RE: Re: Accepting & Dealing with the pain/

[Guest guest]

Hello ,

My name is . I have dealt with Chronic Pain for the last 12 years of my

life. I have had 5 major abdominal surgeries.In total I have had 90% of my

large colon removed.

After the first surgery I was diagnosed with Fibromyalgia which only continues

to get worse after the last surgery I am now faced with bowel incontinence which

I am working very hard on in PT

trying to avoid a 6th surgery.

My greatest bout with depression came after working 30 years in the

Information Technology field and consulting with people all day long was the

decision by myself, and my doctors, that I could no longer work.

I can't stand, sit, walk for more than 15 minutes at a time. I can't lift more

than 15 pounds. The isolation from people and challenging work just about did

me in.

While I am trying to cope with the crap that is happening in my life, my family

is looking at me with a questioning suspicious eye. (What happened to our

exuberant, full of life daughter, mother, wife?) They think I am crazy!

They look pretty crazy from my point of view. Do they really think that I need

attention bad enough to make some monstrous life like this up?

I have three things that have made me cope. First and foremost is I allow myself

to agree with myself that I am in agony, that this sucks and right now this is

what my life is.

Do I feel sad ? Of course I do and sometimes I am incredibly pissed off

and in the quiet of the night, as the whole house sleeps but I lay awake in

agony. Hot tears roll down my face and I ask " Why me " ?

Those are all very human responses and actually that is part of the process of

you wrapping your mind around your current reality.

Secondly, I really look deeply at other people who have it worse than I do. I am

not minimizing my pain, but when I look at others it could be so much worse.

Thirdly, I still allow myself to dream. Since I was a young girl and knew what

retirement was I had always planned to retire and have a goat dairy and an

organic farm.

We have the land and the fences in place. Two years ago (when I almost lost my

life because my kidneys shut down after surgery and I

was in the hospital for a month.)

I was so ill that my husband had all he could handle in taking care of me, he

had to sell my entire goat herd. I still allow myself to dream. I might still

have it on a much smaller scale and with

help doing the physical part.

I do remember to make an entry in my gratitude journal. Today, while my husband

was out doing grocery shopping I got out of bed, did a load of laundry and made

him a batch of cookies (Break apart and put in oven) but still told him " I love

you. "

I hoped this has helped a little. Feel free to write me privately anytime.

> Mittica wrote:

> What I really need to know is how have any of you come to accept

that you will have a life of pain? I just can't seem to wrap my mind

around the fact that I'm going to hurt, maybe for the rest of my life.

It often makes me sad and even causes me to feel depressed at times.

How do you deal with it?

[Guest guest]

I agree 100% with Becky stating that you should not be ashamed for

sharing your experience with alcohol. It's understandable when you have

constant pain. I don't drink now only because of how it reacts with my

meds and I don't like how I feel. But this is certainly a safe place for

people to share their experiences without being judged. We are all here

for each other. I find therapy in this group as it's nice to talk to

others who also deal with chronic pain so they understand. That's

something that hard to get (understanding) from those that have not

experienced it.

[Guest guest]

B wrote:The acceptance of people not seeing me in pain has been the

mostchallenging thing for me with fibromyalgia. This is another reason I am so

thankful for this group is because I am reading things that Ifeel and know and

cannot really talk about to other people who don't understand.

Hello all,

I always thought I would lurk and not reply to posts knowing that a lot of

people are worse off than I am, however, this particular thread is something I'm

dealing with also. My name is Pamela Mann and I am a pastors wife. I won't go

into all of my issues and just say that I'm normally in " a lot " of pain. I do

use a cane and have a parking placard. I wish people could see what I'm going

through ,I wouldn't wish feeling it on anyone, but because I'm also overweight I

usually get the comments about " how fat I am and I wouldn't have these problems

if I lost weight " or, " get up an walk, it's better for you " . I assure you, if I

could walk, I would!

I try not to get angry or feel hurt, I've gotten a thicker skin since all

this started. If someone says something to me I will try to gently educate them

and most of the time they will realize they had judged where they shouldn't

have. The others who don't listen I can't do anything about. I pray for you all.

Blessings,

Pam (the Mann) ;-)

________________________________________________________________________________\

____

Be a better friend, newshound, and

know-it-all with Yahoo! Mobile. Try it now.

http://mobile.yahoo.com/;_ylt=Ahu06i62sR8HDtDypao8Wcj9tAcJ