Re: Rx: Arthrotec anyone?

[Guest guest]

.... I was on Celebrex for about a week; did wonderful at masking the

pain. I am curious though; is masking the pain damaging? In that

further damage could be done because we are not careful with our

bodies without pain screaming at us? What is a good balance? Food

for thought - I guess there is a trade off of some kind.

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Excellent observation and question. You touch on a couple of

extremely important points here.

I have several books in my reference library specifically on pain

and pain management, including (among others) " The Book of Pain

Relief " by Leon Chaitow, " Pain: Mechanisms and Management " by Rene

Cailliet, " Complete Guide to Pain Free Living " by Bonnie

Prudden, " Complete Guide to Pain Relief " by Readers' Digest, " Pain

Erasure the Bonnie Prudden Way " by Bonnie Pruden, and the complete

eight volume pain management set by Rene Cailliet covering specific

areas like foot, hand, shoulder, neck, etc. (And no, I haven't come

even close to reading them all in detail yet. I need to at some

point but for the moment I am using them for reference when

questions come up.)

In several of them, one key fact keeps getting repeated. The use of

medications, whether analgesic or narcotic in nature, in no way cure

or fix the " problem " or cause of the pain. All they do is " mask " or

suppress it. And that is the technical medical name for the use of

medications. It is officially called " suppression therapy. "

It is useful as long as, and only as long as, the benefits of

reduced pain sensation are not outweighed by (1) the associated risk

of long-term adverse side effects and/or (2) the risk that the pain

is a signal that the body has urgent need of some other form of

intervention.

A couple of good examples would be the treatment of migraine

headache pain as opposed to headache pain caused by a brain tumor or

treatment of abdominal pain caused by basic indigestion versus

abdominal pain caused by an appendix just about to rupture. Pure

and simple, pain is the body's way of calling for help. Knowing the

cause of the pain is critical before you do anything to mask or

suppress the pain simply because you don't want to deal with it.

This is more of a broad approach to the issue.

A specific approach is more in keeping with what you suggested. You

have unstable joints. Whenever you attempt anything that puts one

of those unstable joints at risk, your body lets you know about it

by sending you a pain reminder. Just before you put your arm into

that stretch that is going to dislocate your shoulder, you get a

stabbing pain in same said shoulder and you back off (at least in

theory). So, could you hurt yourself because your body wasn't

screaming in pain at you? You bet your bippy you could.