I went in for my regular pain procedure yesterday. I had been scheduled six months ago when I was at my last one and I had even confirmed it over the phone two weeks ago. They called me a few days ago and moved it up an hour early. Bleh. It had already been plenty early.
They arrange for me to be there an hour early so I can be prepped before the doctor comes to get me. His intern started coming down early for me saying that the doctor wanted to speak with me before we began. I was concerned. This doctor gives excellent nerve blocks/joint injections but his bedside manner isn't great and I don't go to the pain clinic anymore. I just meet him at the hospital every six months. The pain clinic itself is awful and other than seeing this doctor at the hospital twice a year, I won't return.
The intern came down a few times and eventually asked the nurse who was taking down my details to let me go already. When I got in to the room, the Doctor asked me to sit down and talk to him. I was scared. We never speak like that and I was scared that he was going to cancel my procedure on me. It turns out that he remembered my comment last time that my other SI, the "good" one, had been acting up and he wanted to know how it had been and when I told him, he switched me to a double procedure at the last minute. I was pleasantly surprised. I've never had a double procedure. They froze the area, but no amount of that can prevent the injection from hurting like a $&%#* when they get that gigantic needle in each joint several times.
It's always super painful when the freezing wears off and for a while it hurts worse than when I went in but then I get a lot of relief after. But right now I'm in the freezing wearing off stage. Times two.