| T O P I C R E V I E W |
| bar99033 |
Posted - 08/03/2011 : 17:03:18
Dear friends who have what they think might be RSI from typing,
The recovery stories on this message board gave me confidence in my recovery, so I wish to share mine briefly.
Nov 2009, Began MS thesis writing, from (6-8) hours/day writing up thesis using Latex (word processor). Started to feel pain on bottom of forearms (portion that rested against edge of desk) as I typed and moused.
Dec 2009, Took 2 weeks off for Christmas break with wife and family, pain disappeared.
Jan, Feb, Mar 2010, Increased time devoted to thesis spending (8-12) hours/day, 5 and 6 days a week. Began swimming (2-3) times/wk. Also played Racquetball 1/wk, and 4 mile bike commute every day. Set goal to master the vertical or superman pushup (hand stand). Began to notice pain in January in forearms again, but also spread to wrists. Pain felt almost like a cramp. Stretching my wrists and arms relieved pain temporarily. I often stretched (2-3) times/hour when it was real bad. I began to mouse with left arm one day, then right arm the next due to increased pain in right arm and wrist. The pain never bothered me in any of my exercising, but rather departed completely during swimming, and racquetball. Upon returning home each night, pain departed and did not bother me in any of my other activities, also true for the weekend. My mother began to caution me along with my Masters advisor about the dangers of carpal tunnel and tendentious. Pain gradually worsened (obviously), I started to notice pain in activities not related to school. At church, for example, I started to fear shaking hands with members of my congregation. Pain progressively showed up in different aspects of my life until it was ever present. Opening heavier doors became painful such that I preferred to do it with 2 hands. Resting my forearms on my body while lying down became agitating. Reaching for my towel after getting out of the shower, brushing my teeth, driving the car, doing the dishes, cleaning the tub. My wife was so patient with my 'injury,' she really stepped it up filling in for me despite her demanding schedule. At this time we decided to see an occupational therapist at the university hospital. This turned out to be a huge joke in retrospect. He came to my office and showed me all of the adjustments I needed to make at my desk to prevent permanent injury. The screen was raised, a better chair was found and a wrist wrest was placed in front of the keyboard. The therapist tested my strength and was convinced my arms retained their strength. He referred to my condition as RSI (repetitive stress injury). He encouraged me to keep exercising as it seemed to relieve the pain. During the few weeks I had before the next appointment, my wrists and arms started to bother me during racquetball, swimming, and bicycling. At our next appointment he encouraged me to raise my handlebars (road position to upright). He also thought that racquetball could be hard on the wrist and elbows, we have all heard of tennis elbow right? The last week I had to work on my thesis before the defense was extremely painful at the computer! I was stretching and icing as often as possible. I would fill a sink with cold water and ice and quench them until numb. Sometimes it felt as though I would stretch so much that the next day my joints would hurt, more of a wrist pain than a forearm pain. This pain shifting occurred for weeks or possibly even months where the arms would feel better but the wrists would ache, then the wrists would feel good and the forearms would be so sensitive. I found myself trying different keyboard positions, standing while typing etc. In conversation I encountered other students and professors who had developed similar pains during thesis writing. Finally the day of defense came and all went well. The occupational therapist had recommended avoiding the computer for a week or two after finishing up. To celebrate my graduation I went for a nice 20 mile bike ride the day after defending, on my return every bump in the road started to cause pain in my arms. Upon returning home I decided to vacuum my car, which I had wanted to do for months. But it became so painful that I almost had to stop prior to finishing. From this point on, instead of getting better (from the decreased typing load), the arms and wrists only began to feel worse. Pain relieving cream often helped for short periods, pain killer never seemed to make a difference. I was convinced that I had damaged my arms permanently from repetitive movements at a stupid computer. I did have to make a poster to finish up the year and present at a conference, this was by far the most painful experience at the computer, finally I finished and was able to completely abandone the computer for a few weeks. This whole time I notice the mental fear that came over me each time I approached a computer or thought of typing. I read many personal accounts on the internet of similar students and employees who had to change their career due to the extreme pain encountered while typing. I read up on all the theories of micro tears in the muscles, tears that cause pain, but cannot be seen. I read of the swelling that supposedly happens restricting free movement and thus causing pain. The more I read and rested, the more it seemed my arms hurt. I spent at least two weeks in pure rest, napping, reading, walking (of course I did not want to drive or ride my bike as it might hurt my arms).
May 2010,About a month after finishing the thesis my family (parents, siblings, nephews, nieces) came from the other side of the country to pay my wife and I a visit. I felt awful leaving my wife to do all the chores that 'hurt my wrists' in preparation for the visit. Before their arrival, my wife and I were able to make a special trip to a nearby state to meet her father (a well-known rheumatologist) as he was on a business trip. We specifically made the 6 hour drive so he could evaluate my arms. My father-in-law noticed how I avoided simple things like carrying a suite case or lifting the heavy restaurant cup with just one arm. He also concluded that my arms were very strong. We went to a pharmacy to test my heart rate, he asked me to squeeze a foam ball 100 times or so to get some blood flow. The thought of doing this brought pain to my arms. But, surprisingly they felt good when I did it. Everything was normal with me, he prescribed me some strong anti-inflammatory drug and we parted gratefully. My wife did most of the driving as I sat with my 'injured' arms on a pillow on my lap. The next few weeks I found the pain to not be as severe as I carried the ball with me everywhere and tossed it, squeezed it etc (I was building strength up in my arms, or so I thought). But then some days the pain would be just as strong as ever. I got frustrated one day, just a few days before the arrival of my parents and I went out to trim the hedges. I thought this might be a good activity to build up my arm muscles again, since I had been inactive (compared to normal) for about a month. My father in law thought that maybe I should start to slowly return to normal activity. I finished the trimming and immediately began to regret the decision. The pain again reached its upper threshold. How frustrating! Here I am, once a very capable young man with a wonderful wife, I had a full-time dream job to begin the following month, I had graduated with a Masters, but I could not trim the hedges, do the dishes, drive the car, sweep the floor, or do anything that involved using my 'fine motor skills.' Oh, I should mention that a number of weeks earlier I had purchased mac speech dictate, so I could still use the computer, but with my voice! What a great program! I was able to start writing letters again, keeping a journal, corresponding with family etc, all with very little arm use--as this could aggravate the pain. While my family was in town by brother told me how he had started to feel pain in his mousing arm and wrist soon after I told him about my problems. How horrible, maybe this was in the family blood. The visit was wonderful, my wife and mother were very kind to give me arm and wrist massages that seemed to stimulate them and relieve pain. It was very depressing, however, not to be able to pick up nieces and nephews as they wanted to see and hug me. I forgot to mention one more bit of instruction I had received from the occupational therapist, after the symptoms worsened with rest, I thought perhaps I was not resting enough, so he got me some wrist braces that prevented movement, as movement might damage the micro tears. I was able to wear them for a few days, how embarrassing to meet people with wrist braces on and be required to tell them about my 'injury.' I thought maybe the wrist braces were just too stiff so I wore ace bandages, but they also only agitated my arms and seemed to cause deep joint pain. At this point I had about a month before my job started. I heard that we would be meeting with other employees for a dinner at a….bowling ally. Oh, how I feared going to this activity! Luckily I was able to converse with others, rather than bowl. My thoughts regarding my future were bleak, would I have to change my career, something that would not involve using my arms? Would I have to have a special office where I could navigate the computer with my voice and not bother others around me? Would my wife have to provide for our family? I hated these thoughts, but nothing seemed to help the arms improve, all appeared to do nothing or worsen the situation. Occupational therapy, over-stretching, pain killers etc. But then the many prayers offered by me and my family begun to be answered and I was led to the path that offered the first ray of light I had seen in months---the Sarno path!
June 2010, One morning I was so frustrated as my arms were in pain, I was saying good bye to my wife as she went to work and I stayed home to "rest" to avoid injuring my arms. I almost was in tears. My dear wife comforted me and expressed words of faith and hope that a complete recovery was possible. If God could create us, he surely could provide a way for us to be healed. After she departed I felt prompted to do an internet search for something similar to "self recovery from RSI." I had never searched for anything with similar wording as I did not want to waste my time with hokey non-traditional medicinal practices---because I knew the pain was real, not made up in my mind. I came upon a website featuring a book of someone who had recovered from RSI induced by too much typing. Just looking at the keyboard on the book cover made me notice my pain(Oh yeah, I was doing all this internet searching by voice command at about 1/2 the speed as a keyboard).The site looked a little sketchy and the book was $20 or so, then I saw a link to the 60 Minutes interview with John Sarno. As soon as I watched it, I was filled with an indescribable hope, knowing that I had found the path I needed to follow. I soon found the TMS Help forum and read a number of accounts similar to mine. But, instead of leading to a depressing end (as I had previously been reading), they led to a recovery! A real recovery! This discovery happened about a week or two before the start of my new job, I quickly read Sarno's book Mindbody Prescription as well as numerous recovery accounts. I watched all the videos I could find of interviews with Sarno and videos of his lectures, I read Fred Amir's book "Rapid Recovery" and found his methods extremely helpful. Within a month I was 80 to 90 percent back to normal. The first few weeks were a mental battle, my arms would flare up as I would engage in some activity that had previously cause pain, but implementing the methods of Sarno and Amir enabled me to cause it to disappear or subside. I could actually see that it was working! I called my brother and told him all about it (as he had begun to feel similar pains a month or so earlier).
August 2011, I'm finally finishing writing this account a little over a year after starting my new job. I am 99% recovered. There are times where a big project is due, or I'm struggling with typing up a report, or having difficulty preparing a discourse or talk to give in church where the pain tries to sneak back in. But I'm quickly able to get rid of it by recognizing what the true reason is behind my pain---internal anger or stress.
Looking back, the methods that helped me the most to recover were (no particular order):
1. Envisioning myself perform tasks without any pain, tasks that formerly caused pain.
2. Setting goals for how long I would perform a task without any pain (e.g. driving to work).
3. Envisioning myself communicating with my brain and body, directing it to stop fooling around with the pain and let me deal with my life. I also envisioned myself sending blood and oxygen to my arms, even more than they needed.
4. Creating a list of everything in the past and at that present time that was causing significant stress or worry. Although I felt like I was a stress-free person, I imagine my child within was enraged at everything going on in life. I think I had come to a point where the pain was distracting me from thinking about how awful it would be if I were not able to lead a normal life again due to my "injury."
5. Awarding my arms or inner self when they would behave and not cause problems at work, e.g. an ice-cream bar or bowl when I arrived home.
6. Punishing my inner self when my arms would act up, depriving myself of sweets, slapping my forearm, yelling at them (in private), etc.
7. Gratitude, prayer, and faith.
A few other milestones were:
1. When I stopped taking the prescribed anti-inflammatory.
2. When I sold mac speech dictate and started typing again.
3. When I rode 20 miles on my bike knowing that I could make the pain go away when ever it would flare up. You would have heard me yelling at my arms that day out on the road if you would have been near by.
4. When I drove almost 6 consecutive hours on a road trip, each time the pain would come, I would lecture my inner self and bribe it with treats if it behaved.
Well, I'm about as happy and grateful as can be now! After telling my brother about the method, his pain immediately departed, and my wife's plantar fasciitis and lower back pain are now under control. When we get these ridiculous pains we simply "Sarnify" them away. I hope this account helps someone who is in a similar situation. What a joke our inner self plays on us, all to distract us from facing up to and dealing with our true stresses in life!
SB |
| 3 L A T E S T R E P L I E S (Newest First) |
| MichaelB |
Posted - 05/13/2012 : 20:58:15
Thank you bar99033. Even though my pain being dealt with is my ankle, I understand the frustration that you had. I am currently having the same frustration. Today I went to a dance class and just flat would fight it all during the lesson. I felt a little better after 2 hours and a little tired. After reading your story, I will try even harder. Again thank you.
MichaelB |
| bar99033 |
Posted - 10/17/2011 : 19:36:43
Chris,
I'm glad my account gave you some confidence, sarnify those pains!
SB |
| cobalt82 |
Posted - 10/10/2011 : 15:39:37
This is a great story!
I have accepted that it's purely tms that is causing my rsi, which I've had for over a year now. Its manageable but I need to be more diligent with my Sarno stuff to eliminate it completely!
Thanks for such a detailed account.
Chris |
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