The next part of my blog is something that I have been struggling over and running through my mind for a long time. The issues is: How do I list and/or explain what my daughter and I have, and what it does to our lives. In other words, what do we deal with on a daily and recurring basis, without out sounding like I am trying to keep score: "Oh look at me! See how many issues I have! See how much I suffer!"
I know that is not the reality, but after years and years of watching doctors and others eye's glaze over and disbelief clouds their faces, as I drone on listing all that my daughter and I have and deal with, it all begins to sound unbelievable even to myself, despite the fact that we are actually living it. For example. When I was 30, I went to see a Neurologist in my home town. He was young, fresh out of school and his internship. He asked me where I hurt. Sitting there, calmly, I smiled and said "Everywhere." He said "Specifically, where?" I replied with "Specifically, everywhere".
He sighed and rolled his eye, then gestured for me to enter the examining room. I layed down and he began a nerve induction test. It is a nasty little test where they stick an electric probe into your skin to tap into a nerve. With me, he stuck the probe into my leg, just below the knee. He then began to use a second needle probe to send electrical shocks through the nerve in my leg from the second probe to the first to measure connectivity. He started at my foot and began to work his way up my leg. He got about half way there, then threw up his arms and proclaimed that I was "In to much pain" and HE could not handle it! HE COULD NOT HANDLE IT! Then he walked out of the room leaving me on the table with the probes still in my leg.
The doctor came back soon after, removed the probes and said to me that he believed that I had a low pain threshold and that I should go to a chronic pain clinic. Understand that this was in 1984, and there were only a handful of such clinics back then. Sitting on the edge of the examining table, I leaned in, close to his ear and said "You are telling a woman who went through 72 hours of two of the worst forms of labor there is, with out any medication, then had a C-Section with only a spinal, that she has a low threshold for pain? I think not!" The look on his face as his eyes flew wide open was priceless. I then accepted his offer to recommend me to a local pain clinic. At that point, having been in constant pain all over my body for 15 years, what could I loose by going to a pain clinic. It turned out to be the best thing I ever did, up to that point in my life.
Funny thing is, that doctor and I became respected friends, and he became one of the leading neurologist in our county.
I know that is not the reality, but after years and years of watching doctors and others eye's glaze over and disbelief clouds their faces, as I drone on listing all that my daughter and I have and deal with, it all begins to sound unbelievable even to myself, despite the fact that we are actually living it. For example. When I was 30, I went to see a Neurologist in my home town. He was young, fresh out of school and his internship. He asked me where I hurt. Sitting there, calmly, I smiled and said "Everywhere." He said "Specifically, where?" I replied with "Specifically, everywhere".
He sighed and rolled his eye, then gestured for me to enter the examining room. I layed down and he began a nerve induction test. It is a nasty little test where they stick an electric probe into your skin to tap into a nerve. With me, he stuck the probe into my leg, just below the knee. He then began to use a second needle probe to send electrical shocks through the nerve in my leg from the second probe to the first to measure connectivity. He started at my foot and began to work his way up my leg. He got about half way there, then threw up his arms and proclaimed that I was "In to much pain" and HE could not handle it! HE COULD NOT HANDLE IT! Then he walked out of the room leaving me on the table with the probes still in my leg.
The doctor came back soon after, removed the probes and said to me that he believed that I had a low pain threshold and that I should go to a chronic pain clinic. Understand that this was in 1984, and there were only a handful of such clinics back then. Sitting on the edge of the examining table, I leaned in, close to his ear and said "You are telling a woman who went through 72 hours of two of the worst forms of labor there is, with out any medication, then had a C-Section with only a spinal, that she has a low threshold for pain? I think not!" The look on his face as his eyes flew wide open was priceless. I then accepted his offer to recommend me to a local pain clinic. At that point, having been in constant pain all over my body for 15 years, what could I loose by going to a pain clinic. It turned out to be the best thing I ever did, up to that point in my life.
Funny thing is, that doctor and I became respected friends, and he became one of the leading neurologist in our county.
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