Thanks for the medical advice, but....

Soooo....I was a dancer, a gymnast and a diver from the time I was 3 years old.  I loved it.  I was good at it.  By the time I was 13 years old, I had to "sleep" over a stack of pillows to try and get any sort of back pain relief.  The fracture, or pars defect, I had developed from the sports I loved was making me miserable.  I had to stop tumbling and diving...the hyperextension on my spine was just too much.  But I continued dancing...through high school, college, and then beyond.  I became a ballroom professional in 1999 (I know...I'm old) and began teaching full-time to pay my bills.  8-9 hours a day in heels, with tall men standing over top of me in dance position. I tried chiropractors (HUGE mistake on that one - made it worse). I tried physical therapy (Oh? It hurts to hyerextend it?  Let's put you in a cobra position!). I tried massage (Nice...but not helpful long-term). I tried acupuncture (All it did was make me break out in welts). I tried oral steroids (Rage much?). I was even doing epidural steroid injections every 6 months (Only helpful on occasion). In the mean time I can't sleep, I can't sit comfortably, I'm in varying amounts of pain every single day, and in general I'm getting a shooting pain down the back of my leg that's bad enough to make me see stars with every step I take. I have constant pins and needles in my left foot.  I keep tripping over it as I lose strength in it.  I finally found a doctor specializing in decompression therapy.  It's a combination of traction (like being stretched on a rack, but with computers), ultra sound, physical therapy, and bracing.  It's a loooong process that I've gone through twice now.  2 weeks every day, 2 weeks every other day, and 2 weeks every third day.  The first week is pure misery.  The second week isn't much better.  But I've gotten better results from this than all the other "cures" combined.  Every 4-5 years I usually end up having to go back and have another round. We're at about year 6...and ouchy.  In the mean time I go to my PCP and get a shot in the hip of anti-inflammatories and pain killers to get by for a few weeks.  So when you see a little less of me on stage each time...please don't be angry.  I'm doing as much as I'm capable of.


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spondylolysis

G