Female Patient Age 23

My Story

It was nearly ten years ago when I had an accident while riding my horse. I was jumping a ditch and I decided to jump the ditch and he decided not to! I landed on my head the other side of the jump. I knocked myself out, when I came round I had to get back on him otherwise I would lose my nerve.

This accident, along with another two or three made me live in pain every day. I used to take pain killers every day before I started riding so that I could deal with it, sometimes it would get so bad that I was taking 36 Anadin Extra a week!

My family are all really well people and wanted to get my back sorted out as soon as possible. We were recommended to an Osteopath. I went to her about 10 times, she said that I needed to get an X-ray done to see if there was any bone damage from the Accident. The X-rays came back and there was no bone damage, there was slight Osteoporosis in my lower spine however nothing too serious.  She said that I had the back of a 45-year-old not a 14 year old!

I began to suffer from splitting headache, like migraine, and when they came I needed to lie down and felt disoriented. After a while of visiting this Osteopath, I felt that I wasn't improving so mum and dad decided to send me to the local GP. He sent me to a Physiotherapist.

I went to Hospital, where I was told to put my horse on loan, while they sorted out my back and gave me a number of different therapies; ultra sound, heat and hydro therapy to name but a few.

At this time I knew that this wasn't the right therapy for me, I knew inside what my body could cope with and what it couldn't. The Physio would make me do exercises/stretches for about an hour in the hydro therapy pool, after each time I visited I would come out with the most severe headache and back ache - this was not the way forward.

We returned to my local GP, he then decided that because the X-rays showed that there was no bone injury. It was also noted that my back became worse when I was stressed or worried about something. He sent me to a councillor - there was nothing wrong with my back so it must be in my head!

After four sessions with the councillor, learning how to relax - I still had terrible backache and headaches - this was not the way forward.

Dad then thought that maybe alternative therapy was the answer; off I went to an acupuncturist. He advised that my back was bad; he stuck lots of needles in me and did ultra sound on me. He also had to put my coccyx back into place from where I had fallen on one of the accidents. At £80 a session when my back felt no better after three sessions we decided this was definitely not the way forward.

Next it was a Chiropractor, whose treatment was very much like that of an Osteopath, very much clicking and pushing things back into place. On my initial consultation I was told to sit down as little as possible and to do lots of different sorts of exercises. This I found very difficult working from 9-17.30 in an office!! The exercise again hurt my back and sometimes caused my back to hurt more and gave me a headache.  After visiting this gentleman for about 6 treatments, I began to feel that we were throwing money into thin air. I would go in, he we tell me to sit up straight, click my back once - maybe twice, then he would try and clear my Atlas - which of course hurt too much, then I got dressed.

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