I am deeply grateful to everyone taking the time to respond, sharing knowledge and experiences.

I saw my rheumatologist. She had spent a tremendous amount of time with me, assessing the types of pain, the locations, etc.

She is up-to-date on using magnesium and her first question to me was inquiring if I had been using magnesium and in which ways and how often I had been using magnesium.

She feels the recent trauma to my foot, along with flared inflammatory arthritis, is all contributing to the CRPS flare.

Her first inclination is to try clonidine, just as mrsD had suggested. We are trying tablets first. She feels the topical clonidine patches are too caustic. We may try it in a topical cream at some point; yet, it is taking several days or longer to get topicals made up and she wants to get the clonidine started asap.

We have talked about the possibilities for topicals/topical blends.
In the meantime, she will be talking with the compounding pharmacist and with my primary care. I will be meeting with my primary care later this week, as well. He is staying late to see me.

None of this seems like it's happening soon enough when we are in so much pain! I try to remain patient while still pushing for swift movement in the most helpful direction. Both doctors agree, the sooner we get this flare shut down, the better.

The pain gets much worse for me at night, for whatever reason.
Just excruciating.

Both feet are equally uncomfortable, even though one has recent "trauma."
I keep my feet warm and continue to use the topical magnesium, lidocaine 4%, topical soma, etc. I take another Epsom salts soak just before bedtime.

Thanks again, to each of you, for sharing your knowledge and experiences with me. Thanks, too, to each of you sending personal notes of support. I am so very fortunate and deeply grateful to each of you.



DejaVu