Chronic Pain

[adept]

Greetings all.

I'm now in my mid-fifties and I consider myself to be very healthy. I rarely get sick. I can't even remember the last time I had a common cold.

From childhood I've always been active. I took up several martial arts in my teens and continued into my thirties when I got interested in the internals. Since then I've had a daily qigong and meditation routine for over two decades, have always eaten well and tend to have a positive outlook on life, despite the state of the world these days. 

The only thing I've had a problem with health wise is recurring abdominal hernias. I've had 4. The last operation earlier this year was far bigger and deeper than my previous ones. My surgeon wanted to repair in such a way so that there was very little chance of another coming back. Recovery took longer because of this, but I noticed something concerning immediately after my procedure. 

I have a protrusion where the wound is situated and a constant soreness which gets very painful at times. An ultrasound scan found nothing there. No fluid, blood, or another hernia. Nothing. Just a painful, but soft and squidgy pot at the bottom of my abdomen. Very unsightly. 

My surgeon said that it looks to be fat and muscle which has binded itself to the scar tissue during the recovery process and that I may have to have plastic surgery to remove the unsightly lump if it doesn't subside in the next 6 months.

The thing that is really bothering me is the pain. My surgeon has diagnosed me with chronic pain which happens in only 3% of patients hernia surgeries. All regular pain medication is not working and so he prescribed me with Pregabalin, which is normally an anti-convulsant medication but when taken in small doses it is a nerve pain medication. However the side-effects are horrendous and I have experienced some of these already only a few days in. Dizziness, suicidal thoughts, pain in the limbs, headaches, brain fog and lack of co-ordination have plagued me for several days. I feel absolutely terrible and have stopped taking them.

I'm looking for alternative means of dealing with this chronic pain, whether that's medication, exercises, energy work, herbal remedies. 

If anyone has any suggestions I'd ver much appreciate it.

Thanks in advance.

[Lairg]

Check for astral entities feeding off your abdominal energies

[Nungali]

Have you no shame Lairg   ? 

 

... you  are  offering stupid new age cosmic advice for someone with a clear medical problem  who is suffering and is in pain  and  your  advice  will not help them in any way shape or form  .

 

I dont even know why such  an approach is allowed here !

 

In any case    Adept  ;   Its tricky with nerve pain , as opposed to 'spasm' pain .... is it nerve pain ?

 

Pain meds are atrocious !  AS you said, the side effects are bad .  Many use medical strength marijuana .   Personally I have an allergy to opioids  and can not take them orally , a few years back I had a hip replacement  and recovered on a mix of panadol and marijuana. But I am not sure about this with nerve pain . 

 

Op sites are tricky .... even with mine  (  when the dressing was changed the nurse was impresses  ; " Some one did a good job here ! " )  - but still, it ended up with a bump and a dent  in it .    I would also be getting another medical opinion on it ... maybe some   TCM  / herbalist  or specialist  ?  That is ; a professional - NOT a Daobum !

 

 

[blue eyed snake]

2 hours ago, adept said:

Greetings all.

I'm now in my mid-fifties and I consider myself to be very healthy. I rarely get sick. I can't even remember the last time I had a common cold.

From childhood I've always been active. I took up several martial arts in my teens and continued into my thirties when I got interested in the internals. Since then I've had a daily qigong and meditation routine for over two decades, have always eaten well and tend to have a positive outlook on life, despite the state of the world these days. 

The only thing I've had a problem with health wise is recurring abdominal hernias. I've had 4. The last operation earlier this year was far bigger and deeper than my previous ones. My surgeon wanted to repair in such a way so that there was very little chance of another coming back. Recovery took longer because of this, but I noticed something concerning immediately after my procedure. 

I have a protrusion where the wound is situated and a constant soreness which gets very painful at times. An ultrasound scan found nothing there. No fluid, blood, or another hernia. Nothing. Just a painful, but soft and squidgy pot at the bottom of my abdomen. Very unsightly. 

My surgeon said that it looks to be fat and muscle which has binded itself to the scar tissue during the recovery process and that I may have to have plastic surgery to remove the unsightly lump if it doesn't subside in the next 6 months.

The thing that is really bothering me is the pain. My surgeon has diagnosed me with chronic pain which happens in only 3% of patients hernia surgeries. All regular pain medication is not working and so he prescribed me with Pregabalin, which is normally an anti-convulsant medication but when taken in small doses it is a nerve pain medication. However the side-effects are horrendous and I have experienced some of these already only a few days in. Dizziness, suicidal thoughts, pain in the limbs, headaches, brain fog and lack of co-ordination have plagued me for several days. I feel absolutely terrible and have stopped taking them.

I'm looking for alternative means of dealing with this chronic pain, whether that's medication, exercises, energy work, herbal remedies. 

If anyone has any suggestions I'd ver much appreciate it.

Thanks in advance.

 

pregabalin is wellknown for its nasty side effects.

 

I would go back to this doc and see what he offers, or go to another one for a second opinion. 

Or, ( being a chronic patient myself, but something totally different) see whether there are patients-groups with your kind of troubles and see what they can tell you.

 

could you treat it topically? or is the pain located too deep inside for that?

 

I hope you'll find something to reduce the pain.

[forestofclarity]

I live in a decriminalized state, so a lot of people take and swear by medical marijuana for pain, even pain not responsive to conventional medications.  Not sure if that’s an option. I’m sure you’re spending a lot of time researching.

 

For meditation, usually the prescription from a Tibetan Buddhist POV is tonglen, compassion practices (ie Chenrezig) or metta meditation.

 

Mingyur Rinpoche has a meditation on pain, but these really depend on the individual. 
 

 

His brother Tsoknyi Rinpoche has a course Fully Being that I found helpful for different kinds of pain.
 

May be worth checking with a traditional Chinese medicine doctor if you haven’t already—- you never know. 
 

Asking for help from a higher power.

 

May you find relief from suffering and the causes of suffering.

 

Edited October 21, 2022 by forestofemptiness

[Master Logray]

Learn self-hypnosis to reduce the pain, and see if can reduce the level of medication to reduce side effects.  It can buy some time to have a second opinion from doctors.

[Lairg]

Western medicine tends to managing symptoms rather than dealing with causes.   Side effects are added to the problem.

 

TCM is better at dealing with life force issues.

 

Some causes come from outside the human - for example family karma

 

 

 

 

[adept]

On 20/10/2022 at 10:34 PM, Nungali said:

Many use medical strength marijuana .  

I would also be getting another medical opinion on it ... maybe some   TCM  / herbalist  or specialist  ?  That is ; a professional - NOT a Daobum !

 

 

 

Thanks Nungali.

Funnily enough I was thinking of marijuana as I was posting.

A friend of mine has had an incredible cancer reversal using cannabis oil. He was given six months to live two years ago with an aggressive bowel cancer and put on chemo. The chemo did nothing for him and so he scoured the internet looking for alternatives. He's now cancer free and the doctors are amazed.

[adept]

On 21/10/2022 at 3:25 AM, forestofemptiness said:

I live in a decriminalized state, so a lot of people take and swear by medical marijuana for pain, even pain not responsive to conventional medications.  Not sure if that’s an option. I’m sure you’re spending a lot of time researching.

 

For meditation, usually the prescription from a Tibetan Buddhist POV is tonglen, compassion practices (ie Chenrezig) or metta meditation.

 

Mingyur Rinpoche has a meditation on pain, but these really depend on the individual. 
 

 

His brother Tsoknyi Rinpoche has a course Fully Being that I found helpful for different kinds of pain.
 

May be worth checking with a traditional Chinese medicine doctor if you haven’t already—- you never know. 
 

Asking for help from a higher power.

 

May you find relief from suffering and the causes of suffering.

 

 Thank you. This is excellent.

[adept]

On 21/10/2022 at 4:09 AM, Lairg said:

Western medicine tends to managing symptoms rather than dealing with causes.   Side effects are added to the problem.

 

TCM is better at dealing with life force issues.

 

Some causes come from outside the human - for example family karma

 

 

 

 

I know an acupuncturist who helped cure me from particularly nasty hay fever a lot of years ago. I may ask him for some advice.

[adept]

On 21/10/2022 at 12:16 AM, blue eyed snake said:

 

pregabalin is wellknown for its nasty side effects.

 

I would go back to this doc and see what he offers, or go to another one for a second opinion. 

 

 

I actually contacted my doctor, not the surgeon who prescribed me the pregabalin, and he put me on amitriptyline. They were ten times worse than the pregabalin. Absolutely awful. It took me a couple of days to put myself right. I'm not taking these types of medication again.

[blue eyed snake]

7 minutes ago, adept said:

 

I actually contacted my doctor, not the surgeon who prescribed me the pregabalin, and he put me on amitriptyline. They were ten times worse than the pregabalin. Absolutely awful. It took me a couple of days to put myself right. I'm not taking these types of medication again.

 

that's an odd choice for pain

and indeed gives horrid side-effects.

 

 

[adept]

13 minutes ago, blue eyed snake said:

 

that's an odd choice for pain

and indeed gives horrid side-effects.

 

 

 

I know. It's an antidepressant. Apparently at low doses it works on nerve pain. 

[Nungali]

1 hour ago, adept said:

 

I actually contacted my doctor, not the surgeon who prescribed me the pregabalin, and he put me on amitriptyline. They were ten times worse than the pregabalin. Absolutely awful. It took me a couple of days to put myself right. I'm not taking these types of medication again.

 

I would be changing doctors .

[Apech]

@adept

 

Hi,

 

I have no medical qualifications or spiritual ones either - so whatever I say is just what comes to mind when reading your OP.

 

It is almost as if you have had a physical ailment (the hernia) fixed by physical means - I assume repaired with webbing or the like - but your body has recreated the symptoms of a hernia.  So you still have the painful swelling.  This suggests to me that your problem is on a more subtle level.  I don't know what that problem would be - only you really can find this out - and address it.  Given the location though I would naturally say it has something to do with the LDT.  Something to do with the formation of the LDT and the way that qi is operating there.

 

You say you have done martial arts and also qigong I think so maybe you are sensitive to qi.  You can through meditation examine what is occurring perhaps - or intuit the cause(s)?  Some nice deep shamatha breathing might help perhaps?

 

 

[adept]

On 25/10/2022 at 10:08 PM, Nungali said:

 

I would be changing doctors .

 

It's very rare that I visit doctors. Only because of my hernia problems and that it can only be fixed with surgery. 

Because of the complications post-surgery, my surgeon and family doctor were going to be my first ports of call.

I do know a TCM practitioner who will most likely be more helpful than these licensed drug-pushers.

[adept]

On 26/10/2022 at 4:26 PM, Apech said:

@adept

 

Hi,

 

I have no medical qualifications or spiritual ones either - so whatever I say is just what comes to mind when reading your OP.

 

It is almost as if you have had a physical ailment (the hernia) fixed by physical means - I assume repaired with webbing or the like - but your body has recreated the symptoms of a hernia.  So you still have the painful swelling.  This suggests to me that your problem is on a more subtle level.  I don't know what that problem would be - only you really can find this out - and address it.  Given the location though I would naturally say it has something to do with the LDT.  Something to do with the formation of the LDT and the way that qi is operating there.

 

You say you have done martial arts and also qigong I think so maybe you are sensitive to qi.  You can through meditation examine what is occurring perhaps - or intuit the cause(s)?  Some nice deep shamatha breathing might help perhaps?

 

 

 

Thanks for the reply Apech.

Yes the hernia was fixed with a mesh, in fact quite a lot was used this time as the rupture was bigger than anticipated. This also may be one of the causes for these post-operative complications. In the past I've recovered fine, only for another hernia to emerge years later. It's interesting that you say that I might be sensitive to qi. All throughout my life I've had a sort of a sixth sense regarding people and situations. Maybe I can detect certain intentions and incidents just before they happen ? I may be picking up on qi and the training and practices that I've done could be amplifying those feelings. I think you might be on to something there. 

I'll have a look at deep shamatha breathing, thanks for the recommendation.