Tag: chronic illness

Bad Pain Day

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

Bad Pain Day

My day has not gone off to a good start. I woke up early, around 0630, and my ankle was hurting so took some pain meds. I went back to sleep faster than I think the pain meds kicked in. When I woke up a few hours later, I thought I was ok. I wasn’t in pain. Then I got up and stood. My ankle was killing me with the pressure of standing. But I had to go pee so had to walk and go down stairs. I don’t remember if I had something to eat or not. I just wanted to get off my leg.

Some time during the night a good friend IM’d me. She needed my input on some gender “privilege” questions. I found the questions to be scary and some of them offensive at the same time. I couldn’t answer them because I didn’t know what to say. Some were yes or no answers, others required more thought. It was very difficult. There were questions about bathrooms and such. I never gave it a thought because I am still my “assigned” gender. Until I have surgery, I will use the designated bathroom for women. I can’t picture myself using a men’s bathroom with knockers on. That is just asking for trouble, in my opinion. And the doctor questions were really biased. A medical professional shouldn’t have to ask what gender you are to swab your throat because you are sick. Strep doesn’t discriminate. But if you are being swabbed because of an STD, I think you should see a different doc.

After I went through these questions, I decided to make some dinner. My ankle again didn’t like me walking on it. Course, my mother was ever so helpful in saying “maybe I twisted it”. Yea, I twisted it while I was sleeping all afternoon. It’s been almost four years that I have been out of work because of my ankle injury and she still doesn’t get it. This is why I hate bringing up my pain issues with her or telling her I am in pain because I get dumbass responses. She still thinks I need to find a doctor that will help me. I guess the 15 that I saw before I was deemed disabled weren’t good enough. If 15 doctors can’t figure out what is wrong with me, I give up, because doctor numbers 16 and 17 still don’t know what is wrong with me. I wish I could see the ankle doctor that I saw when I first hurt my ankle eight years ago. But he is no longer at the location down the street from me. He was a good doc, straight forward, no horse shitting around the bush. I think that is when my ankle started to go downhill, but I will never know. It was the other side of my ankle that I hurt, not the outer part. For the most part, I would say it has gotten better because I am not in as much pain as I was 3.5 years ago. Resting has done it’s job.

But why my ankle would bulge when I put weight on it today, I have no clue. Once I start walking it eases up but soon as I rest and start standing again, holy hell. I was going to take a shower today. It’s no longer in the works. I will try again tomorrow.

My mood kind of sucks right now, not to say it was good to begin with. I still have a heavy heart and black clouds following me. I am really tempted to restart the remeron just so I can have some relief from this darkness. But the risk of gaining weight outweighs the benefits right now. I really don’t want to regain the weight that I lost. Sertraline will be better, if I can get a hold of my pdoc. I’ll start on a baby dose and then if I tolerate it, move to 50 mg. Of course, there is no guarantee that even at 25 mg I will not become nauseated. And there is always the possibility that my pdoc will say no. It’s doubtful, but a possibility. I just priced a new SSRI called ViiBryd and it’s $50/month. If I go on sertraline, it’s, no kidding, $1.35/month, at the 25 mg dose. Sickening.

I have been sleeping most of the day because what else is there for me to do. I am very tired anyways. I wish my CBC showed that I was anemic of some kind that would explain the tiredness, but nope. All came back normal. I hate when there is nothing physically wrong with you when you feel so rotten. It’s just so annoying. Like my ankle pain. Every x-ray and MRI showed normal stuff except for some swelling in a place that wasn’t near my pain. I thought so many times of stabbing myself in my ankle to prove there was something wrong. Even if I damaged a tendon, that would at least be something rather than nothing. There is nothing I can do about the darkness that is surrounding me. There is no x-ray or MRI for that. And it sucks.

3 March 2016

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

3 March 2016

Dear Bozo,

I have seriously thought about therapy the last few days. I feel like I am a burden to you and that you will be better off without me in your life. It’s my fault I have not gotten better. I should be able to fix myself but for whatever reason, I am unable to. You have been a good listener, but I can tell you are tired of hearing me talk these days. I probably talk about the same things and it annoys you.

I know I am a boring person. I live in a bubble that is surrounded by trauma every where I turn, whether it be due to external circumstances (e.g., my father) or internal ones (e.g., my pain). I joined a PTSD chat the other night. I didn’t talk much, just observed what the conversation was about. One day I hope to tell my story, in pieces, but I am scared it will be too triggering. I went off the other day on Twitter with CES stuff because of pain. I didn’t talk about my bowels or bladder, just that pain had controlled me and always gives me anxiety when it reaches a certain notch. It’s not all the time I have anxiety due to pain. But I am always on edge because I don’t know if pain is going to cause it or not, so I am anxious about being anxious.

I have been struggling with the need for therapy the past week. Our relationship has been different than the other relationships that I have had, in regards to therapy. One, it has lasted longer than the others and two, I never really thought about leaving even though I have said I wanted to. When we had this discussion a few months ago, it really terrified me to think I was really going to lose you. Since then, our relationship has changed. And I quite don’t know if it is for better or for worse.

You talk about your anxiety of dealing with me sometimes gets in the way of our talk. Maybe it is for the better that I leave you. I hate causing you pain.

My psych hasn’t returned the email about setting up an appointment. I am in an “I don’t care mood” so will not pursue her. I really don’t care. I am just a burden to her as well. I am just too “weak” right now to deal. I feel I am a failure and she is tired of my bullshit, too. I have read the emails that I wrote. And who cares that I have lost my appetite and a few pounds. No one cares. It isn’t like I am skinny and need the pounds. It’s not like me to have physical symptoms of depression. I am waiting for the heartache to set in and finish me off. I thought about hanging myself tonight. I was feeling that bad. But I don’t have a beam to do it, least not in my room. I just want to be dead. It’s good I don’t own a pistol. I would be dead three times over already. I just have my pills. Maybe a 60 day dose of my blood pressure pill will do the job.

I know talking about killing myself sets you into anxious mode. I am sorry. It’s just the way that I feel.

Jumping around (a book) and other thoughts

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

Jumping around (a book) and other thoughts

So my last blog I wrote about how I bought a book about the standard legal and ethical care of the suicidal patient. In the appendix it listed an “Anti-suicide” contract. I was curious about this as I was hoping it had nothing to do with a “no harm” contract. I was correct. It was similar to the “commitment to living” contract that I wrote about here. But the funny thing and I don’t mean the HAHA funny, is that it lists the lethal dose of common drugs in this book. I won’t go into specifics about these tables, but for an anti-suicide book, I find it odd. I have never seen a table like this listed in a preventative book before.

The book is the second edition, not the first like what I thought I ordered. The original book was printed in 1991. The second edition, 2002. I didn’t know this. I have heard of the author before. He is in another book about the legal and ethical treatment of suicidal patients. That book is co-edited with a bunch of other suicidologists. I had bought both books because it was referenced with an article I was reading and I wanted to read the reference. Trouble is, I forgot the article and the reference. I didn’t make note and so now I have these books but I don’t know why I have them. They will be read in the course of the year. I am doing a reading challenge on GoodReads.com. It will come in handy because I don’t have 20 books to read this year. I have about 15, which leaves me 5 short. I have read 6 books so far this year for this challenge. I had put Dostoevsky’s Brothers Karamazov on it but I think I am going to remove it. It’s much too long to read and I have like 6 books on Kindle I downloaded that I want to read. Four of these book are Lawrence Block books. I had started one book but I read “Common Struggle” today and I am wiped out for reading. I still have Harry Potter to read. I don’t know when I will get around to reading that book.

I had pizza for supper. My mother made it and it was good but my stomach didn’t like it. I think I ate too much as I haven’t been eating good the past three weeks or so. I think I am going to have to have some Alka-Seltzer to settle my stomach. Tomorrow I will buy the generic version of Mylanta. The PPI that I have been using for my reflux just hasn’t been cutting it for indigestion.

I had to bust out laughing when I saw the weather report for Friday. We are supposed to get 0.1 inch of snow. That is nothing! Why even bother reporting it??!! And they are calling it a fucking storm! Are you serious?? The weathermen have nothing better to do these days then to call snow that is 0.1 inch a storm. RIDICULOUS!

For the past half hour, my leg/ankle/foot has been having a weird pain. It’s starting from my calf muscle and is wrapping its way around my leg to down my ankle and foot. I have never felt this before and it’s not my usual pain that I have. My toes are singing to me. That is my usual pain. But that is also because I got zaps in my toes a little while ago before this weird pain started.

My father is still mad at me. He is paranoid. He thinks my sister and I are conspiring to kill him. I had the “pleasant” task of talking to his doctor’s staff today about his refusal to take his medication. Apparently, he told my father he doesn’t want him taking it. Well, don’t you think I should know that?? I am so pissed. Here I am telling the guy to take his meds or bad things will happen and the doc told him not to. I am livid. As the “keeper” of this medication, I should have been told this information. And getting him back on this medication is going to be a hassle. I am not going to be the one to tell my father this because I am “trying to kill him”. He better be put on some other blood thinner. Or I will have him go back to his cardiologist and have him explain to him that he needs to be on it. I am done with coordinating with a PCP that has no regard for the family members who deal with my father’s medication and then leave out pertinent information regarding it.

In other news, there was a “trespasser” on one of the commuter rail lines today and he/she got hit by a train. This is the second person to get hit and now they are closing the station temporarily. I seriously doubt they will say it is a suicide attempt or not. The T doesn’t report “jumpers”. But I am wondering if someone was crossing the tracks and they got hit by the train because it was easier than going around the world to get to the other side. I have seen that happen before. No one got hurt but it is still risky.

Morpheus, Where are you??

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

Morpheus where are you??

My stomach ache is gone but my foot has exploded so I had to take strong pain pills to kill it. I really would have loved to shoot myself in the foot. Least the pain would be explainable. But I would probably take the gun to my head instead at this point. I am feeling really poorly because I can’t fucking sleep. I have taken my regular pain meds, Ativan, and now the strong pain meds and I am still fucking awake.

I looked over my finances and the money I got paid yesterday is gone. I have only a hundred dollars to my name, which will be half that after I pay for my prescription later today and my T pass. I shouldn’t have bought groceries but I needed food, even though I am not eating very much these days. I think I have lost 10 pounds in two weeks because my appetite has been nothing. I have been eating just one meal a day and that has been it. I don’t feel hungry. And you would think that because of the weight loss, my pain would be less. NOPE. If anything, it has increased!! One physiatrist told me that even if I was my “normal” weight, I would still have back issues. Course, she didn’t say that in her notes. She said that I should lose weight. Talk about contradiction. If losing weight is supposed to decrease my pain, why does it increase it? Doesn’t make any fucking sense. My therapist would say I am the exception not the rule. I hate when she says that. She is reckless, like the new Martina McBride song. I can’t wait to get the lyrics because I think the song is perfect for our relationship. It’s not available on Amazon right now and I am pissed. I hate iTunes. It always crashes the computer.

I can’t take my pain anymore. I am going to go through with my plans this weekend. Fuck it. I am done. It probably won’t kill me but at least I will be seriously knocked out. I just need a fucking escape and I have it and I am going to use it. It is a done deal, for right now. I may still change my mind but I doubt it if this fire that is burning is still going on. I will text my therapist before I do it. Or maybe I won’t. Will be kind of stupid if I did.

It’s getting cool outside but it’s still hot in my room so I have the ceiling fan on. It’s a comfortable coolness in my room that I like. I will probably be cold in the morning but oh well. I am comfortable now. Why can’t I sleep then?? The meds have kicked in though now I am feeling nerve pain. I have found that I will have intense fucking physical pain and then when the opioids kick in, my foot/ankle will burn like it is on fire. Neurontin is the only thing that extinguishes these fires but I can’t take it now or I will be foggy brain later today and I need to be coherent because I have to see my “lovely” father.

When I saw him yesterday, he was speaking mostly Italian. My middle sister couldn’t understand a word he was saying. I don’t think she ever really grasped the language like I did when I was taking it in college and in high school. I may not know ALL that he says but I can get the gist of it, if he talks slow enough. If he talks fast, forget about it. I am lost. Maybe I should invest in the Rosetta Stone to learn Italian because he is going to be speaking it more as he ages. I think he thinks he is speaking English sometimes because when you tell him to speak English, he has a confused look on his face like “huh”?? And then he is silent because he is searching for the English translation to what he is saying. He will also talk slow like we are retarded or something. It’s very frustrating.

I am feel loads of pain in my left ankle down to my toes. The peroneal tendon must be inflamed because that’s what it feels like. I had a good pic of the tendon but I have no idea where it got saved to. The spasms that I had earlier before my foot exploded must have triggered the tendon. Fuck. I wish I could just cut the sucker out and be done with it. I am so sick of being in fucking pain.

Every morning a little after 0100, I get a text from the Twitter account of Dilbert. I love the comic strip. It makes me laugh. Very few things these days make me laugh but Dilbert does.

I feel like having ice cream now that my tummy feels better but the effects of the strong pain pills is starting to make me feel woozy. It funny because I will feel high for about 30 seconds and then I will just collapse. This happens to me almost every time I take it. It’s very rare that I am able to fight the effects of this medication. I hope Morpheus finds me and I can sleep. I just hope he doesn’t bring me dreams about Jobes again. Those are weird. Dreaming about a psychologist that I respect a great deal and then following him around like a puppy? No thanks, Morpheus.