Everyone has been so wonderful helping me get the word out and get some much needed commissions and donations. I thank everyone who's helped so far. Unfortunately, bills recur every month, and I have some updates for everyone who's helping.

I was able to get a full spinal x-ray as well as ultrasounds of my lower legs. My doctor also wants me to have an MRI, but she suspects the x-rays are revealing part of the root of the problem.

I haven't been to my doctor yet to talk to her about the results, but as I did bring CD copies of the x-rays home with me, I was able to look at them for myself. I am not a trained medical professional - but I am an anthropologist. I have seen and worked with quite a lot of human bones, and have a very advanced understanding of anatomy and the way a spine should look.

Most of my spine looks fine. But when you get down to the bottom of the thoracic vertebrae (thoracic are the ones going from your shoulders down to almost the small of your back - basically the set where your ribs and collar bones are "attached"), and then into the lumbar (small of back to pelvis, leading into tailbone) vertebrae, things start to look...Wrong.

The discs between my vertebrae are...VERY thin. Less than a third the width that they should be and ARE throughout the rest of my back. Not surprisingly, this is where the pain in my back is localized.

Some quick research on these symptoms pulled up the most likely culprit as degenerative disc syndrome - which is what I suspected from the moment I learned that my mother also has this disorder, as does my father, and it's likely genetic.

The pain in my lower back is constant. I can't stand for longer than a few minutes at a time without having to lean on something. When I'm trying to put together a sandwich, I have to lay over the counter and work while half leaning/half laying there just to be able to stand long enough to do it. And then getting back to my desk is excruciating.

The pain radiates from my spine across my hips. It makes my legs shake and tremble, and more than once they've simply refused to keep holding me up, resulting in me slamming sideways into a wall at best, and actually falling at worst.

During the x-rays the other day, they had me laying on a board-hard table in many different positions. This actually seems to have made the pain worse. I can't sit at my desk for more than an hour or so without it becoming unbearable, and I don't have the money right now to go get my Vicodin refilled to relieve it. I'm in pretty much constant pain, and my doctor wants my next step to be an MRI.

She thinks on top of the back pain, I might have Fibromyalgia. I just stared at her. I know what that is. A very good, long time friend of mine has it. It's terrifying. So I'm trying to put that possibility out of my mind for right now.

I'm focusing on getting the help I need, getting the medical tests I need, and hopefully proving to the Social Security Administration that I deserve Disability.

In the mean time, even knowing that the amount of time I can be at my desk and work is greatly reduced, I am keeping Commissions open, and as always am open for donations. I need to get these pain meds refilled. I...I think I might go crazy if I don't.

Thank you all again for all your help. I appreciate everything.