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Sitting in a restaurant with Devon today, midway through delicious chips and salsa, and my back started hurting so bad I had to stand up, exit our booth, and spend a few minutes crouching and stretching and trying to get my lower back to relax.
And it has been downhill since then. This the oddest, most intense, most sudden back pain I've had in a while. Currently my whole body is trembling and my back is throwing random spasm-fits, and I have no idea why. I've stretched, lied down, used hotpad, had back squishes, stocked up on protein in case it was more dietary need than actual back problems. It's not tightness or misalignment. It's not even pain, really—often when I'm going through long periods of constant and worse-than-usual back troubles, my muscles get so tight that they lose sensation that that's what this feels like: knowledge of pain, but not the pain itself. Shaking, spasms, rictus, the first hints of anxiety and depression—and numbness. All with a sudden onset, and more intense than it's been in a good while.
In a way I'm thankful (who wouldn't be, not to feel pain?), but it's somehow harder to cope with than it would be otherwise. I've many times been told that I do things for attention, that I suffer because I enjoy it, that it's all in my head—and so experiencing a pain that I cannot quite feel has me terrified that I'm making it up, that I'm making myself tremble and tighten so that I can whine and whimper. It's not so foolish an idea as it seems: now that I'm "at peace" with my mental health issues, I do aid and abet them by no longer trying to fight them. I've realized that fighting my suffering only increases it, but that means at the heart of it: I am content to suffer.
I am not content with this, right now. I am confused, a bit concerned, and certainly not benefiting. But the hours of pain have beaten down my defenses and it's all to easy to believe that because I am willing to suffer, because I've been told I welcome suffering, because I can't quite feel this pain—it is all in my head.
So I'm thinking that what I need know is long restful sleep and the promise that tomorrow, all will be better. But ah, this has been a very strange evening.
And it has been downhill since then. This the oddest, most intense, most sudden back pain I've had in a while. Currently my whole body is trembling and my back is throwing random spasm-fits, and I have no idea why. I've stretched, lied down, used hotpad, had back squishes, stocked up on protein in case it was more dietary need than actual back problems. It's not tightness or misalignment. It's not even pain, really—often when I'm going through long periods of constant and worse-than-usual back troubles, my muscles get so tight that they lose sensation that that's what this feels like: knowledge of pain, but not the pain itself. Shaking, spasms, rictus, the first hints of anxiety and depression—and numbness. All with a sudden onset, and more intense than it's been in a good while.
In a way I'm thankful (who wouldn't be, not to feel pain?), but it's somehow harder to cope with than it would be otherwise. I've many times been told that I do things for attention, that I suffer because I enjoy it, that it's all in my head—and so experiencing a pain that I cannot quite feel has me terrified that I'm making it up, that I'm making myself tremble and tighten so that I can whine and whimper. It's not so foolish an idea as it seems: now that I'm "at peace" with my mental health issues, I do aid and abet them by no longer trying to fight them. I've realized that fighting my suffering only increases it, but that means at the heart of it: I am content to suffer.
I am not content with this, right now. I am confused, a bit concerned, and certainly not benefiting. But the hours of pain have beaten down my defenses and it's all to easy to believe that because I am willing to suffer, because I've been told I welcome suffering, because I can't quite feel this pain—it is all in my head.
So I'm thinking that what I need know is long restful sleep and the promise that tomorrow, all will be better. But ah, this has been a very strange evening.
