Hi WW,

I too have a partally ruptured disc in my neck and middle of my back that I sustained through a very hard slip-fall, on the back stairs many years ago.

You might want to try the TENS machine.

http://www.lgmedsupply.com/


I bought mine at a different site but it was more expensive with the AC adapter. It didn't require a doctor's prescription either.

Please search other sites for the best price, but this one, is one of the best that I've seen. (get a bottle of GEL) as it will extend the pads for many more weeks.

Hope you're only a click away from some relief...

t2t

just a couple of quick thoughts. First of all, this guy(the original Dr. Zimmerman) saved my husband's life, he had a pinched nerve in his neck and it was paralyzing. The atlas bone can be the cause of many problems:

http://www.just-think-it.com/sam.htm


That's just an intuit on my part.

The other thing is that I think that Cougar can help you.

oh, I also think that t2t and mikey have good things to say, always:)

Buy an inversion table, believe me, it will work wonders! :)

Hang upside down, it will take the pressure off!

I slept really well so apparently the cervical traction unit did some good. I am going to use it again this morning. I tried a rolled towel under my neck but all it did was to aggravate the situation so I tossed it.

I put some essential oils in a carrier oil and managed to massage the muscles so the spasms decreased too.

Today so long as I stretch my neck up like an ostrich I'm fine but the minute I relax it starts up so I guess the cervical traction is the best thing to do. I feel like Uncle fester in that contraption. ahahahaha.....I would much rather be Thing!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vVDJvrBFDDc


http://theaddamsfamilymusicaltour.com/

Here is my biased input.

I am a bodyworker of 19 years. I used to do Rolfing Structural Integration, but now most of what I do is from the Osteopathic world. Organs, nerves, arteries, bones, ligaments, dura, cranium, brain, discs and more....all part of the mix.

If you have bulging discs most likely you have lost curvature in your cervicals. the trick is to discover why. If chiropractic isn't getting to it by now stop. You are probably aggravating the compensatory pattern not dealing with what is primary. You could have adhesion of the Visceral sheath of the neck...the soft stuff that is in front of the spine is surrounded by a sheath of tissue and it needs to be able to glide on the vertebraes. if it can't glide properly the body will often engage the musculoskeletal system to protect these tissues, and straightening out the curve could be the bodies solution. This may take strain out of the soft stuff, but it makes the discs way more vulnerable to bulging, herniation and rupture. And if you keep trying to forcibly remove the bodies solution, you sometimes destabilized things and make them worse. The body loves to be in balance and ease. But it will create pain and sacrifice mobility if it has to to protect a carotid artery, or a heart, or kidney, or a liver or a sciatic nerve.

And the problem perceptually for us is we aren't wired for pain in our organs the way we are for our muscles. So we tend to blame the problems on the muscles and joints.

If slouching takes strain out of the heart, then that is worth some neck pain if the body is limited in its adaptive capacity. When we are young, usually, the body has tons of adaptive capacity and it can hide all kinds of trauma. And then for many of us in our 30s or 40s stuff starts showing up and we don't know why and sometimes we attribute it to aging. It just could be that we have run out of adaptive capacity and now it doesn't take much to throw us over the edge into pain.

anyway, I am going off here a bit, just trying to present a different paradigm than most are used to hearing.

If you have any interest in exploring this kind of work I might be able to find someone for you if you would like.

And to be clear, I am not saying that you can't or won't be able to do it on your own, you might and it is totally worth exploring. And sometimes the problems are complex or you just have to have another pair of hands to find and release. Cranial work is one example of work that yoga and traction just can't get to, at least as far as I have seen. And boy, if there is a lot of cranial strain it is amazing what it can set up. I had a 10year old boy 2 years ago who had ankle pain and no arches. After working on his head almost the entire session he stood up and had about 80% of his arches back. He was an emergency forceps delivery, they saw blue skin when he crowned and they knew they had to get him out quick. His Dad said it was brutal...but they saved his life!!! But in the process they put in a ton of strain into his head. My best guess is that the strain in his head created strain through his entire spinal system through the dura and it was so much that the body made the legs get a little flacid...trying to create ease somewhere. So when the strain was lifted from the cranium, and the dura, and springiness returned to spine the tone in the leg was allowed to turn on and the arches just popped right up...wallah!
I wish they were all that easy...

and there I go rambling away again.....

and of course, it should also be mentioned that sometimes the organ problem that creates the structural problem/pain is not caused by mechanical strain it is caused by toxicity or physiologic or hormonal problems .....so sometimes Iodine clears out the lungs and that softens the rib cage and that fixes a shoulder...........