Tag: Nerve Pain

My Limit

I’ve seen about 18 doctors in the past 3 years. I’ve honestly lost track. Every single visit was about one thing: I’m in constant, extreme pain. Yet every single doctor has refused to prescribe me ANYTHING to help with the pain. Not one. Not one time.

I just saw 2 pain specialists today, and they wouldn’t do it either. I was told that it would interfere with treatments. First, I can NOT take pain meds when we do procedures, you know. I mean, we all understand that, right? Second, it’s taken me THREE MONTHS just to get that appointment because of our stupid insurance system, and now it’s going to be ANOTHER month before I come back for the first treatment. Can I not get something for this next month of waiting around? No, go home and suffer in silence until you’re summoned again.

I’m just so utterly exhausted and angry and worn out. I’m LIVID. I’ve been LIVID for HOURS now. I understand that doctors not wanting to prescribe pain meds is a giant overreaction to too many opiates in treatments, but of all the situations where pain meds might be called for, this seems to be the TEXTBOOK case, and I get NOTHING. For over 3 years now. Endless, constant pain, and all the mental anguish that implies, but I’m just supposed to see counselors and pray.

I’m sorry, I don’t have magical powers. Whatever mental, emotional, or spiritual reserves I could have used to simply “deal with it” were exhausted a LOOOONG time ago. I’m sitting here at an 8 this evening, and I want to throw things through walls, break windows, and trash my stuff like I was a drug-abusing rock star in a hotel room in the 80’s. The Bible says God won’t put more on you than you can bear. I’m declaring I’ve officially hit my limit. Your move, God.

An Extra 5 Weeks of Pain

Jumping into the middle of the story, I tried cortisone injections to help with my chronic pain, but they only seem to have made things worse. A friend at church gave me a whole new approach to try, but I needed a referral from my primary care physician.

My PCP wouldn’t do the referral over email. She insisted that I needed to make an appointment, and that it had to be a 30-minute one. Because of the length of the appointment, I couldn’t get on her schedule for FIVE WEEKS. But I thought, hey, I have other requests. Maybe because I’m seeing her, she’ll address them.

I just had the appointment. She was 15 minutes late to a 30-minute appointment, and only used 10 minutes of the time. She told me she wouldn’t address my other concerns, and pushed them on the referral. She agreed that this was a good next step, but added 5 weeks of unnecessary extra time to my journey.

Obviously, I’m in a bad mood, and there’s just literally no comfort or rest to be found. Excuse me while I order a pizza, and stick my head inside a video game until I’m exhausted enough to go to sleep.

The responsibility is the reward

 

One of the straightest paths to purpose in life is to take responsibility for something (or someone). Becoming a person whose presence and competence benefits others. For both your sake and theirs.

Jordan Peterson calls this the “meaningful burden” in 12 Rules for Life, and downright posits it as an antidote to depression. Echoing Victor Frankl’s famous quote “he who has a why to live for can bear almost any how” from Man’s Search for Meaning.

There’s something inherently counterintuitive about this notion that people who feel overwhelmed by life, or lost in its endless possibilities, might not need a lighter load, but a more meaningful burden instead. It reminds me of the version of burnout that stems not from overwork, but from under-purpose. Sometimes, the answer to “it’s just all too much” is, weirdly, “can I have some more, please”.

Source: The responsibility is the reward

This may or may not be exactly what I needed to hear at this juncture of life. With my ongoing struggle with nerve pain, I will admit that I have fully lost any sense of “why” in my life. I’m going to have to look inside and find one again. The universe is reminding me to get back to the work of reading certain things, like Frankl, which I started, then stopped.

I talk with the doc who led me to surgery again next week, for more options, but I’ve become burdened with the forced acceptance of the notion that I may never be completely pain free in my life again. I should probably start talking to other people similarly affected, to get more perspective on what it’s like to live with this sort of thing long term, but I haven’t wanted to give into the idea that I can’t get free of this somehow.

Since surgery helped quite a bit, I can’t help thinking that more surgery would help more, but there’s a process to follow here, before undertaking something potentially more risky than the procedure I had done before.