tired of it all....long

[Guest guest]

Let me start by saying hello to all. I've been lurking in the

shadows for several months, mainly cause I wasn't sure if I belong

here or not. Back in 91' I was injured at work. I had about 350 lbs.

of paper fall on me, landing on my back, neck, and rt shoulder. I

went through mri's, mylograms, cat scans...and the list goes on. I

was dx'd with cervical strain and sprain, radiculopathy, reflex

sympathetic dystrophy, brachial neuritis. The pain was and still is

excrutiating at times. Finally around 94' i got a doc to listen to

where my pain was and he did an mri of the thorasic area. He found I

did indeed have a syrinx T6-T8. I was sent to the cleveland clinic

where i was told it was no big deal, have an mri every year just to

keep an eye on it. I have seen doctor after doctor only to be told

the pain is all in my head.

About six mths ago I had a really bad flare up and i told my family

doc I knew there had to be more to this than what they were

saying...something was not right. I contacted a new neurosurgeon and

the first thing he wanted to do was check for chiari. Unfortunately

he found I do have a herniation of 5mm, along with the syrinx.

Although this guy found the prob, i'm not happy with him, he doesn't

believe the syrinx OR the chiari causes pain. I've been to the ER 3

times in the last month and yesterday's visit really has me upset.

Here's what happened...I went up to the pharmacy to pick up my script

of zanaflex, I remember i turned my head and got a severe sharp

pain. Everything went blurry, i was seeing double and felt as though

i was going to hit the floor. My husband came and picked me up and

took me to the ER. The er doc didn't want to give me anything for

pain except an iv of compazine/benadryl. when i told him the last

doc i seen said the next time i came in just request morphine(since

it helped) he looked at me as if i was nuts. He then called the NS

who told him " I have a mild case of chiari and shouldn't have any

pain " . so as you can imagine I now became a druggie looking for a

fix. They did a cat scan...which was fine....gave me a shot of

nubain and shoved me out the door. My question...what do I do if

this happens again? do i take a chance and just go home and lie

down? It scares me to death and I don't know what to do. I have

pain meds but they don't always take care of the headaches. Now i'm

afraid to go back to the ER. I've been there 8times since

January...3 visits for kidney stones 1 for iritis the rest headaches.

I do have an sppointment with Dr benzel Oct. 9th. but not sure I even

want to go. I'm afraid he's going to tell me the same thing i have

heard for the last 9 yrs.

sorry so long... Tina (ohio)

ACM 5mm

syrinx T6-T8 (tho er said differently)

and a whole bunch of other junk