Chronic Pain

[MR. Macabre 666]

Is there anyone else here that has to deal with chronic, nonstop, life affecting pain? Or know someone who does(family, friends, coworkers)? How are you(or they) dealing with it? Are you taking medication to help, or any other types of treatment, like acupuncture? Has it affected your mental health, have you felt hopeless and considered suicide? Has depression made it even harder to get through the day on top of the pain?

I'm just wondering if anyone else would be interested in creating a thread where those of us who deal with and suffer from chronic pain on a daily basis would have a place to vent your frustrations, and interact with others who are in the same boat. Our own version of a support group? I know that there are a lot of people who are worse off than I am, but when you're having a really bad day, it's hard to think about anything/anyone else.

I've been dealing with chronic, sometimes debilitating pain, burning, and numbness for almost a decade now. In July of 2015, I was forced to walk away from my job after almost 17 years, and retire on permanent disability because I couldn't do my job any more. This meant that we had to sell our home and move in with family for almost 2 years before I was eligible to receive retirement benefits, which is less than 1/2 of what I was making when I was working.

From October of 2011 to November 2018, I had over a dozen surgeries on my knees, hands, right elbow, neck, and nose. I've been seen by 5 orthopedists, 3 neurologists, 2 neurosurgeons, a pain specialist, a dermatologist, and my GP of over 20 years. I've also been getting counseling for almost 6 years. I can't walk or stand on my feet for more than 10-15 minutes any more, and need a walking stick to help with my balance issues.

I'm currently taking 8 prescriptions for depression, nerve pain, blood pressure, cholesterol, swollen feet/legs, arthritis pain while sleeping, and gout. When you add in my daily supplements, including 2 probiotics, I take over 30 pills every day.
I know, wah, wah, wah, fell sorry for me. I don't want any sympathy, just the chance to interact with other members of this forum who have been dealt a shitty hand, and deal with this crap 24/7, 365 days a year. We don't get any days off, ever. Some days are better than others, and sometimes they fucking suck.

Is this an idea even worth trying, I don't know.

[BrianSoddingBoru4]

Nothing like what you're going through (which sounds like it sucks more than anything has ever sucked in the history of sucking). I have constant low-level aches and twinges, most of which are the result of my own choices.

Boru

[arewethereyet]

I have gotten to the point where I think pain is just the way it is. I had both breasts removed in 2009 and reconstruction started at that time and finished about six months later. Not one day has gone by that I am not aware of the implants....not in a good way. The range is from discomfort to outright pain. Doctors seemed to decide how long I should have pain that needed treatment. I'd love to have them live a day in my shoes...or my boobs...as it were.

There was scar tissue that developed between two of my ribs on each side for drain tubes. The left side (always the worst) got bad enough that I can catch a cold with a cough and one of my ribs will break. That's miserable but expected after all these years. The good thing is that they have eased up on the crackdown of prescribing pain meds and will actually give me a cough medication with codeine so I can at least get some sleep.

I do take an antidepressant every day. I live on aspirin. My doctor gives me a low dose of a muscle relaxant which can help now and then. It doesn't relieve the pain but a muscle relaxant will help me sleep.

Luckily I don't have much in the way of other body aches. I am pretty flexible and weight is not an issue for me.

Lately I have battled a GI thing that has been miserable. I went five months without seeing the doctor. I just try to deal with it. She rolls her eyes at me but she doesn't seem to understand that I hurt every damn day and that's life.

Right now, I make a mental note of the good days. They seem to be fewer and fewer as the years tick by.

I really think that's an area where medical care needs to improve. You shouldn't have to gauge your day by how much you hurt.

It's a crappy way to live.

[MR. Macabre 666]

I have gotten to the point where I think pain is just the way it is.  I had both breasts removed in 2009 and reconstruction started at that time and finished about six months later.  Not one day has gone by that I am not aware of the implants....not in a good way.   The range is from discomfort to outright pain.  Doctors seemed to decide how long I should have pain that needed treatment.  I'd love to have them live a day in my shoes...or my boobs...as it were.

There was scar tissue that developed between two of my ribs on each side for drain tubes.  The left side (always the worst) got bad enough that I can catch a cold with a cough and one of my ribs will break.  That's miserable but expected after all these years.  The good thing is that they have eased up on the crackdown of prescribing pain meds and will actually give me a cough medication with codeine so I can at least get some sleep.

I do take an antidepressant every day.  I live on aspirin.  My doctor gives me a low dose of a muscle relaxant which can help now and then.  It doesn't relieve the pain but a muscle relaxant will help me sleep.

Luckily I don't have much in the way of other body aches.  I am pretty flexible and weight is not an issue for me.  

Lately I have battled a GI thing that has been miserable.  I went five months without seeing the doctor.  I just try to deal with it.  She rolls her eyes at me but she doesn't seem to understand that I hurt every damn day and that's life.  

Right now, I make a mental note of the good days.  They seem to be fewer and fewer as the years tick by.

I really think that's an area where medical care needs to improve.  You shouldn't have to gauge your day by how much you hurt.  

It's a crappy way to live.

I agree with what you said about pain being something that we have to deal with on a daily basis, and on most days I'm able to ignore it. Every morning when I get up, I have to get up out of my chair(I haven't been able to sleep in a bed for several years) and make sure I'm stable before walking like Frankenstein's monster to the bathroom.
I've been living on Immodium AD for 8 or 9 years, my doctor's have tested me for everything from celiac disease to MS to Ameloydosis to determine the cause of my fucked up stomach, but everything's "normal".
Just like my neuropathy, I've been tested, and then tested again for everything my neurologist can think of, but everythings negative, so I've been diagnosed with Idiopathic Poly Neuropathy in my feet and legs. The only "treatment" is pain management, just like the Osteoarthritis in my knees, hips, lower back, right elbow, and my neck.
The one thing that helps me on my really bad days is music. I put on my headphones and crank up some black or death metal music, put my feet up, and concentrate on that for as long as the pain and or numbness is an issue.

I'm sorry to hear what you had to go through several years ago, getting old isn't for sissies.

[Thumpalumpacus]

I have avascular necrosis in mu right hip, and probably spreading. Constant pain, even asleep, to the point that I've trained myself to roll over in bed without waking myself from an inept move. I occasionally take prescription-strength naproxen (Aleve, 600 mg). I turned down the opiates the VA offered me; I have enough addiction issues as it is.

I deal with it mainly with mental outlook. I've always been something of stoic, and so I deal with it mainly through conditioning my mind. Most days, this works. If I take a wrong step, well, John Henry will pull me up by the short hairs. The VA will give me a hip replacement one day, probably after I'm buried. Fuckin' twats.

[The Grand Nudger]

Absolutely. Every waking moment of every day I feel like someone has wedged a kbar into the joint of my knee. I get headaches that would make me punch a toddler. My back and my shoulder are perpetually on fire, even with the medication. I have blackout curtains in every room, so that no errant light makes it in. My tractor has mirrored tint. I was 210 at peak, I weigh upwards of 250 now (it seesaws, I break three hundo from time to time), this is after dieting. Just hauling my own ass from one side of a field to the other is exhausting...and fills me with shame.

I don't deal with it, so much as ignore it. There's nothing (that I can afford) to do about it. It's been like this for a long time. I'm getting pudgier and pudgier...to my eternal disgust, as the clock ticks. Fun fact, that pick up there, with the imperial mullet. I actually can't grow any hair on most of the right side of my head. That's why all my pictures are from the left. Im fucking gorgeous from the left.....

[MR. Macabre 666]

I have avascular necrosis in mu right hip, and probably spreading. Constant pain, even asleep, to the point that I've trained myself to roll over in bed without waking myself from an inept move. I occasionally take prescription-strength naproxen (Aleve, 600 mg). I turned down the opiates the VA offered me; I have enough addiction issues as it is.

I deal with it mainly with mental outlook. I've always been something of stoic, and so I deal with it mainly through conditioning my mind. Most days, this works. If I take a wrong step, well, John Henry will pull me up by the short hairs. The VA will give me a hip replacement one day, probably after I'm buried. Fuckin' twats.

After all of my surgeries, the hospital would give me Oxycodone to take for the pain. I've been adamant that I'd never let myself get hooked on that shit, so I'd take it for a couple of days, then we'd stash it away for emergencies(really bad days). The only OTC pain medication that helps with my arthritis pain is Aleve, and I only take it when my knees are screaming. I take so many fucking pills every day that I don't want to take any more unless it's really bad.

I know for a fact that if listening to music didn't help me deal with this crap, I wouldn't be here. I can think of 3 specific times when I was ready to kill myself because I couldn't deal with the nerve pain, on top of my arthritis pain. I know it sounds weird, but listening to black metal music helps me deal with the pain, numbness, burning, and random stabbing pain that happens when I've been on my feet for too long.

[The Grand Nudger]

That doesn't sound weird. I'm up at 3am listening to music because..if I lay down, I'll feel like my leg is collapsing in backwards. It passes the time you'd rather be sleeping.

[MR. Macabre 666]

Absolutely.  Every waking moment of every day I feel like someone has wedged a kbar into the joint of my knee.  I get headaches that would make me punch a toddler.  My back and my shoulder are perpetually on fire, even with the medication.  I have blackout curtains in every room, so that no errant light makes it in.  My tractor has mirrored tint.  I was 210 at peak, I weigh upwards of 250 now (it seesaws, I break three hundo from time to time), this is after dieting.  Just hauling my own ass from one side of a field to the other is exhausting...and fills me with shame.

I don't deal with it, so much as ignore it.  There's nothing (that I can afford) to do about it. It's been like this for a long time.  I'm getting pudgier and pudgier...to my eternal disgust, as the clock ticks.  Fun fact, that pick up there, with the imperial mullet.  I actually can't grow any hair on most of the right side of my head.  That's why all my pictures are from the left.  Im fucking gorgeous from the left.....

Join the club, I've been bald on the top of my head for 30 years, but refuse to cut my remaining hair. Why the hell would I want to look like every other bald guy with your hair trimmed short. I haven't cut my hair for 30+ years, but mine isn't even as long as yours is in your avatar. My hair takes forever to grow.

It definitely gets harder trying to stay in some kind of decent shape as we get older. I've made myself swear that I won't die an old fat man like so many others do, so I've been going to the gym off and on ever since I had to retire. Before my second spinal-fusion surgery in my neck in late 2018, I was going to the gym 5 days a week.  During covid, I didn't go for almost 2 years, then last august, I got a severe case of tendonitis in my shoulder that kept me out for almost another year. 
I've started going back about 3 weeks ago, and I really like going and lifting weights and walking. It gets me out of the house. I'm still a work in progress.

[MR. Macabre 666]

That doesn't sound weird.  I'm up at 3am listening to music because..if I lay down, I'll feel like my leg is collapsing in backwards.  It passes the time you'd rather be sleeping.

Sometimes getting old really sucks, doesn't it?