First One Thing, Then Another...There's Just No End

After about three weeks of struggling with some "new" pain in my right hand, wrist and extending up my arm to the elbow, I talked to my family doctor about it, and he gave me a referral to a hand specialist. When I contacted the office of that specialist, the earliest appointment I could get was in early December but was told they would put me on a list to call in case of a cancellation as well.

Received a phone call yesterday morning, telling me they could see me at 2:15 in the afternoon, so told them they could count on my being there.

As luck would have it, my wife has a friend who some time ago had some problems with her hand, too, so I knew what basically to expect when I showed up for my appointment. Turns out the lady doctor was thorough in her examination. Asked lots of questions, tested my strength with some instruments, and then went to work with the usual regimen of asking me if what she was doing to my fingers and other parts of my hand hurt or not, and if so, how bad. She frankly didn't have to wait for my verbal responses, 'cause she had plenty of facial expressions and grunts to tell her what she needed to know.

After about 30 minutes of that, I was ushered into an X-ray lab, where the technician took a series of pictures, before escorting me back to the doctor's office. The doc wasted no time in pulling up a photo of my whole hand and pointing out that I had generous amounts of arthritis and carpal tunnel, with a little gout thrown in for good measure.

I said "OK, can you do something to help the situation?" knowing full well what her answer likely would be, given what my wife had told me about her friend.

She said, "Yes, my assistant will be in shortly to get you ready."

As if on cue, the assistant showed up with some iodine and some kind of sea-shell solution, asking if I was allergic to either, and once I said "no," she quickly got busy readying me for the return of the doctor to administer whatever was in the syringe I now saw laying on the desk. The doc warned about the "pinch" that was coming, and immediately sunk the needle into the area around my thumb.

I had to make another appointment for six weeks down the road, at which point the doctor will monitor how much good this shot has done me and likely will follow up with additional shots until I'm pretty much back to normal. It's my understanding it may take several months for that to happen, and I also may have to keep repeating the process. However, I can hope I'm as lucky as one of the good doctor's old patients, whom she said she saw in a store the other day. He hasn't required any more shots in years now but still is pain-free.

My problem first started rearing its head when I would be working at the computer but then began waking me up in the middle of the night, while just sitting in a chair, or any other time. It wasn't until I started having trouble sometimes just raising a glass of water to my lips for a drink that I got concerned enough to get a medical referral. Figured there would come a time when I wouldn't be able to use a fishing rod (without maybe dropping it overboard), which really would have gotten my attention.

P.S. Readying this item for the blog is the first time in weeks I have not felt any pain while working at the computer. Wouldn't go so far as to say I feel like a new man...'cause we all know that would be a lie. However, it's oh so good to be pain-free...if maybe only for a while. I'll gladly take what I can get.