Category: tremor

This Wrist

Darren Long2 Comments

I’m still in pain from the tremor. Not as bad? Let me explain…

Last week on Friday, I saw a new doctor where I told her about my increased tremor. She understood what I was saying and told me that I’d be seeing some other doctors to get a better idea of what needs to be helped and/or fixed. Fixed? Well, that would be GREAT, but I believe that all this is happening because of one (or more) side-effects of the seizure medications I take. A major (but not common) side-effect is a, or increased, tremor. So…

Let me show you what this FIRST doctor gave me to constantly wear. Drum roll, please….

Okay, this was one of the first fittings I was trying to redo. Little tight in this picture, but I got it fixed. Basically I was ordered:

“Wear this now and ALL DAY & EVERYDAY. … just not while you take a shower.”

“So, how long am I going to wear this? Forever and Ever?”

“Yes. Forever and Ever.”

Holy Crap! This is not fun when you have a permanent tremor on the right-side of your body and this is trying to hold it still. The wrist is held like a board, but my elbow & fingers are still shaking. Drinking coffee while I type this doesn’t help either. We’ll just see how long THIS lasts….

Okay, lets go ahead with this Orthopedic doctor that I saw yesterday. Basically it was…

“Does this hurt when I do this?”

“Well, the first time you moved it & squeezed it, it hurt. The second and third times, it didn’t hurt.”

Kept trying to make it hurt, but he was unsuccessful. Told me there wasn’t any way he could help me. (For some reason or another)

NEXT!

This thing won’t stop!

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What really sucks about this tremor is that it still HURTS. This thing won’t stop its tremendous shaking. I DID finally (because of someone else telling me to) go to one of those walk-in clinics to get it checked out. Yeah, the doctor said it didn’t look good and he had me do some x-rays. This was interesting. A lady was having me sit in a chair with my arm rested on a table with a scanner above it. She’d walk to another room, press a button and then came back. I told her that my arm was “shaking” while that was being done. She told me it wasn’t a problem. (Fast X-Ray?)

The doctor took a look at my x-ray and told me that it wasn’t broken.

“So… You just going to drug me up and call it good-enough for now?”

Basically, that was it. I now have a bottle of Meloxicam that I take once a day. So, I took one when I got home today and, well, it still hurts. The one good thing is that since I have Medicare (because nearly ALL the stuff previously talked about) so that it didn’t cost me anything. 🙂 Heck of a deal, huh? (ok, the medication was $2…)

But still, even with this LOW price, I would love to be guaranteed 100% satisfaction at the moment I swallow one of those pills.

This Arm HURTS

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This right-arm of mine has recently become more and more drastic in the sense that it shakes incredibly worse. My fingers and my wrist are really bad. It hurts SO MUCH. Before, I would need to hold something to “hold it still”, but now my entire arm hurts from the shaking. This is killing me.

Earlier in my life, I was able to entirely relax my arm (easy at night while sleeping) and it wouldn’t shake “at all”. Now, that doesn’t seem to matter anymore. Then again, at this very moment my arm seems okay when it is entirely relaxed and this “brain of mine” is focused on typing. Today (for once) I am going to “try” and take the time for this ENTIRE DAY to NOT drink my coffee or soda. TRY is the keyword. “try…”

I’ll see what happens with that. So far nothing has changed. Still shakes and hurts.

New Neurosurgeon..

Darren Long1 Comment

Went to the hospital and met a new Neurosurgeon today.  We discussed this new brain surgery to fix my tremor. The surgery that’s on my left-side of my brain and fixes the tremor on the right-side of the body. The surgeon explained the WHOLE thing.

The tests before…
The surgery itself…
The outcome afterwards…

Well, all these tests we talked about were the same ones I did before my previous brain surgery. Doing those again, to me, is not a big deal. Not as many tests as last time. No surprises there. Having to do any & all of these tests is not a problem for me…

This surgery (I’ve written about earlier) is not commonly used with people who had a previous brain damage, like me. I was curious as to what a Neurosurgeon had to say about this.

After all this…. well… it will NOT be a 100% fix for the tremor on the right-side of my body. I was basically told that my tremor may either be somewhat better OR not fixed at all.

With all this surgery as being so risky, I personally just turned it down. This arm/hand just “shakes”. I’ve been this way for 30+ years. I’m good. I’ll pass…

WHAT’S NEXT?

Visit the New Neurologist…

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Today I went to see my Neurologist. I explained about the new medication he prescribed at the previous visit. The one to remove the tremor. I told him about how this one was causing me to have the “sleep-all-day” side-effect. That was WAY too much for me to deal with.

He was suggested a prescription for a different medication to do the same job to help with the tremor.

“Uh, no. I’ve had to cope with this tremor for 30+ years. Have went through PLENTY of the side-effects from each one of those prescriptions. Tremor has been better. Tremor has been worse. I have had to deal with it all.”

Once, a “new” medication was SO terrible that it caused my arm/hand to shake all night long!

So, nothing has changed…… for now.