I have had two surgeries on my right foot. Both my feet are messed up, I came away from the surgeries worse off than before. After years of PT, pills, exercises, surgery, casting and trying to ignore it I am in worse pain than ever. Nothing cuts the pain. I can't work, fixing supper or cleaning up the kitchen afterwards is so painful. Five minutes on my feet in the morning isn't bad, but by afternoon that five minutes is awful, by bedtime I am in so much pain. In other words its gets worse the more the day wears on. I haven't worked in two years. The docs have me on neurontin which does help with the nerve pain, (I had nerve damage from the surgery) but the Kadian 20mg doesn't seem to touch the pain anymore. what is crazy.....when I started taking the Kadian a 4 or 5 months ago I thought it was really helping. Could my body have become immune to the pain killing effect that fast?
What is the next step? More mg of the same medicine or a different drug? what happens when I get to the strongest dosage and it doesn't help anymore? I am so sick of being in pain and not being able to do things that normal people take for granted......like going to the damn grocery store. :confused: :confused: :confused:

katkat,
I checked your older posts to see if you were in the same boat that I was. So first let me save that this isn't a dental situation :) Secondly, after years of taking Ultram I had no withdrawal problems when I stopped.
I had a nerve damaged in my foot and went through the same routine. Nortriptyline and others made me sick, Neurontin and others didn't work. Also tried nerve, nerve root, and infusion blocks. The first thing that was any help was Klonipin which worked at night when I was in bed but not when I was on my feet. I Dilantin helped but with the side effects I didn't come out much ahead. Ultram (which replaced the Vicodins) worked well but only as long as each dose lasted. Your post reminded my of how I used to make myself a lunch in the morning so that I could eat later in the day when the preperation would be to much time on my feet and worse, sitting on the bottom of four steps leading into the house wondering if the nieghbors would be looking if I took the easy way and crawled up.
First I'd say that amputaion is too drastic and not garaunteed to work. (That's what my doc said (every time I asked and begged.) I also asked about cutting nerves and was told that the result is often increased pain regardless of which technique is used (physical, chemical, freezing, etc.) I was given the option of exploratory surgery but was told that the resulting pain levels could be the same , better or worse.
There are a lot of medications to try and different dosages. One person can have the opposite results of another so you don't know unless you try them. The same dose doesn't have the same result for everyone. When everything else has been tried there are infusion pumps, spinal stimulators, and peripheral nerve stimulators.
From what I've read the pumps can be successfull at avoiding or eliminating high doses of opiods but you have to be aware of possible complications. From what I've heard the spinal stimulators give 'up to' 50% relief 'up to 50% of the time. I'm told that the peripheral nerve stimulator does better than 50% more than 50% of the time. I have one and it works and works well. I'll be happy to answer questions, but I don't want to sound pushy or like an advertisment.

tchair,
I have nerve damage from having my gallbladder removed
17 months ago, and all of the doctors who I have seen since
the surgery all have said "EXACTLY" the same things that you have
said. (That doing nerve blocks, surgery, etc.. would probably make
my pain much worse so they don't want to try to do anything).
So basically I have to live off of pain med's the rest of my life
which I hate doing, First of all pain med's make me sick (I am taking
ultram now and that makes me sick) I have tried getting off of ultram
but I go thru withdrawals (you are so lucky that you didn't have any
problems getting off of them).
But then I have the nerve pain to think about, so I guess the only hope
is to stay on the ultram, atleast it helps with my pain even tho that it
makes me sick. Oh well I guess it's too much to ask to be pain free
and sickness free ever again. UGH!! Kim

CrystalRose,
I just mentioned the amputation to kitkat because they don't do it just for pain alone, there had to be other serious extenuating circumstances such as your Osteomylitis or diabetic gangrene. Speeking of a "completely pulverized calcaneal fracture", that's what caused my nerve damage. Sorry that your complications were so bad. I can't imagine trying to survive six surgeries! I hope the next is the last you ever need.

tchair,
I have nerve damage from having my gallbladder removed
17 months ago, and all of the doctors who I have seen since
the surgery all have said "EXACTLY" the same things that you have
said. (That doing nerve blocks, surgery, etc.. would probably make
my pain much worse so they don't want to try to do anything).
So basically I have to live off of pain med's the rest of my life
which I hate doing, First of all pain med's make me sick (I am taking
ultram now and that makes me sick) I have tried getting off of ultram
but I go thru withdrawals (you are so lucky that you didn't have any
problems getting off of them).
But then I have the nerve pain to think about, so I guess the only hope
is to stay on the ultram, atleast it helps with my pain even tho that it
makes me sick. Oh well I guess it's too much to ask to be pain free
and sickness free ever again. UGH!! Kim

Kim, are your doctors not willing to give you a different med for the pain? If ultram makes you sick, maybe there is something else that would work without making you nauseated. If the doc is unwilling to prescribe something different, I think I would either ask to be sent to pain management or seek another opinion. You shouldn't have to live in constant pain...there are too many meds out there to try. Good luck.

Carol