Dear Paula,

Don & Jeanie here. Don is me, I have Arachnoiditis from a bad surgery. Jeanie is my Soul Mate and my care giver. I could not make it with out her in my life. I have had this for almost six years. It is true that it is a very bad thing to get stuck with and it really hurts most of the time. It will change your life as you know it forever. There are a lot of very bad things that I can say about Arachnoiditis but, I have had to learn to focus on other prettier things just to get by. I have had just about every drug made out there tried on me and all of them have had side effects. Some not so bad but some with very long lasting side effects. I chose to go with a pain pump after my Stimulator just was not giving me the relief that it once did. I was so tired of not knowing what day it was or who I was anymore. Worse than that, my family thought I had lost my mind. I was not the same Don that my children and wife had known. I was this stoned Robot of a guy still hurting but in a lot of different ways besides the Arachnoiditis pain. I have had my morphine pump for 15 months now and it seams as if each month gets better. Less pain and more my self again. I have not been able to work for 5 1/2 years but now I think that maybe I can try something on a very limited scale again. I am sending out lads to see where it takes me. We also may be moving from St. Louis to AZ. The barometric pressure is not near as great, it is below sea level, it is not as humid and it gets cool but not cold. All those things seamed to help me greatly as I visited out there last year. Also, it is the only time I was able to walk with out a Caine. Here I am back on a Caine to help me balance myself.

I just felt so much better out there.I forgot what it was like not to always be hurting. AZ. brought all those good things back to my life again. I have to tell you that the most important thing that has kept me going under some of the hardest times in my 52 years is the fact that I and my family pray and try our best to be the people that God wants us to be. I found out a long time ago about this Arachnoiditis is that we can only do what we learn to do to help with the pain, The doctors for the most part do not have a clue as to what we are feeling, Their hands are tied, but if we give it to God, He can and will make our life so much better off than if we were not allowing God to work in our life. I feel that one day, I will be healed of this but, until that day comes, I give God the problems everyday and let him handle them for me. It really works. I could tell you countless things that God has done for me to help me get through this living hell. If you are having a bad day, first I would pray and ask God to help ease the pain and help things to go easy so it is not as hard on you, then. Try to stay warm, dry, well rested, keep a much movement in your body everyday that you can. It will pay off down the road. Hot baths help or a hot tub

work really good for the symptoms. Drinking a lot of water helps with any spinal injury.

Find a doctor that you trust and feel real good about. If you have any doubt about the doctor and you do not get the answers you want, get out of the office and find someone else. Your first instincts are right most of the time. I hope that this helps a ;little for any one that is fearful. We are all here because we need each other. I want to thank everyone who is out there for your words on the net because they have helped me more than once over the past few years. God Bless you and your family, Don & Jeanie Goeglein St. Louis Missouri