(no subject)

[sophie8]

“Pain is whatever the experiencing person says it is; existing whenever he or she says it does.”

—Margo McCaffrey

Living with chronic pain is exhausting. I never have a pain-free day. On the best of my good days my pain is like noise from the house next door, always there but easy enough to tune out. And on the worst of my bad days I just want to die because I can't imagine it ever stopping. There is nothing I can do to stop my pain except take lots of analgesics which of course all come with their own side effects and health problems, and they don't always work. There is no pattern of behaviour that triggers the pain, no way of predicting whether tomorrow will be a good or bad day. All of this is exhausting and unfair. I spend a large amount of time incredibly angry that I'm living through this again. And I spend an equal amount of time in despair not knowing if it will ever get better.

On Friday I went on the waiting list for my revision surgery. The wait is at least 9 months. The recovery period is estimated at 6 months. So maybe in 2 years this will all be over. I don't dare to hope yet, like I said I've been through this before. But maybe I will get lucky.

Comments

[chris]

Fingers very firmly crossed, and that's a great quote.

[sophie8]

It's the philosophy that we use at the hospital when it comes to pain. I think it's the best definition of pain I've ever come across.

[confuscious.livejournal.com]

Even what might seem like some time away creeps up on the best of us at an incredibly unexpected pace, so I'm confident it will come quickly, maybe even quicker than you'd think, and that it'll all work out just nicely.

[magic_at_mungos]

I'm certainly hoping for the best for you