Hi Summertime, I wrote you last night, but it didn't go thru. I'll try again. Yes, I have a TENS unit and it helped me a lot. It has leads and a patch. You can monitor the frequency and strength of the current. It's like a distraction; The Dr. that diagnosed me ordered it and physical therapy. Insurance paid for it and the replacement patches. I had already had rsd for maybe 4 years but didn't know it and had lots of p.t. for frozen shoulder after breast surgery. Then had hand injury during water skiing. RSD used to be called shoulder hand syndrom. Anyway, I had a lot of therapy on hand and got half of the range of motion back to my fingers and they desensitized my hand so I could bear things touching it. My fingers bend about 1/2 way now. but can cut my own food etc.
Therapy is very painful, but the only way I got use of both arms (frozen shoulder) and use of hand. Was losing my toes, ( I have full body RSD) they were turning upward off the flood. Dr. gave me exercises to do in the swimming pool, and now they touch the floor. I try to stretch and do something everyday. I can't remember, Summertime, but do you have frozen shoulder? I remember how much torture it was, tears falling down my face, while strapped on a table. I took pain meds before treatment and I also had an hour of massage therapy that I paid for. After about 50 treatments, they introduced me to a orthopedic surgeon who wanted to break my shoulder. I said no thank you. Everyone knows surgery is the worst thing you can do for an rsd patient unless absolutely necessary. I called my insurance company and told them about my introduction to surgeon, and asked them did they want me to go that route or pay for my massage therapy sessions, that I had before the p.t.? They said OH we would be happy to pay for the massage therapy. So I feel , for me, that was the best way to go, massage and p.t. After a few more months, we moved out of state. They therapist told me it might move over to the other shoulder and it did. In RSD language that is called mirror spread. I found a great therapist, who had just opened a new office. He was the PGA physical therapist who traveled on the pro golf circuit. He was great and the therapy was not very long compared to the first shoulder. I still use a cylinder styrofoam and lay on it and roll rom side to side. I do other exercises to keep my shoulders loose and straight.
I do agree about too much pain is not good, but I don't think there is a way out of a part of our body locking up from RSD to loosen up without considerable pain. Swimming has been my best helper, but when I was so bad, I couldn't even do that.
I hope the best for you. What part of the country do you live in? Everyone on here is a kind and compassionate person who understands what you are going thru.
I had the electric shocks and shooting pains, spasms and knife like pain, They only stopped when I went on anti-seizure med after I was correctly diagnosed. Take care, Loretta