I've been away, first to Nottingham, then to London. This has made it impossible to update my blog. It's also mean doing a lot of travelling, alone, which I got through just fine, even with all the physical work involved.
It's also meant taking Tramadol nearly every day for several weeks, and I want a break, even if it makes me very headachey. So I am taking a break from any sort of opiates and I've kept my calendar more or less empty. On Monday I have a flute lesson, Tuesday I have a walk in the morning, Wednesday I'll take drugs because we're having an evening of painting and chat and that's a huge problem without the drugs.
Day two drugless and I am headachey but still able to enjoy life. I am eating Skittles Crazy Sours when the pain hits, as a distraction. Oddly, the pain isn't much worse than without the opiates, but my thoughts are starting to scatter. Yesterday was very busy, cold and wet. Today is bright and sunny after a cold, wet start. Neither weather pattern fills me with joy. Getting everything done I wanted to have done does make my life joyful. However, it's getting more difficult to join my thoughts together and do anything needing concentration or memory.
I have an appointment for relaxation training with the Pain Clinic, finally. It's this month, even.
Showing posts with label pain clinic. Show all posts
Showing posts with label pain clinic. Show all posts
Saturday, 12 April 2008
Sunday, 2 March 2008
In which the Rodent battles depression to win biscuit goodness.
I visited the pain clinic and wrote here about how the psychologist seemed more interested in lowering my expectations than in offering to work with me to get a handle on all this pain. The overall impression I got was very negative. I get very upset about being in so much pain and the unhopeful prognosis, so I ended up dropping into a pit of depression for a few days. Insomnia, crying, feelings of hopelessness, you name it. I've had an awful few days emotionally speaking.
As part of clawing my way out of the pit, I spent a while planning my next week's meals and ordering the necessary food and I stuck to my list of ten as much as I could. I emailed the Samaritans at a point where I felt like ending it all and texted the long-suffering Hunter early in the morning to remind myself that other people were alive and I wasn't all alone. Pol spent a chunk of that morning giving me a hug and tell me aw there there. I spent a chunk of that afternoon giving him a hug and telling him aw there there. These days we seem, I think, to be a lot better at being there for each other.
Just now he's away for the weekend. I haven't felt like grabbing people and suggesting a quick jaunt to Blackpool but it's definitely something to do another day.
So, today I feel better. I got to bed at eleven, got to sleep probably about twelvish and didn't wake up until 2pm. Not what I wanted, but I feel so much better today I'll accept that I needed to sleep for thirteen or fourteen hours. Since I'd been feeling MEish as well as depressed, it's not unexpected. Sometimes a bout of ME will get better after a marathon kip.
I did my ten. I got myself a bath and got dressed. I went outside and looked to see if anything is sprouting. I collected rubbish. I practiced flute. I fussed Moth and got her a fresh hot water bottle. I got myself lunch; breakfast was one the oatmeal and ginger biscuits I baked yesterday and a raw carrot. Lunch was baked sweet potato, sausages and steamed bok choy. I didn't finish it in one go and I've just finished the last of it, nuked hot again, now. I had the last biscuit I baked as a snack and I have frozen part-baked biscuits and frozen dry mix in the freezer ready to go.
Go me!
Out in the wider world, the euro news had a report yesterday on what seemed to be a hurricane, hurricane Emma that had hit Germania and chunks of southern Scandewegia. I know we've had force eleven winds here in Britain because I caught the shipping forecast. I couldn't find any mention of hurricane force winds in Europe on Google or the BBC but a friend on Livejournal has since told me that it was indeed Hurricane Emma, that it did just flick Britain with its tail and she pointed me to some relevant news sites.
As part of clawing my way out of the pit, I spent a while planning my next week's meals and ordering the necessary food and I stuck to my list of ten as much as I could. I emailed the Samaritans at a point where I felt like ending it all and texted the long-suffering Hunter early in the morning to remind myself that other people were alive and I wasn't all alone. Pol spent a chunk of that morning giving me a hug and tell me aw there there. I spent a chunk of that afternoon giving him a hug and telling him aw there there. These days we seem, I think, to be a lot better at being there for each other.
Just now he's away for the weekend. I haven't felt like grabbing people and suggesting a quick jaunt to Blackpool but it's definitely something to do another day.
So, today I feel better. I got to bed at eleven, got to sleep probably about twelvish and didn't wake up until 2pm. Not what I wanted, but I feel so much better today I'll accept that I needed to sleep for thirteen or fourteen hours. Since I'd been feeling MEish as well as depressed, it's not unexpected. Sometimes a bout of ME will get better after a marathon kip.
I did my ten. I got myself a bath and got dressed. I went outside and looked to see if anything is sprouting. I collected rubbish. I practiced flute. I fussed Moth and got her a fresh hot water bottle. I got myself lunch; breakfast was one the oatmeal and ginger biscuits I baked yesterday and a raw carrot. Lunch was baked sweet potato, sausages and steamed bok choy. I didn't finish it in one go and I've just finished the last of it, nuked hot again, now. I had the last biscuit I baked as a snack and I have frozen part-baked biscuits and frozen dry mix in the freezer ready to go.
Go me!
Out in the wider world, the euro news had a report yesterday on what seemed to be a hurricane, hurricane Emma that had hit Germania and chunks of southern Scandewegia. I know we've had force eleven winds here in Britain because I caught the shipping forecast. I couldn't find any mention of hurricane force winds in Europe on Google or the BBC but a friend on Livejournal has since told me that it was indeed Hurricane Emma, that it did just flick Britain with its tail and she pointed me to some relevant news sites.
Tuesday, 26 February 2008
In which the Rodent has its first visit to a pain clinic.
The ME yuk has faded into the background again. Migraines restrict me so much that I am never quite sure if the lack of fluey ache is because I am in remission, because the beta blockers are a miracle drug for my particular woes, or whether I end up accidentally staying at less than seventy percent of capability and thus don't trigger an ME crash. It's impossible to tell without about fifteen thousand similarly afflicted Rodents and a million pounds. Whatever it is, I am lboody grateful.
Today I finally managed to attend a pain clinic after missing the first appointment by turning up on the wrong day. This time it was the right day, although by the end of the two hour assessment I couldn't honestly have told you what day it was without looking at my calendar. The calendar is one of the few Flylady items, I've tried that actually works for me, and this is only after years of slowly adapting the system to my own needs. The main reason the calendar works is because there's no picture and so you end up with two A3 sized pieces of paper for every month.
What I have been told is that after taking no painkillers at all between July 17 2007 and November 17 2007, the headaches are not rebound and I can take whatever kills the pain while the pain clinic teaches me new methods to relax and cope. I'm all for the relaxation, since I think I need it. I don't need the added psychological barrier of being afraid to go out because it will hurt, and that is already beginning to happen. When I explained this, though, I got no feedback at all about whether this was something they did or not. It was very much a talking to blank walls exercise. I could have used their not carefully explaining that they don't offer miracles, since I am feeling crushed and hopeless enough as it is. I'm not expecting to be pain free, or drug free, but it would be nice to be in a better mental place. They kept asking me what I thought they could offer me, and I don't know what they can. Relaxation techniques, CBT, tea and biscuits, who knows? I felt horribly like I was sitting an oral exam I hadn't studied for.
I told them fairly honestly what I use to help the pain: two times 8/500 cocodamol two or three times a day, sometimes four, sometimes none. Tramadol if I need my wits about me for any length of time. Alcohol as an occasional alternative when I want to go out with friends (the Solstice was very boozy). Headbutting a wall during the really bad ones.
I forgot to mention super-sour sweets, cinnamon sweets and ice cream, all of which help the pain by giving me a few seconds respite/distraction.
I am thinking I need a non-junkie style way to explain to my migraine doc that when I was on thirty or so tramadol per month I was unhappy and unable to work but able to learn Spanish, travel to Spain, find my own accommodation and keep up my hobbies, while without them I am struggling with getting to the corner shop and back again. Either my brain has deteriorated very swiftly since 2007 and I am in serious trouble (and livejournal entries then and now suggest not), or my mental health has just become that bad for some reason (that's harder to ascertain), or strong pain relief really does help me get it together. I need to get that all out verbally without resorting at any point to screaming GIVE ME DRUGS!! because that won't help my case. Unfortunately, while I can type this out fairly calmly, once I'm talking to a doc I can hear the brain cells dribbling away until I am snivelling about wanting more tramadol because it makes me feel better....
It might even actually be better to be a drug-free zombie and not get habituated, although experience really, really says I need something. I really wanted a doc at the pain clinic I could talk this sort of thing over with, and I didn't get it. I'll be going to a GP I probably haven't seen before and asking for tramadol after a looooooooong gap without them, so I want to do it with backing. For this reason, I have an appointment to phone my doc at the London Migraine Clinic on Friday morning. I'll take her advice as regard tramadol. Cocodamol too, since, although it's available OTC, I still don't want to make things worse.
I am working on my own strategies for being unable to think all day. I do ten pieces of housework every day, or at least make a gesture in their direction, and mark them done (or not done) on a whiteboard. They're beginning to slowly be things I do without having to think about them. In particular, it's been natural now for months to wash up as I wait for the kettle to boil for my first cuppa, but it's now becoming second nature to also grab the no-taint kitchen spray and a square of Bounty cloth and wipe the kitchen surfaces and visible spots down. While I eat breakfast, the kitchen is spotless. This is so much not the case for the rest of the day. Wiping the bathroom and brushing the loo are also becoming less things I think about and more things I do naturally, and so those might also come off the list-of-ten-things. I can then add new things onto the list. At the current rate, with current levels of gaga, I could be fairly self sufficient and possibly working at something very simple in three to five years.
For depression, actually, not having to think what to do next is a huge bonus. It's been helping me deal with those February blues, stopping the vicious circle of lack of arsedness--->mess--->being overwhelmed--->depression--->lack of arsedness. If I get a huge relapse or merely hit my limit in the future, I will still try to keep my morning routine going just for the lack of stress it engenders.
Since feeding the cat and emptying her tray are on the list, Moth thinks it's a very good thing. She will come and get me if her cat tray is too full for her comfort, after spreading litter and poo about, so it's good for both of us if it's emptied regularly.
Pol and I had our usual Huge Row about the fact that he really wants to live in a caravan and I really can't cope with it even though the idea itself appeals. The last time we had this row, he threw me out just before I walked out, then he bought me coffee about a minute later and we got very vommish while addressing the very real concern I had over getting so little sleep each night. We left the caravan and moved to this house soon after. This time, we just sat and talked it through for a while, then went and watched the first episode of Stargate SG1 together. Like the fact that I want a dog, the fact that he likes living in a caravan is going to keep on and keep on coming up in the future, so I'll be looking for some way forward to that dream. Perhaps he'll start sleeping eight hours a night. Either that or I can live in a second caravan. One full of dogs. Smelly dogs.
Today I finally managed to attend a pain clinic after missing the first appointment by turning up on the wrong day. This time it was the right day, although by the end of the two hour assessment I couldn't honestly have told you what day it was without looking at my calendar. The calendar is one of the few Flylady items, I've tried that actually works for me, and this is only after years of slowly adapting the system to my own needs. The main reason the calendar works is because there's no picture and so you end up with two A3 sized pieces of paper for every month.
What I have been told is that after taking no painkillers at all between July 17 2007 and November 17 2007, the headaches are not rebound and I can take whatever kills the pain while the pain clinic teaches me new methods to relax and cope. I'm all for the relaxation, since I think I need it. I don't need the added psychological barrier of being afraid to go out because it will hurt, and that is already beginning to happen. When I explained this, though, I got no feedback at all about whether this was something they did or not. It was very much a talking to blank walls exercise. I could have used their not carefully explaining that they don't offer miracles, since I am feeling crushed and hopeless enough as it is. I'm not expecting to be pain free, or drug free, but it would be nice to be in a better mental place. They kept asking me what I thought they could offer me, and I don't know what they can. Relaxation techniques, CBT, tea and biscuits, who knows? I felt horribly like I was sitting an oral exam I hadn't studied for.
I told them fairly honestly what I use to help the pain: two times 8/500 cocodamol two or three times a day, sometimes four, sometimes none. Tramadol if I need my wits about me for any length of time. Alcohol as an occasional alternative when I want to go out with friends (the Solstice was very boozy). Headbutting a wall during the really bad ones.
I forgot to mention super-sour sweets, cinnamon sweets and ice cream, all of which help the pain by giving me a few seconds respite/distraction.
I am thinking I need a non-junkie style way to explain to my migraine doc that when I was on thirty or so tramadol per month I was unhappy and unable to work but able to learn Spanish, travel to Spain, find my own accommodation and keep up my hobbies, while without them I am struggling with getting to the corner shop and back again. Either my brain has deteriorated very swiftly since 2007 and I am in serious trouble (and livejournal entries then and now suggest not), or my mental health has just become that bad for some reason (that's harder to ascertain), or strong pain relief really does help me get it together. I need to get that all out verbally without resorting at any point to screaming GIVE ME DRUGS!! because that won't help my case. Unfortunately, while I can type this out fairly calmly, once I'm talking to a doc I can hear the brain cells dribbling away until I am snivelling about wanting more tramadol because it makes me feel better....
It might even actually be better to be a drug-free zombie and not get habituated, although experience really, really says I need something. I really wanted a doc at the pain clinic I could talk this sort of thing over with, and I didn't get it. I'll be going to a GP I probably haven't seen before and asking for tramadol after a looooooooong gap without them, so I want to do it with backing. For this reason, I have an appointment to phone my doc at the London Migraine Clinic on Friday morning. I'll take her advice as regard tramadol. Cocodamol too, since, although it's available OTC, I still don't want to make things worse.
I am working on my own strategies for being unable to think all day. I do ten pieces of housework every day, or at least make a gesture in their direction, and mark them done (or not done) on a whiteboard. They're beginning to slowly be things I do without having to think about them. In particular, it's been natural now for months to wash up as I wait for the kettle to boil for my first cuppa, but it's now becoming second nature to also grab the no-taint kitchen spray and a square of Bounty cloth and wipe the kitchen surfaces and visible spots down. While I eat breakfast, the kitchen is spotless. This is so much not the case for the rest of the day. Wiping the bathroom and brushing the loo are also becoming less things I think about and more things I do naturally, and so those might also come off the list-of-ten-things. I can then add new things onto the list. At the current rate, with current levels of gaga, I could be fairly self sufficient and possibly working at something very simple in three to five years.
For depression, actually, not having to think what to do next is a huge bonus. It's been helping me deal with those February blues, stopping the vicious circle of lack of arsedness--->mess--->being overwhelmed--->depression--->lack of arsedness. If I get a huge relapse or merely hit my limit in the future, I will still try to keep my morning routine going just for the lack of stress it engenders.
Since feeding the cat and emptying her tray are on the list, Moth thinks it's a very good thing. She will come and get me if her cat tray is too full for her comfort, after spreading litter and poo about, so it's good for both of us if it's emptied regularly.
Pol and I had our usual Huge Row about the fact that he really wants to live in a caravan and I really can't cope with it even though the idea itself appeals. The last time we had this row, he threw me out just before I walked out, then he bought me coffee about a minute later and we got very vommish while addressing the very real concern I had over getting so little sleep each night. We left the caravan and moved to this house soon after. This time, we just sat and talked it through for a while, then went and watched the first episode of Stargate SG1 together. Like the fact that I want a dog, the fact that he likes living in a caravan is going to keep on and keep on coming up in the future, so I'll be looking for some way forward to that dream. Perhaps he'll start sleeping eight hours a night. Either that or I can live in a second caravan. One full of dogs. Smelly dogs.
Friday, 1 February 2008
In which the Rodent takes drugs.
So, I've gone back to just taking painkillers, mostly Happy Fun Cocodamol (i.e. the fizzy 8/500s) whenever I feel blech due to pain without worrying about taking too many or rebound headaches. This is working out to be about once or twice a day, generally in the evening.
The end result seems to be that my migraines are calming back down again. I no longer actively dread any task that will mean having to bend forward. I've seen to the cat tray two days in a row now. I did online shopping, which I haven't done for ages because I couldn't focus long enough to work through it all. If I take painkillers, I seem to be in less pain, even after the painkillers have worn off. Avoiding painkillers left me in a lot of pain and unable to function.
Now, how to articulate this for the pain clinic people...
Today's food is veal. Since it's possible now to get high-welfare veal raised in the UK in reasonable living conditions, I got some from Odaco. I made it into burgers, using wholemeal breadcrumbs made by folding past-its-best bread into a lump and grating it, about a third the volume of bread to meat, two eggs, a good-sized double-handful of veal and enough ketjap manis (a thick, sticky, sweetish soy sauce) to be able to taste the difference. It was nice, cooked until done in the Foreman grill. I had it with cajun sweetcorn fritters.
The end result seems to be that my migraines are calming back down again. I no longer actively dread any task that will mean having to bend forward. I've seen to the cat tray two days in a row now. I did online shopping, which I haven't done for ages because I couldn't focus long enough to work through it all. If I take painkillers, I seem to be in less pain, even after the painkillers have worn off. Avoiding painkillers left me in a lot of pain and unable to function.
Now, how to articulate this for the pain clinic people...
Today's food is veal. Since it's possible now to get high-welfare veal raised in the UK in reasonable living conditions, I got some from Odaco. I made it into burgers, using wholemeal breadcrumbs made by folding past-its-best bread into a lump and grating it, about a third the volume of bread to meat, two eggs, a good-sized double-handful of veal and enough ketjap manis (a thick, sticky, sweetish soy sauce) to be able to taste the difference. It was nice, cooked until done in the Foreman grill. I had it with cajun sweetcorn fritters.
Wednesday, 16 January 2008
In which the Rodent spends a lot of time with one taxi driver.
First he took me to the hospital, for my pain clinic appointment. I went in, announced myself, handed over the letter, had it explained to me in small words that today is Wednesday the 16th of January, and not Tuesday the 15th of January. Or, as I'd been thinking, Wednesday the 15th. At least I had the right month.
They don't redo appointments for first timers who fail to show. Unless they're very, very stupid - apparently rank daftness gives you a free pass. I think I'll get Pol to enter my new appointment in the calendar so this doesn't happen again.
So then I called for a taxi, and they said back to $street? I said no, to the railway station. Back comes the driver, surprised to see me so soon and thinking he was taking me home again. I explained about being daft and wanting to buy train tickets while he took me to the railway station, where I bought train tickets, turning down late-night travel for £14 and plumping for a £62 return in the afternoon. Rush hour travel would be £245. It's not where you go, it's when you go...
Back into the same taxi, this time to home, as expected. We talked about train tickets and the prices, and then travel to Spain, and then about Seville! That was an easy subject, although he knew the parts I wasn't so aware of. I discovered I can't remember the name of any of the districts.
Now in and sitting down reluctant to move again today, and with Moth purring her heart out by my side, just where I can reach out and scratch her head. She seems happier now she's got wet food and will forgive me for yesterday soon.
Moth's fit and well and vaccinated, but she does not like being in a car for hours at a time, so we're changing vet. It's a shame, because Crown House Vets in Rochdale have been excellent to us and I don't want to leave. Moth disagrees, especially if she has to travel for an hour, then get rained on all the way to the door, then stuck with a needle (the part she minds least because she looooooooves vets), then back again, and, horror of horrors, not even a drop of evaporated milk, or even tuna cat food. Just dry biscuits and water. Poor cat.
Thanks to Pol, this deficit has since been remedied.
They don't redo appointments for first timers who fail to show. Unless they're very, very stupid - apparently rank daftness gives you a free pass. I think I'll get Pol to enter my new appointment in the calendar so this doesn't happen again.
So then I called for a taxi, and they said back to $street? I said no, to the railway station. Back comes the driver, surprised to see me so soon and thinking he was taking me home again. I explained about being daft and wanting to buy train tickets while he took me to the railway station, where I bought train tickets, turning down late-night travel for £14 and plumping for a £62 return in the afternoon. Rush hour travel would be £245. It's not where you go, it's when you go...
Back into the same taxi, this time to home, as expected. We talked about train tickets and the prices, and then travel to Spain, and then about Seville! That was an easy subject, although he knew the parts I wasn't so aware of. I discovered I can't remember the name of any of the districts.
Now in and sitting down reluctant to move again today, and with Moth purring her heart out by my side, just where I can reach out and scratch her head. She seems happier now she's got wet food and will forgive me for yesterday soon.
Moth's fit and well and vaccinated, but she does not like being in a car for hours at a time, so we're changing vet. It's a shame, because Crown House Vets in Rochdale have been excellent to us and I don't want to leave. Moth disagrees, especially if she has to travel for an hour, then get rained on all the way to the door, then stuck with a needle (the part she minds least because she looooooooves vets), then back again, and, horror of horrors, not even a drop of evaporated milk, or even tuna cat food. Just dry biscuits and water. Poor cat.
Thanks to Pol, this deficit has since been remedied.
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