My name is Tara and I am from Ohio. I am 29 years old. I have a daughter that is 8. Everything she knows is mommy being sick.

I have Lupus and Loin Pain Hematuria Syndrome. It struck me in 2000. I had several kidney stones and had to have surgery to remove them. Ever since I have had dibilitating pain. I went to many urologist and they all told me the pain was in my head. went on antidepressants and began thinking maybe it was me! I met a wonderful urologist who said I was the first patient he had diagnosed with LPHS. That's when all my medications started being prescribed. The pain was not being taken care of. I could barely get out of bed. I was vomitting every other day. I had lost 30 pounds in 4 weeks. I slept 20 hours out of everyday. How could I take care of my daughter? My pain was not my first worry but my daughter seeing me that way and worrying what kind of chances she will have in getting these diseases. That thought just killed me. My depression sunk even lower and I was going through a divorce. I noticed I was a totally different person and hated it.

I started physical therpay Monday. They showed me them exercises. I have alot of pain when doing them. More on the right side. Its always the right side. I can do them. I have been told at this time, chiro care is not good. Until I get a MRI.

I was in a serious car accident 10 years ago. Shattered the bone in my right arm. Had a rod, pins, wire put into the arm for six months. For bone to grow back. Took a year to get use of the arm back. Since then, downhill. Not the same since. I am lopsided in posture. The right side of my body is taller by 2 inches. Chiroprators have tried to straighten it. My hip is also not right. I most likely got a pinched nerve. I have also scars that took quite a time to accept, but have now.

Banker hopes to help others get off drugs

Kristi Metzger had it all: a job she loved as a bank vice president, loving family and friends, community activities, a house to shelter her at the end of a productive day.

And a secret.

Metzger was addicted to the prescription pain reliever Vicodin.

After 10 surgeries in 15 years in a fruitless effort to relieve chronic pain caused by endometriosis, Metzger had almost quadrupled the maximum number of Vicodin she was allowed. And to keep her secret, she had turned into a liar.

Now, after two stays in chemical dependency treatment centers, Metzger, 31, has decided to keep that secret no longer. She has begun talking to civic groups about her addiction to painkillers and the resources available.

Two men suing physician Dr. Robert Harned, claiming he over-prescribed painkillers, causing them to become addicted. Each suit seeks $1.5 million for the plaintiffsí pain and suffering. Also named in the suit are Chatham Medical Associates, where Harned practiced, and Stop & Shop Pharmacy, which filled some of the prescriptions.

This review is by Gael Fashingbauer Cooper

The most frightening thing about Paula Kamen's "All in My Head" (Da Capo, $25) is that what happened to her could happen to any one of us. While putting in a contact lens one day, she was suddenly stricken with a horrible pain, worse than any headache she'd ever had. More than 10 years later, she still suffers from that very same headache.

At 13, I teamed up with my best friend Jill on Halloween: She was a nurse, and I dressed as an injured person. Though we wrapped my body in white gauze and Ace bandages, some of my outfit was not part of the costume. I was in my second month on crutches then, for a painful knee problem that had lingered since August, a case of bone outpacing muscle as it grew.

Great article written by Jacob Sullum on Reason

I have to admit I'm impressed by the achievement of the federal prosecutors who call McLean, Virginia, pain doctor William Hurwitz "a major and deadly drug dealer." Although the evidence they presented in his trial made it clear Hurwitz was not a drug trafficker, they still managed to convict him of drug trafficking.

The prosecutors did not dispute that Hurwitz had helped hundreds of patients recover their lives by prescribing the high doses of narcotics they needed to control their chronic pain. Instead they pointed to the small minority of his patientsó5 to 10 percent, by his attorneys' estimateówho were misusing the painkillers he prescribed, selling them on the black market, or both.

Christine Doyle hears the plight of sufferers of chronic pain and examines possible new treatments

Sharp pain, such as that suffered when accidentally touching a hot oven, is acute and unbearable.

A speedy reaction is a basic survival instinct. Imagine the sensation lingering for months, even years, and you begin to have an idea of what people with chronic pain have to endure.

More than one in 10 people in Britain live with long-term pain, and many feel that their plight is largely unrecognised and under-treated. Despite the increasing number of pain clinics offering a mix of physical, psychological and complementary approaches, surveys suggest that only one in four patients sees a pain specialist.

It all started as a normal TMJ problem. My jaws would pop & click w/ wide opening, yawning, etc.
Over about 2 years it progressed very quickly into "internal derangement w/out reduction". I've done physical therapy, bite splints ( soft & hard ), biofeedback, imagery, soft diet, liquid diet, Advil, Tylenol, Aleve, about 10 different RX NSAID's. After all the O-T-C Nsaid's & Rx Nsaid's, I now have an ulcer. Then I moved onto trigger point injections weekly, occipital nerve blocks weekly. Percocet 10's, 3/day.

I have chronic neck & shoulder pain from an injury in 1987. I had to have surgery to fix part of it, but it's still weaker and tightens up fairly rapidly.

One thing that really helps is using a Thera-band attached to a doorknob. Thera-Bands are the colored bands you often see if you've ever gone to physical therapy. You can get them from a medical supply store by the foot (or maybe inch), though. I do best with the green one (different colors indicate different strengths). I have wrist problems, too, so I have to wear a wrist brace when I use them. the ones I do are:

1. Stand at a sideways to the band. Keep shoulder-to-elbow close to your side and pull the band to the side away from the door.