Thanks again for your replies.
It was not my intention to talk about backs, and this post is getting seriously close to being put in the Agony Aunt forum, but the pattern of flare-ups suddenly sounded familiar, and it was this that caused me to go into the thread-drift while asking about CTS.
In trying to correlate a possible common cause for two quite separate problems, I have of course created several red herrings. I'm banned from talking about backs in the Rivet household, it's all been going on so long. In my years of investigation into back pain, I hear of many famous, and often wealthy people, who's life has been ruined by this problem. Their wealth usually does not buy them an answer. For Jerry Lewis, it was a great deal longer than six years, and he says that it was only his (young) son that kept him from ending it all. ( He resorted to a catheter implant that manages pain control.)
As mentioned, I am trying to think laterally. I really am suspicious that if psychological factors are eliminated, there may be an inflamation factor that fluctuates in a way that may give a few clues. Today I have been working on the house and swimming with the g-children...not a hint of a problem. Yesterday was c&@p
I know that ‘reassuringly expensive' drugs can be injected into the discs and facet joints, but the underlying mystery of inflamation is something that can not be easily determined as the cause. It is not easy to do a biopsy–or indeed to determine the location for such an investigation. It is also very difficult to determine which came first, inflamation or irritation by abrasion. A classic chicken and egg problem.
As one who has tried almost all permutations of exercise and traction imaginable, (but not the DRX9000 mentioned a while back ) I have long thought that the variation in pain is somewhat mysterious. To relate it to CTS is just one possible line of logic.
I am typical of millions of people, and I would like to see more training and education given to the young, so that the worn and collapsing discs found in otherwise active people, can be obviated. Just saying ‘keep your back straight while lifting' is just so much tosh. Sure, it is important, but it's only a fraction of what is needed to keep backs healthy.
The fundamental need for building the structure of the body up--before the age of thirty, is something that catches out a lot of people. I for one, worked harder at sports after that age than ever before...because of a commitment to flying. Cars, pubs and airplanes filled my life before that time, and although years of tennis and judo did not give me a jot of back pain, it left me with a ‘push through red-line' mentality. At sixty years old, the bits inside just did not agree with this viewpoint, and I feel that I have aged 20 years in the last six.
For general interest, I will try to scan an MRI and post the pic or link. It shows some of the problems experienced by people as they age. (I haven't tried this before.)