Thoughts about Pain

Since Friday (today is Wednesday), I have been suffering with debilitating pain from my back.  It feels like there is a wick in my spine that gets lit and then burns all the way down my right leg to my toes, especially burning my ankle. I have rather severe stenosis of the spine and degenerative disk disorder.  This pain is severe enough that I can’t find a comfortable place to sit, stand or lay.  What makes it worse is that I can take no pain medication.  For some reason, my body rejects every one of them except ibuprofen which does little good. Tomorrow I am scheduled for an epidural so I can’t even take ibuprofen now.  My quality of life is just about nil.  I haven’t left the house since Sunday when I did go out for brunch but then came right home.  I am not a stay-at-home type of person.

Today I started looking at old pictures on my computer.  I have had some wonderful trips and seen many places from Halifax to Waikiki.  I have been to Paris and some parts of Mexico.  I have been to all 50 states including a great trip to Alaska. I have been to the Caribbean.  I look at those pictures and I think that was in the past.  I have had a wonderful past.  But – and there is that word “but” – because of the severe pain, I have trouble seeing much of anything in my future.  The epidural should help as they always have but it is not a cure and I can only have one since I had two in November and one can only have 3 in a year.

So what can I do?  I read and watch TV and listen to the radio.  B has been waiting on me, making all my food, helping me with every possible thing. She is an excellent caregiver but I am not terribly good at letting people help me although I have improved over the years in that area.  In July I am going to Milwaukee and then taking my granddaughter to Turks and Caicos.  I have to be better.  The doctors tell me that the only possible cure is surgery and that is not a positive either.  In my later years, surgery has given me complications and so I want to avoid that but it may be my only choice.

I recently read three books about WWII and realized how lucky I was.  I was born in 1938 in Milwaukee.  I could have been born somewhere in Europe and, since I am Jewish, who knows what could have happened.  None of my relatives were in Europe during that time either.  The luck of birth. I was also born into a family that loved children and only wanted the best for them. Another stroke of luck.  I need to look at all the wonderful things in my life and there are many when something like this happens.  And I have many things to look forward to as well.  It is just that, at this moment, I seem to just want to wallow and try to deal with this pain until tomorrow when I will have the shot.