Hi all! I am a 53 year old, native Bavarian turned American Pollyanna. I’m physically fit, an all organic consumer (grass-fed milk/meat products, GMO free) and I live in Southern California. It’s mostly here where I write German short stories, play the classical piano and yodel. Today I’m taking a break from all that to take the time to introduce myself to this community and to ask of you to please bare with me, as English is my second language.  I’m happily married to the kindest, most even tempered, loving and adoring man I believe to live on this planet. We have three beautiful kids: Two girls and a boy. Our oldest just got married to her high school sweetheart and lives in Berlin. Our middle daughter snagged a job in the entertainment industry and bravely moved to the Big Apple a year and a half ago. Our happy-go-lucky son will fly the coop this summer to transfer to UCSC. We are a very close knit, fun-loving family and every winter we get together for exciting days in the snow. Since I love the water just as much, some of my other favorite activities include jet skiing, bodysurfing and boating, but also enjoy playing tennis, or going on runs/hikes with the “Hash House Harriers”, a self proclaimed “drinking club with a running problem”. In short: I am a very active individual with a vivacious and sunny disposition.  However, this winter was to mark the first ski season to take place without me due to unbearable Thoracic back pain. Therefore, bodysurfing, hiking, tennis or participating in any and all activities that involved reaching, bending or twisting motions were now impossible. Practicing the piano was no longer an option due to my inability to sit for longer periods of time. In fact, all activities involving extended sitting were eliminated, like visiting opera, theater or ballet performances, dinners with friends, longer car rides without a seat heating feature.  The constant pain got excruciating with certain movements. Within the past six months my life quality was so severely diminished that I was literally reduced to either “living” on a heating pad most of my days, or taking opiate pain medications to participate in normal daily activities. Out of immense fear of addiction I chose the heating pad over the pain pills whenever possible, with my ever sympathetic husband rubbing the affected area, at times even in the middle of the night. But laying down for extended periods of time turned into a catch-22, as it weakened me considerably, thus generating more flair-ups. My husband and I couldn’t travel anymore to visit with family, and other than an occasional visit to a movie theater with reclining seats we were reduced to the indoors when trying to spend quality time together. It all started in my early 20’s in form of severe spasms, but only very few in-between. I was diagnosed with slight scoliosis and told there was no cure for it. In my 30’s, the onsets of pain came more frequently and occurred on either the upper-mid right or upper-mid left of my spine, but for whatever reason almost never on both sides concurrently. Since I believed nothing could be done, and given that the pain would eventually disappear as fast as it had come, usually within just a day or two, I did not seek medical care then either. Doam’s became my choice of pain aid instead.  Finally, in my early 40’s during travel I experienced a first back spasm attack that lasted for more than two traumatizing weeks. I still was not aware that opiate pain medications were able to eliminate the pain. So I spent all of these horror days and nights with cries of excruciating pain, while I involuntary twisted and turned and jerked, which aggravated the spasms all the more. I swallowed more Doam’s and applied topical creams, I had my children walk on my back, I stood under scolding hot showers, leaned against an electric massage seat cushion and lay motionless on a heating pad. Thankfully, most other times the pain went away after (now increased) 2-5 days, depending on how still I was able to keep my body while I lay on the heating pad. However, just getting up to go to the bathroom aggravated the spasms all over again.  In my mid to end 40’s the pain attacks came more and more frequently. From 3-4 times yearly it had escalated to almost monthly onsets. During this time I went to a random health clinic nearby where I managed to convince an assistant physician to take an Xray of my spine. He diagnosed slight scoliosis, as well. But what was different this time: He prescribed 5mg Hydrocodone, every 4-6 hours or as needed for pain. For the first time I was pain free during a back spasm attack! To my great relieve I also learned that if I took one of these pills at an onset of a flair-up, the spasms completely went away. No longer did I have days or even weeks of debilitating pain. A 30 pill prescription would last me well over a year.  After I turned 50, the attacks came even more frequently. Except now it mostly took 2-3 days of treatment with Hydrocodone before the muscles relaxed to a pain free state. The war on opiates had started as well, and it got increasingly difficult for me to get pain medication prescriptions. By now I had to take two 5mg Hydrocodone pills at once, and at least twice daily to treat the pain effectively. At times I was prescribed Tramadol instead, which would take much too long to set in, therefore giving the spasms a huge head start, making them all the more difficult to contain. I recall one particularly devastating incident when an attack happened right before the weekend. I had to go to the emergency room where I was prescribed a mere six 5mg Hydrocodone pills along with condescending looks from the nurses, as if I was some drug addict jonesing for a fix. It was downright humiliating. To make matters worse, our health insurance company had started to suspect me of being an opiate addict and gave my husband and me numerous concerned phone calls promoting opioid addiction solutions.  Because my condition had worsened so much over the years I grew suspicious of my diagnosis yet again and asked different general practitioners at different medical facilities to please order an MRI. They all declined, wrote out scarce pain prescriptions while generously adding plenty of 10mg Flexeril and sent me on my way. In my distress I decided to go to the emergency room of the same above mentioned hospital, (a nationwide leading catholic hospital chain) to ask for an MRI, because I had learned that this hospital was the only one in my area that had their own MRI equipment on site. But before answering my question they made me sign in. Still in the waiting room area, within minutes a nurse called me over and explained that they don’t do MRI’s on emergency visits. Nevertheless, I was billed $450 co-pay for a visit in the waiting room area that lasted less than five minutes. The administrators explanation: I had been consulted by a nurse. I was absolutely floored. This was downright racketeering. Needless to say I never went back to this hospital again.    In the summer of 2017 I had lost massive amounts of blood over a duration of three months, due to uterine fibroids. Falsely assuming I had entered menopause and brushing it off as a common irregularity I didn’t seek help. Had it not been for my deeply concerned husband who took me to the hospital after he noticed sudden apathy and unresponsiveness in my behavior I would have likely lost my life. I received several blood transfusions and uterus reconstruction operations. Following the blood transfusion and surgery I suffered from non-stop back pain, 24 hours a day, this time with the left and right side hurting simultaneously. In addition, I no longer enjoyed pain-free weeks or even just days. It wasn’t until August of 2017 that I finally saw a spine specialist. He ordered an MRI. The diagnosis was, of course, scoliosis, but the MRI also revealed multilevel degenerative disc disease with protrusions at T1-2, T3-4, T5-6, T7-8 and T8-9\. It was the first time that I felt validated and truly believed. The doctor prescribed 10mg Hydrocodone, at 60 pills per month, for a duration of six months. I took them almost daily but at times was able to skip the evening dose. After six months he wrote me off as chronic and set up an appointment with an in-house pain management physician.  I read up about pain management on internet forums and learned the shocking truth about what this would mean for me: Entering into a very mistrustful environment, complete with regular urine tests and signed contracts to never get pain medication from another physician, which in my case would restrict the length of any family trip overseas. Fear, anxiety, agony and humiliation would be added to my daily routine again, along with trials of different medications that likely wouldn’t work, cortisone shots with horrid long term side effects, psychologist visits, more mandatory physical therapy to trigger flair-ups, opiates in patch form, or suggestions to simply live with the pain while meditating or trying more yoga. It was then that I told my husband that I didn’t want to live anymore if I was going to be shoved down into the chronic pain management hellhole. Over the years I have tried everything under the sun in an effort to heal my back. I have tried numerous medications, prescription pain patches, received acupuncture sessions, seen different chiropractors and physical therapists, both here in the US and abroad. This included out of pocket visits with a DO who charged $500 per session to teach me physical therapy exercises, or a holistic clinic where I was encouraged to purchase all kinds of high cost supplements that weren’t covered by our PPO insurance and frankly did not help me, among them 16 nasty tasting capsules per day of “Yunnan Baiyao Jiaonang”, a Class-1 protected medicine (with its exact formula being a closely guarded secret), made famous for being carried by the Vietcong as a topical for external use to stop bullet wounds from bleeding during the Vietnam War. I am not over-exaggerating when I assure you that the repulsive stench of this “agent orange remedy” was identical to our dog’s flea pills. Needless to say it did nothing for my back.    “Living” in bed and still trying to be productive I began to research the internet for some shred of hope for my depressing and seemingly hopeless back disease. I stumbled over an article about a regenerative medicine approach, particularly stem cell therapy (yet another hopeful treatment for back injuries that the FDA won’t approve).  After much online research I found a renowned physician in Los Angeles who offers stem-cell therapy. I introduced the idea to my spine specialist’s physician assistant, a young man with a more cutting edge approach (if his patient do their own homework!). He strongly encouraged me to seek it out as an alternative treatment for me. The next day I contacted the physician at the stem cell institute and set up an appointment for a consultation. Then I watched an educational video on Youtube about all the wrong things a man said to his pain management doctor before he was entirely cut off from his pain medications. While reading through countless comments the community had left about the video and their own cruel fate, I found two separate comments about Kratom. Both of them raved about how Kratom changed their lives: While one person suffered from chronic pain, the other person suffered from severe depression. Both claimed that Kratom had given them their lives back. The raw writing, filled with utter sadness, despair, relieve and real results sounded so credible that I experienced a sudden glimpse of hope. More than intrigued, I wanted to find out more, so I googled “Kratom Reddit”. There it was: Countless positive testimonials about Kratom. I read them for hours on end, including learning about rotating different strains to avoid building up a tolerance, or where to best order Kratom and which strains, or to avoid Kratom extracts at all cost, or the political standpoint and possible dangers of a Kratom ban, and much, much more. Finally, I decided to try this miracle botanical out for myself and ordered four different strains online: Red Maeng da, White Maeng da, Green Malay and Red Sumatra. And oh my god, they all work for my pain!  I find the Red Maeng da to be my personal favorite, and possibly the Green Malay as well, although the White Maeng Da boasts a little boost of energy for the day that lay ahead. Anyway, a week later I placed another order with a more cost efficient company than the initial one and ordered additional different strains from different origins, like Yellow Thai, Red Thai, Green Maeng Da, Gold MD, Red Sumatra, etc. . The only one that didn’t do anything for me was the Gold MD, but all the other ones are an absolute miracle botanical! All I need to take is 2 grams (1 level teaspoon) twice daily (I’m 5’11” and 148 pounds), before breakfast and before bedtime, whisked in a half a glass of fresh squeezed orange juice. I have not taken a pain pill since the morning I first took Kratom, and to top it all off, I had absolutely zero withdrawal symptoms from the opiates. I guess I will never quite know for sure whether I had gotten physically addicted to them or not.  But who cares! I’ve got my life back! No longer do I cry through sleepless nights from pain, or from depression in light of a terrible future with chronic pain and opiate pain medicine ahead of me. I am ecstatic of relieve and happiness! To my husband’s delight I enjoy sex again! I’m back at the gym! I can go skiing again! I no longer have to dread the high from opioid pain medications! Kratom lets me resume my daily work in a sober and happy state! NO MORE NARCOTICS FOR ME, EVER! :))))  I am eager to help fight for our right to Kratom. I have donated to AKA, I’ve become an AKA Guardian of Our Freedom Warrior for Kratom and afterwards mobilized my entire circle of family and friends to sign the Kratom petition: [https://www.americankratom.org/copy-of-petitions](https://www.americankratom.org/copy-of-petitions) I have also listened to the webinars available on this site, where Dr. Jack Henningfield has so aptly put it in a nutshell:  “Describing Kratom as a narcotic-type opioid is like describing caffein as an opioid-like stimulant.” Next on my list is contacting my congressman at my district office and my senator with my personal story to have them reach out to the DEA and FDA on my behalf.  Thanks for having me! Go AKA!!! :)

A heartwarming testimonial Funny! If you get a chance to copy and paste this into the testimonial section I think everyone would be glad to see it there are well. Your english is excellent and even if english was not my native language, I am a horrid typer. Welcome to the forum i truly look forward to you sharing your knowledge and experience.

Hey & Welcome, Funn …  I am _very_ pleased to meet you & that you have chosen to join us. Your story is an amazing story & I am thrilled that you too have found the miracle that I & others have found in kratom. So many lives have been returned to so many people, it is still stunning for me, even 9 years later as I read each & every new story. As I have told others, I have never, will never lose the amazement & the thrill I feel when I read a success story. It never becomes less than wonderful. I see that you have put your story in Testimonials, Thank You for that. Please make yourself at home & if you have any questions about anything please do not ever hesitate to ask, ok? I think you have already discovered this but will say it anyhow, we, the kratom community, are highly caring & supportive & will help each other, this includes you btw, in any way we can. Again, Welcome & Thank You for your amazing story.

@'RoninAdvocacy': > A heartwarming testimonial Funny! If you get a chance to copy and paste this into the testimonial section I think everyone would be glad to see it there are well. Your english is excellent and even if english was not my native language, I am a horrid typer. Welcome to the forum i truly look forward to you sharing your knowledge and experience. Thank you very much for your kind words of encouragement, Ronin. I look forward to sharing the wealth and to help in anyway I can.  :)

Funny German Girl, I am amazed by your positive spirit in the face of such torturous physical conditions. I related to your story so much as I too suffer from severe scoliosis and am married to whom I feel is the kindest and most even tempered person on the planet. Thank God we have that going for us eh? Your husband sounds like a saint. I wonder sometimes how my wife does it, I’m so thankful for her. I had my first corrective back surgery in 1974, I was 19 yrs old. I had a second in 1999 and was left with a spinal cord injury. I spent 2 months in a rehab hospital learning how to walk again. Luckily, I’m am walking but am compromised from the chest down, T-6 area. Muscle weakness, spasms and pain. I’m new here to AKA and have read a lot of testimonials and was inspired to place my first order of Kratom the other day. Your story has filled me with hope that I will soon be able to post my success story and join you in this community as another advocate. Thank you for your post

@'Green Gene': > Funny German Girl, > I am amazed by your positive spirit in the face of such torturous physical conditions. I related to your story so much as I too suffer from severe scoliosis and am married to whom I feel is the kindest and most even tempered person on the planet. Thank God we have that going for us eh? Your husband sounds like a saint. I wonder sometimes how my wife does it, I’m so thankful for her. > I had my first corrective back surgery in 1974, I was 19 yrs old. I had a second in 1999 and was left with a spinal cord injury. I spent 2 months in a rehab hospital learning how to walk again. Luckily, I’m am walking but am compromised from the chest down, T-6 area. Muscle weakness, spasms and pain. > I’m new here to AKA and have read a lot of testimonials and was inspired to place my first order of Kratom the other day. Your story has filled me with hope that I will soon be able to post my success story and join you in this community as another advocate. > Thank you for your post Congratulations, Gene, you are already a member of the kratom community & should consider your last post (above) ^^^ your first step into Advocacy. Welcome to Advocacy, Gene …  :shy:

Welcome funny, make yourself at home. :)

@'Green Gene': > Funny German Girl, > I am amazed by your positive spirit in the face of such torturous physical conditions. I related to your story so much as I too suffer from severe scoliosis and am married to whom I feel is the kindest and most even tempered person on the planet. Thank God we have that going for us eh? Your husband sounds like a saint. I wonder sometimes how my wife does it, I’m so thankful for her. > I had my first corrective back surgery in 1974, I was 19 yrs old. I had a second in 1999 and was left with a spinal cord injury. I spent 2 months in a rehab hospital learning how to walk again. Luckily, I’m am walking but am compromised from the chest down, T-6 area. Muscle weakness, spasms and pain. > I’m new here to AKA and have read a lot of testimonials and was inspired to place my first order of Kratom the other day. Your story has filled me with hope that I will soon be able to post my success story and join you in this community as another advocate. > Thank you for your post Hello Gene,  If this isn’t the most inspiring note! Thank you so much! I can fully relate to your T pain. A lot more people seem to suffer from lower back pain and there aren't that many many posts on upper back pain. Unlike you, I have not had back surgeries and I can only imagine how much worse your pain must be because of that! But very soon your life will change you back to the person you used to be, before all the agony and pain tortured you.   It is such a nice feeling that my openness has touched you. It also reassures me that it was a good decision to put myself out there, given that I am otherwise a very private person. Vice versa, your loving words about your kind and loving wife touched me all the same. Yes, we are very, very fortunate to have found such understanding mates. Like you, I do not take this for granted, having read in countless chronic pain posts how so many of us are left by their spouses because of the horrible strain it puts on them. I’m all the happier that my husband’s patience has been fully rewarded by the return of the same woman he once married. Thanks to Kratom. I can’t even wait until you will receive your order and your wife experiences the same as my husband! I am absolutely convinced that within the first hour you will start be your normal self again. A new beginning of a new life, so much worth living!  Cheers! Funny   * * * @'will': > Welcome funny, make yourself at home. :) Thank you very much, Will. I truly enjoy looking at your pictures and reading all about your farming! Smiles :)  Funny