Our journey with a neck injury Pt. 3 - The Present
The Present
From August to early December 2017, @millennialnow's progress would finally become tangible. The setback caused by surgery no longer seemed a big deal. On one particularly wet December afternoon, millennialnow was rear-ended when he stopped at a red light turning left onto a major highway. The blessing in getting rear-ended is that he was wearing his cervical collar at the time of the accident. He could have been greatly injured if not for the cervical collar. On the flipside, the curse in getting rear-ended is that he still experienced enough whiplash to reinjure parts of his neck and undo much of the hard work his therapist poured into him.
Two steps forward one step back - that's how much of these last two and half years have felt. After progressing so much last fall, getting rear-ended felt devastating; however, when you have the best physical therapist in the state of Alabama, much can still be accomplished. At the start of this new year, everything fell into rhythm with therapy twice a week. The new year also brought millennialnow a new neurologist, which proved to be a wonderful God-send. He'd seen a neurologist before, who was content with prescribing low-dosage pain medicine and not much else unfortunately. His new neurologist immediately proved to be a much better fit. She and her colleagues at her practice have experience in treating people with chronic migraines. For the first time since this journey began, millennialnow was prescribed medicine with the explicit purpose of treating his migraines.
Finding the migraine medicine that works best is kind of like finding your favorite jelly bean flavor - you've got to try a lot of beans before that perfect flavor reveals itself. Usually, each appointment with the neurologist means a new medicine; yet because millennialnow suffers from myofascial pain and his intense migraines are trigged by his neck injury, medicines typically used to treat migraine may not work. His therapist mentioned he might benefit from Lyrica, a medicine often used to treat nerve and muscle pain; so, he asked his neurologist to prescribe Lyrica and it's helped! The way he describes it is that if he's a seven on the scale of pain, Lyrica will bring that pain down to a five. Again, not a cure-all but definitely helpful.
With physical therapy and new medications, it has felt like we're on our way to recovery. I bet you know what comes next, don't you? For several months, millennialnow has had increasing pain in his right shoulder. His therapist has attempted to rehab the should but to no avail. In fact, the pain in his shoulder has even hindered his progress in therapy. Every time he attempts to move up on resistance bands or use weights in the effort to strengthen his muscles, he hits the proverbial wall. Finally, he had no choice and scheduled an appointment with an orthopedic surgeon.
I know you may be thinking something along the lines of Wait, she hasn't mentioned an injured shoulder before. That's because his shoulder has only been a small part of the puzzle until recently. We don't know exactly how his shoulder got injured but the theory is that it occurred with the initial neck injury, was irritated by surgery last spring (during the same surgery on his back he also had a much smaller cyst removed from his right shoulder), and really exacerbated by the car accident in December.
Yesterday, he had his first appointment with the surgeon. For temporary relief, he received a cortisone shot in his shoulder. On Saturday, he's scheduled to have an MRI on his neck, and next Tuesday, he's scheduled to have an MRI on his shoulder. The MRI on his shoulder should determine whether or not he needs surgery to correct whatever is wrong with his shoulder. No one likes to have surgery but we do look forward to the possibility that surgery can fix his shoulder and he can move forward with therapy on his neck. This could very well be one of the last few puzzle pieces.
Oh! He's also scheduled to begin Botox treatments in June. Apparently Botox can successfully treat migraines. There will be more updates from me as we learn more. In the meantime, look for part four coming soon. I want to share some of my takeaways from our journey.
Missed parts one and two? Check them out!
https://steemit.com/life/@queenvick/our-journey-with-a-neck-injury-pt-1-the-beginning
https://steemit.com/story/@queenvick/our-journey-with-a-neck-injury-pt-2-the-next-steps
Botox for migraines - for ten years or more I've checked in my area, but cosmetic practitioners and NO INSURANCE coverage on botox, even for TMJ, and good luck finding anyone who's certified/qualified.
Our neighbor had neckbones replaced with titanium vertebra - I cannot imagine - and the cut from the front, her throat, to get to the bones. Wow. If you go under the knife, chances are on your side. Neighbor said she hurt a lot in the weeks after surgery but feels so much better now. She also went on her dog walks the day after surgery. Farm girl. Keep moving; use it or lose it; just never stay down! Good luck, and thanks for sharing this! You led me to dry needling, and myofascial videos about trigger points, and today, it led me to a neck exercise I must STOP doing - yoga video has me raising the chin, looking up, and doing head tilts, left, then right. STOP. Nope. Use isometrics instead. Well, dang. Wish I'd known that years ago. Good to know it
now!
I'm glad you found some of the information useful. Millennialnow has difficulty with certain neck movements too. Head tits, especially looking down, are particularly difficult and painful. And to the Botox - our insurance will hopefully cover most to all of it but only after he has tried certain medications and proved that they have not helped the migraines. He is still on the fence about actually doing Botox treatments. Apparently if you get Botox shots in the neck it WILL make neck pain worse for several months after the treatments. He can just get the shots in his forehead/head area, but it's still kind of hard to want to do that even when you already suffer from neck pain.
So glad you found out about trigger points and dry-needling. It has really been the most effective form of treatment I've had so far. My PT has also helped me learn about things I can do at home to prevent from further-agitating those trigger points, and I've been able to make some simple lifestyle changes in order to help myself. Even things as simple as the way we sit, pick up objects, or even the way we bend our arms when using them can influence trigger points. I've also learned how to "listen" more to my body when it comes to pain. Dry-needling has actually taught me how to map how pain travels in my body. For instance, if my fingers are going numb, I know it's likely coming from my lower neck or my "upper trap" as my PT calls it. If I take tension off of that area and apply ice, I can usually get the numbness to subside in a few minutes. So, eventhough I may not have found a fix-all for my issues, just the knowledge of how to treat myself and know my pain better has made a big difference in my quality of life.
The best of luck to you. That sounds so painful.
Thank you! It all does sound so painful doesn't it! He handles it pretty well considering. Can't really call him a big baby anymore.
Good luck to you and @millennialnow. I can somewhat relate to the migraine issue, my wife suffers from them. People that have never had them or have never been around anyone with them cannot understand how debilitating they can be.
Thank you.
This is true. Migraines can completely alter the way someone lives their life or can live their life.
Not just their lives. Helping them avoid things like sunlight and sound, it makes it hard on everyone.
Yes, it really is a lifestyle change for everyone involved. I wouldn't wish migraines on anyone but sometimes do wish people had an "inside" view so they could empathize a little better.
I worked at a hospital when I was going through college driving an ambulance, small town in Alabama. I spent a lot of time in the ER, and not just because of the beautiful girl that checked people in, although Wanda was a big part of it. There was a lady the drove herself to the ER, sat waiting and reading a book until she could get a shot to make her migraine go away.
Until I was present when my wife had a migraine, I never knew that you really could not, or should not, drive with a migraine. And reading, no way.
When you said reading, I thought "no way". I don't have them often and I'm sure not as badly as my husband, but when I do have one, I just want to go to a dark, quiet room. ERs are bright and noisy. I can't imagine the agony in which she must have passed her time.
I am so sorry, sarcasm doesn't come through when it's written. After being around my wife with a migraine, I have never had one, there is no way I believe this lady was having a migraine. I don't know if she was feeding a drug addiction of some kind or what but I can't believe she was able to drive, sit in the ER, and read with a migraine. When my wife has one, even our dogs can sense it and know to be quiet.
Ah, I see it now. No worries. It's unfortunate that pain isn't a more tangible symptom from the outside. A lot of fraud could be avoided if it were; although after seeing all the pain my husband has gone through, I think it's pretty easy to see when someone really is in pain and when someone may not have the kind of pain they claim to have.