Tag: cauda equina syndrome

Daily living activities and pain

by Midnight Demon, posted in blogging, chronic physical pain, depression, mood disorders

Daily living activities and pain

I made dinner tonight. Nothing extravagant. Just boiled some potatoes for potato salad and my mother made grilled cheese. The whole peeling the potatoes killed me even though I was sitting down while I peeled them. My foot just couldn’t take the pressure on the floor I guess. I must have stood maybe ten minutes to get the potatoes in a bowl and cool them off some so we could eat them. I made potato salad with vinegar as they were too hot for the traditional mayonnaise. I will make them tomorrow as we still have some potatoes left over.

I am in so much pain from doing a little cooking. I made myself breakfast this morning and it wasn’t as bad as it is right now. I can’t believe that just standing for a about 10-15 minutes caused my pain levels to explode. Granted I am not supposed to be doing any of this. I am supposed to be resting to get my swelling down but I just can’t stay in bed all day. I am really bummed out that doing something simple hurt me so bad. I was going to take a shower today but that is off the list.

I am supposed to go to the pharmacy tomorrow to drop off my prescription for my pain meds. I have no fucking idea how I am supposed to walk there when I am in this much pain. My sister has a graduation party to go to so it’s not like I can borrow her car or have her drive me. I am so doped up it’s probably good that I am not behind the wheel. I am going to have to force myself to walk the three blocks to the pharmacy tomorrow. I am not looking forward to it because I know I am going to be hurting. I might as well stay and wait to have it filled as I don’t want to pick up the script the next day. I will just be in the same position as I am in now. I still have to walk the three blocks either way.

My cousin called me today and pissed me off. He asked where have I been and said he left a message the other day. That is bullshit because I don’t have a call from him. I checked my phone log and the last time he called me was last week. I hate liars. Then he said maybe I didn’t get the message. That really ticked me off. I quickly got off the phone with him as I said I wasn’t in the mood to talk. But he would let me off the phone without knowing why I was so pissed off. UGH. I don’t know why I answered the phone to begin with!!

I finally got the number for the junk car company to remove my car in the driveway. Now I just have to make the call. LOL I was talking with my writing partner about this. My family has been hounding me to get rid of the car. I don’t know why. It’s not like it’s bothering anyone. But they just do it to annoy me. My sister even volunteered to call for me. But I got mad and said I would call, don’t be rushing me. I stormed out of the house and went back to my room. I have been in a lousy mood and it’s hard to call people when you are hurting. My family just doesn’t understand how much energy it take just for me to go down the stairs to pee. I hate being like this but this is what my life has become. I can’t do simple things anymore. I am just too depressed and overwhelmed. My family thinks it’s because I am lazy but I am not. I just am too overwhelmed with stuff. And I hate talking on the phone. I get worried that I might not get a good deal for the car and I will get screwed. One place already tried to get me at a lower price than what is advertised in the paper. I will call tomorrow. I have the paper by my bed and hopefully by noon, I will call one of the three numbers and see what I can get for the car.

I know my sister wants some money from me because she cleaned out the car. I didn’t ask her, she just did it on her own. It was nice of her to do it but I hate that she now wants money for it. No good deed goes unpunished, I guess.

I am really worried about one of my blogger friends. She is going through a rough time. I wish I could help her but she is across the country, on the west coast of the US. We chat usually late at night if I am up but my late at night is early evening for her. We have a three hour difference in time so it’s sometimes hard to arrange a chat. I just hope she gets through whatever she is going through without harming herself. She is talking about going back to the hospital as a defeat and I wish she didn’t think of it as that. She needs help and the hospital is there to help her. I think that is part of the stigma of having mental illness. People that are frequent visitors of the hospital take it as a personal setback of some kind when it shouldn’t be viewed as such. It’s reaching out and admitting you need help and that takes more courage than anything. I used to think like her but I realized that my life is complicated and I have severe mental illness. It requires me to be in the hospital time and time again. There might be some shame in that but it really needs to end if we are to end the stigma around mental illness.

I know a blogger/twitter person that instead of calling it mental illness, she calls it for mental health. To me, that is different. People who are mentally healthy don’t end up in the hospital a few times a year or take psych medication on a daily basis. They don’t struggle with their illness every day, be it bipolar, depression, or schizophrenia. It pisses me off when people try and pawn off one thing for something else. Yes, I would like to be mentally healthy but that is never going to happen and I am not being pessimistic. That is reality.

Feel stupid

by Midnight Demon, posted in chronic physical pain, depression, mood disorders

Feel stupid

I had asked my therapist for another session today to continue what we were talking about yesterday about my self-image and dissociative state. Least that was the plan anyways. It didn’t work out. I was so out of it from taking pain meds last night and still feeling deeply worried about my ankle as it is numb. I thought with rest it would go away by morning but it hasn’t happened yet. The pain is not there, least as long as I don’t move it a certain way. We ended up talking about that, most of the session. And then I felt bad and stupid because there were periods where I wasn’t talkative or just gave one word answers. Yea I was an interesting person to talk to today. NOT.

I wrote her a letter last night and I partially read it to her, or at least gave her the gist of what it was about. Apparently, I threatened suicide at the end of the letter. But luckily, I didn’t follow through with it because I fell asleep shortly after signing off. I was in a bad state of mind last night because even though I had a “band” of numbness around my ankle, before and after this band was severe pain. I was just very uncomfortable and seriously considering going to the hospital to find out why I was numb. I am still numb but I don’t have the same amount of pain around the numbness. And I don’t think this is psychological. I think because it is so swollen, I can’t feel my ankle because the skin is being stretched so much. Icing it causes me pain so all I have left is elevation.

I almost had to laugh when my therapist asked what I was doing this weekend. UM, don’t you remember I am on bed rest?? The only thing I have to do is figure out how to get to the pharmacy to refill my pain medication. I figure I will do this on Saturday to make sure I don’t waste my time tomorrow. But other than that, I am not planning on going anywhere. I was supposed to go to a grad party Saturday and a birthday party on Sunday but I have cancelled those events as there is no way I can go. It will cause me too much pain.

This numbness that I am experiencing is really annoying me. Just imagine your foot going to sleep and never waking up is the best way I can describe it. I am not getting the pins and needles you get when it wakes up. I feel so stupid that this is happening. I can still stand on my foot, walk on it, etc. It just feels really weird. There is no color change, there is no bruise or redness around the area. It just is so frustrating. Even if I go to the hospital, I know the x-ray is going to show nothing wrong with it.

I am really tired today. I want to sleep but the fricken birds in my area are chirping really loud. It is annoying the crap out of me. And it’s hard to sleep when you are disturbed like this. I wish there was a way to scare the fuckers away but I don’t even know where they are hiding. I would throw rocks at them or something. Good thing I don’t own a fire arm.

Ideas are like Stars

by Midnight Demon, posted in blogging, chronic physical pain, depression, mood disorders, suicide

Ideas are like stars

I am listening to Mary Chapin Carpenter as I am writing this. The name of the album is “Songs from the movie”. She has a song called “Ideas are like stars” so I thought that would be my title tonight.

I had a visit with my writing partner. It really hurt to go out to see her but it was worth it. I have the rest of the week to be on bed rest. I am icing my ankle as it is pretty swollen. After the visit, my father wanted me to help him with something but I was unable to. It was a wasted trip. But at least I made the effort. That really flare up my pain. On the bus ride home, I wasn’t sure if I was going to be able to walk home the block and half. But I did ok once I started walking. I don’t know what I would have done if I couldn’t walk. I probably would start crying from despair.

I really have been thinking about my last blog post about DID, Dissociative Identity Disorder. My therapist and I talked about it most of session yesterday because apparently I shifted tones in the blog and I didn’t even notice it. We talked more about it today as I read through the blog last night and didn’t notice any shifting. I read her the blog and it was when I started talking about suicidal gauge that she noticed the shift. It was very subtle, least to me anyway. She thinks that I may have dissociative disorder not otherwise specified because I am so good at it. Even when I am in severe pain, I don’t feel it most of the time because I just block it out of my mind. Like I am doing right now. My ankle is hurting me really bad but only if I focus on it. As long as I treat it as “background noise” it doesn’t bother me. I know I will have to take some pain medication because it is getting to be a 10 soon. There is only so much dissociating I can do before I break down and need to take something.

We did the SSF (Suicidal Status Form) again today to assess where I am at. I am still partly suicidal. She asked about self-hate and I told her I was ugly. That set off a long discussion about how I am not. Also brought about the body image issues that are contributing to my self-hate. I sent her a picture last night of my writing partner and I and she said that I was “adorable”. I thought I looked retarded in the picture. I am guessing we will talk more about this our next session.

Normal people sleep at this hour. But those in chronic pain are up fighting the demons that are keeping them awake. No one knows of this battle. It is kept in silence because no one wants to hear it. Tomorrow when I wake up grumpy for my coffee I will make sure no one is home so I can drink it in peace. People think that because I am in my room all the time I sleep. I hardly do anymore. The pain demons keep me up. It is a battle I face night after night. I am alone.

Not too happy right now

by Midnight Demon, posted in chronic physical pain, depression, mood disorders

Not too happy right now

I saw my PCP and he gave me advice I didn’t want to hear, that I should ice and rest my foot/ankle until it gets better. I wanted to say, “You fink, I have been doing that”!! But now that my leg is involved and he saw how swollen it is, I am grounded. I was supposed to meet up with friends tomorrow and it looks like I will have to cancel. I am so fucking aggravated.

I might sneak out anyway to see my friend from NM. It depends on how I feel, but I really feel guilty about not seeing my other friends. Either trip is going to cause me pain. I just hate myself all the more.

I saw my pdoc. I have until Wed to make a decision about the hospital. I told her I wanted to talk to my therapist first and see what she thinks. But now with this rest rule in place, I just don’t know. Yes, the hospital will allow me to rest my leg but they don’t have my bed and I am not carrying my wedge to take with me so they can mess with it. I will just stay in my room anyway, propped up on pillows, though their beds suck big time. They psych wards do not have standard issue hospital beds. It’s more like half a bunk bed that is stationary on the floor so you can’t move it and then a thin mattress to sleep on. Does wonders for people with back problems like myself. And the pillows are worse. I usually take one of my pillows with me as I cannot sleep on a soft pillow.

On the one happy note for today, is that I got my books. They just arrived not too long after I started this blog. I am hoping to donate at least 4 of them to local libraries and submit 2 for review for the American Association of Suicidology. They require two copies be sent for review.

Just got two texts that say severe thunderstorms and a tornado warning has just been issued. Hope that doesn’t mean the Sox game will be postponed. I need something to do tonight. Last night I decided to finally watch a Harry Potter movie and my laptop’s DVD player crapped out on me. I watched like half the movie when it went. I was so mad. I am going to try playing it on Windows Media Player next time and see if that works. I don’t know if it’s the software program I use or the DVD player itself.

I so need a nap. I think I will try and get one in soon.