Some advice please...

[Deemented]

Am currently 19 weeks pregnant and i have a chronic back condition. I also suffer with SPD and some days i can hardly walk. I have physio twice a week and hydro twice a week and am taking co-codamol for pain relief. I am due to go for a MRI scan on the 10th September as they theink there is a possibility that i have reslipped a disc that i had replaced in my back 9 years ago. Obviously if i have, they can't do anything about it really until the baby is born.

Anyway, the other day i rang for a repeat perscription of the co-codamol, and yesterday my doctor rang me back. She said that she was reluctant toprescribe me any more as there is a chance that the baby ould be born addicted to the codiene. Now when she first prescribed them for me, she assured me that they were safe for me and baby.

She's advised me to take paracetamol - but they don;t touch the pain at all, to be honest, the co codamol don;t really do much either but they make it a bit more bearable so i can sleep, ect.

I can't imagine the next 20 or so weeks in pain like this - it's utter agony, but i don't know what else i can do.

ouch. that sounds painful. no advice from me but speak to whoever has the most expeience in dealing with SPD, be that doc, midwife or physio. try and find a good pharmacist. also i think there is a pelvic pain helpline run by volunteers. i had rsi for six months, just awful and depressing. sorry i can't help more. N

Anyone?

Can you use a tens machine? My grandad had one when he had spinal cancer, so that he could sleep.

A few thoughts which might help. I'm not in as bad a position as you, but I'm on crutches with SPD and have mild long term back issues.

Is it worth finding out exactly what the co-codamol risks are? i.e. this might be mainstream thinking that this is a real risk (if so is it a low, med or high risk), or is it based on some recent new research which is possibly incomplete (i.e. low sample numbers and a possible risk which needs more research). Nothing of course is risk free, and it might be worth considering trade offs - i.e. the risk of the co-codamol is lower than the health risks of you not sleeping. No idea what the answers are, but these might be questions worth considering.

One thing my physio said which helped me a lot (and he was very sympathetic) was that this wouldn't be forever, and in the grand scheme of things was a really short time period. This did help me adjuct my thinking and made it a lot more bearable.

Dunno if this is your thing or not, but I foudn Paul McKennas book 'I can make you sleep' useful. It hasn't solved all, but has helped with the phycological side of sleeping for me.

Good luck