Can you be present with pain?

Hello hello internet world. I have not disappeared. I don't know what's been up with me the last few weeks. Just feeling uninspired about myself in general. Bummed out. Slightly depressed. It's frustrating. Trying to get my act together and fight through daily pain and still be PRESENT. It's tough. Pain makes me disengage. Check out. Or I get in a funk where I'm beating myself up mentally. Feeling bad about myself. I can be a hardcore Debbie Downer when I want to be. I'm going to be 36 in September. I am really down about the fact that I feel so unaccomplished the last few years. Where the hell did the time go? It goes in a flash, especially when you are chronically sick or in pain. You have nothing to show for it. It feels like I laid in bed,  or was in hospitals for the majority of the time and wasting a perfectly good life. This was not my plan. Planning is such a joke. This summer is half over already and I feel like it's disappeared. As I wrote about last post, I've been a big fail. I was starting to feel a little better but now it's just back to being crap.
I'm not working anymore. My surgeon kept extending my leave and I'll be having some other procedures soon that will require recovery and all that time just made me unreliable and a let down. It wasn't fair to my boss to just be in limbo about my status. She was so wonderful and understanding. I felt so disappointing. I still do. Many, many days I went into work in a lot of pain, struggling to get through a 5 hour shift. In the short time I worked there I went home early a couple times, and had to call in a couple. Very frustrating. Just another example of my body completely failing me. It is not something I can get used to. The thing is, it's not that I can't do something, it's the level of pain I fight while doing it, or the time to recover afterward. That's what knocks me out emotionally. It's just not fair.
My little girl turned 2 last week. She is a handful. Everyday I think I will get past this and to a better place before she gets to a point where she starts remembering. I'm tired of being lame mom. I never was. It's really hard to wrap my brain around it. Like I said- being more present. Fighting yourself to try to be that way. Many days I find distractions to waste time so I'm not focused on hurting or what I CAN'T do.
I was thinking the other day about things I used to do. I used to write. Poems, short stories... I wrote tons of them. I wonder why I stopped? That makes me a little sad. Somewhere along the line of having kids and getting sick I've lost all these little parts of me. Sometimes you don't notice until it's been years and you lost a bunch of them. I think reconnecting with 'me' would be a big help. I don't really go out of my way for time or activities for myself very often. Out with a friend occasionally. Out with Mat almost never unless we have random family in town to watch the kids. I stopped working out a million years ago because I was a sickly mess. Traveling on hold. I don't even really shop anymore! I know, right!! No shopping?? It's a crazy world, living like this. You feel great one day so you over do it and then pay for 3 days after. My semester starts soon and I just hope it won't be too much. I just want to finish and move on.... but then in the back of my head I think, "Well at this rate would I be able to work when I'm done?". Am I back in school for nothing because this shitty disease is going to sideline me forever? I would hope not, but imagine just not knowing? It sucks, big time. See- Debbie Downer. Piss, piss, pisser. I used to LOVE life. I was all in. Where did it stop? I hate that. I don't like myself much right now.
On a positive front, I don't have dysplasia. The wonderful pathologist made a typo. Yeah. Jackass. A TYPO. Thanks for that two weeks of stress, biatch. It was awesome.
Ok.. now that I've bummed everyone out big time and ruined your night, I will end. Sorry I was not entertaining and was so crappy. I'm just so blah about myself. I need something to shift and soon. As always, thanks for reading. I promise- more smiles next time!

Hello hello internet world. I have not disappeared. I don't know what's been up with me the last few weeks. Just feeling uninspired about myself in general. Bummed out. Slightly depressed. It's frustrating. Trying to get my act together and fight through daily pain and still be PRESENT. It's tough. Pain makes me disengage. Check out. Or I get in a funk where I'm beating myself up mentally. Feeling bad about myself. I can be a hardcore Debbie Downer when I want to be. I'm going to be 36 in September. I am really down about the fact that I feel so unaccomplished the last few years. Where the hell did the time go? It goes in a flash, especially when you are chronically sick or in pain. You have nothing to show for it. It feels like I laid in bed,  or was in hospitals for the majority of the time and wasting a perfectly good life. This was not my plan. Planning is such a joke. This summer is half over already and I feel like it's disappeared. As I wrote about last post, I've been a big fail. I was starting to feel a little better but now it's just back to being crap.
I'm not working anymore. My surgeon kept extending my leave and I'll be having some other procedures soon that will require recovery and all that time just made me unreliable and a let down. It wasn't fair to my boss to just be in limbo about my status. She was so wonderful and understanding. I felt so disappointing. I still do. Many, many days I went into work in a lot of pain, struggling to get through a 5 hour shift. In the short time I worked there I went home early a couple times, and had to call in a couple. Very frustrating. Just another example of my body completely failing me. It is not something I can get used to. The thing is, it's not that I can't do something, it's the level of pain I fight while doing it, or the time to recover afterward. That's what knocks me out emotionally. It's just not fair.
My little girl turned 2 last week. She is a handful. Everyday I think I will get past this and to a better place before she gets to a point where she starts remembering. I'm tired of being lame mom. I never was. It's really hard to wrap my brain around it. Like I said- being more present. Fighting yourself to try to be that way. Many days I find distractions to waste time so I'm not focused on hurting or what I CAN'T do.
I was thinking the other day about things I used to do. I used to write. Poems, short stories... I wrote tons of them. I wonder why I stopped? That makes me a little sad. Somewhere along the line of having kids and getting sick I've lost all these little parts of me. Sometimes you don't notice until it's been years and you lost a bunch of them. I think reconnecting with 'me' would be a big help. I don't really go out of my way for time or activities for myself very often. Out with a friend occasionally. Out with Mat almost never unless we have random family in town to watch the kids. I stopped working out a million years ago because I was a sickly mess. Traveling on hold. I don't even really shop anymore! I know, right!! No shopping?? It's a crazy world, living like this. You feel great one day so you over do it and then pay for 3 days after. My semester starts soon and I just hope it won't be too much. I just want to finish and move on.... but then in the back of my head I think, "Well at this rate would I be able to work when I'm done?". Am I back in school for nothing because this shitty disease is going to sideline me forever? I would hope not, but imagine just not knowing? It sucks, big time. See- Debbie Downer. Piss, piss, pisser. I used to LOVE life. I was all in. Where did it stop? I hate that. I don't like myself much right now.
On a positive front, I don't have dysplasia. The wonderful pathologist made a typo. Yeah. Jackass. A TYPO. Thanks for that two weeks of stress, biatch. It was awesome.
Ok.. now that I've bummed everyone out big time and ruined your night, I will end. Sorry I was not entertaining and was so crappy. I'm just so blah about myself. I need something to shift and soon. As always, thanks for reading. I promise- more smiles next time!

Invisibly sick... a day in my life.

So people always talk about Invisible Illnesses. IBD has that funny way of being one. You don't always look sick. Currently I'm not anemic so I'm not pale. I'm thin but not malnourished and sickly thin. I'm not weak and run down so I have what looks like normal energy levels. I'm no longer on steroids that puff my face up. I'm not on immunosuppressants that make my hair fall out. On the surface I look fine. If you didn't know, you wouldn't know. So I'm sure there are plenty of people rolling their eyes if I say I have pain or who are doubtful about why I haven't worked in years or why when I finally was feeling better and got a job, I got taken out for two weeks. I suppose it's all very easy to doubt and to not believe. Those who have had chronic pain understand. Those with IBD understand. You have weeks, months of feeling "normal" for the first time and think you have finally crossed that bridge. Then you realize you haven't even gotten there yet. I've written about the IBD stuff often enough that people get how it affects lives. Now, post surgery, a year out from colectomy I am frustrated. I am in pain. It hurts to stand, to walk, to move around. It hurts to wear anything but granny panties and sweats. It hurts to pee. I've been eating less so I won't go to the bathroom. I'm taking pain meds and muscle relaxers and topical creams to lessen my misery. No one can see any of that. No one looks at me and has any idea how much pain and discomfort I'm in while I'm carrying on the most random conversation about nothing. Google 'anal fissures'. Google 'anal fistulas'. It's horrible. Click on 'images' and it gets even better. It is graphic. They are things you probably never even considered existed. Hemorrhoids, yes maybe, but the issues that can crop up down there with IBD just aren't talked about. The whole fissure situation was bad enough...seriously. But with fistulas it's an entirely different scenario. That means surgery. More pain. I'm not here to gross you out but if you went and googled like I said to, you can only imagine. Of course many of those images are VERY extreme. But my point is, sickness can be invisible. Pain is invisible and easily hidden by those who are accustomed to having it daily. So before you pass judgement on people who 'don't look sick', you should also consider what you can't see. Issues that you'll never even consider being a possibility in life that someone right in front of you has going on. I don't know. I feel like it's been a very weird few years of my brain and body battling it out and my body winning a lot. It has been hard being in my early 30s and having to say I just don't work. I'm sure to many that sounds like a dream or is their reality, but when it's not a choice, it's different. I'm not just choosing to stay home with my kids. I'm not just choosing to be dependent on Hubs. I'm not lazy or feel like a man has to take care of me. It has not been a realistic possibility for me to work since 2010. And honestly I probably should have stopped prior to that because work was affecting my health immensely but I didn't.  I don't know where I wanted to go with this post other than to say, sometimes it just really sucks to not be in control. To be limited in your capacities and abilities and independence really sucks. It's the Anti-Lisa. And I'm tired of it. Life really does have a way of laughing at your plan. No matter how much a perfect plan or life you have plotted out, in the end you don't have very much control over it like you think. You get dealt one bad health situation and it affects you for years. You just never know what's around the corner and that goes for positive things as well. I just try to play the hand I'm dealt. I try to make the best decisions for right now, for today, because that's the only thing I'm sure of. Tomorrow may prove me wrong... I guess I'll wait and see.

So people always talk about Invisible Illnesses. IBD has that funny way of being one. You don't always look sick. Currently I'm not anemic so I'm not pale. I'm thin but not malnourished and sickly thin. I'm not weak and run down so I have what looks like normal energy levels. I'm no longer on steroids that puff my face up. I'm not on immunosuppressants that make my hair fall out. On the surface I look fine. If you didn't know, you wouldn't know. So I'm sure there are plenty of people rolling their eyes if I say I have pain or who are doubtful about why I haven't worked in years or why when I finally was feeling better and got a job, I got taken out for two weeks. I suppose it's all very easy to doubt and to not believe. Those who have had chronic pain understand. Those with IBD understand. You have weeks, months of feeling "normal" for the first time and think you have finally crossed that bridge. Then you realize you haven't even gotten there yet. I've written about the IBD stuff often enough that people get how it affects lives. Now, post surgery, a year out from colectomy I am frustrated. I am in pain. It hurts to stand, to walk, to move around. It hurts to wear anything but granny panties and sweats. It hurts to pee. I've been eating less so I won't go to the bathroom. I'm taking pain meds and muscle relaxers and topical creams to lessen my misery. No one can see any of that. No one looks at me and has any idea how much pain and discomfort I'm in while I'm carrying on the most random conversation about nothing. Google 'anal fissures'. Google 'anal fistulas'. It's horrible. Click on 'images' and it gets even better. It is graphic. They are things you probably never even considered existed. Hemorrhoids, yes maybe, but the issues that can crop up down there with IBD just aren't talked about. The whole fissure situation was bad enough...seriously. But with fistulas it's an entirely different scenario. That means surgery. More pain. I'm not here to gross you out but if you went and googled like I said to, you can only imagine. Of course many of those images are VERY extreme. But my point is, sickness can be invisible. Pain is invisible and easily hidden by those who are accustomed to having it daily. So before you pass judgement on people who 'don't look sick', you should also consider what you can't see. Issues that you'll never even consider being a possibility in life that someone right in front of you has going on. I don't know. I feel like it's been a very weird few years of my brain and body battling it out and my body winning a lot. It has been hard being in my early 30s and having to say I just don't work. I'm sure to many that sounds like a dream or is their reality, but when it's not a choice, it's different. I'm not just choosing to stay home with my kids. I'm not just choosing to be dependent on Hubs. I'm not lazy or feel like a man has to take care of me. It has not been a realistic possibility for me to work since 2010. And honestly I probably should have stopped prior to that because work was affecting my health immensely but I didn't.  I don't know where I wanted to go with this post other than to say, sometimes it just really sucks to not be in control. To be limited in your capacities and abilities and independence really sucks. It's the Anti-Lisa. And I'm tired of it. Life really does have a way of laughing at your plan. No matter how much a perfect plan or life you have plotted out, in the end you don't have very much control over it like you think. You get dealt one bad health situation and it affects you for years. You just never know what's around the corner and that goes for positive things as well. I just try to play the hand I'm dealt. I try to make the best decisions for right now, for today, because that's the only thing I'm sure of. Tomorrow may prove me wrong... I guess I'll wait and see.