The whinge of a hypochondriac

I have had this neck pain for ages, I can't remember how long. I've always attributed it to sleeping in a funny position, or studying for too long. The pain has always been on the same spot: on the back of my neck, on the right upper border of the trapezius muscle.

Yesterday, at about 10am, all of a sudden, I experienced a sharp stabbing pain in that exact location, whereupon I could not move my head nor my arm without excruciating pain. Sitting in a rather prominent position in the library, I managed to gather my things, log off on the computer, and leave the building before emitting a loud moan. As the day wore on, I was able to move my arm but my range of movement of my neck was poor.

I bet you're all thinking: she pulled something. That is what I thought too, except there was no trauma. In the afternoon, when I went to pick up my brother from his after school care facility, I encountered an old friend who was in final year physiotherapy, and who happened to be working there. She got me to sit on the children's couch , where she "looked at" my neck. The "consultation" ran thus:

She moves my head. I scream. The children gawk, then giggle nervously. "Wow, you've lost range of movement," She says. Tell me something I don't bloody know, I thought darkly.

She pokes my neck. I scream. The children are silent, all are concentrating on me now. Their eyes are like 20c coins. "That spot." I say. "Yeah, that's your triggering point... see?" she pokes that spot again. I scream again. I bloody well know that's my triggering point, you didn't need to show me, you twit, I think to myself. But of course, I appreciated her doing this and so I kept my mouth shut.

One little girl comes up to me. "Who are you?" she says. "She is my old friend, and she is training to be a doctor." my friend states. The little girl backs away.

When she was finally done, she said: "I havn't done a proper examination on you. But I think it's either disc, or spasm, or both. But that's only my opinion. Don't take my word for it."

Crap! I thought (completely forgetting about my friend's many disclaimers). Disc as in disc protrusion? How do they treat that anyway? I don't think they can! Arrgh crap!

The pain didn't get any better last night, despite my use of pain killers and heat-packs. I couldn't even sleep properly; dreaming about the pain and waking up to the pain. Sometime during the night (I think, around 3am), I woke up, and palpated my neck, at the "triggering point" and (drowsily) thought: shit, is that a lump? What is this lumpy thing? My gosh, what if I have a tumour of some sort, growing at my brachial plexus? It would have to be surgically removed. Bye-bye use of the right arm. I won't be able to be a doctor anymore. I won't be able to do ANYthing anymore. No no, hold on, I can be a phone-counsellor. Actually I can be a non-phone-counsellor too. I will go to one of those Christian colleges... I wonder which one? (Yes I know it's stupid, but it was 3am and I was in pain.)

Fast forward to this morning, when I finally saw a GP. She listened to me describe it, poked my neck, and said: "You've pulled something." She gave me a NSAID (a "doctor's sample", right off her desk), and basically that was that. No scans. No extensive range-of-movement tests. No questions about how much I study or what I do in my part time. And that was that. I left, feeling some ambivalence over the "physicians sample" drugs, my own hypochondriac tendencies, and why I am such a wimp. My mum bought me pizza to go with my meds and told me soothingly that everyone percieves pain differently (which I know) and I am just sensitive to pain. At least it was nice to be babied.

And now my life must return to normal, albeit with a pain in the neck. So no more procrastinating for me: Iron absorption and metabolism is waiting for me.