Botox: not the answer to my condition

It has been 9 days since my diagnosis and first injection of Botox into my forearm. Though it is a little early to speak definitively on the subject I can say that I will not be doing it again.

First, I feel I made a mistake by accepting the consensus in the US that it was my only option. I must preface the following by saying I do not blame the doctors here, and am extremely grateful for the way they have reached out to help me. I was rushed in 3 weeks ahead of schedule and treated immediately. Their honest intentions were to help me in all ways possible within the context of their education and experience. 

That being said, the botox has now started effecting the wrong fingers, and the problem finger is still the same. My middle finger(right hand) is now having trouble keeping up with the index, and the index is slightly effected as well. The bad news is my middle finger is what saved me through re-fingering and allowed me to keep playing. My picado technique was my savior and is now dysfunctional as well. The good news is I will now be forced to rest, and to stop re-fingering which is known to cause further dystonia. It will stop taking effect after 2-3 months.

I've come to a few conclusions. This is not an exact science. I feel it is too much to ask any doctor to consistently pull this off without error. The idea of temporarily killing the very nerves that are reacting wrong to the commands of my brain does not make sense, and at best would temporarily cover up symptoms. This is not the direction I've ever looked when it comes to health care, so it does not make sense to start now.

Reflecting further on this thought, and discussing the idea with a very respectable physical therapist that works with hand disorders and musicians, we both agreed in theory(not by any evidence) that it is possible that killing these nerves that we are trying to re-train could further aggravate my condition.

And lastly I cannot get past the fact that 1 botox shot costs $1000. It makes me sick to think about it. This has nothing to do with our doctors and everything to do with our dysfunctional health care system. The priority is maximum profit, not the health of patients. The pharmaceutical industry in this country has a strangle hold on whole world. I understand the concept of recouping R & D costs, but I think we can all agree that Botox has made their fair share of profit.

This mentality gives me inherent distrust of our health care system and has always led me to more natural alternative and preventative care.

I am still taking a little more time to decide what direction I will go before I commit to treatment as I will go all the way when I do. So far Dr. Joaquin Farias has resonated with me most regarding my condition. A combination of motor re-training and understanding completely why this is happening to me. I’ll leave you with an excerpt form his book “Intertwined – How to Induce Nueroplacsticity”. I apologize for the spacing.  The PDF does not like copy and paste, which probably means I'm not supposed to. Oh well. This has me thinking in a new direction.

The hypnotizing ball

Daniel is a ping pong player, a member of his country’s national team. To the

surprise of his friends, he left his profession just when it was predicted that he would be

at the top of his career.

Daniel suffered from focal dystonia which affected the extensor muscles in his

forearm. Physical therapy treatments had provided no results.  His case included one

peculiarity: he was able to perform all the movements without holding the paddle. Even more peculiar was that he was able to perfectly perform the movements using the

paddle in the air.

As soon as a ball was bounced on the table, triggering the learned serve

response, his wrist extended uncontrollably. On occasions this happed so intensely that

he lost control and threw the paddle. 

This case can again be explained by association and highlights the importance of

context. A predetermined context existed where his reaction was learned and inevitably

produced a dysfunctional connection. These contexts could become so specific that,

varying only in small details, the system did not recognize the context, leaving it to its

own associations. All of the elements present at the time the dysfunctional sequence

was programmed should appear in a concrete order in order to create the spasticity.

In this case, the dystonia was not in his hand, but in the ball.

This clue can be used when designing rehabilitation exercises, always seeking to

establish control within contexts not associated with spasticity in order to later confront

the conflictive contexts, modifying details so as to produce less extreme responses.