The Pain Game

When it comes to pain, Rob keeps telling me that my brain is very powerful. I will admit, that has always felt like a compliment. It is something that I was proud of...that I seem to have the ability to out-think my pain a lot of the time. Another word for it would be denial. Or compartmentalizing. Whatever you want to call it, the punch line is that my tolerance for pain is really a function of my head, not my nerve endings.

So that's how I typically live life. I put my back pain in a box over there and I try to ignore it. When it tries to get my attention, I get busier to distract myself. I know people quietly wonder why I do so much, why I am so busy given my chronic pain. And I imagine some people wonder how valid my chronic pain actually is given all my activity. But the truth is, much like eating spicy food, I know the real pain will hit as soon as I am still. So I keep moving, even if that moving ultimately leads to more pain. It's the "I'll Deal With It Later" approach.

It's all a mental game, really, living life happily despite daily aches and spasms. And I thought I had it figured out. I knew how to play the game and I think I played it pretty well. But then some new pain wanted in and I was totally thrown for a loop.

Over a year ago, my right foot started hurting. Not a lot but enough to notice. And enough for me to ask my doctor about it at a back-related check-up. He said I was probably walking funny and suggested drug store shoe inserts. So I did that, and bought new shoes, and bought new versions of old shoes, and tried acupuncture and cupping (imagine a vacuum cleaner hose slowly moved back and forth across your foot) and ice and heat and rest and pain meds and an ankle brace. Aspirin and cupping helped for awhile. Our couch and the brace made it worse. As did my apparently very powerful brain.

The pain got a lot worse a few months ago and lots of panic-inducing Internet searches ensued. My world narrowed to the size of my foot. I was completely consumed by the pain and the fear of what it might mean. The fear kicked off a terrifying downward spiral that left me convinced I would never be able to walk again without pain. This was especially heart-wrenching since walking is my therapy, both physically and mentally.

I was on the verge of tears most minutes. I had a hard time focusing on anything besides my increasingly intense foot pain. When I forced myself to do things to get myself out of my head, I felt very fragile. I had been in this state before but it was years ago when the recovery from my first back surgery was going too slowly and then suddenly took a nose dive. I lived in this state for several months and as a result, I was probably depressed for about 5 years. And because of my very powerful brain, that's where I was heading again.

A couple of weeks ago, I finally let a few friends in. I finally spoke about my new pain and my incapacitating fear of it. They rallied around me, gave me incredible, faithful support, and within days the dark hole I was in was suddenly flooded with light. I have been spiraling upward ever since. I have an appointment with a specialist in a couple of weeks and I finally know I will in fact survive until then. And I walked in a parade with llamas a couple of days ago, mostly ignoring my foot pain because it was in a box over there and I was busy.

Game on.