Hi.My name is Shannon. I'm sorry to hear of your plight. But I do know how you feel. I've had 12 back surgeries and I have significant nerve damage. I know that the doctors will tell you that opiates are actually not the best course of action for nerve pain. They usually start with something like Neurontin(gabapentin) or amytriptyline. Then they will probably add an antidepressant. As a last resort for chronic pain they will prescribe narcotics. All I know is that I have literally tried every combination they can think of and the only relief I get is from dangerously large amounts of narcotics.And the relief is minimal due to the tolerance effect after 22 years of pain.They are now considering nerve ablation.And by that I don't mean chemical or radiofrequency ablation as they have already tried that 4 times. They want to actually cut the nerves surgically which would result in some significant paralysis but at this point anything is better than the constant severe pain.I truly hope you find some relief.But take it from me, make the narcotics your last resort. They don't get you "high" when you have severe pain but they will pretty quickly eat your stomach and leave you feeling queasy all the time.Best of Luck and God Bless.

Ive found that Lyrica and Norco help quite a bit with my nerve pain. I suffered nerve damage along time ago due to a clot in an artery and never had any problems with it when it was just numb. Now Im having severe burning pain, that supposedly is being caused by disherniation(protrusion)of my L5S1 disc. Im also 26 and dont want to have back surgery because there no guarantees that it will even reduce the pain, it may even make it worse. I tried other meds to help with the pain, even stronger narcotics than norco but the the combo of Lyrica and Norco work better than anything else Ive tried so far. There now thinking about adding cymbalta into the mix so Im not sure if it will help or just complicate matter worse. All I know is that when I have flare ups of the nerve pain it is absolutely debilatating, even a slight breeze makes the pain intensify. Like mentioned above narcotics should be your last resort because your tolerance goes up rather quickly and you become addicted very quickly, but you gotta do what you gotta do. My doctor still doesnt believe that opiates help with nerve pain at all, but for some reason the combo Im on now makes it somewhat bearable.