Feeling philosophical this morning as I woke up to face another day of intense pain.
How does one reconcile a love of life with pain which blights everything one does.
I live a simple life now living in the country in a beautiful part of France and I am content but so frustrated by this constant pain which prevents me from enjoying even the most simple pleasures.
I feel I am in between the devil and the deep blue sea to quote a cliché. I want a 'Bon continuation' as they say in France and I never seriously considered giving up but it is so hard to carry on with this excruciating pain and sometimes it seems a bit pointless in the grand scale of things.
Trying not to cry again and give way to self pity.
Sharing feelings on the forum is very important to me so please indulge me and I send my good wishes to all fellow sufferers.
Written by
Suzyhayes
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Self pity is ok sometimes! I find it a good release of pent up frustration that I just don't want others to see or hear!
As much as friends, family or professionals say they're listening or understanding, I'm pretty sure that they'd rather not have to hear my wails of desperation!
Other times I have to tell someone - I'm totally fed up with lying to people when they ask "how are you doing?"
"yeah I feel fine!!, thanks, all's well, ta!!"
(Whilst quietly seething and wanting to say "I've got chronic pain, it's horrendous but yeah, I feel great, ta!!")
You say you're content - that's a positive. Not quite what perhaps you had in mind when planning your life but you've got that to hold on to!
I'm not going to say, well, it could be worse because actually, no I don't think it could be really if I'm honest. Every day hoping the next 15 minutes may be a little kinder - just a little less awful perhaps?!
Anyway, the point of my reply, believe it or not, is to say, although we're all different, we're also all the same.
Go on, indulge yourself - we're here to 'listen' to you and totally understand that some days are c%@p, some are utterly s@#t and others are just bad!!
Thank you RAYJAYC for your response to my post. Like the song 'only the lonely know how I feel'. Only other pain sufferers can really empathize. Friends and family express sympathy which I appreciate but it's not the same so thank you so much for your kind words.
I feel this way all the time! Waking up to pain truelly is soul distroying. What I have learned is on the days when nothing works and it all just feels to much, let it feel too much because it is! We do not deserve this; we should not have to endure this and it is well and truelly ok to let the whole world know this! When I feel this way I try and give myself a break! I usually cry, wail, howl in pain, take all the pills I possibly can safely and go to bed with some soothing music. Have hope! X c
Thanks Cags93 for your heartfelt response to my post. Sometimes I say to my husband 'it's not fair' which is silly really because life is not fair. Good people often suffer and bad people flourish.
Good to be able to share the misery with fellow sufferers though Isn't it?
Hi Suzyhayes,
I am not sure how or what to comment about. Pain - oh! how it eludes proper definition. It is so different for all of us. In early November 2015 I had a partial right knee replacement - then I learned more about pain. For the previous 7 or 8 years I had lower back pain emanating from my right Sacrilliac joint (Si Joint).
The pain following surgery was unbelievable - I seriously challenged why I'd had the surgery perhaps it would have been better to put up with the pain from the Osteoarthritis. Another source of pain - BUT - my partner reminded of how close to being crippled I was. Then as I lay in bed I thought about pain, analysed pain (it gave me something to do), thought about the pain my late partner in Australia suffered in her final days with bone cancer, watching her physically shrink in height as her sternum collapsed, I read others comments about pain in another website - and decided I didn't have pain at all.
Now I have won through and no pain from the knee surgery and am about to start back at work (yeah at 71 still working - crazy - no! just mentally not ready to retire - brain - use it or loose it) but now my Si joint pain has returned so its back on medication as and when required and analysing all my activities that bring the Si Joint pain back on. My Si Joint pain is nothing in the grand scheme of things - absolutely bloody nothing - because I go to an Osteopath or Chiropractor, get a manipulation, hit the Co-Codomol and carry on and just watch what I do and try and avoid stirring things up again .... till the next time. Sometimes Co-codomol and red wine make a cheeky little mix too !
But then sometimes in the height of the pain I look at positive things on TV. I love travel documentaries, I love the reality TV shows (no matter how crap), such as real estate shows that take one to Spain, or south of France, or stuff like Coast Australia, to warm, sunny climates, where there are different cultures and ways of life and that lifts my spirits. I love humour, such as Top Gear going through Viet Nam on motor bikes or Rick Stein in a foreign land diagnosing food and culture from those lands.
I love France and the French people, adore their TV drama productions such as 'Spiral' and one day hope to get down to south west France, Carcassonne/the Longedouc and ferret around, let the history of the place devour me.
Enough ! I must be boring you and everyone else who reads this. So, that's it Suzy babe (forgive my expression of familiarity, we Aussies are like that, just say it as it is, Lol! ), hope the pain subsides ...... may the force be with you.
Thanks John, good you have such a positive attitude and a love of life.
It helps to find distractions and there are many good programmes to watch on TV. I watch many nature programmes and travel documentaries. Living in the French countryside I can also enjoy the nature on my doorstep. Saw a lizard yesterday in the garden although they should be sleeping now.
I've family in Australia in Gosford near Sydney and in Melbourne and I don't mind at all being called Suzybabe.
Well, I have to say I do envy you living in the French countryside but am so sorry you aren't able to enjoy life as you would like. I live in Cornwall, about 10 miles from Penzance. I am a member of a local 'Twinning' organisation and we are 'Twinned' with Pordic in Brittany. I haven't been across yet because the last year has been much too painful for me to travel, but, who knows - this year maybe ?
For most of my life I lived in Sydney, in the north western suburbs ending up in Berowra which is about 50 kms from Gosford, which I know very well. I lived in Melbourne for 2 years when my kids were little and also lived a year in Canberra. I lived in the far Eastern suburbs at a place called Ferntree Gully, in the Dandenong Ranges. Where in Melbourne do your family live ?
From what I've been able to find out there are many similarities between Brittany and Cornwall, (particularly with countryside and neolithic sites) and to a degree the western edge of south Wales. I love it all.
Must press on now, hope your day goes well and that you have now enjoying better weather than we are here.
John
Hello Suzy
I understand you are suffering nuro pain, in the short term you could ask your GP for a script of Amatryptlene it is useful in removing nerve pain. I have been on 75mg daily before bed now for many years. Try that until you can square your needs until they can prescribe the drug you are asking for. Sorry for spelling.
If you were in the UK you could ask for appointments for a Pain Clinic Course.
A further way forward if Pain Clinic is not possible look for books on Relaxation. The one they use in Pain Clinic is Mindfulness, another is the Alexander Technique and the third the Maxwell Technique, they all help in controlling your pain. Training in the use of a TENS may also help, a V TENS is the best type and can be purchased in the UK at chemists. There are companies on the internet that sell various types, try Body Shop.
For many in the UK it is hard to know the set up in Europe
Thanks Bob for your advice. Unfortunately I have tried so many medicaments and therapies including the ones you suggest already and I am running out of options.
Although I was feeling low when I wrote my last post I do try to cope with the pain in many ways. It is always there but I do yoga, go for walks, swim in the summer and I engage with the world through radio and television. Very interested in politics and I try to keep my brain active improving my French.
I have access to a pain clinic here but so far they just haven't found anything to help me.
Hi Suzy, I am sorry to hear you are feeling so low....long term chronic pain will steal everything from you, your sense of fun and enjoyment in life, your patience and tolerance, it can steal your friends and family, your means of earning a living, your sense of pride and lastly.....your soul .
I live with constant pain and I have endured horrific intolerable pain, for many years now: I have taken high doses of morphine, prescribed to help me cope. Unfortunately an addiction surfaced and I had to take the decision....live or die.
I chose life...this is what you have to do...talk to someone...get all the hurt and pain....out of your mind...then choose.
Pain takes our ability to choose...remember...you choose...don't allow pain to choose, for you
You have to govern it....or it will govern you.
I have made peace with my pain...it's not easy, it takes a time, resilience,and strength...but, pain has made you stronger...you just don't see it.. I can help.
Communicate with me...I will walk you through it...trust me..
I am out the other side. My pain won't go away..so the only thing I can do is change me....make my life around it.
Think about what you want from life, what you enjoy, what makes you smile, laugh...I promise you....you can get there. But you have to Choose.
Dear Jane, thanks for your very touching response to my post.
You are so right in your analysis of the situation living with pain and most of the time I do adhere to your philosophy of accepting the pain and just getting on with life and I do have lots of interests and activities to try to take my mind off it but from time to time I just feel so weary of the daily fight.
I don't take drugs which perhaps should take the edge off the pain although I have tried some in the past with no positive effect.
I'm glad you overcame the morphine addiction.
It is so crazy that morphine which is heroin based is readily available but sativex which is canabis based is so taboo.
In knowing and loving God who saved me by grace through Jesus Christ I hold on. The relationship gives me strength and hope. I start the morning with Him. I can find so much to be thankful for just looking around or ready these post. Tears come at times but joy comes knowing He's there, He lifts me up, gives me strength to take one step at a time, one day at a time. If you're down and feel a little better, do something for someone else, while your pain may not go away, your endorphins will do a happy dance. I know it's hard, especially when no one around understands, really God does. Blessings to you
I first want to thank you for being vaunerable with us. I also want to echo what others are saying, allowing yourself to have these emotions and express them is so important. And very "normal". I completely understand how you feel. Often waking all these dream and goals; and physically not understanding how to live them out? Staying positive is an Olympic feet, with the everyday pounding of pain.
Please hold on and leaning on us. We are all here for you and confident there is light in your storm. You purpose will be revealed you are important.
It is a wonderful thing to be able to communicate with so many warm hearted people who really understand and are also coping with pain on a daily basis.
I thank you for your kind words and empathy. Gros bisous
Dear u just be in the now don't let yourself think of the bigger stuff as it causes more pain and frustration,the constant pain I can empathise with it has taken two years for me to even have enough function to come on to a pain site,I have distraction only now plus an anti malerial . I have fentanyl induced hyperalgesia it was theopiod that increased the pain till the neuropathic path ways broke amongst other stuff .You do not say what has caused the pain .
Thanks for your response Byfergie. You are right that to live in the present is the best option. I didn't really understand from your description what the cause of your pain is but I presume you too suffer with neuropathic pain.
Mine was caused through stenosis causing serious compression on my spine which without an operation lamenectomy would have resulted in paralysis.
I've had three operations on my neck so it is now quite fragile but unfortunately the condition has left me with severe irreversible nerve damage in my hands and so my fingers are stinging horribly all the time.
On the positive side I avoided paralysis in my legs so I can walk without any difficulty now.
Your words could have been my own. I too look out of my windows onto beautiful countryside, but I am trapped in this darned house, just as I am trapped by the dreadful pain that I wake to each morning. It does take the joy from everything, yes. Even reading a bedtime story with my one very precious child and all I can think of is the pain in my hips eating at me.
Please, try not to cry, but do if it makes you feel better. You have every right to feel pity for yourself. It is totally unfair that some of us in life become destined to suffer like this through no fault of our own.
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Wow four weeks later and still no referral? 🤬
Chronic Hip tendonitis
My Pilates mat has arrived!
Does anyone know anything about nerve pain in the thoracic spine of the back?
Chronic pain sufferer for 55 years!
