Finally, a whole day & night without pain meds

[Enzo777]

Hi everyone, I want to thank you all for your posts, concerns, advice & honesty. I have severe chest wall nerve damage due to a surgery 5 years ago. My lung collapsed several times during & after surgery which required chest tubes to go in & out many times. Nerve pain is so awful that it would take my breath. After three years of suffering I had surgery at the Neurolical center at John Hopkins University hospital in Maryland, US. This is one of the best hospitals in US. They cut two nerves and moved or 'grafted" them to healthy soft tissue hoping the nerves would adjust & start growing naturally. Long story short, the surgery made my pain worse. My Nuerologists compares my situation to "phantom limb pain," where the nerves have nowhere to go. I have been on Oxycontin 30 mgs 2 × day, oxycodone 10 mg up to 5 x day, Gabbapenten 300 mgs 3 x day. Valium 5 mgs up to 3 × day. The medicine helped so much at first. Then the Dr's would have to raise my dose. I was so miserable that some days I laid in bed and cried. Reading everyone's posts & comments here was a blessing to me. They got me going & gave me encouragement. A few months ago I decided to cut back on my medicine just to see how I would do. So slowly, I started cutting back on how much I was taking. After three months (yesterday) I was able to go all day & night without any pain meds or the valium! I did have pain yesterday but I got through it. I did not want to be "dependent" on my meds unless I had to in order to function. I still have my meds and when I have pain that just debilitates me, I will take a pain pill. Sadly, I will always need my pain meds every now & then. I never thought I could go a whole day without them. I never thought I could ween myself off, but I did. Im hoping that by not taking so many pills that when I really need one, it will work better. I told my Dr I was scared to keep upping the dose and I wanted to taper off. He helped me, but did say I would always need occasional pain meds. I feel like a new person. Maybe after several years my nerves got better? There is no way to find out. Again I want to say thank you everyone. Without reading your inspiring posts here I couldn't have done this.

[lovenothate]

Congratulations! That’s excellent and inspiring news.

[Enzo777 in reply to lovenothate]

Thank you so much. I wish you the best