Making Plans

 

Is that a light at the end of the tunnel I see?  Time will tell.

For the past few years I have been dealing with a number of health issues, which compounded have seriously impacted my life and how I live it.

I've tried everything I can think of and finally may have found some help.  I even have a date by which that help will be delivered.

Doug and I will drive to Vancouver to see a pain doctor who was very helpful and sympathetic on a Zoom appointment two weeks ago, who will do a nerve block on my spinal nerve.  Or at least that's the plan.  

Frankly I had no idea any such thing was a possibility or I sure would have looked into it sooner!  But now I know, and I seem to have found a very good doctor to do it, even if it does mean an 800 km drive to get down there - and then back again.

When shingles hit in January, I nearly gave up even trying to get 'better'.  If I were the inflatable punching bag toy my brother had, and who took great delight in knocking  over, I'd plum run out of 'flate'.  I didn't know if I could even pick myself up again.  

Shingles, on top of everything else I'd been dealing with - just barely - was the cherry on the pain pie and I honestly didn't know if I could keep on, keeping on.

I think the ONLY thing that got me through the first few weeks of shingles was the fact that the very same day I got the diagnosis, I had gotten a phone call from the pain doc's office wanting to book an appointment for me.  I had to postpone, but it was a slender little shoot of hope, that if I could get through shingles, I might have some help for the rest.

The pain doc gave me a clear assessment of what she thought was going on in my body, gave me a suggestion for pain control for the neuropathy in my feet, but also said that she would consider me for a nerve block for the pinched nerve.  This morning her office phoned and we booked a date for the in person exam.  From the way the person on the phone was talking, it sounds as though - after seeing the CT scan results - the doctor will go ahead and do the nerve block

Dear reader, I might have less pain beginning next month.

Constant pain is a suck on a person's energy, mood, ability to think.  Every decision has to be filtered through what you think you can manage on any given day.  I'm used to constant low level pain since I've had it most of my life, but the past few years has been an enormous challenge.  

For far too many, chronic health issues are an impediment to living.  If you know of someone dealing with any kind of chronic ill health - and in the wake of Covid, that list will grow - please understand that sometimes, as much as you wish you could do something, you just can't.

If you believe in such things, please hold me in your hearts April 6.  I really REALLY would like to get some of my life back.  I would like to keep teaching for a while yet, and to do so knowing that I won't be laid flat by the end of the class.