Hello,
I have post-traumatic arthritis from a car accident 23 years ago. It only began to show up last year, I had arthroscopic surgery 2 mos ago, I have absolutely no cartilage in my ankle, and my pain is still so severe that I'm now in pain management. Does anyone have any experience with pain mgmt.? They have me on morphine sulphate 12h which really scares me. And even though it is 12h, I can tell it still has peaks and troughs because I get sleepy about 6 hours after taking it. I've driven drowsy and that scares me. They moved me from vicoden (orthopedist prescribed) to the morphine (pain mgmt prescribed). But this is what I have to do for insurance - a "sub-optimal regimen" before they will move me up to Opana-ER. Does anyone have any experience with that or any other drugs?
To top it off, I have 22 years of sobriety in AA and I just don't like the idea of taking medication like morphine. It messes with my mind in that, even though I've taken it appropriately (as well as the vicoden) there is a part of me that doesn't feel like I'm "really sober" even though I need this medication. I have not told very many people at all - 3 to be exact - and I know they are trustworthy, but I want to go to a pain mgmt. place that deals with people in recovery and I found out about one through one of the people I told. It's just a constant internal battle for me.
Has anyone else had this type of experience?
I am so sorry to hear about your situation. I unfortunately do not have any experience in this kind of thing. I wanted to ask you a quick question though, how did your doctor know that your accident was the cause of your arthritis? Had you had arthritis before the accident? I am interested because I was diagnosed w/RA when I was 3, but in my early 20's I am pretty sure it went into remission. About 2 years after this, I was involved in an accident where a car hit me as I was biking and I landed like a cat on my hands and knees. I walked away from it unscathed, but a day afterwards my joints were very different. My RA definitely came back and now I have had to go back on my meds, but the whole disease is much different than what it was before the accident, even when I was first diagnosed with it and it was bad it was never as bad as after the accident. I wanted to know how your doctor knew that the accident caused the arthritis?
Anyway, i am getting waaay off topic. I wanted to tell you that you should also post this message in some of the other forums, like Rheumatoid Arthritis; I think you might get more responses there from others that have been in your situation. Good luck with everything, I wish you the best. And any advice you can give me would be greatly appreciated.
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