By all means have a doctor make sure that there is nothing serious going on.
I would also consider purchasing the book “The Trigger Point Therapy Workbook: Your Self-Treatment Guide for Pain Relief” by Clair Davies.
I found this book to be a repeat life-saver for a variety of ails relating to muscles and their pain. I love it that I can check things out myself - flip to the body charts of pain locations then flip to the suggested muscles for treatment suggestions.
It is an excellent resource for anyone who has a body.
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Hey Steve,
Overthinking is something I do something terrible and for me it grows and GROWS and GROWS. For me, it’s never good. “Could this be a serious issue” possibly yes, but by the same accord, possibly not. When it comes to medical, trying to guess can only lead to disadvantaging yourself. You need professional advice. You are taking the correct steps to obtain the answers you seek. You’re seeing the dr’s. That’s a plus. You’re having scans. That too is a plus. Once the dr’s have that information some sort of professional assessment can be made.
Gabby suggestion of trigger point therapy is well worth investigating. I had a friend who was a chiropractor. He treated me for years and ran me through a heap of self therapy trigger points. That was 20yrs ago and I still use many of those therapies successfully today.
Merl from the Modsupport Team
Update
He says the neck noise is not an issue, he seems to think the pain is because of my issues of my Degenerative Disk Disease that is at C5,6, and 7 and again in my lower back. I still have neck pain and he suggests more surgery to repair the disk issue!
The problem is I do not want more surgery it is costly and puts me out of work for several weeks or more! I was offered spinal shots but I have talked with other people who had the shots and most get only temporary relief at best. So for now I am trying light yoga and meditation with low dose pain meds and am coping with this!
Update; Have avoided the shots and surgery for now as my back is not the major issue at this point! My neck feels like an icepick is jabbed into it just above my shoulders and the doctor insists there is no issue according to the x-rays, he is more focused on my back! The pain is real and it spreads and creates massive pain in the back of my head! I am beginning to wish I never had my surgery, I was used to the headaches despite the pain!
It’s been two years since my surgery, and the neck issues I was told are normal and have decreased. I have learned to ignore what still is there. I decided not to see this doctor anymore though, as I lost my trust in him.
Update start a month ago I have massive pressure headaches again, I am dealing with them as best I can but they are persistent! I refuse to tell anyone as they do not believe me and doctors seem to fluff it off. I am not imagining them they are real and are making me depressed and miserable! I have semi-retired to see if the stress of work is the problem as I drove 7 hours a day 5 days a week. I went down to 2 days a week 5 hours a day starting next week, on vacation this week… Just venting and hoping this works as I need relief!
Hey Steve,
That lack of recognition by medicos is, unfortunately, rather common. And post surgery, even more common I have found. Part of the theory is ‘We operated. We fixed’ and that’s great IF its fixed. When it comes to neurology a slight change in one area can have multiple impacts over our entire bodily functions. Getting a Dr to agree… …ohh, that can be a challenge.
Pressure headaches is something I have some very intense experience with and that ‘professional doubt’ too. The medicos would do their scans, telling me all was OK, but my symptoms were telling me otherwise. That whole area is full of nerves and there isn’t exactly a lot of room, so any changes in that region simply must have a flow on effect.
Have you had a recent scan? CAT or MRI? That would show if there is any physical changes causing the feeling of pressure from Cerebral Spinal Fluid or other physical changes. But I must warn you the search for ‘answers’ from medicos can take forever and although you may report symptom ‘x’ and symptom ‘y’ often it’s not until they can identify, via a test or a scan, what the issue is, that they agree with there being an issue.
I have regular scans yearly, so you’d think they’d see changes. Turns out they had only compared to the most recent previous scan and not the years prior. Turns out the scans from prior show a major change, now needing further follow up. If I’d left it and things progressed too far further, I could have found myself in a wheelchair.
Only you know when things are wrong. The medicos may make out they know all about it. They know the theory, you know the reality and if you have issues you MUST speak up. They may try to railroad you in another direction. Don’t let them. You know ‘You’ better than any dr and if it’s not right you MUST say something. At the very least get it documented, then if things do progress, you can say “I told you so”.
Merl from the Modsupport Team