But, after all this time I still can’t make sense of how it’s possible for something in my lower abdomen to cause me to feel so much pain in my legs, back – and since my unsuccessful procedure in February – by right butt cheek. Since waking up this morning my legs are on fire and my back hurts from my lower spine to my neck. I can’t find a comfortable sitting position. I’m walking like someone whose body is significantly aged and has experienced decades of brutal punishment. While every nerve in my body is on high alert waiting for what might come next.
I feel such burning pain that I imagine it would be easy to set another person on fire with the slightest touch from my skin. Today is not a rare day. This is the kind of pain that I am now accustomed to feeling. Whether it starts early at the break of morning, in the middle of a brightly lit afternoon, or as evening winds into the darkness of night, my pain cannot be separated from my body. All the same, the intellectual logic of knowing why this is happening cannot blend with the desperate, emotional child trying to jump out of my body and run as far away as possible from all this pain.
Before my illness arrived I had some creative pursuits that I tried to commit time to daily. I wrote poetry. I walked around with a point-and-shoot camera and/or my iPhone all the time to make certain I never missed capturing a beautiful moment – flowers, sunsets, the movements of the city – then I used the images I captured to create graphic art. I painted – not very well – but my creations pleased me and the few friends who saw beauty in them.
Now I struggle to do any of those things. I am unable to do any of them with the same frequency, or at all. The constant weight of pain medications on my brain has reduced writing creatively to a slow trickle, which means I haven’t written many poems recently. Because of the pain I can’t go for walks when I want to take pictures of the active world and changing seasons outside my apartment. I have been trying to replace these creative things with activities I can do within the walls of my apartment without too much cerebral or physical effort.
Recently, while clicking through boards on Pinterest I found a creative project – art journaling. It does not require much effort and I decided to add my own twist. I’m combining creativity with gratitude. Each day I write about something for which I am grateful. Then – if I’m alert enough or not feeling too much pain – I sketch shapes or practice Zentangle doodles. I use coloured pencils and markers to draw and fill in the shapes I sketch, or I can paint the pages with water-colour paints. I’ve even written a few poems.
I have found a way to re-ignite my creativity while focusing on positive things. And, I am putting all of these things in one place where I can flip through the pages any time I need remind myself of about the good things that are in my life.
During my first appointment at the pain clinic, the pain specialist completed a very detailed intake questionnaire with me. Some of the questions on the questionnaire were designed to gauge a patient’s mood. One specific question asked if I had thoughts about taking my life. I said no, but jokingly added that I had enough pain medication on hand if I ever considered it. The pain specialist stopped writing and looked me straight in the eyes with deep concern. Her concern surprised me. I had to assure her that it was only a joke and that I would never make such a joke again, and more importantly never try to take my life.
I thought about that meeting this morning because in addition to this blog I recently started a gratitude journal, and this morning I wrote about being grateful that I was never successful at my past attempts to take my life. That’s right, I said attempts; meaning more than one. I tried to kill myself more than once in my youth because of unspeakable things I had lived through that I felt I couldn’t and shouldn’t have survived. Unknowingly, I was also suffering from undiagnosed depression – or more accurately PTSD – which caused me a tremendous amount of psychological and emotional pain and made me believe that death was my only cure. At the bottom of some very dark valleys, I decided it would be better if I never climbed out. So, I swallowed lots of pills but I didn’t die.
I wrote in my gratitude journal that I am grateful I didn’t die for many reasons. Because I didn’t die I had the opportunity to obtain higher education – in academic settings, in the workforce, and just by being part of the world. I have traveled to many places (there are many more I want to see), and in each of those places I met wonderful people. I have seen many beautiful sunrises and sunsets, and as cliché as that sounds there is nothing more incredible than watching the sun set the sky on fire with colours you never imagined before. I have swum in the salt water of oceans and seas. I have skied down mountains. I have learned foreign languages – sometimes just small bits so I could communicate with strangers – and I have shared delicious food with some of those strangers who later became friends. But I am most grateful I didn’t die because I have received many blessings, most of which have come to me from unexpected places at times when I was ready to give up.
Although I am grateful, I understand wanting to die because I understand feeling hopeless, defeated and unloved. Thankfully my illness has not reduced me to feeling any of those things. Maybe it’s because of the antidepressants I’m taking. Early on when it became clear that getting me better would be difficult and could take a long time, my doctors started me on a low dose of antidepressants. Antidepressants are commonly prescribed for chronic pain patients to manage mood. When I started taking them I was concerned that they would dull my mind, but considering the amount of pain medication I’m taking any dulling a mild antidepressant could do is negligible. I also believe those feelings are being kept at bay because I have to be my own advocate, which means I have to be alert to understand and research information about my condition, and participate in all decision-making about my health and daily life.
Nonetheless, since my illness arrived I have not wanted to die. Even though the unbearable pain sometimes makes me feel like I might die. Sometimes I feel like I might die as I lay alone in the dimmed lighting in my apartment in the middle of the night. I have felt like I might die when just trying to get out of bed sends lightning hot pain through my body. I feel like I might die when I stand, weakly, at my kitchen sink to wash my dishes; and I felt like I might die when I fell in the shower a few months ago because my strength gave out while I was standing in the shower washing my pain riddled body. And, I have felt afraid that I might die while riding in the back of a taxi on the way to the hospital emergency room to get help to reduce my pain when my pain medications failed to manage it.
Still, as much as I understand wanting to die and feeling that I might die, today I am grateful that I did not.
My Small Surrenders 