Physical pain

[intothelight]

By age 40, she had been through 13 surgeries and became addicted to the pain meds the doctors gave her.

The drugs can be insidious, especially the way they were prescribed. As a cancer patient, I felt that opioids were being pushed on me and I refused. (use a few after surgery and the spine lesions, but at night so I could sleep a little.) However, since I am not planning on dying soon, I won't take them long term. Don't need to deal with PTSD, cancer and an addiction. Its hard to find what works but I keep trying, and each day is a bit better than the day before.

@Friday Do you have access to a hot tub? They are great for pain relief.

 

[user27357]

i try to remember the physical pain of being overwhelmed by anger and grief and dealing with a brain that had learned that pain brought opiates and relief. Horrible, un describable. And so much worse than anything else i gave endured and thats a lot.
Right now i have a knee that doesn't seem to want to wait the last 4 weeks of its career before retirement, surgical replacement in 28 days, hurts like hell but I know it doesnt compare to what i am capable of surviving. physical pain sucks, no doubt. But when despair and hopelessness set in, physical pain is outclassed.
I try to remember, maybe it helps, maybe it is like thinking memories of sub zero conditions will somehow make me warmer when i am just freezing cold

 

[mamachick]

When the pain is so great, its not unusual to avoid activity that seems to aggravate it, but when activity is avoided for too long, its easy to become de-conditioned. Brings out depression and anxiety and anything else that is lurking in the mind. Now a trip to the grocery store wears me out.

 

[Lionheart]

I am in a lot of pain right now in my back. Tho I have taken oxycodone and one and a half muscle relaxers, (baclofen), which are specifically for people with spinal disease.

I have spinal stenosis, severe muscle spasms in my back, a "bruised tailbone." sciatica, fibromyalgia, and chronic fatigue lymphadenopathy syndrome (also known in the UK as myalgic encephalomyelitis). So, chronic recurring pain syndrome.

 

[whiteraven]

I was gonna start a new thread, but then I remembered about this one.

I've been wondering if all the symptoms I'm having are related to the fibro. Pain, of course. Weird pain, though, in addition to the usual. Like, the muscles in my upper arms (both sides) are very, very sore to the touch. Almost like when you get a shot, only way worse. My left arm hurts when I try to raise it and is weak. Now, I've broken the wrist, elbow, and shoulder on that side over many, many years, so I guess that could have something to do with it, but this just started a few months ago.

My feet both hurt. I have plantar fasciitis, but this is at the ankles and on the inner side. I've fallen twice and twisted my right ankle, and I think I did damage no one has yet found (wouldn't even do an x-ray, and it's been well over a year). My right left hurts, sometimes with sharp pain but mostly just an ache. Not always, but occasionally. That leg has bothered me since I was about 16.

I am having a lot of GI symptoms. Occasional nausea, cramping, diarrhea. I was diagnosed with IBS a very long time ago and gluten intolerance about 7 years ago. The IBS has not been an issue for years, and I stopped the gf diet maybe two years ago, so it could definitely be that.

So much going on, and I just wish I had an answer for it all. Healthcare providers don't know--I'm sure that's why I have like 20 diagnoses. I just want to understand what's going on with me and figure out a way to manage it. 'cause honestly? The symptoms keep me from doing a lot of things I should be able to do.

 

[Friday]

If everything you have, has easily explained reasons… but???… it’s all gotten worse, recently?

That could be caused by about 200 different things.

3/4s of which are sorted win 2 weeks.

The other 50 are about half life threatening, and the other half will take 2 years to Dx correctly.

But sure.

Pick one of those two hundred at random, because it’s commonly known as being associated with pain. Fibromyalgia. Sure thing.

AKA? You’re not that f*cking stupid. Even desperate and exhausted because pain. So suck up the stupid, and?

Go in. Tell them EVERYTHING IS WORSE. And you don’t know why. And let them run the tests that rule out about 80 things with a simple blood/urine panel (about 20 life threatening, the other 60 misc), and settle in for anywhere between a week’s worth of time, or 2 years. And get an actual working DX that identifies and solves what’s up.

Don’t get me wrong. I have been dealing with something for 15 months that if I still had my contacts? Would have been sorted over a year ago. In 48-72 hours. Rather than having to wait 6mo for every specialist appointment…and motherf*cking 15mo later… an am exhausted, and demoralized, and suicidal, and f*cking furious. It is not that I do not understand the need to know wtf is going on.

It’s that I also know you aren’t stupid. No matter how stupid pain may be making you think/feel/act.

 

[whiteraven]

Go in. Tell them EVERYTHING IS WORSE. And you don’t know why. And let them run the tests that rule out about 80 things with a simple blood/urine panel (about 20 life threatening, the other 60 misc), and settle in for anywhere between a week’s worth of time, or 2 years. And get an actual working DX that identifies and solves what’s up.

Oh, I did this. Had $800 worth of bloodwork not that long ago. The answer was that it's fibro and IBS and costo (the latter two of which are often associated with fibro), and so sorry...it's chronic, you'll just have to deal with it.

I can't go back in. Not again. I can't afford it--because besides the labs being ridiculously expensive, they always want to repeat MRIs and tests I've had several times over--and I have been told over and over again for the last 40 years that I just have to deal with it. I've been to lots of doctors. Finding someone who actually has the courage to sit down and think outside the box is harder than finding a needle in a haystack.