Tag: health

Posting as pain relief

I have a confession. I have migraines and depression. And I let them win.

I started this blog two years ago under the advisement of a friend, a dear, dear friend, who was convinced that it would help me feel better on all fronts. That the positive feedback – or any feedback – would make a difference in both mood and pain.

But I let them win. I have forever. I have talent and dreams. What a failure I am.

I’ve posted all of five times, I think. I managed one last night, one I thought was pretty fun. It’s not bad. So I wanted to start an editorial calendar today but could not imagine what my worthless self would talk about. Anxiety filled my throat with acid and shortened breath.

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I’m not looking for sympathy. Just feel like this a lot and wondering if posting would help me lift my head…from time to time.

That one post seemed to change a little something, though, because here I am.

I am wondering what you, my two or three dear readers, think about my friend’s theory. Do you think that regularly posting something, anything, can help fill that hole in your heart? You know, the one you can shrink but never quite sew closed.  I can always find a way to slip backwards into that hole. It’s like I want to.

Do you think posting about something, anything, might keep me upright?

Do you think that over time my migraines, caused primarily by stress and sadness, might alleviate a little bit? If posting something, anything, would help alleviate that stress and sadness, I would take a bit.  Any of you who have chronic migraines or other pain, I know, would take a bit.

Your thoughts and experiences would be invaluable if you’re up for sharing. In the meantime I will do my best to continue posting about the fascinating and useless things I find while cleaning my closet. Maybe some boxing, too.

Thank you all. Thank you so much.

 

 

Missing

I subscribe to a website written by a couple of kids who call themselves soul-workers. There’s stuff about chakras and Solfeggio frequencies and twin flames. At first blush the grownup in you might think you’ve landed at the wrong place; you were looking up “how to stop crying all the time.” But the site has a great deal of good, practical advice and information, crystals notwithstanding.

This includes types of muscle tension, or which emotions get stuck in which parts of the body. I don’t know how true it is that guilt, shame and unworthiness congregate only in the lower back, but I’d believe it because my lower back hurts and I feel all those things.

And I have headaches. I get them all the time.

I wake up with them. If I don’t wake up with them I get them by the middle of the day, end of the day at the latest. I work with them, although I’m not as good at working with a headache as I used to be. I’ve been getting them for nearly 20 years. There’s not much choice in the matter. And it doesn’t matter what kind of headache it is. They all hurt.

I take a cocktail of anticonvulsants and muscle relaxants at night to control – or try to – one source of the daily trauma: TMJ. I have my ex-husband and a car accident to thank for the TMJ. (Thank you!) Some days I don’t know what’s worse: The fear of waking up, painfully, or the struggle to forgive the man and what was a true accident.

I work at mitigating the symptoms. Feverfew, heat, trigger-pointing knots across my back until I’m tearful, sweaty, and nauseous. I’m impatient. I meditate at night. It’s not helping yet. It’s supposed to but it’s not. Is five months enough?

I frequently swallow too many triptans, too many days in a row. These are migraine abortives, in case you didn’t know, and you’re only supposed to take them twice a week, tops. But you try having a migraine every day and see how long you last. They’re expensive and I’ll pay anything to have enough.

The worse part? It’s not the physical pain. It’s missing.

I miss work. Calling in yet again is heartbreaking in its normal abnormality. A frequently deformed workweek, the stress of failure. Talent wasted.  No one is as sick as I am.

I miss people. There is an encompassing fear of making a friend then revealing that in fact, there’s something she should know so she can decide if she wants to be friends with someone who, when asked How are you? will probably lie. I’m OK.

I miss love. See above, making friends. Then multiply it times infinity: How could someone ever love a woman who can’t get her head on straight? Who takes a senior citizen-sized handful of pills each night? You can only hide that for so long.

I miss days. Sunshine hurts my eyes. Rain swells my sinuses. My shades are drawn and I wish the days to pass with a singular purpose, like a line of worker ants with their one job. Then like time they’re gone.

This website, with its talk of shamanism and spiritual teachers, would advise me to attack the root and symptoms by being kind to myself in practical ways. It’s in a book I bought from them: Do some yoga, wear bright colors, discuss every day with myself what is good about myself.

But I don’t know what that is anymore.

Many thanks to lonerwolf, a truly lovely site written and run by truly lovely people. It’s full of free and affordable advice anyone can use. Check them out if you’re stuck. Note: I have no affiliation with the site.