Panic attacks

[Guest guest]

Hey, Gang,

I've taken a few days off due to extra heavy duty stress from super high

levels of pain and fatigue. I'll try to resume my participation with the

group. My computer is still on the fritz. Seems a McAfee Firewall file

has screwed things up. I'll be using my son's computer until I figure out

what's going on with mine. I just don't have the patience to deal with it

right now.

Does anyone else encounter panic attacks when your pain levels rise to a 9

or 10? I've never experienced pain levels this high before. The real

problem is SI joint/lower back and cystitis (bladder) pain. My shoulders

and cervical spine also are tremendous problems, with the hip joints

thrown in for good measure.

I do know that if I take the oxycontin the pain relief will kick in within

one to two hours depending on how low my blood level of the medication has

dropped to. Even with the increased doseage from 20 to 30 I'm

metabolizing the oxycontin faster than the 8 hours between doses I'm now

on. Since I have both 20 and 10 mg tablets I'm going to try taking the

20's every eight hours 6AM, 2PM, and 10PM; and the 10's at 10AM, 6PM, and

12 PM. I'm thinking that this will keep the blood level up high enough to

get through the crashes. Any kind of physical exertion seems to cause

quicker metabolizing of the medications. This is driving me crazy since

I'm usually an active person.

Hopefully, I can get my new rheumatologist and my new psychiatrist (whom I

see in two weeks) to work together with my pain clinic doctor to find a

solution to my current pain problems and the depression it causes.

Ray

[Guest guest]

> <<Does anyone else encounter panic attacks when your pain levels rise to a 9

> or 10?>>

Hi Ray-

I also take oxycontin for my knees and suffer from panic attacks when

my pain reaches a 9. In fact, I do physical therapy twice a week to try and

keep my legs somewhat strong. My PT does soft tissue manipulation on the

excessive scar tissue from my last surgery a year ago.

That is when the panic attack usually occurs for me. She starts

digging in my knees, and all of a sudden it happens. I talked to my pain doc

about this and he is hesitant to prescribe anything else for me. I wish he

would prescribe something to take just as needed because I really don't enjoy

having panic attacks. The psychologist at the pain clinic told me to try

" visualization " when I feel an attack coming on. Not to knock meditation

but for me it doesn't work well for panic attacks.

I never feel them coming on- they just happen!

You are not alone! Margaret