The Pain Center

This week, in my continuing quest for answers, I found myself at the Pain Management Center at Stanford. There I met an extraordinarily condescending pain specialist who seemed to lack both empathy and an ability to compromise. After shooting down all my current (effective) drug therapies and pointedly asking why I felt the need to visit her clinic, she sent me away with a prescription for a multi-disciplinary conference and an order to not change any of my treatments until further notice.

Should I choose to proceed, this involves three more evaluations, three more MRIs, a two stagnant months. While the idea of many doctors collaborating on my case is appealing, the amount of doctor time required of me is daunting. Part of my current plan is to cut out as much medical stuff as I can and try to live. Going to Stanford seven times in the next two months does not jive with that plan.

Additionally, one of my intake forms was a three pager that released them from any liability should I become addicted to prescription medications. Yes.

However, the problem here, in my mind, is not the form, or the amount of evals, or the tests, or the time, or even the fact that she sent me away without even ONE idea of something I could try. The problem here is that I already have a physiatrist, and a physical therapist, and a therapist, and a bajillion other people who already know my case and my body and who all report to essentially the same guy. Everything The Pain Center wants me to have I already posses. Therefore the two months I would spend waiting for them to come up with a drug regimen would not only be long and painful - it would be redundant. And I do not do well with redundancy.

I am sick and tired of going to the doctor. It has been my whole life for more than two years. I am not going to blindly accept that this whole new roster could help me, because I just want to be done. In this case, less is more. I will not be returning.

photo credit: http://hkham.files.wordpress.com/2009/04/hm36drugs-are-bad-posters.jpg

Mind Games

My attitude adjustment, it appears, is not invincible.

I had my wisdom teeth out ten days ago. It has been on the to-do list for a while, however once the teeth dislodged my retainers and caused my gums to swell removal was moved to the top of the triage list. It was horrific timing, as I was just wrapping my head around fighting a chronic pain cycle. Suddenly I spent a week on bed rest chugging vicodin and waiting out the recovery. On the other side, the lack of Enbrel and exercise has destroyed my body. I feel as bad as I did a year ago, plus withdrawal symptoms.

The first few days were okay. I congratulated myself on coming so far that I could endure a procedure like that and stay stable. But as the pain set in, I lost the ability to find a positive angle. I struggle to find one now.

In the past, I was able to hold my head together because I truly believed I could learn something from the experience. I bided my time and sorted through my head and worked really hard and I grew into someone really healthy, not just in body but in mind, more so than I've ever been. Then I was hit. Now the pain really isn't my fault, and everything seems out of my control. I can't reverse anything, or cope with anything, and, for the first time, I feel truly powerless.

I don't know how to believe that I can achieve my previous level of health now that it has been so thoroughly destroyed. Knowing what such a process requires of me, I don't think I want to start over. Now that this has become a mind game, my head is no longer my own, and I have nowhere to retreat. Perhaps the last mental barrier I must defeat is my fear of confronting my pain head on - though I thought that's what I've been doing this whole time. I don't know if I can live in a world where I have to live despite the pain; it seems that living without pain is no longer an option.

And that is one hell of an attitude adjustment.

photo credit: http://archive.student.bmj.com/issues/08/03/life/images/view_3.jpg

Recycling

About two weeks ago, my general prac put me on my first ever narcotic pain regimen. The drug of choice, kadian, is essentially time-released morphine, and although the first couple days were amazing my system subsequently crashed. The goal was to break the pain cycle and allow myself time to gain back the strength I've lost since the accident, but the experiment backfired because instead of feeling better, I simply felt sick in a whole new capacity.

I broke off the narcotics after a week, and instead of going on oxycontin I've elected to proceed with codine and an attitude adjustment. My physiatrist says that he fears I am slipping into a chronic pain cycle, in which the mind tells the body to feel pain when in fact nothing is wrong. This transition is incredibly difficult to undo, and I intend to fight it with everything I have. But now, I'm fighting my own head. Fun.

My physiatrist's main strategy for me is that I should provide my nervous system with other things to focus on besides pain - such as sixty second graders drowning in "A Midsummer Night's Dream." But now that the school year is over, I must find new and equally engaging activities to distract my shredded nerves. Thus, I propose something to the world.

I have always loved visitors, however despite my winning personality I haven't had that many (those of you who have come, know that I appreciate it more than I could say). I understand that people's lives are full and stressful, and that I live in the boonies, but I have been in my house and at the doctor - almost exclusively - for two years. Step up, people, because this part I cannot do alone. I need distraction. Prove that life is out there waiting for me.

photo credit: http://filipaqueiroz.files.wordpress.com/2009/02/escape-key.jpg