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The turning point came when Stephen found a doctor in
Florida who specializes in RSD. “His protocols were different
from any others I’d heard about. He gave me multiple injections
along the edge of my spinal cord (not epidurals, but trigger-point-like
injections). He got me off the morphine and put
me on Buprenex. That’s when things turned around. I started
moving and having energy again, and getting the pain under
control (as opposed to the pain having control of me). I was
still frail and walking with a cane, and I still had flare-ups, but
I was no longer praying not to wake up in the morning.”
When Stephen recovered enough to resume activities, he
had the rare opportunity to explore “a path not taken” in his
life before RSD. “I’ve always been an artist but never thought
of it as a career. I had sold my illustrations to magazines and
newspapers in the past, but I didn’t start expressing myself
through painting until I had recovered enough from the RSD.
When he began painting, Stephen’s work focused solely on
various aspects of RSD. “Some were visualizations of pain and
some were tactile (what the allodynia felt like). Some were
images of despair and loss—the loss of who I was, my ability to
enjoy being touched, and my sexuality.”
Today, Stephen works in his studio each day. His abstract
paintings no longer deal with pain, and he is working on the
illustrations for a short story that is a metaphor for what he
went through during his illness and recovery, and a book for
adolescents.
“I realized that I had always wanted to be an artist. The
RSD was my ‘wake-up call’—just like it was a wake-up call in
every other facet of my life. The RSD was a gift because it
gave me the space to become what I always should have been.
It also gave me an appreciation of life and my family.”
Stephen says, “In a way, I used my paintings as a ‘revenge
on the disease’ by making it something that could be shown. I
wanted to put it up to the light.” For people who were beginning
to have RSD symptoms, he wanted to encourage them
to seek help immediately. He also wanted to use visual
imagery to show the doctors who denied that he had RSD,
that they were wrong.
Stephen does not know if his condition will continue to
improve, but he is hopeful. “I’m mobile and I can use my
hands. I still can’t play ball with my kids, I’m not well enough
to work out and keep in shape, and I still can’t play my guitar,
although I try sometimes (Stephen had signed a contract with
BMI, a music publishing company, prior to his illness). I just
have to be patient and keep doing what I’m doing.”
LOVERS
Soapstone and mixed media on canvas 10x10
SPASM canvas on canvas 20X18
“The RSD was a gift because it gave me the
space to become what I always should have been”
T H E PA I N P R A C T I T I O N E R | V O L U M E 16 , N U M B E R 1 | 23