Christina’s Story – Breaking Free from the Cycle of Pain

Pain. It can break the strongest of us. Sometimes it is sudden and sharp, cracking like thunder, sending bolts of electric agony through us. Other times it might roll in like a fog, slowly enveloping and separating us from the world until it is our new normal. Pain can suck the joy out of life, if you let it. Christina Evans knows all-too-well about pain, but she chose to do something about it and changed her life for the better.

Christina’s story begins in 2006 when she started to experience neck pain on a regular basis. Usually the discomfort would last about a week, and then life would return to normal. Over the course of the next three years it began happening more often, and soon things began to get worse. Her limbs alternated between numbness and pain, she endured two pregnancies made difficult by her mysterious condition, and was forced to wear wrist braces just to do simple tasks. Then one day she woke to find the entire left side of her body numb, and what wasn’t numb was radiating with intense pain. An emergency MRI was ordered and Christina finally discovered the cause of all her pain: syringomyelia.

Syringomyelia is a very rare disease in which a cyst forms within your spinal cord. As the cyst grows over time it compresses and damages the spinal cord, causing pain, weakness, numbness, migraines, bowel control issues, difficultly with speaking and swallowing, paralysis and more. Some cases of syringomyelia are treatable, usually with surgery, but not Christina’s.

Without a cure, with the cyst growing and her pain increasing, Christina struggled to live a normal life. She couldn’t work, could barely parent and was considering going on disability. She lived in constant pain and a drug-induced haze........

Source/more: https://www.cannimed.ca/blogs/blog/117520965-christina-s-story-breaking-free-from-the-cycle-of-pain