Category Archives: Chronic pain

Chronic pain, headache, Just me, Migraine, Mygraine

The Bell Jar…

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BellJarMigraineSylvia Plath wrote “How did I know that someday―at college, in Europe, somewhere, anywhere―the bell jar, with its stifling distortions, wouldn’t descend again?”

I understand exactly how she felt.

The doctors don’t know what causes my headaches. I spent 12 days in the best hospital in the nation for headache treatment and we are no closer to knowing why I get them. Is it hormones? Stress? Food? Nighttime teeth clenching? Pressure changes? All of the above?

I lost four months to my headaches when they were at their worst. Four months of not working, not going much of anywhere. Four months of distance in friend groups and business relationships. Four months of earning no income, not volunteering, and generally not being me.

Now I am better, kind of. I am back to work a few hours a week. I am up to camping for a few days at a time and able to table an event here and there. I can contribute. However, I walk around on tenterhooks, uncertain whether or not I am going to be able to continue this pace or if I will suddenly turn bad enough to have to stop working for four months and spend another 2 weeks in the hospital. I live under the possibility that one day my own bell jar will descend again.

I don’t drive much precisely because I never know if, once I have gotten somewhere, I will feel well enough to drive back. Will I get to a restaurant to meet a friend only to have to send someone for my car in the morning because my headache upped it’s game and rendered driving impossible or will I be able to be out for two hours without any negative consequences?

This past week is a perfect example. I felt great. I gardened, I cleaned, I cooked. I spent time with the kids. Then the 4th of July hit. Suddenly I had to cancel my original plans and find another way to celebrate. I took medication and saw the doctor and this morning it was a little better. Then this afternoon it got worse. I spent the rest of the day generally in bed resting waiting for it to calm the hell down.

Three not so great headache days in a row and I am facing the fear that I will fall back into that hellish place I awoke to in January.

I have lowered my work load and pruned my volunteer efforts. I chose two organizations to stay working with and dropped everything else. I can handle a couple days of work a week. I have to try to succeed at this. If I give up and just wait for the problem to go away I will spend forever waiting.

I take my medication and see my doctors. I eat right and exercise. I sleep. I have built in rest periods in my week to replenish my energy levels. I am doing what I can to make this work.

I just wish there was a way to do it without having that bell jar hanging over my head.

Bees, Chronic Pain, Connection, garden, Home sweet home

Bee calm and garden on…

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Pink flower bee Copy (1)

It’s been my newest project and my reason for being offline so much lately. For the first time in my life I am building a garden. Day in and day out I dig and plant, hammer and staple, water and weed. There is something soothing and, well, down to earth about gardening.

I can feel my connection with the earth healing some deeply hungry part of me. In the garden I am capable and strong, I am able to work for hours and not make my headache worse. I don’t know if it’s not straining my eyes on a computer screen or just that gardening is as replenishing as it is exhausting but my spoons don’t seem to be at risk when I am in the sun and communing with all the bees and plants.

And boy do we have bees!! There is a house a few doors down with a hive and their happy little bees buzz around my Gerbera Daisies, Blueberries, Blackberries, Strawberries and Tomatoes. It’s possible that they love the herb garden even more. Best of all, the big blue fountain in my planter garden gets teeny buzzing visitors who fly over, settle on the rim, and delicately sip at the water in the bowl.

I can watch the bees for hours.

I put up a hammock under the tree and when I am not gardening or working I lie there smelling my spearmint, magnolias, and tomatoes while the bees buzz around me, resting from time to time on my knees. The sun is warm and the sound of the busy birds and insects is soothing.

I seem to be coming back to life with the plants, growing stronger and standing taller every day. The long lonely years of pain and hardship look as though they may actually be in the past. I work, I garden, I walk, I swim. I take the kids places. I am once again living an outside life. I am not confined, alone with my cat, to a dark and quiet room watching the world pass me by on a dimly lit computer screen wishing desperately that I could be free. I am no longer a useless partner, mother, daughter, or friend. I have things to offer the world again. I have people in my life who walk beside me and encourage me to do what I can while reminding me to not overdo it. They value and cherish my contributions even though they are not what they used to be. I am learning to do the same. I suppose I am being cultivated as much as my garden is.

I love how responsive plants are to my labors. A drooping plant will perk up within minutes of being watered, a seed poke through the earth within days of being planted. Every day I see the results of my labors blooming around me and I can’t help but bloom with them! I laugh and dance and sing again. I wake up early, even though I hurt, to take my medication so I can get to the garden faster.

I have more energy now too so I can cook and walk to the grocery store and clean. I make delicious food for my family again and get pleasure out of seeing them gobble it up. My kids are eating vegetable soups and meatloaf and guacamole again, thrilled I am back in the kitchen making it. Dan is touched each and every day I make his lunch for work, happy I have thought of him and taken the time to insure he has a gracious plenty of healthy, delicious food while he keeps the peace in the brutal heat. My parents enjoy the food I cook and my mother loves that she is not doing the cooking.

I am slowly learning that no matter what my professional future holds, whether I can litigate again or not, whether I can earn a decent living or not, I can contribute to the family in a meaningful way.

I can be a goddess of hearth and home if I cannot be the career woman I dreamed of being. I find joy and a profound sense of accomplishment in the tasks I once deemed menial. Now they are the example of improved health.

So my life is blooming again. I think it’s time to bee calm and garden on.

Chronic Pain, Just me, Migraine

To Distraction!

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Did you know that focusing directly on your pain can inhibit your body’s ability to produce pain fighting endorphins?

Apparently if you hurt and you lie there thinking about it you can actually make yourself hurt more. This may be why I feel better when watching t.v. or reading a book than I do when trying to go to sleep at night or waking up first thing in the morning. Having something distract me from my discomfort has been more helpful than any pain killer.

The trick is managing the distractions in a way that doesn’t use up all my spoons. I can visit with people a couple of times a week but the gatherings have to be small and end early or else I sleep for days afterwards and feel like I can never wake up. I can work and clean, but I have to have days to rest in between. When I am resting I have to have distraction with minimal effort.

So how do I rest with minimal distraction and still improve my mind? After all, there are only so many hours one can watch television or read before going quietly mad and if I crochet one more hat I am going to strangle someone with yarn.

Don’t worry. I have plans. Evidence blogs, coding classes, sign language classes online, app development classes. The whole kit and caboodle. I may need to lie down and rest a lot, but there is a lot a person can do lying down.