I am
having a panic attack. I have them fairly often now. There is a rhythm to them.
They come in order and in relation to the other symptoms I feel now. Every week I
can almost put my finger on what I will feel on what day except, that when I am
going through it I feel like I am in the middle of a deep, thick, cloud and no
one mood seems to pass fast enough. I feel like I have enough emotions for more
than one person. There are many sides to me and when dealing with my migraines
it brings out all of my personalities.
The
feelings I am alluding to are all related to my chronic migraine illness.
Anyone who has a chronic illness also has chronic anxiety, chronic stress,
chronic anger, chronic depression, chronic loneliness, and chronic poverty, at some
point. It is like riding a rollercoaster, once you go over one hurdle you feel
a high of the thrill thinking the worst is over until you see the heights you still have to climb ahead of you. It is a vicious cycle and no matter your achievements
there will always be days you can’t manage. It feels like the rug will be
pulled out from under you and hoping to do better the next day, while realizing
deep down you know you can’t, isn’t enough. Sometimes I need more than wishing
to do better. I need to get off the ride permanently.
Living
with chronic migraines presents special sets of circumstances than other
chronic pain illnesses. On the days you are not crippled from the worse pain of
your life, you are more likely than not laid up with feelings of dizziness, a
sense of a fog and disconnection from your body. It is like all time and space
is happening and you have to pay such close attention or you will miss it. You
also are trying so hard not to give it away how bad you feel especially if you
are in the middle of a visit or conversation. You are doing everything within
your power to listen, show you are listening, and not like you are asking God
to please just let them finish talking so they will leave and you can go lay
down and die because that is what you feel like will happen next. Of course
that is not what happens next. You have a whole day of events and life to
attend to, so you drag your sorry, sad excuse of a self on with whatever you
have to do. I don’t say “planned” to do because whatever you planned to do and
can get out of you cancel. Any one close to me knows that. How I still have any
friends left amazes me. I have cancelled on one of my best friends so many
times now that I honestly think the last time I saw her was almost a year ago
but we still try to meet every week. I am still hopeful that we will someday
soon.
On a no
pain day I have what I call a “corpse day”. I feel like I am dead weight and I
have to drag myself around to get on with it. That usually means back to work
after missing countless days. Other days it means finally showering after a
week and going to pick up prescriptions and get something quick to eat so I can
remember how to function in society. But while I am out I am in culture shock
from all the lights and movement and when I go home I am back in full blown
migraine state. Back to square one it is.
At this
point the anxiety is gone we are now in a state of sadness, pain, and pure
surrender. I give up the pain is here and now I know I am useless and there is
no point in fighting it.
After a
few days of this mind-blowing (practically literal) pain, that is when the
depression first starts. It is a combination of pain and frustration.
Frustration of watching others come and go on with their lives while you debate
if you have the strength to climb the stairs to go to the bathroom and wishing
you could go out but then again you have no money and bills to pay. Oh and by
the way what I am I going to do if I never have the strength to go back to
work? How will I get my incredibly expensive medication and Botox without
health insurance? I know I am supposed to be “relaxing” so my “headache” will
go away. I wonder why I can’t. But here I sit on the couch existing in my own
lonely world looking perfectly healthy, undoubtedly unattractive, yet unwell, wondering
why it is that I am here.
All of
the things I love to do get pushed back and even though I know there will be
some better days ahead they are few and far between. I have a good support
system and they check in often and I need it most days. Then there are the days
I dread the check in. If I am being honest with myself and with you it is because
I feel like a failure.
Success is waking up to drug my body, drag it into the shower where I always almost feel like fainting in, get on the bus that gives me motion sickness, sit at work for eight hours
under florescent lighting while staring at my computer monitor, then commute
home, sit to gather my strength to get changed and eat dinner, unwind briefly,
do the nightly three step drug regime, and then pray I get to sleep at all. If
things are really going my way I get about six hours of uninterrupted sleep
each night and wake up in the morning “able” to do it again. Then if I am
really feeling my oats I do something Saturday during the day if possible so I
can lay down for twenty hours afterward to recover enough to work on Monday.
I call
this happiness despite that none of this schedule I have just laid out takes
into account all of the things I would do for food, clothing, errands, reading,
blogging, or for unexpected or additional activities. God forbid I have to go
to Walgreens twice. I want to cry. Back to depression we go.
By Sunday
night the full blown anxiety starts worrying about Monday and if I will get to
work. That doesn’t stop on Monday because each day is new and a surprise. I
know that it may appear that I am faking it or lying because of the many days I
am out of commission even if I am not sobbing but I don’t get the calendar in
advance. There are also just so many tears you can cry because after all they
cause more pain. I have had to learn how to self soothe like they try to teach
newborns. The before and after effects of the trauma of migraine attacks are
almost if not worse that the actually event. Same is true for Botox treatment. Sometimes
you can’t win.
On the days I am not truly
having an inner meltdown I try to remind myself that there are people in far
worse pain and situations. I use to be a girl that lived “no day but today” (http://thequeenoff-ckingeverything.blogspot.com/2012/08/for-jonathan-larson-and-all-of-seasons.html) now I
only get glimpses of her. I have to become stronger. I read so many migraine blogs and books and they are all
incredibly helpful and life saving, rather soul saving. It is so important to
have others who understand and who are living your truth and try to get each
other through it. They remind me of how much stronger I have become since this
journey. Even though there are days when I am still reduced to mush, I can’t
allow myself to stay in that place for too long. I know the dangers and my soul
deep down is always struggling to get out and free its spirit.
You have to
find a way and a reason to dig your soul out of the cave it has crawled into
inside of you and work a way out so that you can eventually move up and on with
your life. You know that you will
have good days again even if you are not interested in having one today. The
irony is that you alternate from states of true loneliness and solitude and
then states where you wish you could run and hide from the world. Having to
explain how you are feeling to those who can’t understand is debilitating especially
when this is reoccurring activity and no one on the outside (outside your
migraine community) can appreciate why one episode is different or of what emotional state you are up to. Sadder still is
when you have to force yourself to care about the little details of other
people’s lives that you love but don’t have the strength to care about. That’s
how I know I have hit a particular low point. I have to first rebuild my
strength to care about my life, outside of my head.
For me
writing and reading are the things that soothe me the most and bring me the
most joy. They are also among the top things to go when an attack hits. I have
the proof staring at me all the time, it is a bag filled with a month’s worth
of New York Times newspapers. I get daily delivery but refuse to throw them out
until I can at least glance through them. I have postponed my service now but
those old ones are looking at me, taunting me, I want to light them on fire.
However when I am doing better, slowly it’s always a gradual process as your
body learns to function when it can, I can go through them one day at a time. I feel
like I am in A.A. because I say that all of the time.
As for my
writing the proof is on my blog and this is the absolute most painful
part. I yearn to write it is in my
blood. But I can barely function a lot of the time and when I can I am not able
to drain myself with this one task. But it is all I think about. I know what I
am working on, should be working on, what is coming next. It breaks my heart.
So when I am in the depression stage I dwell on my writing. After not getting
to work, the other thing that makes me feel like a failure is not posting
regular blogs. Ultimately the person I am always failing is myself. Ironic, huh?
I didn’t
even know that until just now. Writing works everything out for me and clears
my head. That’s when I knew this blog HAD to come in rare form. I was trying
desperately to get my soul back on track and in order to entice it out. I knew I
had to be brutally honest and in order to do that I had to announce it and
share it. Otherwise I would be a coward and continue to live lying to myself.
This way I can let it out and away.
It is
like the five stages of grief. Acceptance is always the last step to admitting
you have a problem.
For me it
is an important step in realizing I am still the person I was but I have a serious
illness and it is okay if that has changed me some.
The next
step has to be that it has changed me for the better.
For My
Previous Migraine Blogs:
I am so proud of you and wish I could wisk away all the pain so that you can get to live a full life again.. It seems so long since my girl has been able to just get up and go. I pray for you each and every day that one day it will finally happen.. xoxo
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