Tag: complex regional pain syndrome

pain chronicles begin

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

I am not having a good day. My day has been nothing but interrupted sleep and pain. Because my sister’s back went out on her last night, I kept my phone on in case she needed something from me. Now today, my back is hurting me, most likely due to change in temp. It was in the 60’s yesterday and in the 80s today. My back just can’t handle that kind of change.

I am so tired of being in pain. I know my mother suffers from chronic back pain as well. It runs in the family. But I am the one that has had four surgeries. Aren’t I the lucky one? I guess you can say that because of my having surgeries and still being in pain, my family is afraid to have surgery or even see a doc for their pain.

I have been trying to get a hold of my aunt that so desperately wants to talk with me but I can’t seem to get a hold of her. Oh well. I guess she will contact me when she is ready to. I miss talking with her.

I went and got my Starbucks today. My favorite barista was not there. She is very cute. But we don’t say anything more than a hello and how are you. That is usually all we have time for as the place is very busy. I brought my Experiences of Depression book with me today and was working on writing out the stuff I highlighted. It’s a laborious process as the text I highlighted are more like paragraphs. But it helps to write it out so I can give it some context to what I am reading. It actually makes sense now that I got past the Freudian stuff. Soon as I finish writing out what I highlighted so far, I will go back to reading the book. I am on chapter 2 so far.

I realized today that I wrote two contradictory blogs yesterday. One I was saying I wasn’t suicidal and the other one written a few hours later stated I was, well that I wanted to be dead. Pain will do that to me if it is consistent enough. I hope that my back pain isn’t consistent. I really was hurting today on the way home from my “happy” place. Then I had to pick up my niece and my walking pace turned almost to a crawl. I was still hunched over in pain. I took one of my pain meds so I should be ok for the next few hours. The pain was bad as it was going down my legs and my right leg felt weak. My mother wanted me to buy eggs but there was no way for me to bend down and get them as they are on the bottom shelf. Kind of stupid place to put eggs, if you ask me.

Pain hour and human suffering and suicide

by Midnight Demon, posted in chronic physical pain, depression, suicidality, suicide

Well, my pain hour has been activated. Every night, at the same time, my pain level increases no matter how much time I am resting my foot or what I am doing. If I am about to go to sleep, I will get zaps.

Tonight is no different. I am so tired of dealing with pain every single night. I was fine all day without too much pain. And that is what kills me. Because I don’t see my doctor after 8 pm, he never will know how much pain I am truly in. This pain is very deceiving. I just wish I knew what activates it so I can put a stop to it. I have tried taking my pain meds before the dreadful hour but that doesn’t seem to work. I have tried icing my foot before the hour and that just makes things worse. I just am in pain no matter what I do, whether I do nothing during the day or if I do have an active day. It is maddening. I did not leave the house today for any reason. Yet my pain level is the same as it would be if I did leave the house. I did go up and down the stairs a few more times than I normally do. But I have stayed in my house/room before and that still didn’t stop the pain from occurring. I just am flabbergasted.

I am not suicidal, though I should be. I really want to just die without having to do anything about it. I am tired of planning my death without acting on it. I am tired of trying to act on my thoughts when my stinking therapist foils my plans or my psychiatrist hospitalizes me because of my thoughts. I need a good pain reliever that will stop the pain before it hits not after. Because after you take your pain reliever, you have to wait a certain time for the next dose and that sucks while you are suffering.

I don’t get why people can euthanize an animal to end their suffering but it is wrong to do the same to a human being. To euthanize an animal is considered “humane” while human suffering is what exactly? Why is an animal have more rights than a human? And why is it that it is the person’s choice to end their suffering and it being denied to them because of state laws. That is why I don’t tell my therapist or psychiatrist I am suicidal most of the time. Because I know it will lead to a “suicide status” and I will be prevented from carrying out MY wishes. Yet 30,000 people commit suicide every year. I want to be one of those people. And I don’t have a problem with it. Yes my family will miss me and people will be hurt. But why should I continue to suffer from this non-malignant chronic pain that sucks the life out of me?

I don’t know what happened

by Midnight Demon, posted in chronic physical pain, depression

I don’t know what happened

I took a big dose of Nyquil to calm my cough down and get some sleep from the allergies that have been plaguing me all day. Within an hour or so, I got a buzzed feeling and decided to sleep. Nope…not happening. I then got an itching for ice cream and had some. Well, that was stupid of me. Now I really can’t sleep and my ankle is sore as hell for going up and down the stairs.

I don’t know where all this energy is coming from. I am not high per se, but I am somewhere in between. My Sox are losing and I should be paying attention to the game rather than writing this blog, but I have no interest in the Indians. I am in a writing mood and that almost never happens. SO I am going to write…

I was listening to a song earlier about “got a little drunk last night” by the Eli Young Band. It got me thinking about my ex. I know I have not talked about her on here because it just is too painful. She was my first love and at this point, I think she will be my only love. But she has a lot of issues. More issues than you can shake a stick at. I won’t get into them but mainly her health is what scares me the most. She recently re-friended me on Facebook and then after an IM session blocked me. I have no idea what I said that caused that to happen. We were talking about how to get to a hospital that is very difficult to get to when you are not used to the surrounding areas. I was trying to get her to use public transportation as that would be easier than driving and poof, she was gone. Her medical issues are getting worse and I just can’t handle it. I know she is going to die sooner than I would because she most likely will go on dialysis for her kidney issues. She has diabetes to boot. And MS. And that is what I know of. She has psych issues too, which is probably why she went and blocked me. I feel bad about her blocking me. I thought this time around we might be friends without the benefits sort of. But now, it is not going to happen because she blocked my ass. I never had anyone block me before, least not that I know of anyway. I miss talking with her. And I guess that was the bottom line. But oh well. Se la vie. She is out of my life, probably for good this time around. It’s her loss.

I do miss having someone in my life that I can talk to. Someone to go out with and hang with. But at the same time, I am glad I don’t because I don’t need the stress of a relationship right now. I can barely keep myself together. My aunt just IM’d me. Said she wants to talk with me. Great. And I know it has to do with my book. I don’t know if I can handle talking about my book with someone. I know she is my aunt, but we aren’t that close, close. She suffers from depression too. Maybe that is what she wants to talk about. I just don’t want to cry in front of her. That would not be good.

I went shopping after everything I did today. BAD IDEA. My fricken foot is not happy with me right now. It’s swollen and it hurts. It is very angry with me. And I am angry with myself. I knew that walking around the grocery store was going to trigger another flare up but I needed my flame retardant Powerade as I only had one bottle left. I spent more than I should have as I went a little crazy. The baked beans were on sale. I love baked beans. My mother told me to buy two, and I bought four. Then I had to buy bread and ice cream. I really didn’t need the ice cream but wanted to have it. I just had some, in case you were wondering. A late night snack. I really want to make a cheeseburger but I will tomorrow. I am in no condition to operate a stove. I still feel buzzed out from the Nyquil.

I am going to ask my therapist what the hell are the objects Freudians talk about in their literature. It is bugging the crap out of me. I just hope I remember to ask her. Because unless you know what the hell they are talking about, the sentences make no sense!!

This week’s AAS post was about coming out as an attempt survivor and then getting fired because of it. It is discrimination just like I was discriminated against because of my mobility issues. But getting back to the article, I think it was an eye opener. Now I feel that anyone that reads my book is going to know my deep darkness and it might cost me a job or two or three. Leave aside my debt issues, and what do I have to show for the last two years? Writing this blog and a book about my struggles with mental illness. I am lucky I am on disability because I really don’t think I can hold a job anymore than I can stand more than twenty minutes in one place. I want to be a barista but I don’t think I can stand to be on my feet for eight hours. Course, working at a place where you can screw up a double skinny no whip latte can be challenging and then having to make it again because it is “cold”, might piss me off. I vowed after working for a place for three years that went out of business, that I would not go back to retail. But I like customer service. I like interacting with people. It is the one thing that I miss most about not working is the isolation it brings. I don’t have many friends outside of the internet. Sure I have family but if you look at my call list, you will not see that many calls from friends where there used to be many. I hardly go over my limit of 450 minutes anymore because most of my calls are mobile to mobile. The only person to call me from a landline is my mother, usually. My father will also call from a landline. And the most they will talk to me is a minute or two. Boring.

I don’t know why I am getting pain in my “good” leg. Started with zaps in my heel and ankle and now I am getting pain in my calf. I think something is wrong with my back. I haven’t been getting back pain but for me to be having pain down my leg, it has to be coming from the back. And that scares me. I don’t want another surgery. I don’t even want to see another neurosurgeon for the rest of my life. I will kill myself if I have to have another back operation to repair my disc. I will have to have a fusion and I just don’t want to because that will mean permanent disability. Not saying I can work now but there is a chance I might find office work as a receptionist or something but that will go down the tubes if my back is gone and fused. I will lose whatever mobility I have and I just can’t risk that. I rather be dead.

ankle chronicles 6

by Midnight Demon, posted in chronic physical pain, depression

I spent the weekend resting my foot. I thought my foot would be better by now but it is still sore. I have things to do and there is no one else who can do them for me. I need to get a haircut, go to the post office, and pick up my prescription.

I feel really bad that I am missing my niece’s graduation tonight. But there is no way I can walk around the stadium. It is also the hottest day of the year and I don’t do heat too well. I really just want some butter pecan ice cream and go back to sleep.

I was up early this morning. I woke up from a bad dream around 0130. I stayed up till almost 0500. I wrote in my journal for about an hour before the pain meds and Ativan kicked in. I also woke up in pain. I was not happy. I guess I really did too much on Friday night for me to still be in pain three days later.

I am tired of being laid up in pain. I want to go out and get an ice coffee and maybe read a little bit. And get my haircut. Or at least be able to shower. I haven’t had a shower since Friday afternoon. I was going to take one at the wee hours of the morning but I didn’t want to risk waking myself up. I never know how a shower is going to go. It will either exhaust me or wake me up. My luck, it will wake me up.

I think for the first time in a while, I might run out of pain meds before my doc appointment. I am running low because of this flare up and I don’t see my doc for another two weeks. I am not that worried. I can stretch them out. I am sure once this pain flare up calms down, I won’t be taking any meds. For some reason I woke up with my calf hurting this afternoon when I got up. A little stretching and it seems to have calmed it down. Don’t know what that was about.

I wish I didn’t catch a cold this weekend. I feel terrible. I think I am going to make some soup, despite it being hot out. But I need the fluids. I have been bad about drinking. It doesn’t really cross my mind. I am not really thirsty, which doesn’t help. I have powerade, but I mostly just use it for my meds. I need to get more, add that to the list of things to do.