Thanks for the book recommendation Trek and I will check it out! That post was about a year ago, and it turned out that my pain and discomfort was much more from the whiplash injury than the disk/arthritis problems. The injections really helped a lot with my symptoms, and then I went to a great physical therapist who helped me a lot. There was so much going on with my neck that my doctor (osteopath) wasn't sure if the pain was from the disc problems or the whiplash. Turned out to be the whiplash, hands down
A year later we've learned that my whiplash injury still isn't quite healed - it was a severe injury. I've learned how to deal with it however, and I am always working to strengthen that area and to do things that are neck friendly. Thankfully I didn't need more than that first set of injections - the dr who gave them warned me if I didn't get the right therapist that he would be seeing me again...