Monday is surgery day!

Well, tomorrow's the day. I'll need to be at the hospital at 8:45 a.m. for surgery at 10:45. I was told by my neurosurgeon's office on Friday that I won't be coming home the day of surgery as my son-in-law did after both of his neck surgeries. I may not even get to come home on Tuesday.

It is my plan to chronicle each day of recuperation as soon as I'm able to type. Nothing but gibberish may show up as I'll be drugged heavily to keep me as immobile as possible, but I'm not planning to let that slow me down... much.

If everything goes as planned, my fingers should start working right again. My hands should follow suit. Both should perform better with much less pain.

Pain. I've been told I'll have the worst sore throat of my life, post surgery. Yeah, that makes me really wanna go through with this.

Okay, I'm off to pack up what little bit I'm allowed to take with me and to get a good night's sleep.

Yeah.

Right.

Drugs?? Now! Please.

Life with osteoarthritis and fibromyalgia is just one freakin' picnic.

So, if you're of the persuasion, kind thoughts and prayers are being gratefully accepted. Moral support would be good, too.

After all, I'm only allowing a surgeon I've only met once cut open my throat to rip out parts of my vertebrae while he reams out the spinal cord opening, shaves off bone spurs, and re-builds connective tissue and bone.

I intend to ask him what's in that paste he cooks up with the ground up cadaver bones. If it's silly putty and they try to charge me $50K for it, there's gonna be some very loud yelling.

Once I can talk again.

I may have to wait until getting back home to update this blog for the first time. From my stint in the hospital with home-grown meningitis two years ago I'm fully aware of how snitty they get when I remove that little oxygen monitor from my finger and place it on my toe so I can type.

Okay, off to bed...

Constructive Pain Management

I know, I know. I promised to post here every day for a month. Well guess what? Blogger wouldn't let me in again. Finally made it in after re-booting twice.

September is all about pain. My life is all about constructive pain management.

If I take enough drugs to not hurt, my brain doesn't function. My editors get cranky when I'm not on deadline, so I write through a lot of hurt and then collapse into sleep to get away from it for a few hours.

Having been an insomniac most of my adult life - clearly before the symptoms of OA or FM began to show up - sleep is often what I will myself to do. No matter what medications I take at night, even though I keep sleep apnea at bay with a CPAP machine, pain rouses me from sleep. Or, if I'm in one position too long, I'm awakened because a part of me has gone numb for a short time and is then hurting. Or a muscle has decided to cramp - usually in my feet. It doesn't really matter, because Fibromyalgia keeps us tired no matter how much sleep we get.

My job this week is to not only get my story in on time, but to get my office cleaned up and organized. Then it will be almost time for the Muse online writer's conference where I'll be a presenter this year - and I'll have another story due for the construction magazine I've been fortunate to write for for the past three years.

In between, we'll have out of town relatives here for a day or so. And son will probably roll through with his trainee in tow. (Son is an owner-operator trucker who trains new drivers over the road.) Or, one of his previous trainees will roll through because he has come to think of our place as the best bed and breakfast in the continental U.S. (They're really easy to please when they're tired, dirty, hungry, and in need of a laundry room that doesn't cost them $5 a load.)

I really wouldn't have it any other way. If there wasn't so much physical pain in my life, and if chronic fatigue wasn't ever-present, I'd still be exhausting myself climbing the corporate ladder. And then I wouldn't have time to stress over all the other "stuff". Besides, I'd be too tired, anyway.

Still ticking along, but ...

We, hubby and I, just returned home from a family mini-reunion. It was held at our daughter and son-in-law's home in Louisville, KY. The main reunion was held in Kelso, WA, in July, but the KY and OH branches of the family weren't able to attend, so we made up our own plans.

I'm tired and sore from the packing and prep, sitting, standing, limping along, traveling, and living without naps - however short. It's good to be home.

While I'm sure to pay for it all tomorrow, seeing 3rd and 4th cousins again was nice. Meeting their children for the first time was very nice. I'm sure I'll recover from all the hugs and snuggling we managed to do with 7 of our 10 grandchildren. Thankfully, fibro fog has been kept at bay, so when the pain sets in I'll re-live all those hugs as pain relief.

I know I'm behind on my commitment to post here every day for a month. I keep thinking about the article I read online about the couples who commit to have sex every day for a year. Yep, for real. How do they find the time? Do they not work? Not have children? Not ever need to sleep? They surely don't have osteoarthritis or fibromyalgia!

Tomorrow I'll be hosting a Virtual Book Tour stop at The Review Hutch for Jane Bernard. Please stop by at The Review Hutch to say hello to Jane and to find out how she does it all. (However, I won't be asking her about any questions about sex commitments.)

September: National Pain Awareness Month

September is National Pain Awareness Month in the United States.

I would have given this designation little thought before being diagnosed with high-end-pain illnesses five years ago. I have not one, but two, disorders/diseases/illnesses - with all of each one's accoutrements. I also have osteoarthritis in varying degrees through my spine, both hips, both knees, and possibly - one shoulder.

The National Fibromyalgia Association has done a great job of getting the word out that Fibromyalgia is not only real, but affects millions of the world's citizens.

The makers of Lyrica have done more to turn the tide regarding how this disease is perceived than any other promotion in my recollection.

Having said that, I must also say that Fibromyalgia affects short-term memory. It affects thought processes. However, the television commercials have run often enough that I can safely say I haven't been hit with "isn't that the one they said was all in your head", nearly as often. It still happens from time to time, but not every other time the subject is brought up.

I must also say that Lyrica has helped me to cope with my symptoms. You see, we who have Fibro tend to live with constant pain. The severity fluctuates, but never goes away completely. I pray every day that a new study doesn't find that Lyrica is detrimental in another way, as the Cox-II medications were found to be.

If you read this, please take a cruise on over to www.fmaware.org and read about the disease. That way, you'll already be armed when someone you know is diagnosed. It will happen.

And please remember to say a prayer or two during September (and throughout the year) for those of us who may not appear to be the happiest persons you've ever met. Happiness may be a state of mind deal that can be altered by a positive outlook, but it's a whole lot easier to be "sunny" when you don't hurt.

I'm daring myself to post here every day during September and to use this forum to keep a running journal. If you choose to follow this to see if I can do it and I screw up and forget to post ... email me to let me know I'm not holding up my end of the bargain.

Case of "The Munchies"

Send chocolate! Send munchies! Send … something to wire my mouth shut with!

I’ve had a good run for almost two years. My pain management regimen has been tolerable and somewhat effective. But … now … I’m having to endure a course of corticosteroids to deal with multiple points of osteoarthritis and Fibromyalgia pain. Pain killers alone can’t curb the muscle/joint/nerve endings that throb, burn, and spasm.

This time, it’s a multi-tiered pain that starts with the major muscle that runs between my spinal column and right shoulder; radiating, pinching, spiking, ice-picking and throbbing its way through the ends of my fingertips like a ricocheting arrow that’s been dipped in a boiling soup of poison sumac, habanera sauce, and mercurochrome. My skin may as well have been ripped away by a rabid raccoon for all the protection it currently affords.

Those broken arrow fragments rebounding to jam up under my fingernails are providing spectacular fireworks in Technicolor. The stars I see are almost pretty enough to take my mind off the pain. HA! I’m positive my elbow will give birth to that baby elephant anytime now.

Of course, it’s the shoulder that was injured in a car accident in 1972, and then re-injured by a mugger in ‘88. My friends on the city council took up a collection to buy the mugger a sympathy card, but that’s another story altogether. Nevermind that my friend Doug Sutherlin, mayor at the time, started the rumor to make me laugh rather than gritch at him to provide more security in downtown Tacoma, WA.

Corticosteroids tend to make me hungry. Hungry enough to eat a cardboard box. The kind a refrigerator comes in. Hubby is keeping me corralled and away from his newly-built garden shed.

This is day one of the seven-day course. Today, I’ll take a total of six tablets. Tomorrow, five. On day six, I’ll eat the last tablet.

If only I could take as many pain pills and muscle relaxers today ...

The munchies will go away in about two months.

Until the pain is controlled, please excuse typos, missed words, etc. My brain is short-circuiting and my fingers seem to have a mind of their own.

My Reason for this Blog

Initially my plan was to set up this blog anonymously, ala Miss Snark. (You'd have to be a writer to get the humor in that.) That way I could bitch and complain at will. However ...

As I mulled it over and began to digest my motive for this blog I began to realize that if all I wanted to do was complain, I could re-join the online Fibromyalgia groups, listen to the tales of woe, and thereby promote the self-serving woe-is-me pity party--which was the reason I left the groups.

I am a writer. But there is so much more to my life. I have a wonderful husband, great kids, even greater grandkids (which is what I hoped for when considering eating my young), and a full life.

A FULL life. In spite of having Fibromyalgia and Osteoarthritis.

Yes, I get tired. Yes, I hurt--a lot and often. Yes, I spend much time with doctors. Yes, I take medication. Yes, I must use the motorized carts to do my grocery shopping and then pray hubby gets home from work in time to unload them--before the ice cream melts. Yes, I have a wheelchair to use on those days when I can't manage to walk OR when the whole family goes to the zoo. Yes, I understand my illnesses are life-long and there is no cure. Yes, I get down sometimes. Yes, I deal with depression.

I also do many of the things I always wanted to do but didn't have time for, now that I'm unable to work a "real job". Like read. And write. And take short naps and long bubble baths.

If you have landed here, you were most likely researching either FM (Fibromyalgia) or OA (Osteoarthritis) because you have one--or both--or someone close to you does.

My plan is to be honest, yet upbeat. To be real. To share--often. Even on the not-so-good days.

Feel free to leave a comment, or to comment on a comment.