Stop whining

[Suzyhayes]

I've had severe neuropathy in my hands four nearly four years and I moan every day to my husband but he never complains and says stop whining. Whining doesn't really help and the pain never goes away but do others find it hard to suffer in silence?

I have stopped taking all prescribed pain killers as they were affecting my liver and they never helped much anyway. Now I am just taking valerian a Herbal remedy to sleep.

Being in constant pain is so annoying. There are so many things I want to do but can't.

It is so frustrating. Don't know about gloomy Sunday. Sometimes every day seems gloomy but still mustn't grumble ha ha.

[Rosepetal60]

Understand what you are saying. But I see the message you write that you are ignoring: Sorry not intending to be blunt. But Forget about the things you can't do. Find things you can do.

There are so many simple things I can't do. And yes it is so frustrating . I can't even pull up a weed from the garden without extra suffering for a week. I can't push a supermarket trolley, I can't sit without my medical cushions (that's the worst part) but there's other things I can do and you can too. But it does take quite a while to get used to the new life. And the other annoying thing is people you know Never understand, most never remember, And I get fed up of explaining. In fact I've decided I'm not going to explain anymore!

Any chance you could find yourself a hobby that is feasible for you to do even if you would not have chosen it before you had these health problems. I say this because I always said I would Never do card making . But guess what? Yes and the particular type I do, I enjoy doing it.

I can't cope with prescribed pain killers either. But I have been helped with Traditional Chinese Acupuncture, not to be confused with Symtomatic Acupuncture./ NHS Acupuncure.

🌹

[Suzyhayes in reply to Rosepetal60]

Thanks rose petal for your message in response to my whining. I can't do gardening, cooking, cycling, driving etc so my activities now are more cerebral including improving my French, reading, playing scrabble on line, crosswords, listening to the radio, watching television, walking so I am not actually wallowing in self pity.

Actually my husband does understand and is very supportive and doesn't seem to mind having to take on a lot of extra chores.

And you do you have support and what is your condition that effects you so badly. All the best to you

Suzy

[Ricknshirley]

Suzy Hayes. My wife & I have probs with pain at base of fingers- and I wth neuropathy from soles of feet up to knees. At moment prescribed Ibuprofen in gel form and I've been using diclofenac gel andCapsaicin under feet. Been trying to keep off too many tablets, as makes drowsy by early evening. Lack of energy and heavy in legs, but trying to keep up activities. Daughter in mid age has taken up running inc. London marathons, to combat her probs - but maybe walks would keep us all active. With hands or fingers it has been suggested to my wife to gently exercise her fingers, and squeeze a soft ball.suggest look up internet regarding solutions to finger and hand pains. Happy hunting, Rick neuropathy.

[johnsmith]

It is not about suffering in silence. It is about finding the right tools to enable you cope better with the health disability you have. It is about investigating your health disability to find what helps and what decreases your quality of life. You have had the disability for four years so I presume you have gone though the bereavement for loss of function and life opportunities. I may be totally wrong of course.

There is no cure. There is stress issues which make the health disability worse than need be. There is something called stress breakdown point. Here the body as an engineering system breaks down. Stress Just below the stress breakdown point and you function. Stress just above the stress breakdown point and you become a human wreck. Activities we engage in are stressful. Some are more stressful than others. Part of the investigation we need to do is to find out what activities we can drop or change to reduce the stress that we experience to take our internal stress away from the stress breakdown point.

The religious traditions have developed good strategies for helping a person with stress. Job in the old testament part of the Bible is well worth reading. The technique of Mindfulness and Meditation from the Buddhist tradition is often helpful in ways that many people do not realise. Much of the Christian traditions which the Richard Dawkins dismisses is a form of meditation and as such therapeutic.

Alexander Technique is a means to help reduce stresses caused by muscle misuse stress. Yoga is another technique for helping with reducing body internal stress.

By developing new skills of investigating your condition it hopefully will become possible to develop hobbies that you enjoy that can make life enjoyable and enable you to dare I say it spiritually become a better person.

Hope I have been able to be helpful.

[Suzyhayes]

Thanks for taking the trouble to reply to my post Johnsmith.

I think perhaps I gave you the wrong impression of my state of mind. Apart from my affliction I am quite content and derive a great deal of pleasure from life. I have hobbies which I described in my response to rose petal but these are more cerebral now as I am more limited in what I can do physically.

I think I have come to terms with the fact that there are things I can no longer do but I do miss them especially gardening.

When I talked about whining I was really just considering whether there was anything to be gained by expressing one's feelings out loud to one's partner who is unable to take away the pain. There is a saying 'better out than in' but is it fair to inflict one's suffering on others.

I'm afraid as a committed atheist I could find no solace in reading the bible or taking up religion but thanks for the suggestion anyway.

All the best Suzy

[johnsmith in reply to Suzyhayes]

Thanks for the reply.

Mindfulness and meditation which comes from the Buddhist tradition does enable the exploring of the question: "When I talked about whining I was really just considering whether there was anything to be gained by expressing one's feelings out loud to one's partner who is unable to take away the pain."

I have found for myself that letting the emotions run away with me makes the situation of pain worse. One can get in a feedback loop where stress of complaining about the pain leads to the conditions for the pain becoming worse.

[CraigJB]

Suffering in silence isn't easy, but moaning may actually make you feel worse too.

I'm not saying that pain is all in the mind, far from it, but I find meditation & mindfulness are really helpful when it comes to coping with chronic severe pain.

At first I thought it was a load of nonsense & even then, the results aren't instant, you need to stick with the training program! It teaches your mind & hence your brain another way to deal with pain altogether.

If you google pain management, meditation, mindfulness - there will be many sites, apps, books where you can find help. I'm sorry but I don't have any links to hand to give you.

Also, your local Buddhist centre will be very friendly & helpful, welcoming you to learn meditation & mindfulness, absolutely regardless of faith/no faith!

Hope that may help a little.

CraigJB