I sure know what the trigger was- - an injury.

While the problem came on gang busters after the injury it did seem there were precursors in retrospect. At the time I thought my life was going pretty well but looking back there were some flies in the ointment. I had recently been moved to a job that was less interesting and required shiftwork. The bosses began expecting overtime which had always been problematical for me. My life was changing in a few ways. My dad was starting to exhibit symptoms of dementia and he was taking care of a brother who was in a more advanced state. My health was decent but I had a chronic back problem. At the time I thought my stress was low but in retrospect it was no better than moderate.

One of these days I'll start a thread about my pet theory on this; Asking about fingernails and toenails. It seems most of us have issues here and I can't shake the feeling that this might be more closely related to the cause than the effects. My nails started getting bad about the same time that it seemed my energy level emerged. Until the late '80's I just didn't get tired. It could have been age related but it didn't seem to be since it would be accompanied by muscle stiffness and soreness after heavy work.

In about '96 I started working intensively on my nails and they were improving by the time of the injury but this set them back. There's extensive ridging and cracking.

Another thing that might be of interest to someone out there is that I keep getting nerves hit by needles. A few docs have told me it's not possible but when you get one hit you'll know it is. Nerves are very tough and would tend to roll off a needle point rather than be punctured, I believe. Apparently my nerves aren't so tough. This has been this way since before the RSD.