Tag: back pain

Pit of Doom

by Midnight Demon, posted in Bipolar Disorder, blogging, Chronic pain, chronic physical pain, CRPS, depression, mood disorders, suicide

Pit of doom

I didn’t think it was that long a period between blogs but I guess I am writing every 4 days or so. I don’t like it but some days it is so hard to get my thoughts together. I am missing the hell out of my psychiatrist even though it has only been two weeks since I last saw her. We have been keeping in touch through email but it isn’t the same thing. I went through the email communication while she was out during her hip surgery and it was torture. I didn’t see her for about 3 to 4 months while she was recovering. I seem to be emailing her at least twice a day, more if there is a response. I just miss her so much.

In the meantime, my mood has blackened. The suicidal mood that I was in in April seems to have returned. It isn’t quite as deep as it was then, but it is slowly getting worse. I am 100% sure the stress of being home and arguing with family nearly every day or every other has significantly contributed. I honestly don’t feel like I am wanted yet I am expected to do things even though my pain is through the roof. Sunday my youngest sister, who I thought was on my side, came up and put my clothes in the bin it was on top of, all without asking first. I did not want them in the bin because I do not want them smelling like plastic. She said she would throw in some dryer sheets. I got so pissed. I sarcastically thanked her and said it is going to hurt my back bending to get my clothes. She said I was being mean and to use my knees. Then she tells me to live my life, storms back up here and puts my clothes that were in a neat pile before, out of the bin in a messy fashion. I was in tears the whole fucking day as my pain just went through the fucking roof I was so upset. Later that night she calls me and I didn’t answer. She calls me a baby and tells me to be an adult. I say you tell me to live my life then call me a baby? Then she goes on about how living in a “mess” is unhealthy. I say I am not dead yet, nor have I been seriously ill. She then calls me selfish and I say good night. We haven’t spoken since. Last night they were having another argument with my mother, and again my fucking middle sister said to my mother “she wasn’t getting younger”. I have no fucking idea why the hell she is obsessed with age. She is 11 months younger than me and says she is old. WTF. I don’t get it. I do not like the fact they have my mother’s bedroom at the far end of the house while every one else is not near her. Something happens to her, we aren’t going to know till morning. How the fuck is that fair. Her sugar was low Saturday night and she came in my room. I was up because I had used the bathroom and couldn’t go back to sleep. She is supposed to navigate with a low sugar to get help or to the kitchen?? Obviously they didn’t plan this out or think this through.

Last night I was in a dark mood. I wrote a draft of what I wanted to say to my psych. Then sent off another email around midnight as I was in so much pain with my back and ankle I couldn’t sleep and was thinking of ending it. I have been slowly doing stuff in my room and it is costing me big time. I bought 6 bins to put my stuff in. I wanted to do stuff yesterday but all I got done was making space for one bin when I wanted to clear my bed so I could change the sheets. I had spilled Gatorade on the bedding so they need to be changed. I wanted to get it done today but I needed a shower, something to eat, and to pick up my meds. I actually had to go to the pharmacy twice because I forgot my ID at home. By the time I came back the second trip, I could barely make it home. I was sweating profusely, back and ankle kicked up two houses from mine, and I was kind of wishing I was fucking dead at that point. I had to change my shirt again. I wanted to jump into a cool shower but I don’t have the energy. Changing my sheets might have to happen Friday, if I don’t have to go to another pharmacy for my pain meds. Maybe I will go to a different chain this time. This new pharmacy always has problems with my meds every month since the other one closed. I am sick of it.

Back is so flared up my scar is hurting. I had to email my pcp to see if he knew of anything to help. He said maybe lidocaine. I have some lido patches so have been using that at night. It has been helping the pain but not the inflammation. I can’t use ibuprofen anymore because I have been getting flares of gastritis. I am on a PPI so I shouldn’t be getting the gastritis and having to use an antacid to settle my stomach. I switched from morning to evening and that has helped. I still don’t want to risk rocking the boat so am avoiding the ibuprofen. I just been taking Tylenol. Some times the pain med helps if the pain is severe enough but it is mostly muscle pain. I know I need to rest it but I got so much shit to do in my room. I thought every other day would be okay but nope. Just makes the pain worse and then I am out of commission for a week. I am just resting the rest of today. I had made a breakfast burrito so that should last me all day. I stayed in my room all day yesterday to avoid family. I didn’t go down to eat at all. I was going to when they had the meeting with my mother. I feel like my sisters are ganging up on my mother and I. All I had to eat yesterday was a protein bar and half cup of coffee. Think I might have had another protein bar before bed but my stomach was killing me so I don’t remember. I lost eight pounds in a week because of the stress. I either had no appetite or just didn’t feel like eating. I think last night’s stomach pains was hunger pains.

I am holding off on sending the draft to my psych. I have a tentative date I want to end things. I really don’t see the point of going on with the ongoing stress at home. I am trying to hold on to what she said of what I have to give to the world. A person on Twitter that I do not know had said the same thing. She had followed me for a while and said somethings that really made me think I mattered in what I say in my tweets, even if I don’t get likes or comments on them. A follower I know through the red sox said she found the courage to share her pain issues on Twitter because of what I write. It is so damn hard to continue living when you want to die yet know people out there, many you don’t know but know of you ether online or through social media, want you to go on despite you having no desire to.

Tuesday is Broken

by Midnight Demon, posted in Bipolar Disorder, blogging, Chronic pain, chronic physical pain, CRPS, depression, mood disorders

Tuesday’s Broken

I was feeling pretty crappy today. Back pain was really bad and I just felt really, really down and worthless. I posted how I felt and someone responded with how I help people with how I feel with my posts and raw emotions. After I asked her if I could share her response and she said I could. I posted it on my IG and FB. I also sent a screen shot of it to my psych as she told me the things this person said, maybe not the way she said it, but the sentiment is the same. While I was thinking of all of this, Sugarland’s song, Tuesday is Broken popped into my head. I couldn’t find a more fitting song in that moment.

Last night I was transferring Gatorade from one bottle to another and ended up spilling it on my bedding. My back was hurting terribly so I wasn’t going to do it right then. I was cold because of the AC so I got some blankets and covered myself with those. The back pain didn’t ease up. When I woke up this morning to take my morning meds, I accidently doubled my dose of breakthrough meds and that made me very sleepy. I have been sleeping on and off all afternoon. I had sent my psych an email around 4 am saying I was worthless. I half expected her to call me but she didn’t. I also told her how suicidal I was feeling because my ankle and foot were no longer dissociating. I was getting crazy thoughts and wanted to go through with them so bad. I emailed her instead and that kind of lifted my load a bit. I have not heard from her at all. I hope she is getting my emails and they aren’t in cyber space somewhere. I haven’t been getting a “could not deliver” message so that is good. I think I have emailed her nearly every day this week. Been trying not to and the more I try, the more I fail. I just send her one email a day unless I am having a hard time, like I was last night. I honestly don’t remember being up at 4 but I must have because that is the time I sent the email. I think I also shut the AC off because of being cold. Today has been really hot that the AC is making my room cold but not an ice box. It is so fricken muggy in the house.

I made an egg burrito for the first time in ages. It was good. I put picante sauce in it before I rolled it up. I found that was better than spooning it onto it with each bite. I might make another tomorrow. I bought the flour tortillas. I have been eating them with chili. I fell in love with a Hormel chunky kind with beans. It has a little bit of a kick to it as my nose always runs when I eat it. I really want to make my cookies but it has been so fricken hot that I don’t want to be in my kitchen at all. Maybe I can convince my sisters to install a wall unit and shush my mother about it. It just makes cooking so hard in the summer.

I was still feeling a little sick after I ate. I think it was because of the pain meds. I took a Zofran so I wouldn’t hurl the contents of my stomach. I had coffee. I wanted another cup but my shirt was soaked with sweat and I didn’t want to stay in the kitchen anymore. The testosterone has so increased my sweating. I hate that I have to wear deodorant all the time now because otherwise, I stink within minutes in this heat, even if I just came out of the shower. I really hate that I have to put off top surgery until the construction is done. I am starting to look stupid because I have facial hair and female boobs. I so hate the things on my chest. I hate them more and more every single day. I think that is why I have been feeling such loathing and worthlessness. I have no idea how to counteract the gender dysphoria. I have been shaving again. I had wanted to stop to see what grew but my nephew said that if I keep shaving it will grow faster so I am doing that. There is one slight problem…I like having a smooth face so I am not sure growing a beard, even though I really want one, is going to be possible. I could just grow it and see how it feels and then if I don’t like it, shave it off. I am not going to let it grow crazy like my nephew does. I can’t stand when men do that. It just drives me crazy. I like when it is neat. Maybe it is just me.

The good news is that because I rested and took meds, my back isn’t hurting me as much. It could have flared up because the thunderstorms were passing through and the pressure changes set it off as well. Either way, I am just glad I can move without pain again. My foot is killing me but that is a constant thing that will never go away. I just hope it doesn’t make me suicidal again like it did last night. Pain had jumped from a 12 to a 15 to a 17 within a few hours. I am really exhausted from it, even though I really haven’t done much today. Tomorrow I want to take down the recycling in my room as it has been growing. I just got some study money for Amazon so I might order the bins I was looking at. I was planning on getting four but I might get six. I was going to buy another foam topper that DOESN’T fucking move but I am too afraid it is going to make me hot because of the gel. I also don’t have a place I can spread it out on for 24 hours. I might sleep in the recliner in the living room if I do get it. It has to air out for that long in order for it to “set.” It is also summer so being in the living room right now would totally fucking suck because it will be hot as hell and I won’t be able to sleep. I am completely heat intolerant because of the nerve injury and T. I might hold off till after the construction so I can maybe place it in the dining room floor for 24 hours and then carry it up to my room. I just hope it doesn’t sell out by then because I will be pissed!

Feeling anxious again so I took my pulse. It dropped 5 points since I last took it. It has been steadily dropping today. After I ate it went up to 89, then went down to 63 and now it is 58. It will probably get lower as the night goes on. I have no idea why my pulse drops when I am in pain. My blood pressure is good; I don’t get hypotensive or hypertensive. I just hate feeling fearful for no reason. I hope tomorrow I can do some more stuff around my room, like putting more clothes in the drawers that I cleared out. Or maybe just put my PJs in there so I know where they are, if I remember LOL. I also had trouble peeing today because I forgot to take my urine retention pill. I was having bad bladder pains and spasms. I was wondering why and then I realized I hadn’t peed since the morning. I wasn’t getting the urge to go because that fucking connection seems to want to work when it wants to work, not when it is supposed to thanks to Cauda Equina Syndrome. My sister was yelling at my mother for something so I didn’t want to go downstairs. I hate that I am walking on eggshells in my own house again because of the bitch bully.

tough painful week

by Midnight Demon, posted in Bipolar Disorder, blogging, Chronic pain, chronic physical pain, CRPS, depression, mood disorders

Tough painful week

I’ve had a rough week both physically and emotionally. Monday I semi said goodbye to my psych of 26 years. She still wants to care for me so when she finds another home, she will call me. She is not sure where she will be as she has not thought that far. I totally understand that. I figure it might be a few months but in the meantime I will still be in contact with her either through phone or email. I started having side effects of my mood stabilizer, which is really bad timing as I am not currently under direct care of a psychiatrist. My psych is trying to push seeing someone faster. My pcp’s social worker is also trying to get me to see a gender affirming psych that is joining the clinic. I just had bloods drawn for a level as last time I was barely therapeutic. I am having double vision and just to make sure there isn’t something wrong with my eyes, I am seeing my eye doc next week.

I had PT which was sort of good. On Saturday, I did some stuff around my room. Sunday I did a little more even though my back didn’t like it. Monday I was okay until I was coming home from my psych’s appointment. Back flared up terribly. I was still hurting when I saw my PT on Tuesday. She gave me some decompressing exercises to do. I was really hurting past few days as I have been having pain go down my leg and the pain was near my spine yesterday when I was coming home from the therapist appointment.

The therapist appointment went well. I found out what kind of therapist she is and I think it is going to work out. She loves the Sox and we both have the same favorite player, though she is a lot more obsessive than I am about him!! At one point, I thought she was going to jump down my throat when I was criticizing him and she stopped me before I could say anything. Yikes! I have my next appointment with her the week after next. She is a CBT therapist but also has some DBT stuff. I am going to bring her my copy of Craig Bryan’s CBT for suicide attempters and see if she is receptive to it. If she isn’t, then I guess that will be okay and we can go from there. I will have a hard time with it though as I feel like I have all these things that could possibly help me with my suicidality but I don’t have a therapist to go along with it and it frustrates the hell out of me! I did ask her if she would turn me away and she said no. I was relieved to hear this. Maybe she will work out after all.

My sister had sent me texts Wed saying she wanted to take my stuff upstairs today. I told her no as I knew I would be hurting as I have all week. Fortunately, she decided to go to the beach so I didn’t have to deal with her. We haven’t really spoken kind words to each other since she moved in. I really don’t care as she really hasn’t been there and doesn’t understand anything I have been going through since I have been on disability. I really don’t see this changing. Maybe when the work on the house is done with but certainly not right now.

A couple of hours ago, I used the bathroom. I normally don’t really look in the mirror as I hate my face. Today I did and much to my surprise, I have darker hair around my jawline! The fuzz is becoming darker. I was so excited. I knew I had to post transition pics, which I did on Instagram and facebook. I kind of did on Twitter, too, though didn’t give as big a description. Kind of hard to do when you only have 240 characters. I just sent it out to a couple of people that want to keep track of my transition. I hope when my T gets increased next week, the facial hair will come in faster and darker. I would love to come downstairs one morning and shock the hell out of my mother with a beard. I am not sure she knows I am on T. I sure as hell didn’t tell her. I am not sure if she asked my sisters or if my sisters told her. She hasn’t said a word to me about anything. I have mentioned that I will be having my breasts removed. She didn’t seem to like that at all. Yet she wants me to be “happy.” I don’t think I can ever be happy as I don’t know what the hell it is. I rather be content but the way things are going, I doubt that will ever happen. I forced myself to shower because some icky water fell on me. I have this thing that turns musty smells to water and the container fell on me. I had to shower. I was hurting afterwards. My back wanted to kill me. I started getting suicidal thoughts again. I have been having them on and off since being discharged from the hospital. They haven’t been really bad like they were. I have thought on a few occasions to end it and started to plan it but once the pain backed off, so did the planning. I just wish something helped with the flares. Since changing my meds to something else, nothing has worked for the flares. The 24/7 pain has been lowered. I wake up with a 2 or 3 but sometimes if I have more than a few days activity, I will have ankle/foot pain that is more than I can bear. I haven’t been able to find something to help ease that pain. Distraction works but only to a point. I could watch a movie but soon as that movie is over, the pain returns, sometimes worse than what it was before I started watching the movie. Last night I did five cryptograms. It was really cool as I really miss doing them. I started to remember the hacks. Some were really too difficult for me so had to go to a new puzzle. One quote was perfect for my psych so I sent it to her. I also sent her the transition pics and the excitement about growing in a beard. I half want to shave the stuff off just to see if it would grow back thicker but my friends told me to leave it alone. Hair under my chin is growing more together. Just wish it was in the middle of my chin. There is still a bare spot.

Guess that is all for today. Not sure if I will post over the weekend. It has been difficult finding my words lately, hence the spotty posts. Thanks for reading and understanding.

midnight demon writes again

by Midnight Demon, posted in Bipolar Disorder, blogging, Chronic pain, chronic physical pain, CRPS, depression, mood disorders, suicide

Midnight demon writes again

It is about half past midnight. I just had something to eat. I tried making myself a deep dish pizza for dinner and burned it pretty bad that it was hard as a rock. I lost my appetite and so haven’t had much to eat today. I knew if I didn’t eat, I wouldn’t be able to sleep. But turns out, pain is keeping me up anyways.

The part of my leg that is swollen has gotten bigger. The day before it was the size of my palm. Now it is the size of my hand. It for some reason, became really painful after I had stood for a while to clear out one of the shelves of my bookcase. I went on my bed to relax my back as it had started to spasm. Next thing I know my lower leg down to my foot was in such intense pain, I couldn’t breathe. I started to have an anxiety attack. I couldn’t touch my leg where it was hurting and that was a bad sign to me that made me panic even more. I just lay there trying to collect myself and grab the pain bottle to take a pill. I think that was harder as I had to move to do so. Half hour later, pain was starting to subside enough I could touch my leg and that is when I notice the swelling had spread up my leg. If I was panicked then, I was more so now. I didn’t know what to do. I couldn’t stand and walk anywhere as the pain was so great. Even an hour later when I had to pee it was painful going down the stairs and using the bathroom. I had talked to my niece and lost my voice. I sounded like a goddamn squirrel. No idea why. No matter how many times I cleared my throat, it sounded off. Fucking puberty.

Anyway, I talked to a Twitter friend and she wanted me to go to the ER. I texted my sister, but she wasn’t home. Fuck. There goes my ride. I wasn’t about to take the T anywhere. I took an Ativan and once that kicked in to take my anxiety away, I calmed down a bit. I also emailed my psych to let her know what was going on. I decided to try some diclofenac gel to try and ease whatever inflammation there was and see if it helped the pain. As I was ready to apply it, my psych emailed me back to keep her posted and let her know if I go to the ER. I am hoping I don’t have to because it is Easter and I will have a super long wait for something that really isn’t an emergency. I don’t have redness or broken skin oozing fluid. I just have a painful lump on my leg. I see my PCP Tues and I hope I can hold off on ER visits until then. I started thinking about this. The pain was similar to what I was experiencing prior to my dismissal from work, basically telling me I was disabled and couldn’t work. The time off gave my leg some much needed rest time. I have been walking more than I have been the past few weeks, as well as standing longer than I usually do. I also have been trying to do some balance work my PT wants me to do, which means putting some weight on my left leg. I have no idea if that aggravated the tendon that gets inflamed when I walk too much because I am compensating. I knew if I went to the ER or even an urgent care center, odds were they would just refer me to my pcp for whatever. They might do x-rays and an ultrasound to rule out a blood clot in my leg (highly unlikely) but that would be it. And the ultrasound would be on my calf, not the area where the swelling is so not useful at all. I am sure my pcp is not going to be able to figure it out and I hope that the weight loss/loss of appetite and this swelling is not related.

So the leg pain finally subsided after the diclofenac but then my veins started popping and my foot felt like it was being crushed so I was, once again, in a flare. This is day 2. My thoughts immediately went to why the fuck am I still alive. Then I think of what my psych said and I fucking hate her. Hate her because she wants me to live and she is fond of me. I looked straight at her when she told me this so I know she wasn’t bullshitting me. She genuinely meant what she said. I don’t think that I am meant to do something great. Yes, I could write another book. But goddamn it, I am not a fucking writer. Yes, I write blogs. But that is what I do because it helps me and possibly others. I know I don’t get as much feedback as I once did but fuck, my stats tell me someone reads my blog every day, even if only 8 people do.

Pain has been my nemesis. It causes me to be suicidal in an instant. Then in the morning, I am usually okay and feel better and am no longer want to end my life. But I am not at that stage right now. I am in the suicidal moment where I want to do what I want to do to end things. Except I can’t. As much as I have this fucking deep surging urge to do it, I do not want a family member to find me in that state. It is the only fucking thing keeping me alive at this time. Sure my family pisses me the fuck off so I wouldn’t care if they found me. But something, and I don’t know what, keeps me from acting on my urges. I can think about them all I want, fantasize all I want but when it comes to times like this, I am so fucking on the edge of live/die that I just get so frustrated that I don’t do fucking shit. I just ponder some more. Fantasize some more. Then I am reading a book about wills and realize I didn’t sign and date it to make it official. FUCK! I don’t remember where I put the notepad I wrote the fucking thing on. This is pure agony. The mental agony of going through living vs dying and being in so much fucking pain you want to end your life. This is the life of the midnight demon. Always until the urge to act prevails.