Back Pain

I think I have written this before, but here goes again.  Since surgery, I have had severe back pain from my neck down to my very low back.  I had an MRI done and found out I have arthritis from my neck all the way down.  Stenosis here there and everywhere.  Also buldging discs.  Anyway, I'm not a candidate for surgery so I take pain meds.  I was just sent to a specialist and he prescribed some heavy duty drugs for me.  Dilaudid, which did nothing and then Levorphanol, which did nothing.  I have taken Lortab pills, Lortab pills, Percoset et.  The usual.  Anyway, it scared me that he prescribed such strong medicines and they didn't work.  Now he is talking about implanting a pain pump into me.  Has anyone had this done?  Does it work?  Any other pain medications that I should try?  Any ideas out there.  I'm so frightened of the strong pills that I won't even try them again.  Last night I took too much Percoset and didn't want to wake up this morning.  I hate taking pain meds, but that's the only way I can get through a day.  I have tried massage, physical therapy (which made everything worse), massage, well what can I say about massage of course it felt good, but I can't find anyone who accepts my insurance for that, so I have to travel over an hour for a massage and by the time I get back home, it's like I never had a massage, plus with the gas prices.  Geesh!  Any ideas or suggestions.......Thanks guys.  I'm also going to try the 5 day pouch test hopefully the week after next. I have gained about 8 lbs. and feel like a blimp.  I was 359, now 179.5.  Was down to 165, but everyone said that was too thin.  I'm 5'9".  I did have lots of bones showing, so I started eating chocolate to maintain my weight and soon became addicted to Ghiradelli's chocolate.  I first started out with just 2 little squares at night.  4 night ago I had over 10 squares over the night.  What finally took the cake was when my husband came over to my side of the bed to see if I was ok because I had something all over my face.  Seems I fell asleep eating a chocolate and it was all over me and the bed sheets.  I was horrified.  So embarassed beyond words.  I can only admit to this all of you because I know most of you will understand.  I swear I am having withdrawals from the chocolate, so I talked myself into just two a day now.  My husband asked me if I thought that the chocolate was an addiction and I said "you think"?  He's overweight, so he should have understood.  Anyway, I'm trying to get back on track but with the back thing going on it's difficult.  I also had a thyroid cancer scare within the last 2 weeks.  I had thyroid cancer in 2004.  I have scans every year.  This year, my thyrogen levels were elevated and have been going up every year for 3 years in a row, so they did a special scan.  They were talking about removing lymph nodes and chemo.  Scared me soo badly.  That is when the 10 chocolates a night came into play.  No excuses.  I'm an addict and always will be one, but I have to learn to control the addition.  So sorry this is such a long message, but I had to get this all of my chest.  I appreciate everyone's input and insight.  God bless you all!

Hi Carol, I'm a food addict too and can so relate to the chocolate fix! I'm sorry you're in so much pain. I heard a show on public radio a while ago talking about pain specialists. In addition to medications, they use biofeedback and other alternative therapies. I know for me with my addictive personality, I'd try this route to limit narcotics. I also had a thyroid cancer scare about 4 years ago but it turned out to be benign. The good news is that I researched thyroid cancer and if you have to get cancer, that's the kind to get (according to my doctor) because of it's high cure rate and low metasticizing (sp?) rate. Good luck and hope the pain eases soon!

Thanks Donna for writing back.  I see soo many people have read my post, but nobody else has replied.  I appreciate your effort.  I surely  wasn't expecting to write such a looooong post, but once I got going I spilled everything out.  I've heard that a million times about thyroid cancer that if you are going to get cancer that is the one to get, but it doesn't make it any easier every year in April, here comes the testing and the scans etc.  I guess it could be worse, I could hear I only have 3 months to live.  Thanks again for writing......

You're welcome and please keep us posted!

I will!  And thanks again for caring........