Category: blogging

having a bad day

by Midnight Demon, posted in blogging, cauda equina syndrome, chronic physical pain, depression, suicide

Having a bad day

I woke up in pain, again. This is the third or fourth morning where my foot has woken me up from a sound sleep. I took some pills to get some relief but unfortunately, I was not going back to sleep. Every noise in the house kept me up. Then my mother’s phone rang. Then the damn smoke detectors went off for some reason I still haven’t figured out yet. Because this noise is far louder than the phone, it scared me and forced me out of bed. When I knew the house wasn’t truly on fire or my mother had left the gas burner on again, I had something to eat and then played on my laptop. I have been playing the same annoying game. I don’t know why I can’t quit it. No one will know but I want to complete the damn missions and it gives me something to do.

I am in a depressed state, a deeply depressed state. I really want to end my life. I find no use for living anymore. I hate being in pain all the time. And then we have Tuesday coming up. A day that I planned a year ago to end my life by if things weren’t better. Things are some what better than they were a year ago. I am not as suicidal or depressed (except for my current state) as I was a year ago. I find that I don’t write depressing messages on Facebook anymore. I will, however, tweet them. I have a book that is done and is ready to be published. I just need an editor to look over anything that I have missed. I am actually looking forward to things, though right now, I can’t say what I am looking forward to. Things just look dreary and dark. I am not looking forward to Christmas or my birthday, both are next week. But Tuesday I am planning on having a day with Crown Royal and drink my sorrows away. I have a ¼ of a bottle left. I doubt I will get very drunk.

I am tired of feeling this way. Maybe I should be dead. My sister said to me the other day that there is no “mental illness on my mother’s side of the family”. It took all that I had in me not to laugh in her face. HELLO, I wanted to scream at her. What about me?? What about your cousins that suffer from anxiety, bipolar disorder and schizophrenia? Aren’t they on your mother’s side??? Talk about complete blindness and denial.

I really want to commit suicide. I have dreamed about it for so long. Why can’t I go ahead with it? Why am I such a coward? I do nothing day in and day out. I have nothing but this blog to keep me going. I feel like I have to write every day or I will lose my mind. I stopped writing in my journal. I don’t seem to have very much to say after I blog. It’s all the same isn’t it except what I journal doesn’t get posted on the internet.

I know that I have another book to write. I don’t know exactly what that will be yet as it is supposed to be co-authored. But I don’t care. One book will be enough for me. I can’t write anything else. Once you write about your memoirs, you can’t write another. Unless at least thirty years go by or something and I know I am not going to be around for the next thirty years. I will be lucky if I make it past this week. I am so tired of fighting myself every day. I am more tired of dealing with pain every day. Today was bad. Still is as the day isn’t over yet. I know part of it is because of the snow storm that hit. I haven’t gone outside nor do I want to. I just realized I have to deal with my father yet again for another stinking doctor’s appointment, all because the asshole lies all the time and won’t give a straight answer. So if his doctor tells him something he is not going to a) remember it or B) deny it and just say that he is “fine”. I don’t know how I got to be the one to go to these appointments. All the more reason I should kill myself. Just so I don’t have to deal with an ornery bastard.

I still have to hear back from my therapist about my sessions or lack thereof this week. I really don’t want sessions this week. I rather deal with this on my own. I do anyways.

let it snow, let it snow

by Midnight Demon, posted in blogging, cauda equina syndrome

Let it Snow, Let it Snow…

I went to the store early this morning to get some food for the weekend. I have been dying to try out a chipotle mayonnaise on a chicken sandwich. Today I finally made it and it was so good. I also did some shopping for my mother who needed milk.

My day started off early as I woke up at six. My foot acted up about a half hour later so I took some pills and went back to sleep. I thought I would chronicle the day but I realized I already had a blog called a day in the life of the midnight demon so I nixed it.

I have been in a relatively ok mood. It’s neither good nor bad, kind of in between. I still am fretting over what my therapist will do/say about me taking this week off and then her being off the next two weeks. But I guess I will find out Monday, that is if the snow doesn’t cancel school. I will be pissed if that happens. It started snowing around 3 and is supposed to continue until tomorrow. My back is not liking this weather at all. I am having a flare up and sciatic pain in my left buttock. I just took something for it because I don’t want it to get worse.

I am concerned about a fellow blogger. She is having some psychotic symptoms that are out of control but because of some issues with an upcoming vacation, she can’t go in the hospital, where I think is where she needs to be as she is getting worse not better with the increase in medication. I am really worried because I know how bad things can get with psychosis and paranoia. Been there, done that. But I am not her so I can’t make judgments of the hospital kind, only express my concern. I hope this quiets down for her and she gets better soon. I also wish there was a better system for her other than just going to the ER because it is the weekend. I always have my pdoc on call in emergencies. But I guess not everyone has that and that is a shame.

I haven’t heard from my writing partner in a few days. I hope things are ok with her. I know she had a speaking engagement yesterday but was expecting an email today at least. But she usually takes the weekend off from email. I don’t know if I could do that. I am almost always on the laptop, playing games and such so it would be hard for me to ignore an email if I got one. Plus my friend usually emails me before we set up a time to meet up so it is kind of good that I don’t keep off the email on weekends.

Wind is rattling the windows. And it is so fricken cold. I don’t know what my mother did but she turn the gas on a pilot and didn’t light it. I came out of my room and smelled gas. I didn’t use the stove today so I know I didn’t turn any knobs accidently. I opened a window to let the smell out for a few minutes but she closed it while I took a shower. The kitchen is the coldest room because my asshole cousins didn’t put enough insulation when they were rebuilding it. We also have a crummy radiator that works when it wants to. The heating system is a joke. We have to turn it on to 70 for the house to get warm, 80 to get it hot. We have gas heat, which I find more convenient than oil heat. I grew up with oil heat and I hated it because you had to have at least $300 (USD) to get a decent amount of fuel in the tank and that was a lot of money when you were on welfare. I am sure the cost is more now than it was back then. I feel for those that can’t afford heat. I know what it is like to be cold. We were never on the streets or close to it but the house I grew up in was drafty and my room had no radiator. So I had to pile on the blankets to keep warm during the winter. I didn’t mind it as I liked my room being drafty and cool. It was better than it being too warm. But since getting my nerve injury, I can no longer tolerate either hot nor cold. The cold weather causes spasms and arthritic pain. Hot weather, I just can’t tolerate, at all. That is why I need the AC. I used to love the cold but it doesn’t like me anymore.

Lucky Friday 13th: Taylor’s Birthday

by Midnight Demon, posted in blogging, chronic physical pain, depression, writing

Lucky Friday 13th: Taylor’s Birthday

Today is Taylor Swift’s birthday. In her honor I have been playing all her music that I own. She was born 24 years ago and 13 is her favorite number. How fitting that her favorite number is also the day number she was born on. I was thirteen when she was born. My favorite number is also the day of my birth, twenty-three. So we have some things in common, though I will never be able to tell her these things.

My favorite songs of hers are Love Story, Fearless, Hey Stephen, Story of Us, Red, Begin Again, Invisible, and Tied Together with a Smile. I think that is a song from each of her albums. If you are a Taylor fan, you can correct me on this.

My day has been ok. I woke up in pain but was able to get my latte and a crappy doughnut from Starbucks. Their doughnuts are usually good but today I got one that wasn’t so good. I have a funny story, as I brought in my own mug today. One of the girls didn’t know what size it was, even though it was clearly written on the bottom of the Starbucks mug. She was knew and said to the other girl that she has never seen the mug before. I have had this mug for the last few years. It looks like a Starbucks cup and they don’t make those kind anymore. I really thought it was funny.

I lost two blog followers. Oh well. I will get a few more and then some. I am past 500 so I am happy it happened before the end of the year.

I gave my therapist an ultimatum yesterday. She just pissed me off because she scheduled me into an appointment without my permission. I told her that I don’t want to see her next week, at all and that I won’t text her while she is on vacation. If she does call me anyway, I won’t answer the phone. I feel that I need a break from her. I know she will be away for the two weeks for Christmas/New Year’s but I rarely ask for time off. I also feel like she is the only one that can ask for time off and I can’t. I don’t think that is fair. I am just asking for a week off. Nothing more. Then I can see her on whatever Thursday she is back in the office.

I sent yesterday’s blog post to my doctors. Surprisingly, I have not received a response. I would have sent it to my PCP but he doesn’t like email and the last time I sent him a message through his office, it backfired horribly on me. The message was misconstrued and the meaning devalued. So I will never send another blog to my PCP, unless I print it out and hand it to him. But he doesn’t seem to care for my writing so why bother.

Today I was at Starbucks and it felt strange being there with just my journal. Usually I have a pad of paper, a book, and my editing. Now that the editing is done, I am no longer carrying that around. I used another backpack today so I could hold the mug so it didn’t have a book or pad of paper. Strange feeling. And now that I am done with editing, I don’t know what to do with my time. I could work on my second book but I want to take some time off from writing for a bit. NO, I am not taking time off my blog. Please comment if you would want me to though!

you learn to live with it

by Midnight Demon, posted in blogging, cauda equina syndrome, chronic physical pain, depression, suicide

You learn to live with it

It didn’t happen overnight. It didn’t happen in a week. It took some time but you learned to bare it. Except on nights like this when the pain keeps you awake and nothing eases your mind to bring on sleep. You think of death as your only way out. You think of what more your doctor can do to ease the pain but he doesn’t know because it’s fucking midnight and he’s not on call anyways. Besides, they don’t want to hear you cry in pain. They just want you to live with it. And that is the toughest thing to do.

I have been battling pain since seven tonight. And it’s been a trigger for me. CES started when my left leg went out on me and then I was left with foot drop. I wasn’t told to live with it. I was told my ass was going to have surgery for a condition I had no knowledge of. I still don’t have complete knowledge of cauda equina syndrome because it varies in so many people. Sometimes the right side is affected. Sometimes it is the left. In my case it was the left and I still have nerve damage twelve years later.

Yet I haven’t been told to live with the pain. No, not yet. But you have to or you lose your mind or your life. It is a conscious effort every day to not stare at the bottle of pills or some other weapon of destruction and not think, why not? You have to take the walls down piece by piece of the strength you have and build it back up again with new ones to block the pain out the best you can. But sometimes, like tonight, the walls fails you and you are in mega pain. My foot/ankle/leg are hurting all at once and all you want to do is scream. But you can’t because it’s after midnight and everyone else is asleep. Thoughts of wanting to amputate run high on these nights. It’s a good thing there isn’t a chainsaw in the bedroom.

Meds kicking in is a joke. They may lessen the pain some but they do nothing to ease it 100%. At my best, the pain is always on the level of 3 on a scale of 1-10. At my worst, like now, it can be an 8-12. So I will have to take a third pain pill to quiet it down or I won’t be waking up at 0645 like I need to. Got to take dear old Dad for his tests.

I hate my leg right now. And I should be able to live with the pain. And I will. But not tonight. Tonight I am writing and writing until I pass out because people should know that despite having surgery for CES, you are still left in pain. It is called nerve pain and it sucks. Nothing eases it except narcotic medications or some anti-convulsant drug and that is some of the time. Oh how I wish I could call my doctor now. Have him see the veins popping out on my foot, how swollen my ankle bone is and how I can’t get it down with ice or elevation.

But I got to live with this? I can’t kill myself? That really sucks when you know you are in so much pain, physically, and you can’t end your life because of it. I have too many people I’m responsible for. People say they will miss me. I often wonder if that is true.

My psychiatrist told me tonight to take my meds and get some rest. How am I supposed to do that when I got pain this bad? I keep hearing her voice telling me to go to bed. But I can’t sleep. Pain is just too fucking bad.

I didn’t do anything to cause this. I didn’t stand too long, I didn’t walk too far. I didn’t go up and down the stairs too much today. Well, maybe I did, now that I think about it. I went downstairs a few times to empty my recycle bins and get rid of some boxes in my room.

I wish I could just disappear, permanently, where there is no more pain and no more agony. No more depression. But I don’t want to be happy all the time. That would be too weird for me. Just being content is all that I want. Content means being neither sad nor happy but not being miserable either.

I just want the pain to stop permanently. Then I maybe I could live my life a little better. Third dose of meds and an Ativan have kicked in. And this is how I live with it, without putting a noose around my neck. I put my hat on backwards and I write, until the meds kick in.

It helps to write. It really does.