May God bless you! It is a hard life to live like this but I have decided that I would rather be here like this than not be here so ..where do you go from there? I can sit at the computer 30 minutes and I am just about to scream in ppain. My feet and legs swell so that they feel like they are going to explode. Then..I have to go get in the bed and prop my feet up on pillows until the swelling has gone down. The disc. in my back that have deteriorated (3) are not the cause of my legs. The valves in my veins are weak and will let the blood flow down but they will not let it flow back up unless my feet are up higher than the rest of my body. This is a lifetime thing with me and can not be fixed. It causes the skin on my legs to rupture when they swell so bad. I had surgery 5 years ago on my legs and they dug pretty deep to clean the places. This time they are trying to use a chemical medicine to clean up the places and then try skin grafts. They can't dig any deeper to clean up the places because of the nerves. I can just be sitting/laying down and I will feel these stabbing pains like needles going into the nerves. When it gets really bad and last for along time I will be screaming out in pain. It would be no different if someone was burning me over and over. This has just started since they started trying the chemical meds I am putting on the two places. One large place on the back of my right lower leg and one smaller place on the left lower leg. The really bad thing is they are on the back of each leg and I have to prop these places on pillows and that part is touching the pillows. My legs are bandaged everyday but the most painful part is what is touching something when I lay down and when I try to sleep. I really think the wound care spec. goofed somewhere because they were not hurting like this until he started with a cure. Now, I stay sick on my stomach all the time. The pain is almost unbearable. Prayer is the only thing that has kept me going these last few months. My advise to you is the same you gave me. Hang in there. I am sure the Lord will see me through this. Prayer is the answer to everything! Linda in Ga