Is this pain coming from disc problem or muscle imbalance

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I agree. It is a deal.

[Iamjennmedic]

Great! Virtual handshake.

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Spit shake.

[Iamjennmedic]

ewwwww Just a firm shake is good with me

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Well I went to the spinal correction center which is basicly an advanced chiro. They use something called DTS therpy witch is decompression therpy which looks like it might benefit me. They took xrays of my back and had a very experinced chiro do an exam with me and he found some things that need to be corrected. He seems to think that the pain beside my shoulder blade is coming from my neck not from the hernatied disc there. I don't know if I quite agree with that but will give him the benefit of the doubt for now. I go back tomorrow at 2:30 to review the xrays and see if they will accept me as a patient. I will report back tomorrow with findings.

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Well I went back to the spinal decompression center and they confirmed that the pain in my shoulder blade is coming from the hernation in my thoratic region and not my neck. They told me that I have bone spurs in my neck and that the disc above my tailbone doesn't have very much fluid in it at all. This is nothing that I already didn't know so I am not any more educated than I already was. I can go to the treatments but they are not covered by insurance and would be a $100 per visit and they want me to go to 40 visits. They did a trail run on me today for free and it isn't much diffrent than hanging from the inversion table imo. They only did lower back and not my neck so I don't know how that would feel but I wouldn't expect any mircales. I would go if I didn't have anything better to do with $4000 but I can think of a lot I can do with that at the time being.

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Oh yea they also said my spine is pretty straight at the bottom and then torwards the middle vears of to the left then straightens back up.

[Iamjennmedic]

Ok so now you can start getting some things straightened out. Talk to your doctor and see if they can start dealing with the curvature and the spur right away. Also see what plan they have to stop any further degeneration of the spine and what they are going to do for the hernation. Tell them you want a proactive plan not just wait and see what happens. Show the doc your work outs and see if there is anything that he recommends you add in or that he does not want you doing. Be firm that you want to get things moving toward better and not just medicate you when it hurts.

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Will do Jen. I am supposed to get the written report from the spinal place on Wendsday. I have an appointment with my regular doc on Monday but I am going to reschedule it until after I get the written report from the spinal doc. I will let you know what the plan of action is.

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Well I went to my doctor this morning and she wants me to have another epidoral injection in my back or physical therpy again. I don't know if I have the money right now to do either so I am going to call bcbs today and see how much it cost. We are really tight on money right now so I will have to see how much all this will cost out of my pocket. If worse comes to worse I will just take my meds when things flare up and go to PT or get the injection when my money situation gets better.

[Iamjennmedic]

Well that sucks! I feel for you, I know how it is when you have financial obligations that make it tough to do what is needed for yourself. If you can manage I would opt for the PT over the epidural. What what really burns my ass about this whole thing is that it could have been a whole lot better outcome had you gotten proper treatment right away. Do they not board and collar you when you are in a MVC out there?

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Yea it does suck but it is what I expected. I check with Blue Cross and I would have to meet my deductable first of $350 and then they would cover 80% of the PT and I would be responsible for the other 20% so this option might be put on hold for a while. I asked her about my workout and she said that if my form was good and I wasn't slinging the weights around to continue on but avoid any overhead lifting like shoulder press. So as long as I don't round my upper back or round my shoulders forward while doing shrugs they should be ok. Do you agree with this? I haven't had any pain while doing shrugs that I can think of. I don't feel the deadlifts at all in my lower back all in my hamstrings. That is one reason I switched to DB deads is because my form is better along with my ROM. By form I mean I feel it all in my hammies and not in my lower back.

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And no they don't automatically send you to the hospital after a wreck. They really should have made me go after one of the wrecks because I am pretty sure I had a concussion from where I hit the steering wheel. The other ones I was out of the car by the time the cops and parameds got there. How dumb was I? I really thought I was invincible. Dead wrong on that.

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I haven't worked out in four days beacuse I wanted to see what the doctor said. So I guess I will be back at it in the morning or possibly tonight if I get home in time. I am kind of depressed about the whole thing but I guess that is part of being permantly injured. I also asked if she had ever heard of foam rolling and the tennis ball thoratic mobilty exercise with the tennis balls. She had not but said they were a good idea. I was also wondering about hanging from a chinup bar with a total of 50 lbs hanging from my chinup belt and wondering if that would create a similar effect of decompressing my spine. Anybody have any thought on that?

[Iamjennmedic]

No idea on the chin up bar idea. I would also nix the shrugs until you get treatment. Sorry I know you didn't want to hear that but there it is. I think you should be ok with deads as long as you keep perfect form.

I am so glad I live in Canada! Here when you get in a wreak, regardless if you are out of the car or not, we immediately take control of c-spine and do a full assessment. Based on our findings, previous medical hx, and what the speeds were, angle of inpact and damage to,the vehicles and a bunch of other stuff, almost 100% of the time you get put on a board and collared. Just the idea that they would not do it automatically makes me sick. Even a little fender bender can result in fractures to the cervical region. Did they even make you sign a waiver to refuse treatment?

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Alright shrugs are out then. MaybeI will do inverted rows instead because I could use some more back strengthening exercises. They don't make you sign anything refusing treatment that I remember. This sucks I wish I felt better but oh well.

[UConnJulie]

You can do self tractioning that way and it might help, it might not ... tired right now, but try googling "self tractioning" and looking under images. The only thing I can think of the way you want to do it is grip fatigue before you actually get a relaxation response ...

And definitely lay off the shrugs. Foam rolling/tennis ball rolling should be fine (listen to your body). Do you have Inside/Out? I'd recommend it for all the mobility stuff for the T-spine and stabilization stuff for the scapula )both of which will help you.

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I will google it and see what I can find Julie. I tried the chinup bar hang last night and it felt good but my grip gave out pretty quick. I have Magnificent Mobility but not Inside/Out I will see about picking up a copy.