Dear Anyone Who Reads This,

I believe, and so does my doctor, that I have a pinched nerve somewhere in my neck. Which is causing excruciating pain in my right arm. It’s hard to describe the pain, because I haven’t felt it before. Like, I’ve broken my hip and wrist, have small pebbles permanently in my elbow, and suffer migraines on a regular basis, and none of those hurt like this. It’s like a really sharp ache, combined with bouts of burning, and stabbing sensations, deep in my upper arm. My elbow feels like someones driving a screw driver through it. Same for the area between my spine and my upper shoulder.

Sometimes it doesn’t hurt at all, and comes and goes during the day in waves. But at night, it’s pretty constant and at it’s strongest. So I’ve only been getting like 2 hours of sleep a night, with maybe another 2 hours of semi-conicious-just-about-to-pass-out-but-i-dont sleep.

I’m exhausted.

So I’ve been dealing with this for the past 2 1/2 weeks, and finally got an MRI scheduled in about 6 days because everything takes forever with an HMO. And I can’t even get in to see the doctor again for another 4 days after that.

Anyways, on to the point of this post.

The Vicodin/Norco (5/500mg for the Vic, 5/325mg for the Norco) I’ve been prescribed works marginally well. Maybe giving relief for an hour or so, sometimes 5 hours. But that’s during the day. At night it’s almost useless. Ibuprofen works a little, but only in conjunction with the Vicodin/Norco, not by itself. Heat from heating pads does nothing. Hot showers seem to help, but only while I’m in there, The pain comes back pretty rapidly when I get out. Plus, I can’t afford the hot water to be in there constantly. I was also given Prednisone to help with any possible inflammation, but that was just a 5 day treatment. They also gave me a shot of something, which may or may not have helped for a day. I couldn’t really tell, because the pain varies pretty wildly throughout the day. I have a neck brace they gave me, but that’s not really doing anything either.

So my question…. Does anyone have any possible suggestion for how to deal with the pain? I can handle it during the day but at night it’s crazy and I really need some sleep. Any home remedies?