my first Calmare Treatment

Yesterday I traveled with my parents to Rutherford, NJ where the Giants and Jets play which is about two hours away from my house each way. I went to see Dr. Michael Cooney who is one of seven certified persons certified in the country to perform Calmare therapy. Calmare is not just for RSD. In fact pretty much  if not all of the clinical studies have been on Post chemotherapy cancer neruopathic pain. However, he has had success with RSD patients with this treatment. First he found where the most painful areas of my body were by touch. The idea is to not put the electrodes on the exact spots of pain, but around them in a certain way that i can't remember exactly why but will post in a future blog because i don't want to provide a guess or a wrong answer, especially for those of you that might be interested in this treatment who have RSD. Of course being touched in painful areas like my back was painful, but i knew it was needed for the treatment. Electrodes were put on my back but not directly on the one spot that really bothers me. Interestingly enough he found the exact spot that hurt me without me pointing it out to him in no time at all. I guess because i said it's been bothering me since the three day epidural i had and also he's treated a lot of patients like me. Then there were a few placed on my feet. He then turned on the machine. The thing is you are supposed to feel the electric current (it's  not really painful but it does feel weird), but you aren't supposed to have it so strong. In other words, don't think that its time to be tough and say i don't feel it when you do and think that if it's stronger to the point of pain it will work better cause its not really true. A bit into the treatment my sensitivity to touch started being reduced. At the end which was about 45 minutes on the machine my overall pain went from an 8/10 to almost a 5. he was wiping the excess gel from the electrode on the bottom of my foot with a paper towel and before i most likely would have screamed from that paper towel, and i could feel it and it hurt a little, but not that bad. I made it home in storms and it stormed all night and my pain went up to about a 7 but i avoided taking perocet and that's amazing considering it was storming, and I had the long car trip because long travel always makes my legs and back hurt.  I even practiced my violin last night for the first serious time since coming home from school in the beginning of May. I will get more sessions starting July 9th. It will be every day for about 10 days, with Sunday off. Hopefully this will continue to help and be the answer i've been looking for. I think it will. It may not be a cure, but it will defenetely help the point where i can attend school this fall and function and not be bedridden!