The Daily Pain Report
This morning was BAD. Last night was bad, but this morning was really bad. Woke up at 6:00 AM with pain at an eight and took pain meds. Woke again at 8:20 or so with pain topping out at a nine. On my zero-to-ten point pain scale, a ten is the level at which you pass out, and frankly this morning I would have given anything if I could have done so. I took the high dose of the new stronger narcotic medicine (8 mg Dilaudid), plus a high dose of Aleve, and proceeded to cry uncontrollably for an hour. Ethan happened to call around 8:50 while I was in the midst of it, and he and Bryce came over and crushed up some ice for me to eat and sat with me while I cried and waited for the drugs to kick in. They finally did around 9:30, but that only got the pain down to an eight. I stayed in bed whimpering all morning.
Julissa came over and was much concerned. She made me some coconut pudding which she insisted on spoon feeding me, and tried to get me to go to the hospital, but I said I was waiting for the pharmacy to call and say the Toradol-a very potent injectable NSAID, not a narcotic-was in (they'd had to order it from their San Francisco store the day previous.) I promised her that if the new medicine didn't work I'd go to the ER, but fortunately at 11:40 I finally heard my medicine was available. Ethan went and got it for me, I gave myself a shot at around 12:40, when he got back with it, and at 1:30 life was livable again. Pain was down to a manageable five for most of the rest of the afternoon, but I was completely exhausted, dizzy and nauseated, and I slept.
I had some very bizarre dreams, including one where a boy was playing with a disembodied reddish-brown and white pied-color horse's head. The head was alive and floating around at horse height, and you could see at the back where it had been severed from the rest of the horse. JB was there, and very angry, saying that the people who had done that to the horse had been trying to euthanize it because of multiple injuries and debilitating disease, and had done it wrong, so now the head was hanging around. It seemed to me that the head was reasonably happy, if a bit creepy, so I wasn't entirely sure what the problem was. He was free from his injured, dying body, after all, playing with the child who loved him, and eating apples.
Huh. Now that I write that I have only this thought: Wish fulfillment dream much?
At present the pain's up to about a six. I've taken a second dose of both Toradol and Dilaudid, and am hoping it doesn't climb into the stratosphere again. Needless to say I'm completely wasted and useless as far as socializing or writing goes right now. I'm like a limp dishrag, except not so clean. I'm hoping that tomorrow I'll feel well enough for long enough to take a shower and wash my hair. Tonight I'm watching Heroes, napping, and sucking on ice chips.
Thanks to everyone for their love and support and kind words and prayers. I'm hanging in there. If I can just have 24 hours with the pain reasonably controlled and not going over a six I think it will really make a difference.
Thankful for: friends who come to me in times of crisis, pain medicine that works, not being afraid of needles
Julissa came over and was much concerned. She made me some coconut pudding which she insisted on spoon feeding me, and tried to get me to go to the hospital, but I said I was waiting for the pharmacy to call and say the Toradol-a very potent injectable NSAID, not a narcotic-was in (they'd had to order it from their San Francisco store the day previous.) I promised her that if the new medicine didn't work I'd go to the ER, but fortunately at 11:40 I finally heard my medicine was available. Ethan went and got it for me, I gave myself a shot at around 12:40, when he got back with it, and at 1:30 life was livable again. Pain was down to a manageable five for most of the rest of the afternoon, but I was completely exhausted, dizzy and nauseated, and I slept.
I had some very bizarre dreams, including one where a boy was playing with a disembodied reddish-brown and white pied-color horse's head. The head was alive and floating around at horse height, and you could see at the back where it had been severed from the rest of the horse. JB was there, and very angry, saying that the people who had done that to the horse had been trying to euthanize it because of multiple injuries and debilitating disease, and had done it wrong, so now the head was hanging around. It seemed to me that the head was reasonably happy, if a bit creepy, so I wasn't entirely sure what the problem was. He was free from his injured, dying body, after all, playing with the child who loved him, and eating apples.
Huh. Now that I write that I have only this thought: Wish fulfillment dream much?
At present the pain's up to about a six. I've taken a second dose of both Toradol and Dilaudid, and am hoping it doesn't climb into the stratosphere again. Needless to say I'm completely wasted and useless as far as socializing or writing goes right now. I'm like a limp dishrag, except not so clean. I'm hoping that tomorrow I'll feel well enough for long enough to take a shower and wash my hair. Tonight I'm watching Heroes, napping, and sucking on ice chips.
Thanks to everyone for their love and support and kind words and prayers. I'm hanging in there. If I can just have 24 hours with the pain reasonably controlled and not going over a six I think it will really make a difference.
Thankful for: friends who come to me in times of crisis, pain medicine that works, not being afraid of needles