Tag: complex regional pain syndrome

just feeling sad

by Midnight Demon, posted in chronic physical pain

Been feeling a lot of emotions the past few days. I can’t help wondering if maybe some medication at this point will help as I am crying for the incoming support because I am happy and then cry when I hear about the poor mother whose daughter was misidentified and now has to mourn her daughter. I am crying for the eight year old who just wanted peace in the world and his mother and sister who are still critically injured. I am crying as I write this. I just can’t help it. Nothing like this has ever happened in my city before. I feel like it is 9-11 all over again. But the support from my Boys, The Boston Red Sox, has been tremendous. They will be going on the field tonight with black armbands. The Yankees, our hated rivals, will be holding a moment of silence and then playing our song Sweet Caroline in the middle of the 3rd tonight. I couldn’t believe they did that. But I guess in tragedy we all come together and it is such a powerful feeling.

Today I had to take the T, our public transportation system because I had a doctor’s appt. At every Boston T stop, there were National Guardsmen and T Police everywhere. It was good to have their presence there but I couldn’t help but feel a little freaked out when a State trooper and two police officers swept the trolley car I was on.

My appointment did and didn’t go so well. I wasn’t happy that after all the resting that I have been doing, I still have tendonitis in my ankle, probably nerve related. I also have Complex Regional Pain Syndrome, which basically means I am fucked. My doc gave me some options but I think I am going to stay the course with oral meds. I am considering a lidocaine infusion but I want to read up on them before going through with it. I need the hard facts before I can invest something like that. I don’t want the infusion to numb me out and then when it wears off cause me mega pain. I don’t know how my PCP is going to take this. There is nothing more they can do. I am at my wits end on how to handle this. My first thoughts were to kill myself. I truly think that is going to be an option if I don’t have any pain relief. I just can’t imagine going on and on like this. I can’t work. I can’t walk. WTF am I going to do?

suicide ramblings

by Midnight Demon, posted in chronic physical pain, mood disorders, psychache, suicide, suicide attempt

Today was not a good day. I got hit with pain early this morning and I couldn’t go anywhere. While I was watching the baseball games I started knuckling my calf muscle to take the knots out of it. It helped the pain along with pain meds. I tried stretching my calf but it still would not get loose. But the pain is gone now so I am glad it is. Now I just got to remember what I did so that the next time pain hits that part of my leg I know what to do.

I wrote a paper today, again on the Aeschi model. You will hear me talk about this because it is essential to get the word out for people who are suicidal. I believe in this model because it is so straight forward and humane. I also talk about CAMS but even though I know more about the assessment of CAMs than I do about the actual CAMS model. CAMS is Collaborating And Managing Suicidality.

Yesterday was a big day for me. The blog that I write for, What Happens Now, http://attemptsurvivors.com/ , was put into print for the Associate Press on suicide attempt survivors. It made the news and the sad part is that I cannot share it with my family. I am somewhat saddened by this. I can share this with my friends and the internet world but I can’t share it with those I live with. It is sad. But I chose to not share it because I am afraid it will lead to questions about my own suicidality and I cannot bare the thought of sharing this information with my family. It’s bad enough when my Suicide and Life Threatening Behavior journal comes in, I get the glances of disgust. Suicide is not a topic of interest in my house like it is an interest of mine, if only because I think about it nearly every day.

Suicide has been an interest of mine since I was young. Now at nearly thirty years later and I don’t know how many attempts, I still think it is the only way out of my suffering. I have made a date this year that if things aren’t improved, I will go through with it. I can’t help but think that being dead is the answer to my problems. I know that people say that suicide is the permanent solution to temporary problem, but my leg pain and depression are not temporary. I have to live with this the rest of my life and if I choose not to, isn’t it my choice? Don’t I have the right to die if I so choose? I am not saying that I will commit suicide tomorrow but it is in the distant future that I will die. I am not promised tomorrow, no one is. I just think that I don’t have a purpose with my life. And a lifetime of being in chronic physical pain is not appealing to me. I just can’t go on knowing that every day I will be in some kind of pain that has no end. Or the fact that I have to be on pain medication for the rest of my life. I just can’t fathom that. I worry that one day I will be denied the medication because I have been on them for so long. I just can’t risk that happening. I am scared of that happening. I’m also afraid of people not believing that I am depressed because I joke around so much. I’m sorry that I have a sense of humor. It has helped me with my depression more than anything. If I didn’t have it, I told my psychiatrist, she had permission to commit me somewhere. My heart is so dark at times I can’t stand it. I feel like it should stop beating because I feel so dead inside. And this goes on day after day. There is no relief. I never feel alive and joyful. Just sad and despairing.

more about nerve pain

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

Watched the baseball game. It went to the 10th inning and my boys came through. They beat the Rays 2-1. It was the first extra innings game this season they won so I am hopeful for the season. The Sox improve to 6-4 and still are leading in the AL East.

Was happy to get an email about the blog I write for the American Association of Suicidology has made the news http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/U/US_SUICIDE_SURVIVORS?SITE=AP&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT&CTIME=2013-04-13-12-09-11.
It was good to see something come off of the hard work of the AAS president, Michelle Linn Gust to get the blog underway and now we have a voice.

It is not even six o’clock yet and I am exhausted. All I did today was run to the pharmacy to get my prescriptions and go up and down the stairs a few times to help my mother with some groceries. I have been up since seven. Seems I cannot sleep later than that. And I even stayed up late too. I didn’t go to bed until around midnight, after watching Lincoln and reading for a bit afterwards. I kept on going on twitter and facebook to wait for my meds to kick in.

Last night my foot acted weird because of the CRPS, complex regional pain syndrome. It got really cold, like ice and really painful. I put on some socks that were heavy and still my foot was cold even under my blankets. My bones were hurting really bad and if I had a chain saw, I probably would have used it to amputate. That is how bad the pain got. Then after it warmed up, it really warmed up. It got really hot and felt like it was on fire. I had to take the sock off and leave my foot hanging off the bed away from the sheets and blankets because it just was burning me. Nerve pain acts this way. The doctors don’t really understand why this happens. I am seeing a specialist on Tuesday to talk about this. I really hope she can give me some answers. All I can take is pain medication to soothe it or use a gel to try and calm it down some but touching it hurts like hell, which makes it difficult to use the gel sometimes. I find that oral meds work well for this type of pain, but the problem is that most doctors don’t want to prescribe it. I have not run into problems but I know I will soon enough. I’ll get the opioid speech how it is not good to be on these meds long term. But I have been on these meds for almost a decade now and aside from constipation which I control with some senna, I have no other side effects. It might make me drowsy but it’s not like I am operating machinery or driving like I used to. Now I just take these meds when the pain flairs up, which will be again tonight. Every night I am in this horrible pain but it’s never the same. Some times it is bone crushing, other times it is a burning sensation like my foot is on fire. Other times it feels like a barbed wire is surrounding my foot ready to be garroted. I can’t say what will be in store for me tonight after going up an down the stairs four times in a row this evening. I am not looking forward to it and there is no sense in taking the meds early. The pain hit unexpectedly, when I least expect it to so I can’t judge a good time. That is the most frustrating this about this condition. I have a HIGH pain tolerance and it usually isn’t until a pain is an 8-9 that I will feel it. Right now it is simmering on a 4-5 on a scale of 1-10. I have heavy thermal socks on to prevent it from getting cold because it is still winter in New England. My house is cold because my mother doesn’t want to pay a large gas bill, which we shouldn’t have to turn the heat on in the middle of April anyways!! So I try and protect my foot from getting cold anyway I can. But sometimes even having socks on will not prevent my foot temperature from dropping. My left will be cold as ice and my right a balmy 98.6. I hate this condition and wish I never got it but I got to learn to live with it and that is the hardest part.

another day of pain

by Midnight Demon, posted in cauda equina syndrome

Usually after a night of pain, I am ok the next day. I usually don’t have pain until later in the evening right before bed. Today was different. I woke up to my foot still hurting so I made some breakfast and took some pain pills and went back to sleep. I have been sleepy all afternoon since waking up at two o’clock. My foot is still hurting, not as bad so took another pain pill. Now I am ready for a nap.

I hate it when I have days like today. It just sucks because I don’t do anything but stay in my pajamas. I wanted to go out today to get my coffee and maybe write in my journal but that didn’t happen. It’s just another day in the house where all I can do is keep my foot up to stop it from hurting. Having a pain syndrome sucks.

I am very tired from the meds and feel a little dizzy, probably because I have not been drinking enough fluids. I could go to sleep right now and I am going to try and resist.

I started reading a new book. It’s about Lincoln’s first 100 days in office. So far, I think the book is badly written as the author has repeated himself a couple of times with in a few pages of each other. I don’t know if I can get through a book like this. Makes me wonder what the hell the editor was thinking or if he or she even read the thing. The book is supposed to be about the first 100 days but yet the author keeps talking about the Emancipation Proclamation, which is not until Lincoln’s second year, which is MORE than 100 days after he is in office. I’m already confused as to what the author is trying to convey.