Tag: chronic pain

Random 685

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

I came home after I had my appointment with my pdoc. Before leaving, I went to say good-bye to my former coworker who is heading south. She will be leaving Boston and is such a good friend I had to say good-bye before she left. I also saw the lab manager. She is also a good friend of mine. We reminisced about our working days. But I think I stood too long as my ankle is very angry with me right now. It wasn’t hurting at the time or on the walk home. Soon as I was in the comfort of my home it flared up. I can’t win. This is why I can no longer work anywhere. Just a few minutes standing and I am in agony afterwards or later that night. It is very frustrating.

I talked to my pdoc about my writing and she said “You are writing again”. This was after I sent her a blog the other night. She gave me feedback on it, which I really appreciated. She really enjoys my writing, even if I think it’s crapola. I told her I wasn’t book writing and she just said, “take a break”. Stating the obvious, I know. She didn’t care what kind of writing I was doing, long as I sent her tidbits of it. I told her I was trying desperately to write a transference blog about my therapist but I just couldn’t hold on to the feelings. They were coming in spurts so I wrote in spurts. It was frustrating trying to blog yesterday. Then I got that article about counter-transference in my head and there went the blog. Just 300 words and that was it. I hate when I write short blogs. I sent it off to my therapist so she could read it, if it makes sense. I also told my pdoc that I get really down at night and it’s not funny. Past week I have been experiencing extremely low moods and agitation. Not a good mix when you are post suicidal. I told her every bottle seemed in danger of being taken as an outlet. I wouldn’t act on it. It’s just a rush of feelings I get at once and I want an escape, right now. I don’t do anything but ride the wave and perhaps take an Ativan to quell the agitation. I also told her the voices have been noisy lately as I have been talking to them more. I tend to talk more to them when I am agitated and annoyed. I was talking to them last night as I was laughing at Twitter and they wanted to know what I was laughing about. A conversation ensued. Thank goodness my mother is deaf or I would have some explaining to do! I wasn’t talking in my normal whisper, I was talking aloud, that was how wound up I was last night. The voices have been a part of my being since I was five. I don’t know how to live my life without them. They keep me ‘sane’. It is annoying sometimes as they are always watching me and commenting on what I am doing, or wanting to know what I am doing.

I didn’t wake up in pain this morning but I did wake up earlier than expected. I am tired now. I even had coffee today and I was in a good mood till I came home and my foot exploded. Being in chronic pain is exhausting. I just tried to go to the pharmacy but I bumped into my aunt and she said the lights are out. I will go tomorrow. I really wanted to have my prescription tonight but at least I have it. It came in the mail today.

what is it like living post suicidal thoughts

by Midnight Demon, posted in Bipolar Disorder, blogging, depression, mood disorders, suicide attempt

I finally had therapy today as my therapist is back from her two week vacation. She had an ok time, despite being in Hawaii. I told her I won’t be book writing anymore. She wanted to talk about this as she really wants a second book out of me. I told her my muse was gone (meaning “Hyde”). I just haven’t been able to do any good writing since my mood has shifted and the muse is gone. I have to be in a dark place to write, or at least have the writing itch. Neither has occurred in the last few weeks. Since I didn’t go through with my suicide plan two weeks ago, I have been in this weird place of where do I belong. I feel absolutely nothing most days and the days that I do feel something, I am extremely sad. I have no physical symptoms of depression, like I usually do. My appetite is not affected as I have gained five pounds. My PCP is going to flip if I don’t lose it in the next few weeks. I do have loss of energy and just the feeling of hibernation, even though it’s summer. I slept most of the weekend. I would have slept today but I really wanted a caramel macchiato. I wrote at Starbucks for a little while. Nothing pertinent, just my thoughts of the moment. I feel so useless. I have no hope for the future but I don’t feel hopeless. I feel a little helplessness, like no one can help me out of this pit that I am in. It just stinks that I can’t write, only for this blog. I don’t know what I would do if I didn’t have this blog. I probably be out of journals in no time. That happened before I started buying thicker volumes of journals, like 200 page counts. The 100 counts only got me within a half a year, at most. I don’t understand how I can write so much stuff on my blog and just nothing for the book writing. It is so annoying.

While perusing through my blog the other night, I came across a fictional story. It was a story I wrote about how someone was going to kill himself in a hotel bathroom. I remember writing it and sending it to my therapist, who knew it was not a fictional story. But that is all I remember. I don’t remember feeling the way I did when I wrote this story. I thought about including it in my book but then I would feel horrible if someone actually ended their life the way that I wrote it. I didn’t write specifics, I just said chemicals as a means of death, which could be anything. Everything is made up of chemicals. It’s just finding the ones that are lethal, which is not an easy thing to do, even with the internet. I must be so dumb not to find a quick poison, like hemlock in the days of old. But even if I did, there is no way I could get a hotel room. I don’t have credit cards anymore and I don’t think they accept debit cards. I refuse to kill myself in public, say the train station, and I certainly won’t do it in my room for my mother to find me. That will give her a heart attack on the spot. As you can see, I have put a lot of thought into this. If I had a vehicle, things might be different. I would be able to get to some cheap motel and do the deed there, where they accept cash as payment. Or who knows, maybe I will just leave town and travel to California to see my blogger friend and start a new life there. I doubt I would be able to stand the heat for too long, but they have beaches and she has a pool we can cool off in. I’d feel bad for leaving my mother, but I have always wanted to leave this state, if only for a little while. My heart will always be in Boston but it’s too constricting. I hate the city I live in because the subway is so far and I can no long walk there. It used to be my exercise to walk to and from the train station. But since my injury, I can’t walk that far anymore (approximately 1 mile). It makes me sad that I can’t walk to where I want to go. Even getting to local places, like the pizza shop on the main strip can be difficult and exhausting. And it’s only a few blocks from my house! No wonder I have gained weight. I wish my doc would have pity on me and just place me on a diet pill. I can lose the weight and not have to worry about gaining it back. I know that if I lost it, I wouldn’t be able to gain it back because I am so inactive. My weight has been stable the past year. I still have no idea how I gained those 5 pounds. I haven’t changed my eating habits, but I have been eating a lot more meat than I usually do, so maybe that is why. I am a carnivore!

My therapist was glad to see that I have the Harry Potter book collection. She knows how much I love to read. Years ago, I bought a Harry Potter journal set. I still have them somewhere in my room or in a bookcase. They are filled with my thoughts. They were filled quickly because they were only around 90 pages, not a big book but I enjoyed writing in them. Yesterday I started reading “Chamber of Secrets”. It has been so long since I last read it that I forgot some parts of the book that the movie left out.

Writing Workshop and Other Things

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

Writing Workshop and Other Things

I went to the writing workshop today and it seemed geared more for poets than writers. I wrote a couple of good paragraphs in the time allotted. But I thought it would be more discussion about writing itself rather than what we were writing about in the class. It was only for 45 mins and when I realized what it was, I really wanted to leave. The room was stifling hot, there were a lot of people there, and it just made me uncomfortable. It was supposed to be a cool day today but it’s not. The weatherman lied, again. I am just glad that I wore shorts and not full length jeans. I would have been really uncomfortable.

The errands that I had to run after the class got postponed because I had to go to the bathroom really bad. I felt funny using the bathroom at the workshop so I just left holding it until I got home. Now I got to go to Walgreens and pick up my prescription. I thought about getting my haircut but I think I will do that tomorrow. I tried getting it cut today but the line was too long and there were only two barbers on duty. Usually there are four. I am really spent so unless I get my sister’s car to go to Stop and Shop, that will have to wait till Friday. The walk to the place wasn’t bad but finding the green line back home was a trick. I had no idea where the station was so just walked over to the orange line a few blocks away from the class. I went down the stairs rather than using the elevator and I am paying for it now. I really don’t want to go to Walgreens but I have to. My mother needs something and I need to buy water. I have no spring water in the house and I hate drinking tap, unless it’s mixed with iced tea or lemonade mix. I am picky about water. When I lived in my hometown where I grew up, the tap water was excellent. But where I live now, it just doesn’t taste the same. I will buy a couple of gallons so I am stocked. There is no way I can carry a case home from Walgreens and it’s much more expensive there than at Stop and Shop. I will only buy Poland Spring water. If they don’t have that, Dasani is the next one I will get. If they don’t have either, I usually won’t buy it.

When I came out, I found out some sad news. My cousin’s mother in law passed away this morning. He was with her when she died. She had been sick for some time and was in a nursing home. She was a very nice lady. I met her more than a few times over the years.

I have an ace bandage around my ankle to help support it while I was out and about today. I still have it on. I should take it off but I will be going back out again. It’s very restrictive as going up and down stairs I could feel that my ankle did not want to do those motions. It feels comfortable now that I have my leg up and am relaxing as I am typing this. I should have been using this all along and maybe on long days where I am walking, I won’t be in so much pain afterwards. It’s a one piece ace that is made specific for the ankle. I really like it because you wear it like a sock. No pins or taping or wrapping needed. I can never wrap my ankle anyway or any other part. I just suck at that.

I started the day writing to my therapist like I have been doing the last few mornings. I will be so glad when she comes back and I don’t have to write to her anymore. Well, I could still write to her. She does like getting my letters. We will keep the post office in business. But with this writing, I am not doing much of anything else. I am not writing anything for my book and I am not writing in my journal like I usually do. I wanted to get a few pointers today on how to get unstuck but the stupid class wasn’t made for it. They do have other classes you can take but it costs money that I don’t have.

Before the workshop, I went to my “Happy” place, Starbucks and lo and behold, they had the coffee that I have been dying to get! I finally got my Kati Kati coffee!! I am so going to make it tomorrow morning!! I thought I was going to miss my chance on getting it this year because the Starbucks stores near me have sold out of it already. It’s an extremely popular blend and it’s only around during the summer months. It made my day to get a bag.

Random 582

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

There is a new screening tool for suicide assessment risk that people in Australia created. I read the study to the point where they said that even though the SSF is “the gold standard” for clinical work, it is “inconvenient” as a research and screening tool because of the qualitative answers. Soon as I read that, I stopped reading. Then I skipped to the back where they had the questions and literally laughed out loud. It DIRECTLY asks if you are going to attempt suicide someday. All I could say was “duh”. Can’t get more direct than that! No wonder it is a “great” screening tool. But more astonishing than that, there were over 1000 people who volunteered for this study with “no funding as reported by the authors”. HUH?? How can you conduct a large research study and have no funds to do it? It just sounds suspicious to me. I do like the screening tool and think that it will be valuable, if people in the US actually fucking use it. I have place it here ABCs of suicide risk assessment so you can form your own opinions.

Tomorrow is approaching faster than I would like. In less than twenty-four hours, I see my pdoc to discuss how things are. I still feel dejected. I really don’t want to be here but what choice do I have. If I say that I am still going through with my plan, my pdoc will take measures to ensure my safety. And I really don’t want to go to the hospital. It’s a pain in the ass in all accounts you can possibly think of. Sure it will keep me from myself but I have been doing fine with that the past few weeks. If I was going to do something, I think I would have done something by now. I will just take some Neurontin and sleep. This is the only drug that works for me to zone me out. And it’s safe as it leaves your system in eight hours or so. Only thing that sucks is that it can give you a hangover. But that is why they make coffee. I will NOT go out to Starbucks like I did last Saturday. The days where I trust the T are over after I got stranded in the Square last weekend. I don’t know what I would have done if my sister wasn’t home that day.

I still need to write a letter to my therapist today. I probably will do that later tonight. I was in a “Hyde” mood last night that got broken up by a fellow blogger checking in with me. We chatted until I couldn’t keep my eyes open anymore. It was late, past 0100 my time. She is on the west coast so it was “early” for her. I think there is a three hour difference in our zones. It was helpful to talk because we randomly talk about anything and everything. She was in a hypo state and I was trying to keep up with her typing but because I had already taken my meds, I was slow.

It’s finally a cool day. No humidity and medium temps. I like it when it’s in the late 60’s, early 70’s. It’s perfect walking weather. And I did some walking today that my ankle didn’t like. But oh well, I had to walk from A to B to get to where I was going. There was no other way to get there but my own two feet. And it was too short a distance for a cab. It would cost too much and besides, by the time the cab came, I would be at my father’s apartment. But the streets are level so my ankle didn’t like it. I had inclines and broken pavement to maneuver. I was supposed to go to the post office today to mail the first packet of letters for my therapist but I forgot the letters at home. I was mad at myself. I will have to do it tomorrow before my appointment with my pdoc. I will have plenty of time as I will be in the Square at least an hour before the appointment.

I am feeling really sad about not being able to kill myself. I am also feeling angry because I am being made to live a life I don’t want to. With all my pain that I experience, both physically and mentally, I just cannot take it anymore. I feel stupid for letting my treaters know of my plans. Maybe my ambivalence is what made me tell them. Or my fear that I wouldn’t succeed anyway. I am going to be grumpy the next few days. I already am grumpy and upset but even more so. I hope I don’t wake up tomorrow morning, that I die in my sleep. But that doesn’t happen in my family. They just die of old age. I don’t want to live to be old. I will die one day and it will be soon. I just don’t know when.