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Part 5: Bev is pain-free following her April 22, 1999 adhesiolysis...
There is NO other effective pain management for adhesions: NO massage therapies ( the adhesions are located too deep within the cavity for "breaking down," etc.. ); and NO types of linaments or balms, which will either reach or penetrate the peritoneum. The peritoneum tissue is there to PROTECT against the invasion of infectious and foreign matter. That IS OUR problem to begin with! So please be carefull folks with paying out bucks for things that sound good -- but WILL NOT work on the adhesions!
Relaxation, massage, and such WILL help relax the adhesion sufferer -- and there is something to be said for treating the emotional as well as the psychological self. In fact, it is imperative to do that!! And therapy for family members -- support, education, and ideas as to how to live with one who is suffering this very painfull and debilitating disorder. The impact that "Adhesion Disorder" places on a family is no different than a diagnosis of cancer, Muscular Dystrophy, Multiple Sclerosis, or any other debilitating disorder -- only that our disorder is just beginning to be focused on. How much focus it gets is up to each one of us! So learn about it!! Educate your doctors about it!! Don't be afraid of it; because it can be effectively lived with...and, most of all, THERE IS HOPE !!!
If a medical facility DID NOT perform medical tests on a patient, who presented with complaints of pain -- and just assumed that their symptoms of pain WERE due to adhesions ( because the patient has a history of adhesions ) -- what would you do if you DID have a tumor or cancer and it went undetected because of a doctor writing your pain off as due to adhesions -- without checking into it? I'd be pretty miffed!
My contact with the Mayo Clinic indicated to me that a number of the doctors DID in fact feel that adhesions in and of themselves caused pain. Like almost everywhere else though, they have not come up with a practical treatment or surgical procedure that would be able to benefit an adhesion-former. Mayo Clinic doctors will work with an adhesion patient through pain management. I did start my pain management through them. ( I cannot see a basis for an "investigation" into the Mayo Clinic or any other medical facility because they perform medical tests on those of us who have a history of adhesions. )
I was found to have TWO tumors -- and that was only through an adhesional lysis -- that I elected to have done in New York City under Dr. Reich! If he had not found them, who knows what might have happend to me. I would not allow any local doctors to perform anymore tests on me -- as I was convinced that ALL MY pain was from adhesions and that there was no valid reason to put myself through testing that would have negative results for abnormal pathology -- let alone pay for tests over and over again. Boy was I wrong!!!
So I have to advise all, for what it's worth, that testing is necessary and could save your life! If all tests have negative results for abnormal pathology, then it is probably your adhesions. It is then up to you to determine the next step -- surgery for them or live with them and try pain management.
( Continued in Part 6 )