My shoulder saga
Posted by Lois Anne on April 3rd, 2008
This is long, but I’ve been having problems with my shoulder lately and I figure this is a good place to document how it’s feeling from day to day until my doctor’s appointment later this month.
I have an old shoulder injury from when I was 15, and I was in my room one night trying to see how high I could kick. Kind of silly, I know, but I lived on a farm in the middle of nowhere and I was bored. Anyway, I kicked so hard with my left leg that I pulled my right leg out from under me and landed on my back. My right shoulder must have hit the floor first, because that’s where all of my problems have been over the years.
At first my parents took me to a chiropractor. After his very unpleasant treatment, he said my shoulder would improve if I came back regularly, but it would never be completely normal again. I hated it so much I told my parents I’d rather just live with it. And I have for 27 years now.
For the most part, this injury doesn’t stop me from doing what I like to do. But occasionally I aggravate it and have pain for a few days, weeks, or months. Then it goes away. It happenned when I was 22. It just started hurting all the time for maybe 2 months, then suddenly stopped. I went to a doctor who took x-rays and did some nerve testing, but didn’t find anything. He had me scheduled for another test where he would inject dye and x-ray it again, but that’s when it stopped hurting so I cancelled. I was just out of college and poor, and it didn’t make sense to me to spend all that money on something that wasn’t hurting anymore.
Then about 8 years ago, I had a few months of pain in my hand, and had to see a physical therapist. After weeks of trying different things and asking lots of questions, he determined that something was pressing on a nerve that runs from the top of my spine, through my shoulder, down my arm to my hand, then splits and goes down my middle finger and my ring finger (most of my pain was in those 2 fingers). One day while examining my back, he noticed I had a vertebrae rotated out of place -if I’m remembering that correctly. Whatever was out of place, he whacked back into place, and I’ve been pain-free ever since. Until about a month ago.
My 13yo son ws in the kitchen with me. He was showing me how he could put his hands on the counter and lift himself off the floor. Big deal. I could do that, too. I shouldn’t do it, but like a ding dong, I did. I felt something crackle in my bad shoulder and thought to myself, “I’m gonna pay for that.”
For about 3 weeks I had pain either in my neck, shoulder, back, arm (upper, elbow, lower), or hand. And I could tell it was that “pressing on a nerve” type of pain that I had in my hand 8 years ago. When I swam on Saturday morning, I was trying to decide if the swimming was aggravating the injury. I decided that while swimming I was no more uncomfortable than I was while doing anything else (including sitting still), but I did seem to have more discomfort later in the day after swimming. Maybe I should stop swimming? Yeah, like that’ll happen.
I did call my doctor on friday and left a message that I need to make an appointment about my injury. It’s now thursday and she hasn’t called back, so that makes her my ex-doctor (this has been an ongoing problem with her office). I have an appointment with my new doctor at the end of this month for a complete physical. I made that appointment on Monday, when my pain had temporarily stopped, and I figured if it came back I’d discuss it with her at my physical.
I swam yesterday morning (4/2) which may have tired my shoulder out some, then at home I reached behind my back in an awkward position to turn off a light switch (why do I do these things?) and it’s been uncomfortable since. It’s not the same nerve pain, but something isn’t right.
I have this nagging feeling that if I keep putting off seeking treatment each time the pain stops, that one day I’ll regret it. Maybe a more serious condition is developing that I’m unaware of. Then again, maybe it’s no big deal. Hopefully my new doctor can get to the bottom of things, and offer a solution - preferably something that doesn’t involve surgery!