Oh the horror. Why do I feel like that one day was the best day I’m going to get from this procedure? I kind of wish that day didn’t happen, because it only made these other days feel so much worse. The last time I had this procedure, I felt better right away. There wasn’t any kind of lag period, or recovery period. Will the procedure make things worse? How am I going to get through this again in 6 more weeks? I can’t answer any of those questions, and they all scare the crap out of me. I can’t handle too many days of horror in a row, and today is super horrifying. I’m bordering on panic because the pain levels are so high. At this point I’m worried the procedure is only making things worse.
I’m pretty paralyzed from pain today. Every time I move, it hurts more. I’m afraid to even get up out of bed. Rolling over hurts. I already had an ice pack, and it didn’t really do anything. This pain is completely out of control, with no hope of getting it under control anytime soon. The only thing I can hope for is waking up tomorrow after some healing sleep. Nothing will happen today. It’s only 10am, and the only thing I can find to look forward to is tomorrow morning. Something that might happen in 22 hours. How do I get through today?
This is so fucking bad today. I am struggling so hard just to survive today. I’m a bit in tears right now. I’m on the verge of pure panic, and it’s only 11am. This is sticking me in a nasty logic loop thinking about this procedure. Even if this procedure is successful, how can I work a job, and have a 1 or 2 week recovery 4 times a year? I’ll have to do this twice a year, and it’s split in two, so 4 times. With a week or two recovery, how do I survive like that? I would need 4 to 8 weeks of vacation time every year. No job allows you to do that. No job gives you health insurance with that much time off. Add in the scheduling of it all. The procedures get scheduled when the doctor’s office schedules it. It doesn’t get scheduled on my time, or what’s needed for an employer. Who would even hire me? I would have to lie to them and take some unexpected, unpaid, short term disability time 4 times a year. This isn’t good in any way. This still doesn’t work in any way.
The Tour de France ends today, and that always sends me into a mild depression. Cycling was always a huge love of mine. I was training really hard way back when I first injured my spine. Watching cycling on TV is the only way I can enjoy the sport anymore, but it also serves as a constant reminder that I can never ride a bike again. The TDF is always a lovely way to spend 3 weeks though. I usually cry as soon as they hit the Champs Elysees in Paris, but this year they end in Nice because of the Olympics in Paris, so it feels very different.
Yesterday and today have been 2 of the hardest days of my life. I just can’t explain how bad this has been. A solid 10 for a couple days straight. This is so incredibly hard to get through. All I can do is try to breathe, hang onto the couch for dear life. Count the seconds until the day is over. Focus as much as I can, which is to say hardly at all, because this is so difficult. It’s hard to even distract myself. I can’t focus on a distraction enough to take my attention away from the pain. I also changed my mind. This has become more difficult to recover from than my last fusion surgery, so I’m going to add each one of these to the surgery tally. I was going to give it a half. This makes it 7 spine surgeries then. For my last fusion surgery, I walked in at a 9/10, and I left at an 8. This one I went in at an 8, now I’m a 10.
Just forced myself to do a church walk. I was pretty much in full panic, so that’s part of my grounding/coping. Change my setting. Get some fresh air. That was super painful. It’s about 1.5 blocks of walking. I thought I was going to collapse right when I started. It fulfilled its purpose of easing some of the panic, but that’s it. When does this fucking pain ease up? I’m going to have to drug myself to sleep or something if I don’t catch any sort of break.
Not lucky enough to a pass out. Again. I really wish it would happen already. I’m so ready for this day to be over. I’m exhausted. I need a week of sleep to get past the exhaustion. Please make this pain stop. Please let the madness stop.