Highlights: Emotional Consequences of RSD

 

Amanda Alberigi

Amanda Alberigi:
I planned on going to college on a full gymnast scholarship, and I lost that and it was hard. I couldn't go to college and be the gymnast I wanted to be or go to the Olympics.

Sarah Young

Sarah Young:

(Link to update on Sarah

Young below)

I always wanted to be a flight attendant ever since I was younger, but I can't!

Justin Raulerson

Justin Raulerson:
I have played baseball for 10 years in a row. And then I had broken my ankle and got this disease and haven't played since.

Lacey Booth

Lacey Booth:
I use to ride horseback and now my sister rides horseback and I can't and I really want to. My mom told me, "Next year", and then we figured out I have Reflex Sympathetic Dystrophy and there wasn't any next year.

Narrator:
Dr. Richard Hoffman, a clinical psychologist experienced in treating the emotional needs of patients with RSD, sat down with four young people with RSD and encouraged them to talk about their experiences with this disease.

Sarah Young:
You can't be a normal teenager.

Amanda Alberigi:
It's hard waking up every morning and going on with your day and not being able to do the things you really enjoyed before you had it and it's hard not being able to participate in the things you would like to participate in.

Justin Raulerson:
You can't really, like you can't do any of the stuff you use to do. It's hard to get up in the mornings.

Dr. Richard Hoffman discusses RSD with Lacey

Lacey Booth:
I just...when my friends used to go outside and play, at school, I couldn't go out, you know. All I could do was sit there and watch them.

Sarah Young:
I went to therapy and it kind of made me feel like I was kinda crazy but, I knew I wasn't, but I was like really suicidal. (Sarah was crying at this time.)

Narrator:
Their comments were unscripted and the video was presented without editing to allow the viewer to appreciate the honest and natural discussion as it occurred.

Dr. Hoffman separately talked with the mothers of the four patients and once again this discussion is presented uncut and unedited.

Renee Raulerson

Mrs. Raulerson:
And the school system is bad. They don't understand so, yet you have a hard time because the children miss a lot of school.

Dr. Hoffman:
The school system doesn't want to accommodate to the special needs of the kid.

Mrs. Raulerson:
No, no.

Patti Booth

Patti Booth:
It is very hard because like right now Lacey is doing real well, and so it's hard for me to sit here and listen to everybody else talk about the fact that it does come and go and that's scary, that's real scary. You know, I keep telling Lacey I wish I could put a band-aid on it and kiss it and I can't do that.

Mrs. Alberigi:
You feel helpless.

Narrator:
Both of these discussions provide an insight into the emotional and psychological impact of a disease like RSD on both patients and caregivers alike.

Our purpose in presenting these discussions is to allow health care professionals and others an opportunity to glimpse the emotional side of RSD, providing an important supplement to the critically important but necessarily impersonal clinical information.

 

 

If you wish to purchase an extended version of this program that is two hours long on DVD or VHS video tape please contact the International Research Foundation for RSD / CRPS at its website www.rsdfoundation.org or call the Foundation's headquarters in the United States at 1-813-907-2312. The price for either the DVD or VHS video tape is $49.95. All proceeds go to the RSD Research Fund.