Tag: CRPS (formerly RSD)

Pain and Anxiety

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

Pain and Anxiety

Last night, I took my normal pain pills around 2200. At midnight, the pain got worse. My heart rate shot up and I became nervous, again. I had already taken my night meds at the same time I took my pain meds. It was too early for me to take my normal pills so I had to take a stronger pill. It took another hour for the pain to fade enough for me to sleep. I also took an Ativan to calm down. I spoke to my doc about this and she said the anxiety is the body’s response to not liking pain. Great. Now I have to deal with anxiety on top of my other problems. I don’t like being anxious or nervous. It really irritates me and makes me feel unsafe, like something terrible is going to happen. I have to mentally play with ideas of it just being a physiological reaction, that I am okay, even though I don’t feel that way. It’s very hard to mentalize when your heart is pounding like you ran several blocks. I don’t become out of breath but my breathing speeds up. I have to take deep breaths to calm down, or try to. It’s very difficult to do. And it also makes me feel helpless because other than taking drugs to stop the pain and anxiety, there is nothing I can do. I am not hyperventilating so breathing into a paper bag won’t help me. Music helps to a degree but not all the time. After a while, it just becomes background noise.

I have not been trained in any capacity to deal with anxiety. I don’t know how to deal with it other than take medication. But even then, I have to wait a half hour or more for it to work. In the meantime, I am very nervous, in terrible pain, and keep wondering what to do. I can’t walk because the pain is too intense in my foot, so pacing is out of the question. I usually just have grin and bear it. I don’t like doing this. It just messes with my head. And then I become agitated, which does me no favors. Last night, I tried to read. It didn’t work so I tried writing in my journal. If I could have done something physical, I would have but writing is the only thing that usually works when I am anxious. It is my go to whenever things are going wrong, or are perceived to be.

All this bullshit could be avoided if I didn’t have this pain syndrome. I didn’t do too much yesterday so I don’t know why my foot decided to explode at midnight. I had been resting for hours, but I got hungry and went downstairs to have something to eat. When I came back up stairs and propped my foot up, I got hit with the pain wave. Other than amputation, I don’t think there is anything I could have done to avoid it. I just don’t understand why because I had taken my normal pain meds two hours before hand and that should have avoided a 10+ pain flare. But that is the thing with pain syndromes. You never know when they are going to spike.

I need to pick up my niece later. I plan on ordering pizza before I pick her up. This way, the pizza is a little cooled off before gobbling it up. The last time I had pizza with my niece, she ate half a box! It was crazy but she was hungry. She ate all of it too, crust and all. She is too funny but is still growing like a weed. I just hope that walking to her school doesn’t aggravate my foot more than it already is. I really don’t want a repeat of last night. I have my appointment with my psych tomorrow so I really don’t want to be really drugged up or sleep deprived when I see her. It’s in the afternoon so I should be awake enough when I see her, but sometimes after a bad night of pain, I am not in a good mood the next day. Only day that I don’t have something planned is Saturday. I can rest all day then. I still need to finish my editing, which includes proofing what I have written and then putting those edits in the word doc. I have stuff to take out too, as one of my stories is listed twice, but under a different name. Don’t know how that happened.

So pain and anxiety is not a good thing for me, or anyone, really. Pain causes the anxiety and I don’t like it one bit. It makes me feel helpless. My therapist is on vacation for the next two weeks. I am to write her a letter and text her while she is away. She also wants me to send them to her so when she is back, they will be in her office. We talked about the anxiety part but really didn’t talk about what to do with it. She just wants me to take an Ativan. I am just afraid that I will become addicted to it, which is why I am so hesitant to even take the pill. But I guess, I need it so my heart rate slows down and calms my nervous agitation that doesn’t do me any good. I swear the pain is like drinking five cups of coffee the way it makes me feel. I just wish I had more control over it but I don’t and that is what is so frustrating! I hate not being in control. Pain takes that away from you and then your heart rate soars up and makes you feel even worse. So you are battling the demons in your head, the pain in your foot and the nervousness of it all because it’s a physiological response. How the hell do you combat it?? I guess I am going to have to research what to do about anxiety, an unknown entity to me. I never was an anxious person until pain entered my life. It doesn’t happen ALL the time but when it does, holy hell! I am noticing it more with each pain flare up. I really wish I had better control of my pain, like if I had a warning before the pain would flare, that would be awesome. But I don’t. It’s one minute low level pain and the next high level pain. Sometimes it is because I moved my ankle, either flexed it or moved my big toe. That is all it takes to set the pain off in my foot and/or ankle. It just sucks not knowing when to expect severe pain. It’s the million dollar question that no one can answer. And I am not okay with it, not one bit!

It’s Pain O’Clock

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

It’s Pain O’Clock

Pain started around 2015 and has slowly increased. I took a pain pill about an hour ago, just to be able to stand long enough to take my night time meds. Because I didn’t fill my pill box today, it was hodgepodge night. I just take what I want and not the whole kit and caboodle. I will try and fill the box tomorrow morning when hopefully, my pain levels are lower. I hope I have a good night’s sleep. I can never know if I am going to wake up between 4-8 AM. Today I slept till almost 0800, which is highly unusual for me. But pain woke me up, actually, it was more my bladder, but I was still in pain. My right leg has been hurting all day, from hip to toes. I almost never have pain in my right leg. I think because I am a side sleeper and hadn’t moved for more than four hours, I was in pain. I am hoping the pain meds take care of that and my left foot pain. Right now it feels like someone is hammering my metatarsals. Just the last three. I think I would hit the roof if it was all five.

I have noticed that since taking the vitamin D again, my mood has changed, for the better. I still think about suicide, but the depression is not as heavy as it once was. I can breathe a little better, though I have been having awful anxiety with this pain flare up I have been having. I tend to breathe faster than I should and my heart is palpating. I have to take deep breaths to slow things down. I don’t know why I am so anxious with pain. I know it’s not going to kill me, though I am always in danger of attempting, or cutting. I still have it in my head that if I just cut the swelling, maybe I will be in less pain, that if the fluid is released, I will be fine. There is NO proof this will happen. I might just make things worse. And if I cut to the point of stitches, that will be a problem.

In two days I see my doc. I hope that he can give me something that will help my mental state. I can deal with the physical pain with medication. But I just want to figure out why the hell I have hammers hammering my bones! And why I sometimes feel a crushing sensation all along the edge of my foot. I haven’t been really active the last week and I have been in horrible pain. I see him in the morning and that is not going to be good. I wish I could see him at eight in the evening when the pain starts to flare up all the time, every single night. I am not going to be in horrendous pain at 0930 in the morning. I will have to stop my pain meds entirely the next few days if I want that to happen. I don’t want to go through that because I just got the pain under control again. I might have done the stairs a little bit too much today. I wish I could do a drawing of my foot and show you where it hurts the most. But I am not creative that way and I have no idea what program/app to use to make it. I don’t even know how to make a meme. I just am not a creative person when it comes to stuff like that.

I hope he won’t be mad that I stopped going to PT. I hated going because it just brought me more pain. And I could never remember the damn exercises the PT gave me, even though she gave me sheets on the exercises. I have too many things going on in my brain and so I just couldn’t retain what I was being taught. After my last session with her, my foot exploded and I barely made it home. So if he should tell me I need to go back, I just am not going to. The pain is just too complex at this point. What I would like is an MRI of my ankle and foot to see if there are any changes since my last one.

As far as meds go, I don’t think he will prescribe me another pain med. The NSAID hasn’t worked out as well as I was hoping it to. That would be the only change I could see happening. The baclofen has helped, though it doesn’t help all spasms. It has helped ease the tightness that I had surrounding my ankle and calf area. But it hasn’t helped the back spasms or hip pain that I have been experiencing. I am going to tell him about my hip and see if he can do something about that. My PCP hasn’t been too worried about it but this has been going on for more than eight months now. Today I was sweeping the floor and it caused my hip to flare up. I could barely stand afterwards. And it still is hurting me. It’s odd because it hasn’t bothered me in a few weeks and now with me sleeping on it, it flared up again. I know it is still weak from my surgeries. And I haven’t strengthened it since I pulled it out back in December. I sneezed and my back went out. My hip muscle is what hurts the most and I just can’t seem to stretch it enough to get it loose. It sucks. All the exercises that I have learned to deal with it haven’t helped at all. Course I don’t know what muscle it is that I have pulled so that kind of sucks. Knowing my luck, my hip will be fine come Tuesday morning.

Saturday Blog 26

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

Saturday Blog 26

I had a rough night of pain. I didn’t sleep well. I spent the day just resting my ankle as I really didn’t want to make it hurt again. The pain and swelling had really gotten bad. So I stay in and only went downstairs to stuff my face and use the bathroom. I plan on taking a shower soon. I think it will relax me. I haven’t taken a pain pill all day, so that is good. I will probably take a couple tonight just so I can sleep without worrying about pain creeping up. I plan on doing the same thing tomorrow.

I watched “Gone with the Wind” after the baseball game. I never knew how much Scarlett was a two faced bitch. But then, that is what the character is. I couldn’t bare to watch the end as I know the child dies and wrecks the marriage even further with Rhett Butler. It’s just sad.

I wrote a distressing status on Facebook last night. I think it was like three in the morning when I woke up in pain again. I was pissed and hurting. I didn’t get any responses, none even in the morning. Only response I got was about posting that I was watching the movie and that was a cruel friend of mine calling me a racist. That really pissed me off. I should unfriend her as I am tired of her jokes. This is the first time she has called me a racist. I don’t care if it is in jest. You don’t call people that unless they truly are and I don’t think I am. I have never been prejudiced against another person for the race, religion, or creed. I don’t know how to hate a person for these things. I do hate a person if they are an asshole or not. You can be an asshole of any color, religion, or creed. Half the senators running for president are, well, they are more brainless than most people. How they got elected to their positions I will never know. Nor do I care to know. I just hope the country has sense not to make them president or this country will be a cesspool more than it already is.

Last night I was editing as I felt up to it. It was once of the few activities that I could do without moving too much. Half of what I wrote is getting tossed out. My therapist might disagree with me but I am the one writing this thing, not her. The stuff I am tossing out are the blog posts that aren’t really dealing with mental illness at all. It is just a blog post of how my day went. I don’t know what made me think that it would be good in a short story when there is no story or theme or even connecting points. I wrote a blog about coffee and therapy and it was more about how I drink my coffee than it was about therapy. That is when I started questioning what I was writing. Maybe I shouldn’t come out with a second book. My writing doesn’t seem to want to cooperate with me anyway. Not like I can write on demand, I can’t. But I should be able to be creative enough to write something about mental illness.

The Boston fireworks are going off. Big bangs are being heard. I hate noise like that. Sounds like bombs going off. It scares me. There also seem to be helicopters flying in the area. That almost never happens. I know they were having some flyovers with some military jets but I didn’t get the memo about helicopters. Just weird. Maybe they are filming the fireworks. I don’t know. I lost interest in the works when I was a kid. I used to love 4th of July but then things changed after I lost my hearing in one of my ears. It wasn’t appealing to me anymore.

I heard there is a case in Belgium where a 24 year-old was granted the right to die because she is depressed. It will be, I think, assisted suicide. She apparently wanted to die since the age of six. In the story, it told of her wanting to kill herself with a pistol. I didn’t think a child that age could have those kind of thoughts. I started having thoughts of dying when I was eight. But I had an abused childhood. The article didn’t say if this girl was abused or not, or even go into specifics on why she wanted to die. Only that she was granted the right after being committed for two years. I have mixed feelings about this. She thinks she is a hopeless case, but all depressed people think that. I even think that. I know that if I went to my psychiatrist and told her she had to help me kill myself because I was hopeless, I would be committed too. I guess the laws in Belgium are different than the states because a two year commitment at a hospital is unheard of these days. The article also didn’t say what kind of treatment she has had. I am curious to know only because as bad as my depressions have been, they seem to get better over time. Granted the suicidality of my condition doesn’t change. I always want to die. I just don’t act on those feelings. I don’t know why that is. Maybe I am just not desperate enough to want to die. Or my despair isn’t that great as it once was. I don’t know. I do know that I don’t want to hurt people with my death and that keeps me going, sadly.

Writing

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

Saw my psychiatrist today. We talked about the depression and the sleep problems I have been having. She didn’t have any advice on how to deal. I am sleeping, just not on a normal schedule, whatever that is. She refilled my meds and when I went to pick them up at my pharmacy, I was shocked that the price was $0 for both of them! I like this!

I had my morning snicker’s latte. I wanted to write more than what I did but I had an errand to do before my appointment. I ended up writing while I was on the train ride home. I realized then that I need to buy a new journal. It’s almost half way through. The one that I really want is through Barnes and Noble. They have like a 500 page journal that I like. Maybe I will go to Kenmore my next pay period and see if they still have this journal. If not, I can always check online.

Since being let off of work because of my disability, I have written a lot more in my journals. They have become my saving grace, just like this blog has done. If you are struggling with mental illness, I encourage you to try and journal. It doesn’t have to be long. Just a short description about how your day went is sufficient or anything else that is troubling you. It really helps to express yourself this way, if you are able to do it. I know some people like art more than writing, and that is ok too.

I sent my psychiatrist my blog I wrote the other night when I was having the writing bug. She said she wants to see more of my “cathartic” writing so I am sending it to her. She really likes my writing and think it has improved. I don’t see it, but then I write something every day, even on days I don’t feel like writing.

I had another rough sleep session. I should have told my psychiatrist that my therapist thinks I am hypomanic again. But I know I am not so that is why I didn’t say anything. I am so tired all the time from not having a regular sleep schedule. If I was working, I would be in big trouble. Last night, as I was trying to get to sleep, my mother came into my room because there was a problem with her TV. The aggravation from that cost me a few minutes to calm down and get back to a comfy spot to sleep. My psych doesn’t know why I wake up before seven most days. I was just glad I was able to get a quad mocha before seeing her. I had a hard time getting up. If I didn’t have to get up, I probably would have slept longer. But I had woken up around 0230 and didn’t go back to sleep until an hour or so later. I have been trying not to play with my electronics when I get up. But it’s hard not checking my phone to see if messages have come through. I didn’t wake up in pain or anything, I just woke up, ready to face the day. Or in this case, the night. I had went to bed earlier than usual because the baseball game was in the afternoon. That is another one of my triggers. Going to bed before 2100. I almost always wake up between 2 and 4 if I sleep before 2100. I don’t nap during the day any more. I usually try and stay up as long as I can, even though right now it’s after 1700 and I want a nap very badly. Game is on at 1900 so I will probably listen to it till around 2100 or the end, which ever comes first. One of the games lasted two hours and fifteen minutes. It was the fastest game I ever heard. Course there was nothing going on, which made it fast. But the way that I am feeling right now, I don’t think I am going to make it to 2200. I can try, but I doubt it, unless I catch my second wind.

My mood has been up and down today. It was up during the morning when I was having “me” time but then turned sour when I had to do my errand. I had to get on buses and people are so rude. Then on the way home, a woman was half asleep on her seat. She was so hunched over, I thought she was going to fall over. It was sad. I felt bad for her. My foot also did not want to cooperate with me while walking home. At least two times, my foot dragged. I was turning my foot again, probably because it got fatigued. I no longer wear my AFO to prevent this from happening. My foot/ankle is really sore right now. It didn’t like all the walking I had to do. But I have to increase my walking so that I can be somewhat normal again. I hate being disabled. It’s one thing to be mentally disabled, but to be physically as well…just doesn’t bode well for the mind. I don’t know if the pain is going to get worse or not. Time can only tell. I already took one of my pain pills when I came home, which is probably why I am so sleepy.