What's the matter with me?

[Caitlin9]

I am 16 years old. In mid-October, I was in the play West Side Story for my school. I was on top of scaffolding, and fell 18 feet onto my back. In the emergency room, the doctors told me I had compression fractured my T5, T6, T7, and T8 vertebrates. I was also told I lost an inch off my height, and because of the spine injury my growth is now stunted. We took many x-rays and a CAT scan, but they said there was nothing they could do to fix me. They gave me a prescription for Ephedrine and told me to visit an orthopedic surgeon to see if my back was still compressing and if I needed surgery. However, we didn't go. It is now February. I am involved in Swing dancing, Weight-lifting, P.E., and recently snowboarding. I am pretty active, I find sports and working out fun. The thing that makes these activities difficult is the pain I am constantly in. Since that accident, I have been experiencing:
-constant, shooting pains in my right arm and leg
-trouble breathing while even sitting down
-constant fatigue
-I now twitch and shake in my sleep. Not like convulsions, but shaky like a hypoglycemic would have if sick.
-my back hurts every single day. painkillers do not help whatsoever. at all. it always hurts.
-sometimes i get brief heart pains. like the arm and leg pains, just in my heart.
I was hoping someone would tell me if these symptoms had anything to do with my back injury, or were caused from it. Please tell me anything you may know or any suggestions. I would love to stop hurting everyday.

[Caitlin9]

I am in the US. The doctor said that a brace would be pointless and to just take painkillers and take it easy. I thought it was a little weird, too. One of the reasons I haven't had work done on me is because I don't live with my parents. When I was in the hospital, no one from my family came to get me and when the police called them my mom said to do whatever with me, as long as she didn't have to pay for it. So I got released to a different family, my friends' family. But I am not legally emancipated.

[J T Junig, MD PhD]

Exactly.  The symptoms are frightening, and you really need to do the things mentioned above ASAP.  All of those compression fractures, in a young person... I cannot understand how you ended up not being taken care of.  Are you in the US, or in Canada?  Whoever told you there was nothing to be done was wrong;  at your age you might need extensive surgery to repair things so that the spinal cord isn't impacted.  I don't want to scare you away from surgery, but I do want to scare you enough to get you moving.  This cannot wait.

[Jaybay]

Sweetheart, I hate to say it, but you really need to see that orthopedic surgeon.  The weightlifting is a great thing as long as you're using perfect form and are supervised by a trainer who knows what he's doing.  The swing dancing and snowboarding, however, probably aren't a good idea until you find out exactly what is happening to your spine.  All your symptoms scream that you have several nerves that are getting crushed due to the compression fractures.  You really don't want to let this go any longer to the point that even surgery won't help.  It's time for another CT scan or MRI to see what kind of changes have happened since your first imaging studies were done.