Plaidophile

You know it isn't a good sign when a traditional doctor suggests trying acupuncture...

(Well okay, he didn't actually say it outright but he implied it.)

Anyway he injected my left wrist with cortisone so we could see if that helps with the pain, to see if it's an extreme tendonitis or something. And meanwhile he still doesn't have any idea as to whether I should keep working or not. Followup on the cortisone is he wants me to pay attention to my left wrist's pain levels especially in comparison to my right wrist's (I chose to make the left the test since in the meantime it's the one which needs the most love since it gets the most stressful use) and then tell him how it went... in two months.

The doctor said it's possible that I could have one particular rare form of CTS which results in the various standard CTS symptoms without the nerve compression, in which case the best treatment would be surgery (which I see as a last resort). Even if the cortisone helps he wouldn't use that as a long-term solution, though, since apparently although cortisone stops the rubbing and prevents new damage, it also slows down the natural healing process so the net result is that it actually causes more trouble than it fixes.

Anyway, I think the real solution would be for me to stop programming. And playing guitar. And violin. Ugh.