Help with pain

[Mummabear123]

Hey .. I'm new on here..

I suffer with pain daily.. this really affects me & my mood.. it's tiring & debilitating.. I take pain killers but they don't really help alot..

So what I want to know is.. how do you cope with being constantly in pain?

Does it hold you back like it does me?

Even something like pushing a hoover around leaves me in excruciating pain!

What can I do?

[CryBaby91]

Hi Mummabear123, I'm sorry you're struggling so much and I'm sending you a big hug

Sadly yes I do understand how you feel, and you're not alone in feeling like it constantly holds you back. Lots of us feel this way and it really is tough!

I've been poorly for as long as I can remember really, but I would say it's been so bad it effects my day to day life for the last 11 years. It literally did stop my life, I left school early thanks to my mental health and always thought I would pursue it again after a bit of time away. But thanks to being a new mum at 18 and having my health take a nose dive I had to put all that on hold. I tried working and found it crippling, I couldn't manage and because I had no real qualifications the only jobs I could get were minimum wage and very hard on me physically (bar work mostly!). I got to 26/27 and started feeling like I had no life, I was a mum and a wife. But that was it. I didn't feel like I existed. I felt like all I had and all I spoke about was my kids or being poorly. Mentally that was tough, because it wasn't how I saw my life.

I'm 30 in a few months, just completed my first year at University (The Open University so all from home) and I passed with a distinction, all of my assignments were distinctions and I was helping others at the same time, plus juggling my health which has got progressively worse this last year. So please please know that your life does not have to be controlled by this, your life is not over and you do not have to just accept that this is it. But, also please don't think that just because you're not doing things that you should feel bad because you absolutely shouldn't. It has taken me a long time to get to this point, but it is possible. You learn how to manage round the pain, you find ways that help relieve it (we can chat about that if you need) and you learn when to push and when to rest. But you have to take some time and learn your new limits first!

If you want something to do to make you feel like you're not just sat at home in pain 24/7 then i highly recommend doing a course with the OU. They are super supportive of people with health issues, it's all done from home too, so no running out to lectures (unless you want!). It's done wonders for my self esteem and my self worth. It also takes my mind off being in pain and gives me something constructive to do there's free courses too, so you can see if you enjoy learning with them. Keep your mind busy, it really does help! If you can make your mind more healthy and find some self worth it makes all the pain much easier to handle, it doesn't reduce it but having a strong positive attitude and a mental goal can be really helpful

Sending you all the love and spoons possible! Hang in there babe xxx

[Salamander88]

Hi Mummabear123,

Really sorry to hear what you're going through, I've had some really bad patches with pain and I know how exhausting it can be and that feeling of missing out on doing what you want to.

You may already have tried lots of different things but I thought I'd share some of the things that have made the biggest difference for me - I'm now on a combination of the Mirena coil which helped but I still had quite a bit of pain (it got worse over a few years), and then my gynae doctor added the mini-pill (desogestrel) on top of that, and between the two of them my pain is now a lot better. Although worth saying that I did get quite a bit of cramping during the first months with the Mirena whilst I guess my body was getting used to it - worth it long term though for me. Wearing looser fitting pants and clothes has also been a big help. Those may not be relevant at all to your situation but I would definitely make sure you're speaking to a specialist so that if there are options that would work for you you can consider them and hopefully it might help reduce the pain.

I'm trying to decide whether to go for laparoscopy as although my pain is much more manageable now I'm worried about what will happen if I want to try for a baby as I'll have to come off both of those contraceptives, and although I know it doesn't cure it it sounds like that might help.

Sending you virtual hugs, hang in there xxx