What is RSD?
It is the sleeping hours
of a cat,
and the hearing of a
dog......only sometimes
A cute, albeit nightmarish
hell of a screaming baby
in a store can unleash the
torrents of hellish pain,
and in feeling like you've
just heard fingernails dragged across a chalkboard.
But can set off your RSD
pain...arm, leg, whole body, whatever...
That cute child???
The one everyone,
including me,
would love to hold and
love, if this thing called pain
is ever to be “brought
under control”
as my neurologist, Dr. J
says,
so that he can do the
proper studies....
pain control exists, I
wonder, I think to myself.
I should see that day.
What is RSD?
RSD is an “Odd duck,”
even to neurologists,
the very doctors you'd
think would treat this....
and some have been
unknowingly been outright cruel to RSD patients,
subjecting them to the
nerve conduction studies
before achieving enough
control to examine them
without causing
excruciating pain..
I had a neurologist
examine me, causing a cresendo of pain,
I nearly threw up on her
shoes,
and I've achieved enough
control not to scream,
and she then told me it
was a “psychological problem,”
having to do with my
“psychological issues,
and refraining also from
saying anything “impolite”
I merely took the slip
that said I was to make a follow-up,
and threw it away on my
way out.
I'm not a sadist. I just
have RSD.
She even wrote that it was
“neurogenic pain”
due to my “psychological
disorder.”
Anyone would have
psychological disorders after a screaming exam like that!
But what does RSD feel
like??
The sleeping habits of a
cat, the hearing of a dog.
I start the month with a
large box of ear plugs.....
the only thing that helps
the latter.
The skin sensitivity is a
killer...the pain will take your breath away,
make you vomit, and when
you finish, you want to scream and cry.
The burning pain, the
burning, flaming, incinerating, kindling,
roasting, scalding,
scorching, smoking, blazing, and finally withering away
of just one part of the
body.....my leg was never the same after the surgery.
I feel like acid has been
poured on my skin,
but no burn can be
seen....
Dousing your leg with
lighter fluid, and lighting a match,
leaving the fire to burn,
24/7....
Then, when someone touches
me,
it feels like an open
wound
being rubbed, scrubbed,
and scraped, with sandpaper and wire brushes.
My soft warn blankets bring relief.
the electric on a low setting
No pain when they touch my skin,
and they serve to protect me from the
elements
I have an apartment full of medical equipment.
I have not one, but two shower chairs:
One is a bench, and see below:
 |
| age 19 |
 |
| 2003 |
 |
| 2008 |
To the CEO of Virginia Mason, and gave my doctor a degree, diplom
