Reading your own X-Rays? Yup. There's an app for that.

It's time for another show-and-tell. This time, it's about my progress on slowing the progression of my possible Hyper Mobility Syndrome/Ehlers Danlos Syndrome. Yes, progress on slowing progress. That's right.

In English: putting, and keeping, my joints in their places in order to:

• immediately - decrease my clumsiness & help me sleep better
• near future - decrease my pain & fatigue
• far future - decrease my chances of early arthritis & need for braces and other aids to help me do everyday things

I'm not sure whether these goals are achievable or not, but they seem reasonable to me, and I do have to start somewhere.  I'm enlisting professional help, while I have some health insurance, in order to see if these goals can be reached.

Here are a few of my recent x-rays, which show that this isn't all in my head.

Ohai, fused vertebrae!

Ohai, misaligned ribs!

 I'm going to the chiropractor twice a week for 5 or 6 weeks, and then I'll decrease the frequency of the sessions. The chiropractor is one of those new-fangled ones with all sorts of devices and ways to make adjustments as relaxing and as simple as possible for me. That's good news, because these newer methods make for a gentler visit and keeps my joints happy. So far, my body is adjusting really easily (probably due to the extra elasticity, ha!) and my neck is holding in place fairly well. My ribs and hips don't like to stay in place, but they feel fantastic for the first hour or so after the adjustment. Once they go back into their normal routine, I can feel that it's more difficult to walk and that I'm clumsier and not as strong.

I'm also have a physio appointment booked for two weeks from now. I'm going to get an assessment and see what they recommend. For now, though, it seems odd: they only work on one joint or problem at a time. Um.. sure.. that's one way to do it.. I explained that every joint in my body is hypermobile and that most partially dislocate every day, which causes me pain, stiffness, blah blah, but they asked me to pick one joint to work on. So.. left shoulder it is. They'll have fun with that one. I partially dislocate it whenever I move it, so it'll be a good test of the physio's chops to see if she can make sense of it.

In an attempt to prove that this isn't all in my head, I asked my chiro for temporary solutions for shoulder instability. He suggested seeing if a physio recommended taping my shoulder into place, like athletes do to prevent injuries.  I jumped the gun, found a good physio website, and followed the instructions to tape my shoulder into a stable position with sports tape.

The taping looks awful, because it's remarkably difficult to tape your own shoulder, I've discovered, even if your other arm is super bendy and can extend in odd angles. I got my partner to retape my shoulder the next day, and his tape job was much neater than mine.

During those two days, my left shoulder felt fantastic! My neck wasn't as tight or sore, and my left shoulder didn't feel anywhere near as stiff and tired as my right shoulder did. It improved my posture a bit, and I don't think it limited my range of motion much more than is the normal range for people. I couldn't reach in ways that I usually do, but I was able to sit in a chair for much longer without becoming uncomfortable, and I knit for hours longer than I'm usually able to. (I was listening to an audio book for school while knitting. It wasn't a completely frivolous use of my time!) I also slept really well, and was actually very comfortable in bed - which is rare for me. I usually toss and turn, changing my position every half hour or so. Therefore, I was a quick convert to sports taping, and was eager to see a physiotherapist to learn taping techniques and to get official medical approval.

So, last night: I had been wearing the tape for about 8 hours, and my shoulder had felt a little itchy during the day, but it wasn't enough to concern me, and certainly wasn't enough to outweigh the benefits that the tape afforded me. That was, until I took off the tape off and was greeted with this:

Eek! I was super itchy, but instead of scratching it, I put some lovely moisturizer on it. The moisturizer I use is also used for hospital patients with sensitive skin - like those undergoing chemo. So, it's good stuff and didn't cause the irritation. I still wasn't too concerned because, well, I had just removed the tape and I figured that a certain amount of itching was normal. I'd let it breathe for the night and retape it in the morning, even though I knew that sleeping without it taped up would mean that I would have a tricky time getting comfy in bed. But, I had to follow the cautions and not keep the tape on for an extended period of time (the tape packaging suggested 12h as a max).

Regardless, I woke up this morning to this:

So, no more sports taping for me, I guess. At least not unless the physio suggests kinesio tape, which a friend recommends as the least likely to give EDSers a tape rash, or, perhaps, just a minimal rash if your other EDS symptoms are mild, like mine are.

Good thing I only bought four rolls of the tape. Sigh.