Nostalgia

The pain that's been bothering me for 5 years is here. The dull, intense pain that spreads the entire middle of my back along the spine. The pain that causes my muscles to tighten to the point of stone-hard. The pain that causes my back spasms.

This is the pain that drove me to finally go talk to a surgeon.

It doesn't matter where I sit. My couch, my friend's couch, my chair, my car...it doesn't matter. It doesn't matter how I sit, how much I stretch, or how much I move or don't move. Nothing helps.

Usually, when it's this bad, it almost inevitably comes down to spasms. I know a lot of you have seen them. I know a lot of you have not. I do have limited control over them. But repressing them hurts more than just letting them go. When I'm at home, I will usually let them run their course. They go for an hour, sometimes an hour and a half. I'm lucid during the whole thing.

Once they start, I have a muscle relaxant I take. It's called flexeril or cyclobenzaprine (I'll call it cyclo for short). The effect is a rag-doll relaxation that makes my limbs turn to jelly, but my back relax to what would be considered "normal". Sometimes, it makes me tired. I do know one thing, though. I can't usually do much after it starts working.

So, right now, I'm waiting for the hydrocodone and the cyclo to kick in. My back hasn't spasmed, yet. It got very close when I was at my friend's house, it was pretty close when I was in my car, and it has twitched a few times since then. There's not much the cyclo will do to stop it, but at least it will take the edge off the pain. At this point, it's a waiting game. I know it will spasm. I just hope it's not terribly bad.

I'll post an update tomorrow if anything happens.

*edit*
It's now the next day, and nothing happened. I managed to catch it in time. I usually don't. It still hurts, though.