Category: Chronic pain

what it’s like to be in physical pain

by Midnight Demon, posted in cauda equina syndrome, CES, Chronic pain, chronic physical pain, depression, physical pain, suicide, suicide attempt

Last night I was in wicked bad pain. I started to think about ending my life again. The pain was that bad. I don’t know what caused my pain to flair up. I didn’t do anything more than I usually do when I have a day to chill, which is most days. I took a walk to the post office and sub shop to get a sub, then went to the liquor store to get a drink and cash my scratch ticket. Then walked home. I guess I was walking out of sorts as I didn’t wear my AFO. It sucks to use it for short walks but I guess me not wearing it is causing some flare ups.

Today pain is not that bad. I did some reading on a big book that I am reading, Alexander Hamilton. I am making headway slow but sure. I have to read it when I am not too tired as my eyesight will become unfocused now. It really sucks but this week I am going to visual therapy to correct it. My eye muscles just need some adjusting. I should also be taking a multivitamin but it is a pain to remember everything I have to take. Last week I filled my weekly pill holder with everything I have to take with extras such as omega 3, vitamin d, senna, and iron. My night time meds looked like a meal. I normally take at least a half dozen pills a night, not including my pain or anxiety meds so with these pills added, there were a lot. Then I had to eat something to cover it so to coat my stomach. I tried not to eat too much, just a bowl of cereal or a slice of toast. But sometimes I will have a meal, like scrambled eggs and toast. My eating habits are not usual as I don’t eat regularly. I tend to eat every 6 or 7 hours, if that. And usually only have one or two meals a day, even though I am home and it isn’t good. I just don’t have an appetite most days.

I take a lot of meds for my various medical and psychiatric illnesses. I used to only take meds for my psych condition but since CES entered my life, I am on more meds than I can shake a stick at. And that is if I am having a good day. A bad day, I take more, especially to control the pain. Or if I just want to escape I will take some Neurontin. That drugs takes your to another planet for a couple of hours but lately it hasn’t been as effective as it once was. Which is disappointing. The only downside of this med is that it gives you the hungry horrors the next day. I have gained more weight on this med than any other but I try and eat better when I have the horrors because I know I will be eating more. It is the only time that my appetite will increase.

Anyways, last night was a bad night and now I am feeling fine and good, least for now. Pain doesn’t usually start until around 2100. If it is not too bad I will take pain meds and then be able to sleep in an hour or two. If I am up more than that, it’s going to be a night similar to last night where nothing can touch my pain and I am off to thinking bad thoughts again.

Sometimes weather can play a part in it. Right now it’s snowing so I know that the pain last night was more because there was precipitation on its way than anything. I am sensitive to this. I am just grateful it didn’t knock my back out. I have had rain storms do that and soon as it stops, I am fine. It is the weirdest thing to be in excruciating pain, not being able to move any back muscles one minute and then be fine the next.

another night of pain 2

by Midnight Demon, posted in cauda equina syndrome, CES, Chronic pain, chronic physical pain

19/20-Feb-13 0115

I had a long day today and I am not kidding. I have been up since 0700 and it is now 0100. I did way too much and I did it without doing too much. I just had a long day. First it was with my eye appointment and dinner with friends. I did some exercises while waiting for the bus and my foot refused to go heel to toe. It kept swerving to go back to the heel. Tired. Then I did some dorsiflexion and that really made my foot hate me. I thought I was getting better because the pain had decreased some but I can’t fix the weakness that is in my foot. Not after 12 years. It just refuses to cooperate with me and I really don’t think any amount of physical therapy is going to get my foot a 5-5 again. I have had so many trips to physical therapy that I know the exercises by heart. I might do them if I feel like it but none of them address the weakness in my foot to make it stronger. But then I am pessimistic about it ever returning to a 5-5. If fatigues quickly to go to a 3-5 and then I am screwed the rest of the day. I found this out tonight. It was tough walking home because I could feel my foot swerving to walk and by the time I was half way to my street, the pain started and I had to stop. When going up on the curb, I barely cleared it, almost stumbling. This makes me depressed and distraught. Tomorrow I am supposed to start a psychotherapy group and I am afraid that I am going to have to wear the AFO because I don’t know if my foot is going to be ok. I am exhausted but right now but I have pain and my meds have not kicked in. My back is aching because it is raining outside. All I want is some sleep but my foot/ankle is angry at me right now. I hate myself for doing the stupid exercises. I should have known I was fatigued but it’s hard to realize when there is no pain. Now I am feeling the pain because I am finally at rest and I want to go to sleep. It is always like that. Soon as the body is ready to sleep, the pain says “no stupid you are not going to sleep because you did too much today and you are going to pay for it”. I am such an idiot. Here I thought I was doing something constructive and all it did was make me hurt. I am ready to say fuck it about the group but it is my first meeting. Maybe things won’t be bad tomorrow like I predict it will. I just hope I can wake up early enough to make myself a cup of coffee before leaving the house. Priority number one!!

support groups and other things

by Midnight Demon, posted in Chronic pain, chronic physical pain, depression, mood disorders, psychache, suicide, suicide attempt

I had emailed my eye doc saying I was having problems with my eyes while reading, especially when I was tired. I just coughed it up to being fatigued but he wanted to see me the next day (today) and did some tests. Apparently my eyes have decided to go in different directions when I am reading so I have to go to visual therapy. It is basically physical therapy for the eye. Oh joy.

I am going to dinner tonight in Stoughton, south of where I live with some friends of mine. We have a good time and because my friend just came back from Germany, I am sure she has some chocolates for me . German chocolate is sooo good. Last time I had it, the damn mice ate it when we had a few. I was so mad. Mice enjoying my chocolate. Damn rodents!

Yesterday I was supposed to have a blog post in the AAS but it got scrapped for another few weeks. The post that got published was a hit. It was about support groups and now everyone wants one for suicide attempt survivors. If I knew the platform, I would do it. I am glad my post got bumped because support groups are important. I know that if I didn’t have my CES group, I would feel alone and probably would have killed myself because of the isolation you feel after something so traumatic happens to you. You are never the same after something like CES affects you. I know with suicide attempt it is similar. People attempt for different reasons but mostly to escape the psychological pain they are feeling.

Speaking of psychological pain. I recent came across another psychological pain scale that has some promise if it ever gets across the board. But the hard part is that most of these scales have to go through rigorous critical review from committees of all sorts before being accepted as an assessment tool used for the emergency rooms and urgent care units. Plus in busy settings, things will get missed and then what are you going to do when the person is positive for psychological pain? You can’t just leave them hanging and say have a nice day or come back when you have more pain. That would be unethical and unprofessional. And most academic psychiatric emergency rooms are almost always filled with “real” psychiatric emergencies such as the actual attempts and psychotic behaviors of drug use or because of schizophrenia/mania. Though each case should be evaluated by a mental health professional before an attempt be made. I suppose if this were to be implemented a special unit would have to be designated for it to speed up the process and long waits avoided. Or if this were implemented in the psych ER it would be more ideal than the general ER (Emergency Room/ward/department).

Problems

by Midnight Demon, posted in cauda equina syndrome, CES, Chronic pain, chronic physical pain, mood disorders, physical pain

Problems

I have problems. Quite a few. I have mental illness and chronic physical pain. Both make me want to take my life. I know that you might think that the depression is causing me to think about it but it really isn’t. I am not depressed. I am in pain and when pain levels get beyond a certain point for me, I think about killing myself.

It’s after midnight. My therapist texted me back about how sorry she is that I am in pain. I asked her if I should take my heavy dose of pain meds as the moderate pain meds have not touched my pain and it is too soon to take another dose. Now my toes have been on fire and feel like they are in a vise. I hate feeling this way.

Pain is the main reason most people want to kill themselves. There has been multiple studies about how people in chronic pain want to end their life because it is not a malignant type of pain. Meaning that it is not terminal, you are not going to die from whatever it is causing you this pain. I have what is called complex regional pain syndrome that was caused by cauda equina syndrome. I have been suffering with this CRPS the past year and a half. I was diagnosed finally sometime in November in 2011. Once I was diagnosed, my life began to fall apart. I quit one of my two jobs and then four months later I was out of my second job because they could not accommodate my medical restrictions. I basically can’t walk correctly. I tried to correct it with an AFO but the pain still persists. Like tonight. My leg is swollen and I really want to fillet it open to get the shit out of it. But it will be against medical advice to do so. I don’t know why. My theory is that if the shit was drained it might get better. I don’t have the equipment to really drain it but I can cut it open and squeeze the until the shit comes out. Or maybe I just want to see the blood and see what color it is. You see when the pain gets this bad, I don’t think my leg is mine anymore. I think it belongs to an alien so why not cut it. I might not have a scalpel but I have sharp razors. I have bandages. I have tape. Cutting is something that I am familiar with but I am used to cutting my wrist up. I have the scars to prove it. The only thing that is really stopping me is the sound. A few years ago I cut my leg to see if it would stop the pain. And I didn’t like the sound. It was like cardboard getting cut. My leg was cardboard and there was even little blood. It was like I didn’t cut at all no matter how deep I was cutting.

So what am I to do except to write about how sucky my life is because of these conditions. So I have problems that no one has any answers for. That no one can help me with. It is very frustrating and makes you feel alone. You want to reach out but who do you reach out to at midnight or time after that? It was a fluke that my therapist answered me. She usually doesn’t answer my texts. I could page my psychiatrist but there is nothing she can do except tell me to go to the emergency room. I don’t want to stay there all night for a psych consult that will just end up sending me home anyway. I’m self-injurious but I am not suicidal at the moment. I’ll be able to get out of the hospital admission by saying that I promise not to do it. Which I won’t because I really don’t want to hear that sound.

Music is awesome. On my MP3 player Love Story is playing, it is my favorite time of all time. A song that I can listen to over and over again without getting sick of it. And it relaxes me. So maybe between the two pain killers, and the rest of my meds I can finally go to sleep…