Canning my back out

After a few summers of living here, I came to understand that September hurts.

I won't go into a lot of detail since it is a Big Secret, but summer in the Pacific Northwest is sort of ok, I guess. We get some sunshine and warm weather here and there that are the payoff for the long months of rain and grey skies the rest of the year.

What this means in practice is that I do a lot of stuff during the summer that I shouldn't do. Stuff that helps me feel productive outside in the happy, glowy, sunshine because somehow hanging out in my zero-gravity fancy-pants recliner patio chair with a cold beverage and magazines seems somehow lazy. So there's some weeding and gardening and playing with water that I might do. I love every minute but I pay for it with back pain. Lots of it.

I try to take breaks and space out my outdoor activities and build in lots of walks. Nevertheless, the frequent limit-pushing accumulates and by the time September is here, I am in a mess of hurt.  At least I know it's coming, though, so I don't tail spin in panic like I used to. That's progress, right?

This year has been a little worse, unfortunately, because we have had the best growing season of the ten we've been here. Our garden is exploding with produce. Corn, onions, peppers, lettuce. Wild blackberries keep reappearing on bushes despite all of my picking. Today we actually gave away some tomatoes. In California, we pushed our tomatoes-aplenty on anyone who slowed down long enough to be accosted. At Woodhaven, I have hoarded each year's meager harvest with greed and absolutely no shame.

This garden bounty and my questionable need to feel "productive" have resulted in several rounds of this in the past couple of weeks, oddly coinciding with a back that is just a touch grumpy:

Corn is severely under-represented in this photo.  Oh so much corn in the freezer.
Let it also be noted that Rob has helped A TON in the making of this photo.
Oh, and a food processor. Why it took me 46 years to finally own one is the definition of a "brain fart."

The jars jars and more jars have also resulted in me starting to wonder if I need better pain meds and if my TENS unit is really working and thinking maybe winter isn't such a bad season after all. Mmmmm, fleece.

So yeah, I'm hurting. A lot. I've been trying to ignore it, like I do. As I said to a friend recently, denial is so handy! Until it's not.

I was hanging out in my doctor's office recently -- for a sinus thingy because I was still blissfully ignoring anything notable about my back -- and I spotted a cool little pain chart taped up on a cabinet.

Now, I've been around the block with pain charts. The 10 point pain scale is ubiquitous yet feels largely useless. It typically looks like this:

Don't those goofy faces make you feel better already? Except that last one; he really needs an ice cream cone with lots of sprinkles.

Years ago, after finally deciding my lumbar pain wasn't ever going to go away completely, I sort of recalibrated the Smiley Face Pain Scale. In my head, I typically live life around a 4 but try to make it look like a 2. I've been told I do a pretty damn good job of it, too. Yay me.

But entirely like that metaphorical frog placed in a pot of tepid water and slowly brought to a boil, I have gotten used to my 4 pain. Knowing this, when talking to doctors and other people with clipboards and prescription pads, I have sensed that were I not living in the pot of bubbling water all the time, I am probably hanging out more at a 6. That's been my gut feel with only a sad little face with droopy eyelids to back me up.

Until I saw this.

Click on the photo to see a larger version.

This is the pain chart I stared at while crinkling on the butcher paper in my doctor's office a few weeks ago. It is by far the best pain scale I have ever come across (well, except this one which is hysterical and worthy of a t-shirt). As I read each description, I almost cried with the joy of finally being understood. Even the use of "twinge" is perfect.

And so with this much improved pain scale, I confirmed my gut. Yep, I indeed live at 6 to 6.5. Right now, I'm approaching a 7.5. I have been at a 9 three times in my life. Very vivid, indelible, really sucky moments. Before I saw this scale, I had pegged them as 10s. I am very grateful now I've never gotten a perfect score.

None of this changes my pain level, of course. Only rest and sleep and heat and meds and acupuncture and kittens can do that. But the discovery of a well considered and useful pain scale does give my spirit some peace to know that my gut has been right. And that there is actually a pain scale out there that seems to have been constructed with the help of people in, you know, pain. Imagine that.