Beyond the Pain

There are many sucky things about chronic pain.

One of the biggest is the sheer unpredictability of it. For example, 2 days ago I was able to hop in the car and drive to and from the Town of Canmore, to have lunch with my daughter. Being able to drive 2 1/2 hours round-trip doesn’t sound like much. But, for me it’s a major accomplishment. Normally, when I travel to the mountains I have to space my driving out over 2 days: driving to my destination 1 day and returning a day or 2 later.

What was even more astonishing was that fact that it was incredibly windy. Normally wind gusts provoke pain but not that day.

Yesterday was a whole different story.

The winds started blowing around noon and my ‘friend’ pain paid a visit. Pain is a ‘friend’ in the same way that a woman’s monthlies are a friend. 😉

Over the course of the afternoon the pain ramped up until I could barely walk. The problem was that I was on the other side of the city, about 40 kilometers and a 1/2 hour drive from home base. Gritting my teeth, literally and figuratively, I drove home and collapsed into bed.

Why  bed? Well, quite simply when the pain becomes off the scale the only ‘treatment’ is sleep. Luckily I can sleep even when in excruciating pain. Many Fibromites can’t.

I slept for some 11 hours and crawled out of bed at 6:30 today. Emphasis on crawled.

Because I am in the high phase of my SAD I can operate in spite of the pain. It’s called COPING.

When severe pain strikes I am forced to go to Plan B … or even Plan Z.

I had planned to do some copywriting today. But, that requires too much creativity, too much inspiration. And, my inspiration gets blocked by the pain.

So, I have to find other things with which to distract myself.

Why distract?

Because 1 of the ways to deal with pain is to distract oneself. 1 way I do that is by writing … but not creative writing. Somehow, I am able to blog but I can’t seem to do creative writing. But, then when I am depressed I can teach workshops but I can’t market them. I guess creation just requires too damn much energy.

Other ways I distract myself include Facebooking, Twittering, reading blogs, watching videos, IMing, and  talking on the phone.

Another strategy I’m going to implement is 1 I used 28 years ago when I was clinically depressed. You can probably imagine how little get up and go 1 has when depressed. So, what I came up with was a check list of things I could do when depressed. Naturally, I created the list when I wasn’t depressed. I kept it in the top drawer of my desk at work. And, whenever I was really, really depressed I haul it out. I’d look at the list and see what ‘task’ on the list I thought I could manage to do.

So, I’m adopting the same idea now. I’m going to create a List of things I can do when I’m in pain.

Then on days like today I don’t have to THINK about what I can do, I just look at the list and pick something.

FIRST thing on my list will be, of course, TAKE A NAP!

Copyright 2010 Lyle T. Lachmuth  All Rights Reserved

I often wonder what it would be like to not be moody.

I’ve tried to remember what life was like before my Manic Depressive Illness kicked in. I remember times, or at least I think I remember times, when I felt joy. For instance when my daughter was born. I remember the sheer terror of her breech birth and the flush of happiness when she was actually born, whole and sound, with a very bruised bottom.

But, today, some 28 years after my mood disorder was triggered I wonder what it would be like to be normal. To not experience the ebb and flow of moods. In particular, to not experience the painful embrace of depression. To not shuffle through the morning feeling gray and dull. To not have a part of me that wants to drown itself in the searing pain of sadness.

I have a friend who claims to have never been depressed. And, I believe that to be so. She seems possessed of an eternal perkiness, as if equipped with some special force field that repels badness, sadness, and meaness.

I wonder what it would be like to be her. To not be downed by the challenges of life. To not be sadened by the shitty, evil things we humans do to each other. To not feel dispair at the cruelness we perpetrate on each other.

I know she cares about others. It is clear from what she says and does. Yet somehow that caring never seems to drag her down; as it does me.

Part of me seems to live off the side somehow, an interested observer. “He” listens to the melancholy stories of my sad self and seems bemused; if not downright disgusted by the seemingly constant whining and complaining.

And, yet that sad part of me seems to take control on these cloudy days. She, for it seems that part is a she, feels such exquiste pain. Such deep acrid sadness that permeats every cell and molecule of my being.

The observer raises a bemused eyebrow and thinks, “Fuck. Here we go again! How long must I put up with this shit?”

And, yet somehow this sad pain seems so much a part of who I am, of who I have become.

The observer wonders, why do poets, songwriters, and artists wallow so much in pain?

And, yet somehow I welcome the sadness and pain. Not so much that it proves that I can feel. Nor so much that it proves that I am alive. Yet it is a welcome friend.

I want to drown in melancholy. I want the sadness to permeate every crevice and crack of my being. I want to take a razor and cut open my skin, slice my veins and bleed out the dark crimson sadness.

What will that accomplish? I don’t know. All I know is that somehow if I absorb all my sadness; somehow if I suck it deeply, wholely into my being; somehow if it become all of me, it will transform me.

Into what I know not.

Copyright 2010 Lyle T. Lachmuth All Rights Reserved