Tag: chronic illness

ankle chronicles 3

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

I went to my appointments today for my primary and psychiatry. Neither had much to offer other than doing the same old same old. My primary wants me to see yet another doctor for the same problem I have been having. I want to refuse but I will make the appointment Monday to show that I am making an effort at getting to the bottom of my pain even though no one knows why I am in pain. They have different theories, each doctor I see has a different opinion or that there is nothing wrong with me because it doesn’t show up on an MRI or X-ray. I just want to be able to control my pain. Is that so wrong? That is why I see him, to get medication for my pain so that I am not suicidally inclined to end my life because of the physical pain in my foot and ankle. But let’s take it from my perspective. I have seen at least 10 medical professionals in the past year to find out what my pain is about. I have had countless sessions of physical therapy, all that have no helped my pain or ease the misery of it. And now he wants me to see my physiatrist to get yet another opinion on what is the reason behind my pain. He thinks that it is tendinitis. If that were so, I would have been cured of that within 6-8 weeks after immobilization. I have worn a boot for almost three months and still my ankle felt like it was going to fall off. To be up in pain night after night of doing NOTHING the past few months have shown that something nerve like is the culprit and not a mechanical problem like it was. Unless I am going up and down stairs wrong after 37 years. Then maybe I am doing something mechanically wrong flexing and reflexing my foot in the upward and downward motion of stair climbing. But no one know this for certain. Hell I don’t even know. I have to take the steps one step at a time to avoid falling. I have gotten so into the habit that I no longer do one step after the other on the stairs leading away from my bedroom.

I am tired of having to explain my pain every month but have decided that I am not going to take my pain medicine every day that I am suppose to. I have no appointment with my primary in a month like I supposed to either. So my little experiment will be can I go a few weeks without pain medication. I know this prospect scares me a little but I feel that I have to at least try this. My only fear is that it will bring on a pain cycle that will be hard to break once it starts. I know that if I don’t do this I might as well try and kill myself now. What is the point of going on like this if I am just going to have panic attacks worrying about pain all the time like I do. I have zap pain, I have burning pain. I don’t have pain down the leg. I don’t have back pain. I just have this fucking pain in my ankle and foot that does not go away except for when I sleep. It is with me 24/7. Some of it I am not aware of because I have gotten so used to it. But if I stop and think about it, it is there, buzzing like a bee.

blog post 262

by Midnight Demon, posted in suicide attempt

I have been up since eight. I tried to go back to sleep but failed. Woke up again from a strange dream, which I have been having all week. I don’t know why that is. I have stopped taking my pain meds for the time being to see if that was making the weird dreams but it is not. I don’t know what is causing this. Might be my mood stabilizer. I remember going through a period of this when I first started it. It will phase out eventually but it is disturbing as hell.

I couldn’t write yesterday as I was exhausted and had another headache. So far I have been getting them the past three days at the exact same time. Another oddity. I took some migraine meds and that seemed to put it to a holt for now. We’ll know this afternoon if it comes back, I guess.

I have decided I won’t be going back to group therapy. It is just too stressful for me. The walking is too far and hurts me and after each session I want to kill myself.

I will be going to visual therapy starting next week. For some reason they called me last night to confirm my appointment. That is a week’s confirmation!

I should be getting Lincoln soon. I can’t wait to watch this movie again. It is such a great film.

I have decided, sort of, that I won’t be going out today. I need the rest because last week when I had back to back appointments, all I did was sleep all day Friday because I was in pain most of the night. I’d like to sleep today but I got therapy in about a half hour. And I have stuff I like to talk about while awake.

I think today I will work on my book for a little bit. I have some stuff to add that I have been thinking about. I also found a journal from 2006 that is helping to fill in the gaps a little bit. I forgot that I didn’t really keep a journal. See I would write my therapist letters and they became quite numerous so I started to keep the letters in journals as a way of me writing my thoughts and also to keep track of my therapy progress or regress. Some entries I was mad at her. Others I was tearful. It also documented my back injury in 2006 when I had to have surgery. That was important to me because I had blocked out a lot of what was going on while I was in a lot of pain and I seriously tried to down play it so that no one would now how bad I was hurting, and I was hurting bad. I remember I went to the supermarket to get some food and reached for a can of peas or something on the top shelf and that caused me such pain that I just left my things and went home. I had no idea that my back was in bad shape. Even the surgeon was asking how I could be standing and walking as the chunk of disc they took out was significantly large. I ended up getting the chunks from pathology and have them in my room as a reminder of what I don’t want to go through a third time.

lack of sleep is a costly thing

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

I can’t sleep but then it’s early for me. I have been thinking about all the nights I have not been able to sleep because of pain, because of worries, because of things that keep running through my head.

Tonight I feel suicidal but I am not going to act on it. I just don’t feel the lethality of my thoughts anymore though if given a chance to actually act on them I might do it. I just don’t care anymore. If I live, if I die. What difference does it make. I still will be doing the same thing tomorrow that I am doing today, nothing. I realized that because I don’t sit down, say in a chair, it has helped my leg get better. I don’t know how better as the pain is less but when I walk or have a long day, it will flair. Even on days when I don’t have long days or walk it will flair up. There is no rhyme or reason as to why this happens. But it bugs me. I need something to do because I am going out of my mind. I have MASH DVDs that I can watch but I don’t watch them. I have other programs I can watch but I don’t. I can clean my room but that just overwhelms me. I try to go out at least once a day but even that seems to be too much of a hassle for me. I am becoming a hermit and I don’t like it. I know tomorrow I will have to go out to pick up my prescription. I probably will get a soda as I have not had one in a few days. I might get a tonic water to avoid the calories of a soda as I am watching my weight. I also might mix this tonic water with some gin and have a drink. I love gin. It tastes so good but I can’t have too much or I will get sick.

I just tried stretching my legs. It felt good. I wish I could remember to do it every day. Maybe then they won’t be so tight. Right now it’s nine thirty in the evening and I am thinking of going to bed but it hold no good dreams for me. I dream about work or killing myself. And this saddens me. I hate trying to go to sleep. Unless I am severely exhausted, I will fight it till the end. No matter how many pills, I take to get to sleep it seems my body always fights it no matter what. It is so frustrating. My lovely Neurontin that I love to take to zone out no longer works for me, even at high doses. I used to be able to sleep a good twelve hours, now I’m lucky to sleep five. That is my interval, four hours maximum. Where I used to sleep till 10 am or later, I am now waking up between six and eight in the morning. I hate this. I need something that makes me sleep longer but I don’t know what to take to let me sleep. Maybe some benedryl. I don’t know…

And this is all if I don’t have pain keeping me up. If I have pain then I am not sleeping at all. I writher in agony until the pain meds bring me some relief. Then soon as they wear off I am in pain again it starts the cycle all over again. The doctors don’t get it. They see me at 2-3 in the afternoon when I am not at my worst pain and think I am doing ok or better than I was the month before and give me my pills and say have a nice month before coming back to tell them the same story of losing sleep because of pain. Pain that wakes me up. Pain that keeps me awake. They don’t care. I am the one paying the price and they don’t care. They think that 2-3 pills a day is an adequate dose to keep me from withering in agony but they don’t see the price it is costing me. Lack of sleep. Lack of ambition, lack of motivation to do things I normally do. I tell them all this and still all I get is lose weight and be more active. I’ll be more active when I am dead…

why do I bother

by Midnight Demon, posted in depression, suicide, suicide attempt

Why do I bother

Things seemed to go ok today but now I am feeling the rut of my depression and want to end things. Nothing specific has happened, I just don’t want to exist. I feel worthless and that what I am doing is nothing but wasting people’s time.

I have a messed up right eye. The muscles are weak and I have to do therapy to correct it but my insurance doesn’t cover therapy so I have to pay out of pocket. I am already on a budget and I am not sure I can swing this extra money for this therapy. It has me stressed out because without this, my eyes won’t be corrected and it will be hard for me to read continuously. I would have to take breaks like every ten minutes and who can read something every ten minutes. It has me feeling frustrated that yet my body is failing me and it has nothing to do with age.

Feeling suicidal and acting on it are two different things. But right now I would act if I had a plan to go to. I just don’t want to exist anymore.