Hello everyone.

I'm Stief. a 27 year old from Belgium. I've been diagnosed with CRPS stadium 2 about a month ago now. 4-5 weeks earlier I had sprayed my ankle. And now I've got CRPS in my left foot.

I've been to 3 docters now. And they all give me different advice when it comes to physical therapy. And reading up on the internet can be confusing too...

The docter who's treating me told me to rest and relax a lot. To burden my foot as little as possible. To stop visiting my physiotherapist and stop the excercises I was doing there. Stop biking on my hometrainer. To keep my walks short and painfree, and visit the pool 3 times a week for swimming and walking in the water. He prescribed me with daily Miacalcic (calcitonin) injections, and lysomucil (acetylcysteine) 600mg every morning. And to take lots of vitamin C. I've been receiving the injections, and taking the medication for 1 month now.

The next day I had an unrelated problem, and couldn't reach the docter who is treating me. I went to the one closest to where I live in my hometown. She had CRPS in her arm, so I told her my story. She adviced me to get a pair of crutches, and not go swiming and just stop walking all together, because I needed to rest and not burden my foot... She was shocked by the other docter's advice to keep me walking, and that even walking to reach the pool by public transport would be too much. Since the other docter adviced me to burden my foot as little as possible, I followed up on her advice.

2 weeks later I had another cardiovascular scan and the results came out worse. The docter in the hospital told me it was because of me using the crutches, and told me that I needed to keep moving so my blood circulation would get better in my foot. The results of the scan may have been incorrect because of the lower blood circulation by not using my foot anymore.

Back to the docters who were treating me, both of them. They've read the hospital's report and both told me to start moving again. Learn to walk without crutches, but keep those walks short. And start biking again, but without resistance. I asked them about my physiotherapist and they told me not to start up again. The docter who ordered the scan, gave me the same advice like he did before. Short walks when neccesary but don't overdo it, and go swiming and walking in the pool. But now he also told me to start biking again, but with no resistance from the hometrainer. He advised me to try to build up again and get rid of the crutches in 10 days.

After all of this I was confused and decided to contact a good hospital. I expected to consult a docter there, but I only got to speak to a young docter in training. And basically they've just took me in to start treating me immediately. It all goes very fast and I felt they didn't give me good counsulation and wanted me out of the door again very quickly.

They immediately did a bier block. And advised me to start moving as much as I can, but being careful not to go beyond my pain treshold. And to contact my physiotherapist to start excercises again, visiting her 2-3 times a week for sessions.

The next 3 days after the bier block went well. I got to the point that I could bike painfree for thirty minutes quickly, and started walking with my crutches, slowly building up the burden on my foot again. By the third day I was doing short walks without my crutches. My foot looked normal again. No more swealing, no more temperature changes, no more coloring, no more sweating...

Then I went to my physiotherapist (4 days ago). She massaged my foot and loosened everything up. After that the symptoms started to come back, and walking and biking was a lot harder that evening. I could only bike for 5 minutes or the pain would come back. And walking without crutches hurted rapidly now.

The next day I went back for another session. Same massage, which went better and with less pain. After that she let me do some simple exercises by moving and stretching my foot into the directions I'm having trouble with.

Like I said, biking and walking was a lot harder now. And my symptoms started to come back. The first day they were back in full force, and the two next days they lessened alot again. I cancelled my next appointement (which was supposed to be yesterday), and just worked on walking and biking again.

Today I went back to the hospital for the next bier block (which is 1 week after the last). They adviced me to continue visiting my physiotherapist, and to try and keep moving as much as possible, below my pain threshold.

I'm not sure what to do now. I've told them about the symptoms coming back, but they've told me not to take them into account and keep moving...

I feel like I'm getting better. I've only been receiving the injections for a month now. So I'm hoping that they are starting to work now, together with the bier blocks. But I'm afraid of starting up physiotherapy again because it made all the symptoms come back this week.

I know now that it's not good to stop moving all together. But the first two docters made it clear I had to relax a lot, and not to burden my foot too much. My physiotherapist also said that walking would be too much of a burden on my foot right now, and might hamper the healing of the CRPS.

I've also read that pain will make the CRPS worse. So now I'm thinking about leaving the physiotherapist for another week, and see if I get better this week if I don't overdo it. Just try to keep biking with no resistance, try to learn to walk again, but don't overdo that. And hopefully I'll be able to make it to the pool in a few days without using my crutches so I can start swimming! And that the symptoms won't come back!

In the hospital they told me I shouldn't take the symptoms getting worse again into account, and keep going to the physiotherapist...

Can anyone offer their opinions on this? I have been getting better the last 2 weeks, since I started moving again. I'm just afraid that overdoing it might make it worse again. And I'm hoping to fully heal from this!