Days when a Positive Mindset is Impossible
Today is one of those days. Woke up fine, most of the day I was fine. Then at 2pm I had cortisone injections into L3. I have had the injections in L1 before and the improvement was almost instant.
This was a very uncomfortable proceedure and the afternoon was a horrible level of pain I was just unable to escape. I tried staying in my bed, I did a short walk, I tried sitting. I ate lots of painkillers and I used heat packs. Nada. I could not escape.
I hate myself on these days as I have zero patience with kids, I am bedridden, I feed them crap and sit them in front of DVD's until I can finally send the poor little mites off to bed. This is NOT the person that I am, and although the odd day here and there will not kill them, it is not how I want to be their mother. I am certainly not perfect AT ALL, but I really try to love and nuture to encourage them, to talk of the environment and healthy lifestyles and diets. We talk of diversity, disabilities and how some people live lives of pain and terror, we do craft and cooking, we do walks and then I do days like today where I hate myself and I hate the way their faces show the raw feelings of disappointment that mum is sick AGAIN and AGAIN we are shouted at and told to go away mum is in pain. This is not me, or rather is it ME and I don't want to be this me.
Today out of desperation I bought a book, a Paul Mckenna book something along the lines - How to Change your life in 7 days. I will glad share any revelations I find in the next 7 days!! Really I should be looking for books on how to manage my pain and how to change ME in the next 7 days, not how to transform my life (external elements). I have not started the book yet, that is my project for the next 7 days that hubby is away and doesn't see my reading material and think - not only do I have a useless wife that lays around moaning in pain all day long, she has now gone crackers and is buying self transformation books.
The sad thing is everyone (well everyone I know and meet) do generally absolutely love me, the problem is they loved me as the pain free able bodied person with an energy and vibrancy that used to enter the room before my physical body had entered the room, BUT now they put up with and don't seek out the me that is in pain, that is limited and that needs some emotional bouying, copious amounts of magazines, books and chocolate, adult conversation and a miracle cure for pain and lack of mobility. This saddens me, as I am still the same person, I just cannot be their prop and entertainer anymore and it is funny that you can get discarded when they can no longer tap into my energy and vibrancy to feel good.
My family has never waived in the love support and constant nagging and never ending list of ideas that might help me, and I have 2 best friends that have gone way beyond my imaginings to help me and support me and so although I am disappointed in so many people as a whole, I also feel sooooo honoured to have the very special people around me that have chosen to share my journey with me, despite me being a total pain in the arse and an annoying whinger alot of the time.
So some days like today I have to admit that I am over the pain, over having to live this way and put others through this with me and over not having the life that I want to live. But for all my morose mood I can still see the love fighting to get through the haze of doom I am in today. I am know that tomorrow I will wake up again and my mood will have improved and I am planning to take the kids (pain or no pain) to one of the best parks ever in our area. AND on the way I am going to stay stuff it to my no chocolate ban and buy tonnes of the bloody stuff and gorge - yeay!!!
Thursday, January 27, 2011
Tuesday, January 25, 2011
Positive Mindset
After waking up in pain this morning and just not being able to get rid of it even after walking, swmming and a physio visit. I just resigned myself to sitting and reading a new book from the library and not doing anything on my to do list today. If illness has taught me anything you have to work with your limitations and not push them.
So I began to read Vistoria Hislops "The Return". I read her first book "The Island" and was totally enthralled, and now I have managed to get all my friends hooked on this author. Anyway it is set in Granada Spain. I was reading it and getting a little distressed and jealous of this young lady wandering the streets exploring Granada and was thinking I want to do that, but then the little voice said I could not sit on the flights for that long, I would not be able to walk that long, how would I survive without my physio and pool, I can't go anywhere anymore, sob story sob story. And then I thought to myself NO, I want to travel again (I used to be quite an extensive traveller) so I have given myself a little pep talk, and told myself that I just need to keep going with my rehab programme, I have to train up my muscles and I need to make sure I get a cortisone jab before I leave for another country and I should be able to manage.
I do believe that although not everything can be healed and not everyone can live painfree, but it is the mindset that matters. Most things could be possible with some hard work and a positive outlook. If you tell yourself you cannot do anything anymore, then you wont, but if you say you can get around it and make it happen, then I believe that you can find a way to make some of it happen.
Happy thinking.
After waking up in pain this morning and just not being able to get rid of it even after walking, swmming and a physio visit. I just resigned myself to sitting and reading a new book from the library and not doing anything on my to do list today. If illness has taught me anything you have to work with your limitations and not push them.
So I began to read Vistoria Hislops "The Return". I read her first book "The Island" and was totally enthralled, and now I have managed to get all my friends hooked on this author. Anyway it is set in Granada Spain. I was reading it and getting a little distressed and jealous of this young lady wandering the streets exploring Granada and was thinking I want to do that, but then the little voice said I could not sit on the flights for that long, I would not be able to walk that long, how would I survive without my physio and pool, I can't go anywhere anymore, sob story sob story. And then I thought to myself NO, I want to travel again (I used to be quite an extensive traveller) so I have given myself a little pep talk, and told myself that I just need to keep going with my rehab programme, I have to train up my muscles and I need to make sure I get a cortisone jab before I leave for another country and I should be able to manage.
I do believe that although not everything can be healed and not everyone can live painfree, but it is the mindset that matters. Most things could be possible with some hard work and a positive outlook. If you tell yourself you cannot do anything anymore, then you wont, but if you say you can get around it and make it happen, then I believe that you can find a way to make some of it happen.
Happy thinking.
Sunday, January 23, 2011
Gratitude and Energy
Every morning I roll over and listen to my body, I slowly start the rolling out of bed process and am overwhelmed with gratitude - today I am pain free.
We go out and about and acheive all our tasks on the farm and then out for some fun stuff to keep the kids (therefore ME) sane. I do what I do everyday, begrudgingly, pack swimmers and towels, as no matter where we end up and at what time, at some stage today my hydrotherapy exercises HAVE to be done. If I want to still be walking in the afternoon, if I don't want to see the anger and disappointment on hubbys face later, when he dutifully checks if I have done my programme today, then the pool is not the stop that gets put off any more, something else goes to the back of the list instead. I pray that one day I pack my swimmers because I am just sooo excited to be exercising today!
Then the day is drawing to an end, and cooking must be done for dinners, and this is where ALL my energy comes into play. This is usually my pain time. Anytime from 2pm onwards we could hit rock bottom. Today is that day where the pain creeps in till it forces me into bed. Having to cook in spurts for the 1 or 2 mins I can keep on my feet. All the time praying for the phone to ring to let me know he is on the way home, that I will be rescued soon to retreat to bed whilst he wearily takes over my duties and does the story telling, the snuggling in and kisses. It takes not just physical energy to keep me going, but mental and emotional too. I lie here relieved on the one hand and disappointed and over it on the other hand. Wracking my brain with schemes to fund my disability, manage my disability, over come my disability, cure my pain, become free and independant and FUN again.
There is always tomorrow, maybe tomorrow I will get a full 24hours of freedom and joy. But still I am happy, I had fun with my kids today and I have a loving husband and the pain cannot take that from me.
We go out and about and acheive all our tasks on the farm and then out for some fun stuff to keep the kids (therefore ME) sane. I do what I do everyday, begrudgingly, pack swimmers and towels, as no matter where we end up and at what time, at some stage today my hydrotherapy exercises HAVE to be done. If I want to still be walking in the afternoon, if I don't want to see the anger and disappointment on hubbys face later, when he dutifully checks if I have done my programme today, then the pool is not the stop that gets put off any more, something else goes to the back of the list instead. I pray that one day I pack my swimmers because I am just sooo excited to be exercising today!
Then the day is drawing to an end, and cooking must be done for dinners, and this is where ALL my energy comes into play. This is usually my pain time. Anytime from 2pm onwards we could hit rock bottom. Today is that day where the pain creeps in till it forces me into bed. Having to cook in spurts for the 1 or 2 mins I can keep on my feet. All the time praying for the phone to ring to let me know he is on the way home, that I will be rescued soon to retreat to bed whilst he wearily takes over my duties and does the story telling, the snuggling in and kisses. It takes not just physical energy to keep me going, but mental and emotional too. I lie here relieved on the one hand and disappointed and over it on the other hand. Wracking my brain with schemes to fund my disability, manage my disability, over come my disability, cure my pain, become free and independant and FUN again.
There is always tomorrow, maybe tomorrow I will get a full 24hours of freedom and joy. But still I am happy, I had fun with my kids today and I have a loving husband and the pain cannot take that from me.
Why
why did I start this blog? why me? Why? for soooo many things and reasons.
I had my spine fused in May 2010 and I was hoping it would be the miracle cure to terrible pain, disability, emotional dispair, an infringment on my childrens lives and a humungous burden to my poor old hubby who commutes 2 hours to and 2 back from work everyday when he is here that is! to cook clean and childmind whilst hanging onto his sanity by a whisper of a thread.
Alas it was NOT the miracle cure. It cured the agony and being completely bedridden. It gave me a glimpse of normalcy where I could maybe return to chasing the kids like a looney around the deck roaring like a monster pinching their bums as they I caught them up. Normalcy where I could bounce out of bed and spring into action and re-grow my farm after 9 months of watching it drown under weeds and neglect. But it was only a glimpse and it did not happen.
I slowly lumbered into normal life thinking I will get going soon, the doctors wondered why I did not heal, but thought I just needed more time than other people. But now it seems to deterioration to my spine was already too great, and a fusion what not going to help, so not even a year out from the op, the other disks start to bulge and slip and I dispair as I watch my dreams and hopes go and a haze of uncertainty loom.
Now this might all sound so depressing. Which it is. BUT, and there is always a BUT, I don't just lie down and accept this sort of shit (opps, can you swear online? I am a terrible swearer in real life so I appologise in advance that swearing will feature on this blog A LOT). For the one of the first times EVER (other than a blimp in my teenage years at uni) I have crawled out from a depression cloud and said - bugger off (thats not really what I said, but that is the polite way to say my version of what I said, yes it began with an f). And I am getting back on my feet again. I am going to win this.
Now this is not something terrible like cancer, this is an everyday bummer luck thing, but this deeply affects the life of my children (especially as I am usually the sole parent most of the time) so to me this is very serious.
I HATE exercise and I HATE diets and all forms of low fat anything. I loooooovvvve butter and cream and coco pops and chocolate, oooohhhhh loads and loads of chocolate. BUT I have to loose some weight as my spine cannot carry all this around (I am only about 10kgs overweight, but that is 10kgs too much for my back) and I need to make my muscles work again and I have to exercise every day (SCREAM) what, yes every bloody day (SCREAM again).
So for the last 2 weeks I actually have exercised everyday. I have got myself a personal trainer (once a fortnight) as I am also extremely broke) and I have bought a detox book called "Clean" By Dr A Junger which fishpond will hopefully deliver soon, as hubby is away for a month in the USA so I have 1 month to get my shit together and blow him away when he gets back.
I am the Queen, no really I am the absolute hands down queen of queens at starting something and having great ideas, plans and schemes, I am also the absolute queen of failing to follow through. Diets I usually manage till morning tea comes and I have almost chewed a hole through a metal cabinet I locked a bar of chocolate into, exercise programmes I have managed 2 weeks before (only because a friend of mine (who was also my neighbour at the time) was doing it too so I was guilted out all the time to do the bloody exercise program.
So I thought if I put it online and told the world (well my world of one person, as no one is likely to ready my rantings other than me, and maybe my mum out of duty), I might succeed this time. The price is really high this time, exercise and loose 10kgs or be in pain and disabled for the rest of my life - hmmmm, this should not be a hard call, but like I said I hate exercise and diets SO MUCH, yes THIS MUCH that I am virtually unmotivated by anything.
But this is going to change, I hope.
If you read this site and want to spur me along let me know at any time. Would love to hear from anyone.
Thanks for reading the ravings of a middle aged menopausal not able to cope mum.
I had my spine fused in May 2010 and I was hoping it would be the miracle cure to terrible pain, disability, emotional dispair, an infringment on my childrens lives and a humungous burden to my poor old hubby who commutes 2 hours to and 2 back from work everyday when he is here that is! to cook clean and childmind whilst hanging onto his sanity by a whisper of a thread.
Alas it was NOT the miracle cure. It cured the agony and being completely bedridden. It gave me a glimpse of normalcy where I could maybe return to chasing the kids like a looney around the deck roaring like a monster pinching their bums as they I caught them up. Normalcy where I could bounce out of bed and spring into action and re-grow my farm after 9 months of watching it drown under weeds and neglect. But it was only a glimpse and it did not happen.
I slowly lumbered into normal life thinking I will get going soon, the doctors wondered why I did not heal, but thought I just needed more time than other people. But now it seems to deterioration to my spine was already too great, and a fusion what not going to help, so not even a year out from the op, the other disks start to bulge and slip and I dispair as I watch my dreams and hopes go and a haze of uncertainty loom.
Now this might all sound so depressing. Which it is. BUT, and there is always a BUT, I don't just lie down and accept this sort of shit (opps, can you swear online? I am a terrible swearer in real life so I appologise in advance that swearing will feature on this blog A LOT). For the one of the first times EVER (other than a blimp in my teenage years at uni) I have crawled out from a depression cloud and said - bugger off (thats not really what I said, but that is the polite way to say my version of what I said, yes it began with an f). And I am getting back on my feet again. I am going to win this.
Now this is not something terrible like cancer, this is an everyday bummer luck thing, but this deeply affects the life of my children (especially as I am usually the sole parent most of the time) so to me this is very serious.
I HATE exercise and I HATE diets and all forms of low fat anything. I loooooovvvve butter and cream and coco pops and chocolate, oooohhhhh loads and loads of chocolate. BUT I have to loose some weight as my spine cannot carry all this around (I am only about 10kgs overweight, but that is 10kgs too much for my back) and I need to make my muscles work again and I have to exercise every day (SCREAM) what, yes every bloody day (SCREAM again).
So for the last 2 weeks I actually have exercised everyday. I have got myself a personal trainer (once a fortnight) as I am also extremely broke) and I have bought a detox book called "Clean" By Dr A Junger which fishpond will hopefully deliver soon, as hubby is away for a month in the USA so I have 1 month to get my shit together and blow him away when he gets back.
I am the Queen, no really I am the absolute hands down queen of queens at starting something and having great ideas, plans and schemes, I am also the absolute queen of failing to follow through. Diets I usually manage till morning tea comes and I have almost chewed a hole through a metal cabinet I locked a bar of chocolate into, exercise programmes I have managed 2 weeks before (only because a friend of mine (who was also my neighbour at the time) was doing it too so I was guilted out all the time to do the bloody exercise program.
So I thought if I put it online and told the world (well my world of one person, as no one is likely to ready my rantings other than me, and maybe my mum out of duty), I might succeed this time. The price is really high this time, exercise and loose 10kgs or be in pain and disabled for the rest of my life - hmmmm, this should not be a hard call, but like I said I hate exercise and diets SO MUCH, yes THIS MUCH that I am virtually unmotivated by anything.
But this is going to change, I hope.
If you read this site and want to spur me along let me know at any time. Would love to hear from anyone.
Thanks for reading the ravings of a middle aged menopausal not able to cope mum.
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