or my result been a pain free life, but merely a level of discomfort that I could live with. I've learned much about the patient's role in this, namely positioning yourself in the least painful way, moving to prevent stiffness, use of heat and ice, and use of the many, many distraction techniques available (like thus forum ! ) available these days. Most importantly is your own attitude about the situation you are in and the acceptance of it, and how you choose to handle it.
That being said, when the pain level prevents you from living your normal (whatever your own "normal" may be) life, or rises to an unbearable level, treatment is sought. I fought like H*££ to tolerate staying off the Celebrex. I would have done just about anything not to return to the med, but I could not tolerate what was happening to me. I cannot tolerate Ibuprofen, Tylenol was not helping, and my docs felt that one Celebrex per day was, at this time, the best option for me.
Good to see you posting here.
Hugs . . .
@q-girl,
It is never good when I read about people that have been dealing with pain for years. I know a bit about this as my nephew is a doctor(Anesthesiologist) and at last count owns 5 Pain Clinics. Of these 2 are in our city/1 in our state/1 in California, and 1 in South Korea.
I've talked with him on several occasions about people with chronic pain many times. He has always told me there is no 1 med or treatment that will work for everyone, nor the same with side effects and risk factors. Then he says there is always each individual patient's pain threshold level.
I have have had(still do) several issues with my spine going back to hurting my back making money shoveling snow from driveways back before my teen years. Hurt my back then and coupled with my choice of sports I played, and working on race cars, and my 30+ years of lifting reels of telephone wire of 60-80lbs, hence my problems.
Have had 3 crushed vertebrae in my neck since the 1990's. Had major back surgery to remove my L-5/S-1 ruptured discs and in around 2006, another back surgery to remove a ruptured L-3 disc. My fingers were just the part that I was concerned with when I chose to take Celebrex.
I have slept in a recliner chair for going on 30 years now because of my back problems, and 1 of my real good friends is a Spinal Specialist at our State Spine Hospital. He removed my L-3 and has no answers as to why I cannot sleep lying in any type of bed, and I have tried most of them.
Have always been what many call a "health and fitness nut". I made my own exercises I could do at work during breaks and lunch(and this was the lifting those heavy reels). My main priorities were always flexibility/muscle strength, and doing lots of cardio after work. In the winter I would Referee maybe 20 hockey games each week, after I got off of work. Spring/Summer and Fall, run 25-30 miles every week.
Don't see anything you said as "challenging me", quite the opposite. We both are saying the same things, just from a different perspective. The human body is as individual as a leaf falling from a tree or a snowflake falling in the winter. The bodies my be similar in looks, but each one is unique, and I wish more people understood this.
My normal? Right now since I am in top physical conditioning and able to do any workout I choose, including now, my ice skating for close to 2 hours, that is my type of normal for me. Days I don't skate I try to do cardio at least 1 hour a day/resistance every other day/stretching half hour after each workout/10-15 minutes of abdominal exercises 7 days a week. Now I use my Teeter Inversion Table every single day for varying amounts of time, a certain amount at Full Inversion.
It has been at least 10 years since I was at "this-my normal". Lung blood clots/ heart attacks/ bleeding colon/anemia, any several other medical issues that prevented or slowed me down reaching "my normal". Were not easy times getting halfway there, then boom, colon bleeding or heart attack, and back to square 1 again in my quest to reach "my normal" (the above paragraph).
You do what works for "your normal" as much as you possibly can at each present time. Whatever makes your day better is a good thing. I have always believed in living in the day, not the past or too far into the future. Each day is the important day when it comes to living one's life, and my wish is for you to have as many of those less painful days as possible.
You, like myself are an optimist, we always have hope and keep doing what we can do, when we can do it. Take good care of yourself now,
hckynut(john)
Blogs & Forums
Forums
Blogs
