Tag: chronic pain

Ankle Chronicles 11

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

Ankle Chronicles 11

Hard to believe I am up to 11 stories about my stupid ankle. But here goes…

I woke up early this morning to my foot having fits and being a real ass. I had to go out today. There was no way I was spending another day in the house after I spent nearly all weekend and then some inside. So I took some pain meds and within and hour I was back to sleep. When I woke up my foot wasn’t as bad, until I started walking on it. It didn’t like it one bit. Shit. Too bad. I rebelled. I kept off it most of the day until I had to do an errand for my sister and then leave to go get my latte. My sister is a little nuts. I know she has anxiety when it comes to her kids but her kids aren’t little anymore. She wanted me to check in on the 17 year old to see if she had a fever. Really? My niece is not mentally disabled. I think she can stick a thermometer in her mouth quite safely to see if she is running a fever. So I hobble over there and find she is fine. No fever just some pain in her side that I contribute to either a pulled muscle or her period coming on. She is not throwing up, doesn’t feel nauseous, is drinking fluids. So I leave to catch my bus to the Square. My foot is not really hurting but before I leave to go to the train station to meet up with my friends, I take a pain pill just in case.

I met up with my friends and we had dinner. Then we went to the bookstore and I got a book that I wanted on Amazon and a new journal. I really wanted to get the $40 one but settled on the camo one for $30. As we are walking back to the car, my ankle decides it is going to act up. I have to play it cool so I just walk like nothing is bothering me. We get back to the train station to head home and we have to jog a bit to make it to the platform on time. Yea, my ankle REALLY didn’t like that. I thought all was good until I got off the bus and started walking home. I should have taken a pain pill while I was waiting for the bus. So I pretty much had to crawl home. It took me at least twenty minutes to get home when it normally would take me ten. I am half way down the street that I hate walking at night when I start to feel really nauseous. I had to stop for a few minutes and then continue. I had some dry heaves in the process. I didn’t think I was going to get home without hurling my dinner. I finally make it home, stomach contents still intact and where they should be.

Now I have to climb two flights of stairs to my room. My ankle is still being a whiny bitch and fights me every step. I also have to go to the bathroom but want to change before I do. I took a Zofran (anti-emetic) so I don’t puke. I am waiting for that to kick in before I start taking my handful of night meds and my pain meds. I go to the bathroom and come back to my room. Ankle is fuming at me now. It wants no part of standing to take my meds. My stomach is still unsettled to I take my pill box to the night stand and when my stomach is ready, least I won’t have to get up again. I am tempted just to take the one pill that I need and my pain meds and say screw the rest of them. Problem is, that pill looks like my Ativan so I will have to take both pills because I can’t really distinguish them without looking up the pill numbers and such. That is too much work to do when I am in pain and just want to go to sleep.

I had therapy today. Again she wanted to know where my writing was at. UGH. Why do my two treaters care where my writing is at when I don’t have the answer for them? It drives me crazy because I am not writing and I feel bad about this. It adds pressure for me and the more pressure that is on, I can’t write. It’s not writer’s block. The stuff is there. I just need motivation to actually write my thoughts out. But I am scared it is going to cause some unpleasantness, maybe some dissociation or worse, psychotic symptoms to come out. That is why I am treading lightly in my head before it is on paper. They don’t know this though. I haven’t told them because I just don’t want them to pressure me more. It has been months since I wrote something good. I think the NYT article was the last thing I wrote, outside my blog and journal. I got to find my mojo again.

Game Day Sunday

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

Game Day Sunday

My football team won. Baseball team won. I just finished with a shower at halftime and my damn foot got zaps in it. I am in some serious pain but I just took a pain pill so hopefully that will take care of it. If not, in an hour I will take another one. I hate nerve pain. I can’t do anything about the zaps. I never know when they will occur and they come out of the blue. I never know when they will stop either. The longer they last, the deeper the pain is. Drives me insane.

Been in a depressed mood since I woke up this morning after a couple of weird dreams. The only one I can recall is walking toward a destination and getting lost. I was in the right vicinity of where I needed to be but kept on making wrong turns and had to back track. Then it got dark as I was walking back so I woke up. No idea what that dream is about. Probably just about getting lost. Or perhaps, feeling lost. I wanted to do some writing today before the game, but I got distracted. I wrote in my journal for about 45 mins before game time and that was the only writing I did. I feel like I should work on my manic story but not sure where to go with it. It’s not even 500 words so I really need to write more. I would like to describe the scene a little more, like where I was and such but don’t know where to put that in. Maybe a different paragraph. I know that if I write it out by hand, it will be better than typing it up on the word doc. I tend to write better with the pen and paper. I don’t lose my attention so fast when I make a mistake.

I woke up thinking today was Monday. This is the second time that I have thought this after having a rough night sleeping. Last week, I thought Saturday was Sunday all day. I swear if I don’t wear a watch, I just lose my sense of time. If I have the watch on, I don’t lose the time, if that makes sense. I know I have my phone but I don’t really pay attention to the date as well as I do with a watch. But since I no longer work or go out every day, wearing a watch has become inconsistent.

I hate this feeling of depression that I have been feeling all day. Watching both games distracted me from it for a little while but now the games are over and I have a long night ahead of me. I don’t know what to do with myself and that further depresses me. I have things I can read but I just can’t stay focused like I used to. I’ll read for about 20-30 minutes and then be done. I still haven’t finished reading “Order of the Phoenix” because my concentration is off. I lost interest in reading, so it’s hard to read. Things were all well and good when I was hypo but now that I am depressed, I find things to be so hard. My thinking has been a lot slower. I don’t have that much of an appetite lately. I have been sleeping more as I just been so tired. I am not really motivated to do anything. It just stinks.

Finally, a diagnosis

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

Finally a diagnosis…

Since we have been talking about all the different personality disorders that I have been given the past two weeks, I decided to ask my therapist what I have. I must have one, surely. Turns out I don’t. I might have traits of borderline but I don’t fit the diagnosis. I have complex post traumatic stress disorder (C-PTSD). I kind of figured I did as my symptoms do fit. Now that I know this, I am kind of relieved but also kind of not. It’s a serious diagnosis, one you don’t really recover fully from and I have been in a steady state for the last fourteen years. Some days are better than others, but pain seems to dictate my symptoms. For example, if I can’t move my toes because of temporary swelling, I will freak out and panic thinking I am going to get cauda equina syndrome (CES) again. I am in a quandary as to what to do. And calming down is extremely difficult. It makes the pain worse the more anxious I become. The swelling just happens because I have nerve damage and usually have overdone it for the day. My foot is constantly being used so the more I use it, the more pain I have, which lead me to more symptoms of flashbacks and thinking of not wanting to go there. I don’t want to have CES ever again but I have a few discs that are faulty and I am at risk of it happening, especially since one of the discs touches my nerves occasionally. I also have a constant reminder of this condition whenever my bladder leaks, which is has the past three days because of my increase in activity levels. It’s not fun. I should be wearing a diaper but my dignity is not there yet. Plus, it has been super hot and I really don’t want to wear a diaper when I am hot and sweaty.

Besides flashbacks, I also dissociate a lot when my depression is really bad. It is not clear whether I do have dissociative identity disorder, NOS or if it is a symptom of PTSD. Or it could be both. I do give my therapist a run for her money. I don’t know the whole symptomatology of the PTSD as it has been a LONG while since I last looked at the DSM and the DSM has changed so I am not sure if it is now included or not.

I think the stress over the last two weeks have finally caught up with me as I am having psychotic symptoms. I mentioned in yesterday’s blog that I have been listening to Matchbox 20 incessantly. When I am not listening to it, the music is playing in my head, very loud. I tried listening to Adele to break the monotony but it didn’t work. The voices were demanding that I play MB20. So I am back to listening to them day and night. I plan on taking some trilafon soon. I will have to take some extra stuff for the constipation that will ensue. I hate being constipated but luckily there are things I can take to make me go. Otherwise, it could be days before I go. I have to be careful with my bowel regimen because too much and I have the opposite problem, which lead to accidents. I hate them more than my bladder leaks. It’s just degrading and demoralizing. It will also set off the reminder that I had CES and I will become depressed and feel despair. It’s the one thing I can’t control, like my bladder. And it sucks.

Depression and other things

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

I had a rough day. All I want to do is sleep. I managed to make some breakfast and eat a couple of cupcakes for lunch. I really just want to sleep today but I had to pick up my prescription before it got “recycled” at the pharmacy. They give you three days to pick up the meds. Any longer than that, it gets reshuffled into the stock pile. Today was day number three so I had to get it.

My sister texted me to pick up my niece tomorrow evening. I hope this sleepiness is gone by then. I need the energy to walk to the school and back. I hope it’s cool like today.

I texted my therapist to see if there was an opening and doesn’t appear to be. So I am stuck with talking with her tomorrow. I haven’t decided if I am going to keep Wed’s session or not. I am guessing it all depends on when my cake pops will be ready to be picked up. I am getting them as a thank you to my psych.

I feel really tired. My thoughts are slow. I can’t seem to focus on anything. My appetite is off. I think I am depressed. I really want to read Harry Potter but I can’t concentrate. I am not even close to being half way finished. I hate being in the middle of a book. But things have been so crazy the past two weeks. I am still in awe that I got published in the New York Times. My mother still hasn’t said anything about it. But my sisters have. They are so happy for me. My younger sister bought me champagne the other night. We still haven’t celebrated because I have been in this funk. There has been a bright side. I have sold nine books so far, five from Kindle and four paperbacks. I haven’t gotten any reviews yet. We’ll have to wait for that.

Oh dear god, they are starting a “say no to suicide” campaign. Like that is really going to work. I know it worked for drugs, but suicide is a different thing. It’s deeply personal. Because saying no, always worked for me. NOT! I don’t know who comes up with these things. It’s horrible. And they are doing this to stop stigma. Well you just added stigma to your stupid campaign. How are people going to talk about it if you just “say no”? It really bothers me. Most people in the prevention campaign have been open to talking about suicide, not shutting it down and certainly by not saying “no”. To me, if someone is seeking help and all they hear is the word no, then it further breaks down the lines of communication and there might be a suicide.

I’ve been in a lot of pain today for some reason. My big toe starting zapping early this morning and it is still sore. The lump I have on my good ankle is sore. I just took an NSAID and a pain pill to calm things down. I think the weather change has brought about this pain. My bad ankle is also throbbing, but then, it always is. I have been lucky the past week my pain has been minimal. But now it’s starting to ramp up again. Like I said earlier, other than going to Walgreens, I mostly have been in bed all day. I haven’t even been up and down the stairs that much. Hope it settles down because I have things to do this week and I need to be able to walk.