Paul has cervical radiculopathy (from a bulging disc) - advice?

I've had a few rough days. The inflatable thing arrived yesterday, but I was too messed up to even try it. Sharla set it up for me today and I gave it a go. It was amazing.

The instructions say that you can use it for 20 minutes at a time, three times a day.

So, for 20 minutes today I was able to walk around like a normal person and just have some annoying pain. I sat at my computer for 5 minutes. I did some of my physical therapy exercises. I ate my breakfast in one sitting - normally, I can eat about 4 bites and then I have to lie down again. Above all, it was just delicious to get out of this room. And it was glorious to see the outside. I saw little tiny growies on the ground and on the hugelkultur.

And the thing is freaky cheap too.

Best news I've got today. Glad to hear of some relief.

've got a bit of good news! Paul started using one of these inflatable neck stretchers and the pain in his arm dropped by 80% even while he was sitting up!

Now There is cause for celebration!

Today I've taken Paul into a surgery center for a steroid injection in his neck. They use a fluoroscope (sp?) to guide where the needle will go.

It's an out-patient/day surgery thing, so he'll be home, but likely even more loopy, later this afternoon.

Paul received what they call an epidural injection and all went well. They even gave him flowers afterwards.

I said to him, "you know an epidural is what they call a pain killer for women in childbirth, right?"

Paul didn't miss a beat. "it makes sense because, apparently, I have a cervix."

Jocelyn Campbell wrote:Paul received what they call an epidural injection and all went well. They even gave him flowers afterwards.

I said to him, "you know an epidural is what they call a pain killer for women in childbirth, right?"

Paul didn't miss a beat. "it makes sense because, apparently, I have a cervix."

Sure hope the epidural works. My wife had two sets of epidurals in her lower back for severe back pain. It worked. Miraculously so.

I had three sets (three different visits) of epidurals in my neck. They did a two-step approach for each set. First something lidocaine-like that was fast-acting, 100% effective but unfortunately short-lived. The second step was some form of cortisone that was supposed to take days or even weeks to reach it's maximum effectiveness. Sadly the neck epidurals were a complete waste of time and money for me.

Results often vary.

On a different note. Earlier someone recommended "7 Steps to a Pain-free Life". I found a copy on Amazon and have been practicing the neck exercises. I'm finding the exercises very effective. I highly recommend that Paul get a copy and look into some mild exercises once he regains mobility.

I am sure its been said, I didnt read all 7 pages of this thread. But CHIROPRACTOR. Specifically a WELLNESS based chiropractor, not one thats symptomatically based. Tell them whats happened so far, and what kind of pain, dont just expect 1 adjustment to be a miracle fix, this problem is likely years of abuse and stress to the spine that has finally reared its ugly head.

I used to get migraines when I would stand up from a sitting position, so bad that I would collapse on the ground and my vision would pulse. Did the hospitals, CT scan, spinal tap, everything they could throw at me. Finally just said I would have to take oxycontin for the rest of my life as long as I was having pain. They said whatever I do do not go to a chiropractor.

Finally went into a chiropractor and I had a reverse curve in my neck, which was slowly molded back to its proper shape. A week of adjustments and I felt back to normal, a year later and my neck shaped much better. I rarely get any sort of headache and I have not had a migraine in years.

I still visit the chiro once a week or so just to keep my wellness up. Because of being a wellness doc, he also can help me with all sorts of nutritional help. He follows the Weston A Price studies, and is not telling people if they eat meat they will die.

I am very sorry this is happening, good luck with everything. I know well what he is going through, back and neck spasms are the worst.

I highly doubt this would be his diet of eating meat and pie along with his organic produce. Reduction in nerve flow from brain and spine has hundreds or thousands of symptoms, all parts of the body are controlled by the flow of nerve energy to and from the spine.

Best of wishes, hope he feels better soon!

back and neck spasms are the worst.

Yes. Anybody who has never had a pain spasm has no idea, none what-so-ever, of what this is like. I was laid up for nearly two straight weeks, and

CHIROPRACTOR. Specifically a WELLNESS based chiropractor

was the only way for me to get out of it.

For me, the nearest Chiro was 1.5 hours away. I had to take some extra pain killers and a muscle relaxant to get there (and that was not without it's episodes), but the guy nailed it, right off. I've seen him and a couple other Chiro's since then, and have only had two recurrences (both because I failed to do my exercises)...

... So whatever you do, Paul, please keep up with the healing protocol-make it a part of your daily routine from now on. Be also sure, Paul, that you get up and stretch routinely when you are at your computer desk for too long. You may need a better chair, and a better position (height) for your hands and a better angle to your screen. Make it super comfy, but don't slouch.

I had a massage therapist for a partner, and boy did she ever crack the whip about posture. I hated it at the time, but I'm thanking her now. Years later, my posture is awesome and my back is in much better shape.

Well said Rob.

What about taking a curcumin supplement to replace the turmeric? It shouldn't cause a reaction, and it will be more powerful. I take Meriva by Thorne to reduce the inflammation caused by Crohn's disease. My CRP(inflammatory marker) reduced significantly with just half a dose. They used it in a study of osteoarthritis patients with good results. It's important to use a prodcut like Meriva because many curcumin supplements lose their effectiveness quickly. I used to have a business as an Ayurveda practitioner, so I like using whole herbs too. However, I find supplements to be more powerful for pain relief. I know Chinese medicine practitioners who feel the same way. Sometimes you need a concentrated substance beyond what whole plants can offer. For me, fish oil has been the best for pain relief. I know some people take large amounts of fish oil when they are injured, but I've never tried it myself. Feel better.

Jocelyn before Paul gets anymore please watch this video to learn the long term solution for his problems.

Jocelyn Campbell wrote:Paul received what they call an epidural injection and all went well. They even gave him flowers afterwards.

I said to him, "you know an epidural is what they call a pain killer for women in childbirth, right?"

Paul didn't miss a beat. "it makes sense because, apparently, I have a cervix."

Juuuust in case it hasn't been said.......

This is getting radiculous.

It seems that for the medication to work properly I need to drink an enormous amount of water. What seems to be happening is that I will drink a lot of water before bed and I'll be able to get two and a half hours of sleep and then wake up due to the pain. So then I'll chug water for 2 hours before I can go back to sleep again and then I might be able to get 3 more hours of sleep. Then during the day I might be able to get in a nap. And that's how to describe my very best days.

On other days the pain will be so ridiculous that I might get only 2 hours of sleep total. And then without enough sleep I can't even look at emails on my phone.

2 days after the injection things seemed much better. I was very hopeful. On the third day things were slightly better. Now things seem to have returned to what they were as if I didn't get the injection. My understanding is that we're supposed to wait a month after the injection and if things aren't better then I need to get the surgery.

I'm trying to think if I've ever had surgery before. I don't think I have. The closest I can think of is getting stitches or having my large toe nails removed. That was decades ago.

I have tried to read some of the suggestions here and I'm having a hard time sorting out the good advice from the unhelpful advice. For example, my obesity does not cause cervical radiculopathy.

So I continue to lean heavily on Jocelyn's decisions.

Bottom line: I have 3 ruptured discs. Two of them are no problem, there jelly squirted out in a place that doesn't hurt me. The third one, however, has pushed its jelly right into my spinal cord. If the jelly will simply dissolve then this will go away all by itself. If it doesn't, then I guess I need to get surgery. So, apparently, I have a few weeks to get something else to work before surgery. I'm glad to go through suggestions myself, I guess I just need the suggestion to be clearly tied to my flavor of cervical radiculopathy, and worded in a way that I can understand even when I'm in pain.

Thanks for your help.

I came here from the Kick starter link. Just want to say it does not matter to me how long the project takes. I have plenty to learn, read and do in the mean time.

Get well soon!

I came here from the Kick starter link as well.
For us, it does not matter how long the project takes.
Doing it right is much more important than doing it on time.

I don't know if an inversion table was suggested already. We have one, and it rocks.
I wish I lived closer so I could lend it to you.

I hope a permanent solution is close

Namaste

Paul, I've been listening to your podcasts for years whilst doing the dishes (that's how I kept my interest in Permaculture whilst my child as a baby took all my time).
Just to say thanks for all you do and I have no problem with this kickstarter taking more time than expected.

Hope you get better soon, your health is more important than this Kickstarter.

I get low back pain due to a jelly spill. It made me crooked from that disk up. I learned to do some exercises to help make the jelly go back into place. The jelly doesn't spill out anymore but I still get back pain in the same spot. It became a constant pain thought I'd have to have surgery to fix it. I was really trying to be healthy in life and was trying different things to help with fatigue. And I stumbled on to a pain relief for my back. I was doing multiple things at the time and wanted to narrow it down to find out what was actually helping my pain. When I stopped taking Raw apple cider Vinegar the pain came back. It was doing two things for me. It helped with the pain and also helped my circulation to get the nutrients my back needed to heal. My back pain comes back now and then due to what I'm sleeping on. If I don't sleep on the right mattress I get pain. Vinegar probably won't relive your severe pain but it will help your body fix itself while giving you some relief. Maybe vinegar and tumric and some of the other ideas on here will at least make life more managable. I use Braggs apple cider vinegar. I mix 1oz vinegar to 16oz water. Good luck, wish I could help I know you must be going crazy not being able to put in your 100 hours a week of work.

Possibly the most comforting words I have heard so far we're on the very first day that this started.

The doctor told me that the pain that I was experiencing was a pain that he had experience too. He had listed on a few extremely painful things and said that the pain of this is the worst. He went so far as to say that the pain is up there with childbirth. Therefore, some of the worst pain imaginable.

I found this comforting because it just happened... There is no axe wound, there is no missing limb, there is no bullet hole... or a baby trying to come out of some orifice... There is just pain. Unexplainable pain. I felt like a whiner to bring up this pain when there is no obvious cause.

Now that I know more about it, it is even more frustrating because I feel all this pain in my shoulder and my arm and, today it is even in my fingers... But the real problem is happening with a little bump touching my spinal cord.

Next: this isn't like a little blemish that goes away in a few days or a week. It sounds like when this happens to people they're just offline for months.

Gabapentin. Wow, my voice recognition software is familiar with the word gabapentin. For the first several weeks I thought of it as the Gabby pill or the big pill. I am finally able to remember the name of this stuff.

When I'm having a day with lot of pain, I just think that it would probably be much worse if it wasn't for this gabapentin stuff.

I normally sleep a full seven and a half hours every night. And if for any reason that sleep is even slightly interrupted, like needing to pee in the middle of the night, then my next day is just crap - I can't really concentrate. I feel like a dumbass all day. I have not had a proper night's sleep in more than a month. On a good night I'm lucky to get 5 hours of sleep. So I have to apologize to all the lovely people who are posted lovely stuff in this thread: I have not read all of it. I have read most of the posts... I think I have read all of the posts - but some of the posts I could not wrap my head around. I followed some of the links, but I have not read any of the suggested books. I just don't feel like I can read a book right now. I appreciate people making their suggestions and away that a 5th grader could understand them - because that is stuff that I can digest right now. I mentioned the apple cider vinegar thing to Jocelyn this morning and now I have a special drink here that I've been sippin on that has it in it.

I very much appreciate the lovely things people are saying here in this thread. It does help to curb the pain. My aunt Donna Lee was very frustrated with me that I did not send out thank you cards. I guess I don't know what to say when somebody does a lovely kindness for me. And now there's a bunch of new, lovely feedback from people from the Kickstarter. Well, mostly lovely. That's been helping too.

I appreciate the $100 gift certificate to Amazon. I am playing the role of the invalid and distracting myself from the pain with silly shows. The other night was a really rough night made much easier with the latest season of Archer. I never would have spent that much on something like that if not for having a gift certificate dedicated to that function. Thank you so much.

I'm not sure if I have mentioned this in this thread: but for people that are experiencing this kind of pain, I highly recommend audible books. Basically, somebody reads you a story while you go to sleep and when you wake up they are still reading you that story. It does a lovely job of distracting you from the pain thus allowing you to go to sleep. I'm using Jocelyn account at audible. I suppose I've spent about $150 there now now. The most permaculture book I have listened to so far was my side of the mountain. A book I read when I was a teenager, and I suspect it was one of the greatest influences that makes me so bonkers about permaculture.

My voice recognition software knows about bonkers and permaculture.

Everybody here, including Jocelyn, will be going to see vandaag Achieva today... ha! That tripped up the voice recognition software. Vandana Shiva is speaking today in Missoula. I wish I could go. Jocelyn is taking her a gift on my behalf. I suspect that Vandana Shiva has no idea who I am, so it will end up being just a gift from some admirer. Jocelyn keeps saying that she's not going to go so that she can take care of me. But I'm insisting that she goes. I want to hear about it from her. She's already set me up with food and drink... and I have the Amazon shows and the audio books. I'll be fine.

I can spend a couple of hours a day, most days, processing simple e-mails and talking to people through the speakerphone. I was really worried about Cassie's transition. But it sounds like Cassie and Adrien are bringing Destiny, Josh and Christina up to speed smoothly. Several of the permies staff are helping too.

So sorry to read about your pain Paul. I've been out of the loop for a while and just discovered this thread. 3 disc problems sounds pretty severe but I had paralyzing pain with a compressed lumbar disc about ten years ago, and found this guy to be brilliant and his methods have virtually cured my back pain as well as some neck pain from alternating sitting at a computer too much and then overdoing strenuous building and gardening tasks. I also had an old ankle injury that used to flair up when not wearing good support shoes. PLEASE read his book ([b]PAIN FREE by Pete Egoscue[/b]) before considering surgeries, conventional chiropractic, or more random treatments. If you haven't had any specific injury, then the alignment exercises just might give you relief. And once the extreme pain is gone then YOGA YOGA YOGA everyday to keep the spine loose and strong and prevent recurring. There are yoga therapy people out there who teach movements that release tension and improve flow of synovial fluids. Yes even football players do yoga to prevent injuries :) Best of luck!

This video is an introduction to Egoscue's work by one of his devotees.
http://www.bing.com/videos/search?q=pain+free+pete+egoscue&view=detail&mid=6CAF284AAEF41D4909C66CAF284AAEF41D4909C6&FORM=VIRE1

and this little video by Pete Egoscue describing how the spine works and muscle memory


[youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a6pTC4JvMjc[/youtube]

My side of the mountain! I love that book! I read it to my older kids who are now teens and look forward to reading it to my little kids when they get a little older. Living in a hollow tree! With a peregrine falcon. Tiny house indeed.

All those Bill Bryson books are on audio books now. Those are sometimes funny and sometimes have useful or illuminating bits of information. Barbara Kingsolver too, although her humor is sometimes dark or wry. I like a little history or science thrown in like they do.

Is it hard for you to watch videos?

I do find with the streaming videos because I can watch them on my phone.

Jocelyn and I had a DVD we wanted to watch and Jocelyn orchestrated a collection of bizarre stuff to pull off watching a DVD on a laptop that was suspended over the two of us laying on our backs.

The moral of the story is that watching DVDs is pretty difficult.

Oh, ditto audio books... discovered them a couple of years ago and love them... as soothing as childhood bedtime stories ;) And also ditto Bill Bryson.. 'A Short History of Nearly Everything", unabridged, will provide a lot of entertainment, and is available at Audible. 'A Walk in the Woods' is also fun ... plus many other works.

And, I found a few spy mysteries very engaging... i.e., Olen Steinhauer's Milo Weaver trilogy. Now I have to listen to his other works :) They will certainly take you away from Montana :)

If you want, I could talk to one of my former Ayurveda teachers about your case. My two year education is not enough to deal with this. They are all doctors of Ayurveda, trained in India. Maybe one would do a Skype consultation even.

The plan would probably be something like this:
1) herbal formulations to address the root of the problem
2) anti-inflammatory herbal formulas
3) herb infused oil to be warmed and applied topically
4) herb infused oil nose drops
5) diet and lifestyle tips
6) breathing exercises

All formulations can be purchased from American companies.
If you haven't seen the documentary 'Ayurveda: The Art of Being', I highly recommend it.

Dear friends,
A month has gone by and I hear Paul is still not well!
In my experience, acupuncture first, chiropractic afterwards. Works to fix whatever is wrong.
Lifestyle changes are not dramatic enough to heal right away.
Get well soon!!!

Paul-

I work with people in chronic back and neck pain every day. I work with people that have had back surgeries every day.

If you are considering surgery, look into minimally invasive laser back surgery for bulging discs. Don't let the pain management doctors talk you into any type of surgery that involves the word, "fusion" without looking into minimally invasive laser.

The gabapentin/neurontin can help. People I work with have also found that cymbalta can help.

I cannot tell you how many hundreds of people I've spoken with that regret getting epidurals in the long run. They tell me its a lot of hassle for 2-3 days of relief.

A swimming pool with wide steps (not a ladder) can be quite helpful when it warms up outside. With supervision to make sure you are safe, an inversion table could also bring you a great deal of relief. Also, properly mounted support bars in the bathroom and near your bed will help. A urinal for bedtime can help-- so you don't have to get out of bed in the middle of the night. A walker can also help remove some of the pressure. There are also "grabbers" that can help you reach things without extending your shoulders (which will cause more pain).

Also, sitting for long periods, especially in the car, is likely to be a nightmare for you, that will lead to rebound pain (more pain the next day). The best advice I can give you is to get a memory foam bed topper, as thick as possible, and use that to cushion you in the car on long trips, while you are laying down. Rip out the front seat if you have to.

The things I mention in this post are direct reports from people that I work with, who are managing very similar (and worse) problems.

Please feel free to contact me if you want more specific advice.

Your friend,
Joe in the Carolinas

How are you doing today Paul.

Joe,

When are you going to come out here?

I know you and I know the work that you do, so your words have a lot of weight with me.

I had not thought of the swimming thing. However, I hope to be done with this before swimming season begins.

I'm going to read your email a couple of more times to try to soak in the information.

...

To answer how I am doing today...

Remarkably better. I think that last night I got a full nights sleep. That was the first time since all this started.

I think the gabapentin requires a lot of water in my system. But Jocelyn has been doing an excellent job of feeding me well . So, no sugar, no grain. Therefore not a lot of carbohydrate. I was in a lot of pain. I could sleep for about 2 hours and then I would wake up in pain. I would drink a lot of water and about 2 hours later the pain would subside enough so I could go back to sleep.

Netflix is a powerful tool to distract me from the pain. How I ended up watching an odd movie... it focused on a man named Bill, & a lot of the movie was devoted to the dreams that bill would have. A recurring theme in the dreams was people eating ice cream sandwiches.

Ice cream sammiches.

Ha! My voice recognition software recognizes the word sammiches!

Yesterday I decided that the word sandwiches does not feed my humor needs as well as the word sammiches. I look forward to people telling me that it is not a real word because that will make the word even better.

Jocelyn, being awesome, brings me ice cream sammiches. I eat two late night and then sleep longer than I have in over a month.

I hereby declare that there's a powerful medicinal agent in ice cream sammiches. Mostly I think that the high carbohydrate content help me to retain water and the water helps the gabapentin do its job.

I'm still on my back, but as long as I stay on my back the pain is much less.

Today I got a lot done. I feel good about the sepp stuff. I feel good that I came up with a creative solution to a problem. I feel good that I wrote Adalia shemale... this is hilarious... Voice recognition software... It should be: a dailyish email.

When I did my traction contraption today, I was able to do full two sets of my physical therapy exercises.

For the moment, I feel like I'm getting better, knock on wood.

So glad to hear you had a better day! I just bought a shitload of pie, hope that's helpful as well...

I will agree that any surgery that involves fusing bones together is a surgery to skip, if you can. I also agree that yoga is so helpful, for all sorts of neck and back and alignment issues. Yoga is what keeps me upright and strong - if I miss practicing it for a week, I will wake up with pain from my scoliosis.

I tried acupuncture for my back pain, it didn't help me, but many people say it helps. Same thing with chiropractic. I wish I could send you my friend Lois Steinberg, she's an Iyengar yoga master.

I'm not very medically versed, but I recall reading that eating ice cream before bed gives one glycogen that calms the stress hormones and helps a person sleeps. I eat mangoes for a similar reason. The sammich part of the ice cream can probably be done away with if you're trying to avoid grains. And, if you make it with grass fed milk, cream, and honey, you'll get the benefits without the inflammatory sugar and grains.

Here's one random page I found about ice cream and sleep: http://butternutrition.com/cant-sleep-natural-sleep-aids/. A different page mentioned that milk also contains tryptophan, which is more affective when paired with carbs (like the sugar in ice cream) to pass the blood-brain barrier (http://articles.philly.com/2011-11-28/news/30450609_1_tryptophan-brain-tissue-placebo-effect)

The bedtime snack is by the most overlooked of natural sleep aids. Using ice cream as a bedtime snack works in magical ways by providing your body with calcium, sugar, salt, protein and fat. All of these constituents work to reduce stress hormones (such as adrenaline, cortisol and parathyroid hormone) to help you fall asleep! Ice cream that is made from quality dairy products and is made without additives is loaded with vitamins A, D, calcium, fat and has been said to have a macro-nutrient profile similar to breast milk. No wonder it’s an anti-stress comfort food!

P.S. My spell check says sammich isn't a word .

P.P.S. Another thing that might help you sleep is tart cherry juice or tart cherry juice extract (http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3133468/). Like mulberry juice, it contains melatonin. There's also been studies showing that it helps with arthritis (http://blog.arthritis.org/living-with-arthritis/arthritis-diet-cherries/). Maybe some cherry ice cream is in order?

I've looked for Iyengar yoga practitioners in Missoula. Serena Early on this page: http://www.yogafitnesscenter.net/index.php/teachers has quite a bit of Iyengar training and has gone to India to study at the source. Amy Friedman, further down the same page, also invokes Iyengar in her bio but hasn't studied it as much.

I'm emphasizing Iyengar because that school of yoga is very medically oriented, very therapeutic.

Adalia shemale! I'm busting my buttons over here, hahahahaha

Seriously though, it was nice to have The Voice of Paul on the ol' Dailyish.

Jolie Bookspan's "Fix Your Own Pain Without Drugs or Surgery" book can help. It has steps for fixing pain from bulging discs throughout the spine. Here is her website http://www.drbookspan.com

I had a bulging L5 disc in my low back from moving mulch for years with poor posture. It was so bad that I couldn't walk for days when it first happened. I saw different chiropractors for over a year and didn't get better. Then I found her website and tried bits of advice. Every time that I followed her advice I felt better. I am now able to move mulch again! Yay! I also feel that I am on the right track to not get a hunchback when I am old. I no longer have to go to a chiropractor either. All of her books are good. In particular, I like her "Stretching Smarter Stretching Healthier" book.

Glad to hear you having a better day Paul, I am recovering from a health anomaly myself, I believe a thyroid enlargement blocked lymph flow in my neck and left everything from my shoulders up messed up especially my throat. I looked like an octopus hanging out in my throat! Food as medicine is great if I could swallow without 6 level pain every 3 mins! I believe the root cause was an iodine deficiency making my thyroid enlarge...strange no doubt.

One homeopathic remedy I would really look into is Hypericum Perforatum which has given my family miraculous results in eliminating nerve pain allowing healing in many different situations. They can easily be found in the boiron section of any health food store or online. My pregnant wife was completely ruined from rib out of place crippling spine nerve pain for a day and a half until about half hour after giving this remedy in the appropriate dilution. It was like a switch. She went from completely bedridden to cleaning the house!
Another is Homeopathic Arnica Montana, we have used this countless times for everything from natural childbirth, tooth extraction, heavy bruises, sprains, falls etc. Homeopathics have no side effects, they work if you use the appropriate remedy, if you don't, they do nothing for you and leave no side effects. We use them as the primary form of medicine with our children from birth.

Chiropractors are amazing! Not all chiropractors are the same. If you find one and they aren't helping, find another, there are many different disciplines of chiropractic, though all focus on care and alignment of the human frame for the healing and prevention of disease.
Acupuncture is amazing! acupuncture is especially amazing for the management of pain. It takes a few visits to get used to the concept of sitting in a chair for an hour with needles sticking out of you...

Bone broth! and broth based recipes. "Good broth can raise the dead"

CBD rich oil (hemp oil) There are many good ones out there, I happened to find Cibdex first, tried it and like it so that is the one I have stuck with. I credit it to curing my minor but annoying chronic lower back pain. Cbd rich oil works on the endocannabiniod system of the body and man does it work well! Also no side effects and no psychoactive effect.

Hope some of this advice can help you, take what you want discard the rest, hopefully soon you'll be feeling 100%.

That is interesting about gabapentin and needing to drink lots of water, as my partner has a similar problem right now (only his is in his lower back so it is affecting his legs rather than his shoulders). And he is finding that gabapentin doesn't do anything.. so I shall advise him to drink lots and see if that helps!

Hope you're feeling better soon.
Charli

Hello Paul
I suffer from the same symptoms and have found an exercise that really helps me.

With such seriously seized up muscles start by taking the anti-inflammatory of your choice and having a hot bath - with Epson Salts if possible because they seem to get magnesium to the problem quickly - right through your skin!

Then sit in your most comfortable chair and place your hands on your shoulders near your neck palms down and gently press down as you pull your hands over the muscles that run from your shoulders to your neck - at the same time, gently pull your head backwards while keeping your chin level with the floor.

Sometimes I find it helps to gently turn your head from side to side while pulling your hands over the muscles - so the vertebrae get moving again.

It is a very good exercise to do every 15 minutes or so while sitting at a computer so you do not develop a serious chronic issue.
I would also check out some of the sites that help you set up your work area to reduce or eliminate repeats of the problem.
You may find that your monitor may be a bit too high (or low) for your line of site causing you to tilt your head back to far back or too far forward.
I had to switch to a trackball instead of a mouse because of the terrible pain the mouse caused me!
Having the keyboard at just the right height and distance from your body is also extremely important!
Hope this helps
I know how devastating the pain can be!

Paul
After years of Pain from spinal injuries suffered in a car accident,a massage therapist friend who
had also suffered crippling back pain in the past told me about the work of Dr. John Sarno.I can't recommend this
approach enough.Look him up online,buy the DVD.Save yourself years of temporary fixes or drug dependence.
Get well soon big guy.
Mark

Went to the doctor yesterday. He was open to almost any scheduled for surgery or not surgery or anything. He answered lots and lots of questions. He was super humble in saying that he's a surgeon and everything outside of being a surgeon is stuff that he really doesn't know, but is open to almost anything.

We talked about what the surgery would be like and what exactly would happen. It sounds a lot simpler than I thought it would be. At the same time he made it clear that there is a good probability that this whole problem will just suddenly go away one day.

We talked at great length about other people and how their stuff would just go away or not go away.

He even kinda giggled at some of my lame jokes.

Overall, I thought he was really super excellent.

I told him how in the 6 weeks I've been on my back I've had only one night of good sleep. So he prescribed something for me and last night I got more than 10 hours of sleep.

We talked about scheduling the surgery for 4 weeks into the future and if it mysteriously goes away the day of the surgery, the surgery can be cancelled.

So I have 4 weeks to get this to go away or I do the surgery.

Well I laid on my back in the little room with the little bed, Jocelyn attempted to schedule the surgery. By law, I am now required to buy health insurance. And apparently the health insurance company is complicating the surgery. My opinions about this are of the sort that if I shared them 90% of you would hate my guts, which is why my opinions about health insurance are in the political podcast- where if people are going to hate me then I at least get $25 out of them first.

Huge thanks to Jocelyn for driving me in, and coming up with creative solutions so that she can run errands while I stay in a mom and pop B&B on my back for couple of hours. her getting me set up this way talk so much time, that some of the places that she needed to go for her errands we're closed by the time she got there.

I guess this is an important point for this thread. Jocelyn is being spread pretty thin with me on my back all day.