Hi Loretta and Diana- Thanks for your responses- sorry to hear you are in so much pain Diana! Loretta you seem to have a good head for this now.
Actually I do co-run a support group here on Long Island. I can give others advice and the group does help me a lot. Its just with each level of increased pain I go thru I guess a morning period..Now I will probably have to take vicodin which makes me hung over which makes it hard for me to go to work. When I take vicodin or muscle relaxers I don't sleep well. Its like I cant get into a deep sleep and feel like sh** the next day. My biggest step recently was using a wheelchair at work. That was soo hard yet such a relief!! I don't feel like crying or screeming at work (although the arm pain/weakness has increased a lot!) I feel like this has just been a long nightmare and I will wake up and be normal again
Thanks again for your thoughts and ideas- Keep em coming:

Deb



ns- so painful
I take vicodin also. Something that really calms me is Lorazepam 2 mg. 3xday. It's an anti-anxiety med and my Dr. and I both feel i get more benefit from that than just about anything. I went of two double dosed anti-depressants and went on lose dose of Cymbalta, which is also effective for fibromyalgia, advertised as the first drug approved for fibro. I can't believe how much better I feel on it instead of the other two drugs.
I had terrible electric jolts, jerks, spasms, etc night and day and was on neurotin 3200 mg. to make them stop. Then Lyrica was working for a lot of people so I wanted to try it- so went off the neurotin and was on 300 mg of Lyrica. My weight gain was very depressing, so Doc and I have been working together in going down till I'm on just 50 mg. and no jolts. So next call him and hopefully will go off.
I've had about 150 PT and 200 massage treatments and feel that is a huge reason for my mobility. I have full body, generalized 12 years now. The massage therapy is still wonderful to keep toned and moving. Don't give up. Please let me know if you find a group or even another person. Sometimes you can call a hospital's education program and ask if there is any support group for RSD or even chronic pain groups. That would be wonderful to get together with some others. Would you let me know? I'll see if I can find something out too. Take care, Loretta[/QUOTE]