I feel the need for some sort of reality, sanity, brain on overload, stress check. Due to an issue with my PM Dr’s office I have been Neurontin free since Friday. For the first time in nearly a year and a half I can feel a bit of the brain fog start to lift. Not all of it is gone mind you, but enough to knock me off my sedated butt and notice a difference. This Neurontin free body is possibly about to revert back to its hazy comfort zone tomorrow. Before it does, I’d like to record a few things and possibly get feedback, thoughts and opinions from others. Perhaps I do not need feedback, but instead to just work through this moment…
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My brief RSD/CRPS overview…
June 2008 I stubbed my right foot/little toe causing abnormal pain. I was diagnosed in October 2008 with the beast. It is my, er, opinion that RSD now encompasses the entire right side of my body, with the exception of my face and some of my stomach. Most spreads happened after a sympathetic block or other procedure directly involving a major nerve branch. None of my doctors have confirmed a spread… probably because I am too truthful and tell them I experience more pain in new areas after each procedure. Every time there is a spread I feel as if I go through a grief process all over again, morning the normalcy of the section of my body now claimed by the kingdom of the beast, watched over by an army of sneaky ninja gnomes ready to dice apart my flesh with their fiery electric swords and leave the gashing wound to fight off frost bite.
Over the past couple of months I have watched, or felt, the radius of pain and sensitivity spread to incorporate my underarm and underside of the top half of my arm. Often I wear shirts inside out if I can tolerate them at all. A week or so ago the top of my right hand turned purple and swollen for the first time. I have felt a growing resistance to either flex or close my hand completely. The “signs” are all there, sensations, physical indications, the whole package… yet this feels slightly different from other affected areas of my body… again copying the non-pattern of each spread before it.
Tonight I ask myself a series of questions. Is what I’m feeling now, at this very moment, related to an absence of Neurontin? Am I physically feeling more, like this bizarre, irritating tickle more obnoxious and painful than sticking my finger in an electrical socket? Am I mentally processing more now that part of this fogginess is parting and unnecessarily agonizing over that which I already know to be true? Or am I finally moving to that final step I encounter with each spread, grief over losing the last outpost in my upper right limb to the enemy? If it is grief, then does it have anything at all to do with the absence of Neurontin, or is this just the illusion of coincidence… for I lost faith in that word quite some time ago?
As I continue to struggle with accepting the new Carey, the one changed for good or bad forevermore, there is one piece I do not know I’ll ever find peace with… this fog that will always sit atop my brain, clouding reasoning skills, confusing emotions, slowing thought processes, causing doubt in my own logic. For as far back as I can remember this single attribute has defined more of my being than any other. I pray for something else to fill the void, something that would not have been able to show its amazing beauty had my brain not taken a step off to the side. Although it’s often frustrating not being clued in on the greater plan, I know this life has a specific purpose yet to fill. Now to find the patience while I wait at the bus stop in a remote, unfamiliar land for the correct vehicle to arrive.
????????
My brief RSD/CRPS overview…
June 2008 I stubbed my right foot/little toe causing abnormal pain. I was diagnosed in October 2008 with the beast. It is my, er, opinion that RSD now encompasses the entire right side of my body, with the exception of my face and some of my stomach. Most spreads happened after a sympathetic block or other procedure directly involving a major nerve branch. None of my doctors have confirmed a spread… probably because I am too truthful and tell them I experience more pain in new areas after each procedure. Every time there is a spread I feel as if I go through a grief process all over again, morning the normalcy of the section of my body now claimed by the kingdom of the beast, watched over by an army of sneaky ninja gnomes ready to dice apart my flesh with their fiery electric swords and leave the gashing wound to fight off frost bite.
Over the past couple of months I have watched, or felt, the radius of pain and sensitivity spread to incorporate my underarm and underside of the top half of my arm. Often I wear shirts inside out if I can tolerate them at all. A week or so ago the top of my right hand turned purple and swollen for the first time. I have felt a growing resistance to either flex or close my hand completely. The “signs” are all there, sensations, physical indications, the whole package… yet this feels slightly different from other affected areas of my body… again copying the non-pattern of each spread before it.
Tonight I ask myself a series of questions. Is what I’m feeling now, at this very moment, related to an absence of Neurontin? Am I physically feeling more, like this bizarre, irritating tickle more obnoxious and painful than sticking my finger in an electrical socket? Am I mentally processing more now that part of this fogginess is parting and unnecessarily agonizing over that which I already know to be true? Or am I finally moving to that final step I encounter with each spread, grief over losing the last outpost in my upper right limb to the enemy? If it is grief, then does it have anything at all to do with the absence of Neurontin, or is this just the illusion of coincidence… for I lost faith in that word quite some time ago?
As I continue to struggle with accepting the new Carey, the one changed for good or bad forevermore, there is one piece I do not know I’ll ever find peace with… this fog that will always sit atop my brain, clouding reasoning skills, confusing emotions, slowing thought processes, causing doubt in my own logic. For as far back as I can remember this single attribute has defined more of my being than any other. I pray for something else to fill the void, something that would not have been able to show its amazing beauty had my brain not taken a step off to the side. Although it’s often frustrating not being clued in on the greater plan, I know this life has a specific purpose yet to fill. Now to find the patience while I wait at the bus stop in a remote, unfamiliar land for the correct vehicle to arrive.
