My First Second Opinion

This is the first time in the history of my headache that I haven't plunged straight in with a new treatment with the first practitioner I've seen.

Today I had my second opinion from a chiropractor at Chiltern Health Centre in Sutton. And he said some similar, and some different things.

For a start, he didn't take any x-rays, but he looked at a neck x-ray I had left with the hypnotherapist at the clinic when I first started seeing him in January. Which lasted on two sessions before I had to start working on Saturdays and didn't manage to go back.
This neck x-ray is 4 years old, and I have had my car crash since then, but he still did the routine testing of the joints and when he compared what he felt to the x-ray, he said there wasn't much difference. This x-ray showed my neck is quite straight.
Well, at least it's not backwards.

Of course there were the usual 'oofs' and 'oohs' from me when he touched sensitive spots. And there was the usual "what the..." when he touched my shoulders and felt how rock solid they are (and not in a good rock solid muscle way. In a bad they-aren't-moving-not-because-I'm beefy-but-because-they're-broken way.

He took my medical history, during which I jumped all over the place - MRIs, drugs, Osteopathy, hypnotherapy, this year, that year.
He was glad to hear I wasn't hurt in the car crash, but seemed amused that I'd gotten acquainted with a ditch.

I got changed into a gown that had velcro up the back and he moved my head around and felt my neck joints. He lay me on a moving bed (well I stood on a foot plate against the vertical bed, then the whole thing moved backwards until horizontal) and he felt around the top of my neck. He pushed his fingers in the same places, like hooking his fingers under my skull. I do it to alleviate pain, and that's the same place I'm always rubbing. After a while he said the intensity should be ebbing away, and I said no, it's getting more intense on the right side. "Ah", he said. "You're not normal."

So after establishing that my shoulders are rock solid and I'm not normal because the intensity got worse... he said something that I have known for a while, and that the other chiropractor didn't really touch on: that the muscles and spine are connected, and neither one are letting the other do their job properly. My muscles in particular are baddies in this scenario, because as they get tighter, they pull the joints into the wrong position, and that's where they get stuck, and the other joints have to compensate.

I'm very aware my posture isn't bad, so really it's no news to me that I stick my head out and I'm rounding my back. Everything this guy said was matter of fact, no nonsense.
And the best (and worst) thing he said? Was that he doesn't know if this will make me better, and therefore he doesn't know how long it will take.

I have had so many people promise me I'll only need so many sessions, and I'm still going back after a year. When someone says to me "You'll be good as new in 10 sessions" I think "so I'll still be the same in 20 sessions". It's pessimistic, I know, but I have had so many false hopes.

This chiropractor recognises that both the joints and spine, and the muscle balance need to be addresses, simultaneously.  And he said he'd use various different methods to do that when treating me, such as acupuncture and Tens machine, etc.

But, none of this will work, without my commitment.

And it has taken me this long but I realise now that no wonder the other treatments don't work - one hour, here and there, won't fix me, if I don't carry on treating myself at home.
I'm not talking learning how to adjust my own back. I'm talking stretches, exercise, hydration, healthy eating. I'm talking building up my muscle strength and making sure my muscles are strong enough to keep my spine healthy.

This is a way of life, I'm committing to. I'm not just having yet another treatment. I'm learning to heal myself, any way I can.
The question is, am I ready to commit?



Oh, and he told me to stop cracking my neck and back. Dammit.

My Back Aches

One of the few alternative therapies I have never tried over the course of the last 7 years is Chiropractic treatment. It has often been suggested to me, but I have tried almost everything else.

So a few months ago when I was walking through the Epsom shopping mall I jumped at the chance for a quick and free back check. I then signed up for a full consultation, which only cost me £50, including any x-rays required.

The place I went to is called ProBack, and I saw a Dr. Christian Allard.
The first time I went he explained how a back should look, and then he caused me pain by making me touch my toes and try to bend into various difficult positions. He checked my posture, he looked at my neck. He took a general medical history too.
He said he thought it was my brain stem causing the soreness I always feel and also causing my headache. Did you know the brain stem is the first thing in a person to develop? Dr. Allard also decided I needed x-rays.

I had to wait quite a few weeks for my x-rays at the clinic, because it was waiting for a part from America in order to make it work. But I got the results literally 10 minutes after the x-rays were done.

Dr. Allard asked me if I was sure I hadn't been dropped as a baby or been in a car accident. My thoracic vertebrae looks good, my lumbar are a bit out but really only because my neck curve is reversed.
Yes. You read that right.
My neck curve is reversed. I think this roughly translates into my neck is backwards.
My cervical curve is the wrong way, and he thinks that is causing my headache and a lot of my pain.
Yay.
There's also a big gap between my first vertebrae and spine on my right-hand side, which accounts for the loss of sensation. (In my first appointment, he moved a feather down my hands and feet to see if I could feel it. I could barely feel anything on my right hand side.)

So some permanent nerve damage, but not completely untreatable.
I do, however, have the back of a 40-year-old.

So what is the solution, according to Dr. Allard and ProBack.

ProBack use a particular machine to treat back problems, called the ProBack Pulse. Rather than the usual back cracking you might associate with chiropractors, ProBack practitioners do not work on that basis. The Pulse machine works to record the health of your spine, one vertebrae at a time, and then uses vibration to loosen the tension and reposition vertebrae to make it better. I'm not going to lie, it sounds like a taser. But it does not hurt at all, and it does make you feel looser, but for me it did not eradicate any pain.
If I want to treat my back effectively, and get it back to full health, Dr. Allard recommends 3 sets of 12 treatments. The first 12 are done in quick succession - 3x a week for 4 weeks, or 4x a week for 3 weeks. The next 12 are done twice weekly, for 6 weeks. Then once a week for 12 weeks. So you are looking at up 22 weeks.
And each treatment is £40. There is a payment plan available, but you do the math.

Cost never used to be an issue for me with treatments for my head. But because I have tried so many, and been let down so often, this is quite an expensive gamble. There is no guarantee this will cure my headache, although it is guaranteed to make me taller by improving my posture.

The theory is that I have a headache because my back and shoulders and neck are bad, and my back, shoulders and neck are bad because I have a headache. Vicious cycle.

Could Dr. Allard, and ProBack finally be the cure?
I'll kick myself if it is and it's taken me 7 years to get here!

But I am going to get a second opinion first. Much as I trust them, and they have given me no reason to think they are lying (and I saw the x-rays, my neck is the wrong way!), I want to be sure I am going to get a result for my money.

So watch this space, and I'll let you know whether Dr. Christian Allard saves the day.

Funnily enough, the way I've sat to write this blog, has made my back hurt :(