Pain management

‘Kay, here’s my question du jour:

Why the hell are Lidoderm patches only available by prescription? You should be able to pick them up at the supermarket checkout stand, next to Mounds bars & People magazines. Along with cortisone ampoules, too.

I mean—if you can toss some junk food for your body & your brain onto the conveyor belt, you ought to be able to add a little pain relief to the mix, too.

Especially if your back hurts as much as mine does & your pain management specialist has hared off to Hawaii like some irresponsible nitwit with his pregnant wife & you have to wait until next week to see him.

Okay—as you can tell, I’m a little edgy. Once I hit 8 on the pain scale of 1 to 10, 10 being “shoot me; now”, I get just a tad cranky. In the sense that Ivan IV Vasilyevich lost his temper occasionally & fussed at the courtiers.

So when I…acquired…a couple of these Lidocaine patches, at first I was not hopeful. After all, that OTC “pain cream” I got a while back doesn’t make a dent in the problem. But I somehow managed to slap one of them on one of the four main trigger points (naturally, they’re just at the very edge of your reach on your own back) the other night & was stunned.

I’d been at the whimpering point (okay, I was crying) because it hurt so much, & then when I realized that the pain had dissipated, I started crying again at the relief. I actually got to sleep that night without having to talk myself down from the ledge & into pretending that it’s only discomfort & therefore bearable.

That relief allowed my muscles to relax for a while, which in turn allowed me to do some of the exercises that are supposed to help mitigate the trigger points. I’m dreaming of Lidoderm patches the size of trade paperbacks, that I could spread from scapula to scapula & from about T4 up to the base of my skull. Then I could face the world with a smile.

But I’ve only got the one patch left, which brings me back to my question: why the hell can’t I get these OTC? It’s not like I’m going to start smoking them. &, really—it would be a boon to all humanity if I were out of pain.

Especially if you’re in the same time zone as I am.