Tag: complex regional pain syndrome

Ac in October, why not?

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

AC in October, why not?

I just came home from my therapy appointment. It warmed up considerably as I made my way back home. I am sweating so I turned on the AC soon as I got in my room. It was supposed to be in the 80s but it’s 10 degrees cooler. I don’t care as long as I have AC.

I woke up five minutes before my alarm was set to go off. I waited it out before I got up to take a shower. Then I killed time before I trekked to the car. It wasn’t bad as it was last time. I guess because I wasn’t in as much pain. Surprisingly, I didn’t have to put gas in the car as it had more than a half tank. I set off and got to my appointment a half hour early. I waited in the car listening to the radio and checking Twitter.

Therapy went okay. She wasn’t able to read the password protected blog I sent her because she was putting in the wrong password. She didn’t read the text completely so didn’t see what the password was. She isn’t that technological. I told her what the password was and what the blog was about. I also told her that I emailed my psychiatrist bluntly about what is going on. We talked about my pain most of the time and how yesterday was a really bad day for me. I never cry because of pain but yesterday between the sleep deprivation and the loss of my father hitting me hard, I was more vulnerable.

We talked about my suicidality but I didn’t give her my new date and she didn’t ask. She understands why I go there and how things get so bad so quickly. What I don’t think she is getting is how fucking close I am to attempting. I am beyond snapped. I just got to get the courage to go through with it and I hope to do it sometime soon. My biggest fear stopping me is being found before I am dead and then I survive. That is the problem with taking pills, they take a while to work before they finally kill you.

We did talk about my “lovely” father as his six month anniversary is coming up next Tuesday. I really can’t believe it has been six months already. It still feels like yesterday. It’s weird yet relieving that I don’t have to deal with his abuse anymore. The hard part is that I miss his banter, his stupid, demanding phone calls. I had a voicemail message come through last week. I missed his voice so I replayed one of his old voicemails. When I played the message thinking it was the new message I was shocked for a little bit. Then I realized I didn’t get out of the message. I miss that fucker.

My therapist hasn’t texted me about liking the cake I sent her. I hope the sweetness didn’t kill her. That would be the first. Death by pumpkin cake. My mother is making lasagna for dinner. I am going to be loaded with carbs tonight. Lasagna is not my favorite dish but I will eat it if I am hungry enough. After therapy when I came back to Boston, I went to Kelly’s for roast beef sandwich and onion rings. I ate the sandwich but couldn’t finish the rings. It’s the only thing that I have had today other than a latte.

My mood is still kind of sour and my ankle is throbbing. I took some pain meds when I came home and the voices started on me. They want to know why I just don’t take the bottle. I didn’t take the afternoon dose of trilafon because I was on the road. I took it with my pain meds to shut the voices up. They have been really ornery lately, especially when I am vulnerable with pain overload. I told my therapist that my PTSD is up because the pain is so awful. I really don’t know what is going to get me out from under this. It just seems so pointless and I just want to die so I don’t have to deal with it anymore. I told her I was just mentally and physically exhausted from dealing with it night after night. I am being conditioned to fall asleep around 0300 nearly every night. If I can’t break the cycle, I dread what will happen. I need two pain meds to get me through these horrible nights. I know part of it is the anxiety I have when the pain is peaking, making it hard to settle down. Then it’s pure exhaustion when I do finally sleep. It’s good that I don’t work because I would be sleep deprived nearly every work day.

So damn frustrated

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

So damn frustrated

So I did ONE stinking errand today and I am paying for it big time. My ankle gave out on me just a little while ago so I decided to take a nap. OOPS I didn’t get the memo it was going to cause me MORE fucking pain. My mother is cooking dinner downstairs in the kitchen and I have no clue how I am going to get there. I just took a strong pain pill to see if that helps. I already took 2 of my regular pain meds and I can’t take any more for the next few hours.

I am so depressed I want to cry. And there is construction going on the street over from me so I can’t even get a decent rest from noise. They are remodeling a house and adding shit to it. I just hope they quit soon so I can have peace. I texted my sister that I am in pain and she says to elevate my foot. Like that is going to really do anything! It’s already elevated sort of. I have it on a pillow. Might not be the best pillow but it works for me. So much for me changing my sheets this weekend. I will be lucky to make my cake Sunday when I want to.

I’m really frustrated that this is happening. I didn’t do too much today and I wasn’t on my feet that long. I technically didn’t walk more than I normally do so I don’t understand why the fuck I am in pain. Granted the temperature dropped significantly from yesterday so that may be a factor. It was 70 degrees yesterday. Today it’s 50.

I got notification today that my disability pass for the public transportation system has been approved. Monday I need to go to the office to get a new card as my current card expires in a couple weeks. I hope the money transfers over or I am going to be pissed. I just got a credit card and have been making small purchases on it. Small purchases add up quickly and I don’t want to put more money on my card if I don’t have to when there already is money on there.

I just put on my Red Sox slipper socks. They act like compression stockings because they are so tightly knit. I love them for this reason and they keep my feet warm. I had the ceiling fan going but I just shut it off because it’s cold in my room. I think my mother is going to turn on the heat tonight. Temps are going to fall again as I just got a freeze warning advisory from WeatherBug. It’s supposed to be FALL MOTHER NATURE!! Not winter, ya fool!

An Hour of Energy

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

An Hour of Energy

I woke up and was feeling good. I made breakfast and coffee and then had some really good energy so I decided to run the errand I wanted to do. That proved harder than I thought because half way to the store, my back acted up, making it hard to walk. It wiped out my energy levels pretty fast. By the time I finished what I had to do in the store, I was wiped out. All of this took less than hour to do. I feel so rotten.

I came home and put my stuff away. I then made it to my bedroom and got undressed. My back and ankle started acting up. Pain med time! I was hoping, as foolishly as that may be, that I would have the energy to bake after my errand. No can do. I will do it on Sunday like I planned. I just hope there is room in the refrigerator for the pan.

I got the letter from the CBT place saying where to go and what floor they were on. I was thinking about this when I go a trial run and then it hit me that I could go to my favorite restaurant at Government Center. They have the Asgard burger that is wicked good. It’s an Irish place and I have been there a few times. I really like going there, when I am in the area. I also will be taking pics of the new station so I can show you. It’s really cool.

I just bought a book about managing chronic pain through CBT. I wanted to know what I was getting into before I go to this appointment. I flipped through the book, which isn’t that thick, and I am cringing on the exercises. One of them asks what increases/decreases your pain. That is a hard one because I sometimes don’t know what increases or decreases my pain because it is all over the place. What makes it hurt today, won’t make it hurt tomorrow and vice versa. It’s really challenging because even on days I don’t do anything but sleep, I will have severe pain at night. Or I could be walking all over the place, feeling good, no pain and have a good night of no pain. Then the next day I am in agony for the next few days. The worse is when I wake up in pain. That blows the day and it’s hard to get moving. Other times, I could be having no pain and all of a sudden my ankle decides not to work anymore and gives me severe pain if I do try and use it. So it’s not a clear cut answer. And even if I rest and take meds, that is mostly all I can do for my pain. Nothing else helps decrease it. But in the meantime, I am withering in agony until the pain meds kick in.

Then they had a section where you wrote down automatic thoughts. My automatic thoughts when I am withering in agony is to kill myself. Some of the thoughts they had in the book was “the pain will kill me”. I had to say yes, but I will help it do so. Just give it a nudge with some bottle of pills and hope it’s enough to do the job.

Seeing as I am cooped up for the rest of the day, I will start reading it today and see how it goes. I have never been a fan of CBT but I am willing to try and put aside my pessimism and sarcasm to see if this will help me. It is my last hope before I finally throw in the towel. I have exhausted other treatments and nothing has seemed to help. I know there are other pain meds I could try but I really don’t want to be playing with narcotics when there are opioid nuts fighting against ALL of them being “bad” for everyone, including chronic pain patients. Hell, with every script that I get with my pain meds, I get a handout of what to do if I am misusing my meds. It’s a joke. I know the addiction problem is real. But without these meds, you might as well sign my death certificate.

I am really depressed my little errand took out most of my energy and now I am cooped up. I was feeling really good while I was making breakfast. I don’t know what happened. Granted, I didn’t make anything extravagant. Just bacon, toast, and coffee. How hard is that?

Psychache Unreal

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

Psychache unreal

I was listening to a few of my favorite songs and then psychache hit. Psychache is the emotional pain that you feel when basically every thing sucks. I was thinking about my father, the Sox, and other stuff and the psychache just became unbearable. I feel like I should take something for it but there is nothing for me to take. Pain meds, even Tylenol, are useless. Doesn’t help that my ankle is throbbing. Nothing like it was last night but I just noticed that it’s swollen and painful. Not a good sign.

I hate when my heart feels like it is being torn apart. It’s the worse feeling in the world. I had a temporary break when some things on Twitter and Facebook made me laugh. One was about a great dane that was trying to escape his house through his skylight. The picture was really funny. The second one was about Pavlov. It was a psych joke that really had me busting out laughing. I don’t remember how the joke went. I am never good at remembering jokes. I usually tell them in the wrong order.

I don’t really know why I am hurting so badly. Sure the sox season is over and I am still grieving for my father. I just feel like that has been old news for a while and why should it be bothering me tonight? I have been thinking of suicide again. While I was typing up my previous blog, I read about the treatment for BDD (body dysmorphic disorder). The article said that CBT is effective in treatment in most patients. Great. Another thing for me to have CBT. There is a book on it but I don’t plan on getting it because I just ordered one for managing chronic pain. I will have three books on CBT, all on various conditions. I don’t really believe I have BDD. Maybe some symptoms of it but not the full disorder. One of the examples they gave was about a person who felt there nose was crooked and people were staring at them. I don’t feel that way. I just think I am ugly and every body knows this. They know I am fat because I am definitely not skinny by any means.

Growing up, I was always compared to my cousins who were thin. They always said to me, why don’t you be like so and so. I couldn’t because my father kept calling me fat so I felt like I had a reputation and permission to be fat. I couldn’t let him down. And because he called me ugly all the time, I just assumed every body else thought so too because he was my world.

I had a surprise when I came home today. I found out I had leaked urine in my pants. I stunk really bad. I was so embarrassed. I changed and felt immediately down. I guess my mood has been sinking since then. It’s so tough because I never know when I am full and lately between all the meds I have been taking, it’s been hard to pee some times or know when I am full. Plus I haven’t been drinking too much so that just makes things harder and stinkyer. It’s because of my nerve injury that I don’t have a sense of my bladder like I used to. I lost it back when I got it the second time around 10 years ago. I always feel a loss of dignity when this happens. You would think that after 10 years I would be used to it by now but I am not. It still hurts my pride. It makes me feel ashamed. It really sucks.