CPPS is taking my life from me (Brett's Case)

[BrettP]

Today was same story. Wake up take dump, urgency, frequency, pain.... Eat, problem gone. Weird!!!!! I also have been backed up two days. Working on that. Just a weird set of symptoms. The fact they go away after eating is just strange.

[BrettP]

After a good run I have to hang my head and admit this condition is back. I was doing good felt so good. I have been lowering my Valium and my pain had been decreasing until yesterday. Basically here's what happened. I lowered my Valium to 5 mgs. And started to feel withdrawal effects. I then overate and had a nasty bought of stomach pain. Then noticed my premium clenching again, spasming too. Now I'm constipated and today had some electric shock sensations in my penis. Everything else I can deal with. But not the electric shocks. I think a lot of this is related to my benzo withdrawal. God I hope this goes away soon. I was making real progress. Enough to bring tears to my eyes foolishly thinking I was beating this thing .

[carld]

Just remember you don't beat this thing...you manage it. That's what you were doing. Now you also have the benzo issue, and withdrawls are an issue for sure.

Hang in there...It will pass...

[BrettP]

All I know is I'm staying on this dose for a while. I don't want to rock the boat any more than I already have.

[painagain]

Feels like its getting better then gets worse again. That's what my case was for years - then it did completely go away for 4 years. It's back again now, but I know I will get back to the point where it feels like its gone again for an extended period of time. At least that is what I am working to convince myself.

When you say you feel it spasm - what does that mean? I feel shooting pains every now and then, but mostly, my pain is constant. I'm not sure I would recongnize a spasm if it happened. That's why its hard for me to know if it is muscular or not.

[BrettP]

i just feel the muscle fluttering, clenching, out of my control. Sometimes its not hard, but sometimes it is and really stays constricted, sometimes it loosens. I really think this is because of the withdrawal symtpoms i am facing as other parts of my body are twitching and spasming as well. effin nightmare

[Gav]

Brett, have you even considered the use of low doses of Elavil (5-30mg) to help you come off the benzos (admittedly I have not looked through the entire thread to see if you have already used it with no positive outcome). While I was in hospital for a different issue I found Valium excellent for my UCPPS but Elavil took over and is much better for long term use than a benzo.

[BrettP]

actually have not tried Elavil. I seem to have stabilized a bit on my valium. Symptoms seem to be dissapating today. I'll give it a week hopefully it stays this way . I can feel a majority of the muscle tension is gone. Still some butnot as bad. Also my nightmares have been tamed down. I have noticed those being correlated with a increase in my symptoms as well. I assume it's due to muscle tension while sleeping and dreaming. I'm still proud of myself have reallly slashed the benzos down and feel overall better. So weell see what happens fromhere. I also would like to let everyone know something I did the other day that helped, took a rag heated it up in microwave and put it in plastic bag, and then applied it to my lower abs perineum, everywhere there was tension. I felt immediate releif. Worth a shot! ;)

[Jay]

Hi Brett,

Glad that you are starting to feel a bit better. I hope that you are doing your drug taper under the guidance of a doctor, as they may be able to help smooth some of the bumps in the road.

I wanted to add that, if it turns out you need a small dose of a drug in order to maintain quality of life, that's not a bad thing. I'm on four! Of course, there is dependency and possibly side-effects, but you have to weigh that against what you gain. You haven't failed if you end up continuing with your current path and enjoy a decent life for it.

I used to be a bit against incorporating medication into my treatment regimen, but it proved helpful when I did on the long term (through pain management). Of course, I still combine that with muscular work and relaxation. My personal feeling is that treatment for chronic prostatitis / chronic pelvic pain syndrome must be multi-modal, hitting the problem from many angles at once.

You're in my prayers, buddy. You've been in this place before, and you'll make it out again.

[BrettP]

Question for you all... ok so yesterday i was feeling pretty good, and have been getting continually better since i slowed down the benzos. However, yesterday afternoon, i had a big rice dish with chicken (I'm eating better as well, at least trying too). Usually rice can cause some backup so i said, why not take a large dose of metamucil. So i took this monster dose, and after that I started to have back pain, not sure why.

The pain is located on my back, just under where the rib cage would be if it were on the front, that general area. My question is, do you think its possible that having to take a big BM and being somewhat constipated can cause back pain in that general area? Its been with me for 24 hrs now, i just went to the bathroom but figure it may take another day to go away. What do you guys think? It was almost so bad i couldnt get out of bed this morning...never really had back pain that lasted this long before. I could have also pulled a muscle somewhere, but i dont remember it...

BP

[Jay]

Hi,

As someone with IBS-C, I can tell you that constipation can cause me pain all over the place! It agitates my chronic prostatitis / chronic pelvic pain syndrome and brings out some of the worst symptoms, but it can also cause cramps and terrible discomfort well above my pelvis.

Having said that, if this is a debilitating pain which is unusual for you, I certainly wouldn't advise against seeing your doctor. They would probably want to run an X-ray to make sure that you don't have a fecal impaction or something else going on. As you say, it could also just be a pulled muscle.

[BrettP]

Finally went to the bathroom, felt better the next day. Amazing. Amazing what constipation can do to your body. And then today, I have these skin pains behind my knees, the weirdest thing, guess its that allodynia. Very very odd, I thought it was do to the hair being compressed, kinda like bed head, but so odd. Came out of nowhere. So I shaved the hair, and of course cut the back of my knees numerous times. . lol Guess that will give me something else to complain about.

[Jay]

Hi Brett,

Glad to hear that you're feeling a bit better.

I also get pain/sensitivity on the skin, from the back of my knees all the way up to my buttocks! Part of this may be associated with the location of my degenerated discs. However, I've also discovered that using a drying/soothing powder at bedtime (or more, if I want) is very helpful. Could be due to the fact that I spend so much time in the tub!

[BrettP]

Wow, just when I thought I was doing better, it creeps back. This time is the WORST flare up I have ever had.

I don't know what happened. About three weeks ago I woke up with pain in my anal area, no blood, no haemorrhoid, nothing -- I HAVE NO CLUE WHAT HAPPENED. Just hurt to even move it, then it was constantly being aggravated by using the restroom. I delt with this for a bout 2 days, it got progressively better, then went away. THen it comes back, then it goes away... etc, etc. Its really starting to affect me in a very negative way. There is burning, itching, and then it gets better, and generally gets worse after BM. Terrible, its killing my sexx drive for some reason.

AND THEN to top it off, the last four days I have been TERRIBLY constipated, and I mean really, really bad -- hard to move without pain bad. Some of the worst yet. So I was super bloated tonight and had sex. About 5 min later I sat down and then the burning started. And the burning is just compounded by the terrible fullness I feel in my gut. So as the burning and pain overtook me, basically put me to tears, I didn't know what to do. Burning, spasming prostate issues, pain. And to top it off my stomach/colon was in overdrive as well, as I started to void after the 4 days of backup -- this has provided SOME relief. This is terrible. I've never been like this. I'm hoping the burning goes away soon, it usually does. But if my bowels don't behave I'm afraid this sticks around for a while. I think that the pressure in my bowels is once again flaring up the prostate. This is just scary, scary that maybe this is perm. I mean, I've been around this road long enough, and know it will end, but damn, this is just so scary after doing better, and aside from the rectal pain and burning, I was doing MUCH better. I just really hope these problems will go away.

On a different note, I have continued my valium taper, and am now currently taking 3. 75mg, which is a significant reduction, this has generally led to an overall better feeling of well being and allowed me to get a bit more positive on life which has helped improve this condition, but I'll tell ya, I'm about ready to take a big dose to assist this pain -- although I can't give up months of progress. So well see how this progresses. Going to get back on my fiber and healthy diet, hopefully that helps as well, but I'm not confident. anyways, I'll quit my bitching and complaining. I hope you all are well and not in my same position.

[webslave]

After bowel motions, apply a heat source to the anal area, eg a heating pad.
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