Sometimes this illness presents itself in the absolute strangest ways. Take last week for example. I woke up during the wee hours of Monday morning to pee and caught a violent cold shiver on my way back to bed. So I bundled up under my blankets like a mummy and shivered myself back to sleep. Well when I woke up a few hours later, I was drenched in sweat. Like hair plastered to my forehead, sheets soaked, drenched in sweat. I felt sick, but that's kinda my normal state these days so it didn't cause much concern. I dragged my way through the day getting non-physical activities done and somehow, despite feeling pretty awful, kept my mental state steady.
On Tuesday I woke up still feeling sick: alternating between really hot and freezing cold, achy, lethargic, stomach a mess, bla bla bla... But in addition to feeling sick, there was an extreme pain on the right side of my mid-back, kinda near my ribs. It flared and spasmed at times with such severity not only could I not breathe, but I was forced to cry. I tried massaging it and icing it. I took ibuprofen. I sat in strange and contorted positions trying to relieve the pressure, but for the life of me I couldn't get out of pain. I hurt too bad everywhere else to do yoga; a medieval torture rack sounded more appealing. So I sat there patiently waiting for the flare to subside, knowing once it did I could attack my back with some good ol' fashioned stretching.
On Wednesday I woke up so sick and in so much pain that I lost my shit. I'd tried to keep it together, I really did, but my PTSD started to kick in and I couldn't. If I thought I was crying on Tuesday, Wednesday took it to a whole new level. I spent the majority of the day ranting and raving about the unfairness of life. What had I ever done to deserve unending misery? How was I supposed to survive it? Horrible people have wonderful lives, why can't mine just be normal? And it was while crying this out to dear old mom that a lightbulb went off in my head.
This particular back pain is easily sixteen years old. I had it long before I started feeling the symptoms of CFS and fibro. I remember going to the doctor and being told it was because I was a makeup artist and worked with my right arm extended out in front of me for like forty hours a week. He told me to file a workman's comp claim. I thought he was ridiculous. I was twenty-six years old and had worked in the industry for a year-and-a-half. I hadn't exactly been performing hard physical labor for twenty years under adverse conditions. Clearly my doctor just didn't want to deal with me. So I sucked it up and ignored the pain until a few years later when I started feeling the symptoms of what turned out to be CFS and fibro. I found out that whatever's wrong with my shoulder is connected to whatever's wrong with my neck. Combine that with these chronic pain conditions, and the result was damn near right-arm paralysis.
It took years to get that spot, along with all the other areas on my body where I have a slight inequity fibro lives to exploit, out of pain. Acupuncture and yoga helped, but it wasn't until I started weight lifting that I forgot it even existed. But I'm not exercising regularly right now and am actually in pretty pathetic shape. I've been really down on myself for gaining weight and not looking as good as I did a few years ago. Last Tuesday I was reminded in a brutal and punishing way that exercise, for me, has nothing to do with looking good. It is, quite simply, the only way to feel like my body isn't falling apart.
Wednesday's realization did nothing to improve my Thursday. I believe at one point my husband actually told me I wasn't allowed to cry anymore. And I didn't blame him a bit. How he hadn't walked out the door yet was beyond comprehension. If I'd had any way to get away from me, I woulda flown the coop in a heartbeat. Nevertheless, we somehow made it through my flare. He found the trigger spot under my shoulder blade and pushed on it until I thought my eyes were gonna pop out of my head. I spent hours stretching while we watched TV. Sure, it hurt like hell, but sitting still wasn't any better. Clearly the only way to improve my future is to torture myself now.
On Sunday I woke up and the first thing I felt wasn't my back. Hallelujah! Yes, it still hurts, but the stretching and massaging and ibuprofen and ice, and in all honesty my flare ending, shifted the pain from agonizing to uncomfortable. So that's that. Another week gone. Another week I won't get back. Another week of my life absorbed by this sickness that doesn't make a damn bit of sense and no one can seem to fix.
Thanks for joining,
Leah
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