These last few weeks have been brutal on my body. I have had so many things to get done, I have had to go and make trips out nearly every second day. I often wonder why I even leave the house with the amount of pain my body goes through when I go out. Having no vehicle, or no bus that goes to the centre of town, as it is just a walk away, makes it a hell of a lot harder.
Many of you know me well enough to know that I do my best not to complain about my pain. It is generally a private thing, and being honest, I hate having to share and relate about it. But there are times when the pain gets so bad, that I just want to sit and cry. Often, through my own self discipline, strict meditation practices and an ability to just block things out, I can deal with it. Hell, it is how I have dealt with pain the majority of my life. Also, even denying the existence of my pain has helped, but only for short periods of times.
These days, though, my body has become worse. With a ban on training now in place, and to be frank, it is probably a good thing, my body has become more fluid and relaxed. Generally you would think that this is a great thing right? But in the case of my medical condition, relaxed muscles are a curse. As soon as they relax, the spinal column itself starts to move and click in different areas. Breathing becomes more strenuous as the lungs are being moved into different positions within the chest cavity and heart function is impeded. When the muscles do tighten up due to stress, then I get cramps in the muscles and knotting in the tendons. I have around 5 - 10 sets of muscles spasms in a day. The ones in my legs are fine as they are just hsakes and stop of their own accord. The ones in my back cause severe stiffness in the spine, but more painfully, can cause the muscles that attatch at the base of my skull and jaw to actually tighten so badly to induce migraines, locked jaw and reduce rotation in the neck itself.
Then we get to the nerves and heart. Due to the kyphotic hump that I have, as mentioned the internals are in different areas than someone with no back issues. What is scary though, in my view, is that my heart has pressure directly placed on it by the sternum/rib area. This, when climbing the most evil thing in the word, stairs, causes a massive amount of fatigue, just to climb one flight. When I am online gaming, my friends know I have been downstairs and are worried about the sounds I make from breathing. Something else that my doctor drew my attention to, and I had never had an answer to some of the problems it causes, is the severing of the nerves when I had my back opened up 3 times, as well as when they cleared out an infection alongside the spinal column. The first two surgeries involved numerous muscle systems being severed to allow for the expansion of the chest cavity to straighten up my spine. Yes, it was actually worse than it is now. This involved a lot of nerve areas being sliced through along the length of my spine, the inside of my rib cage and the upper part of my pelvic area. This has had numerous side effects, but the worse one is when you are holding something in your hand, and suddenly, your nerves fire and drop everything in your hands. I have had 2 mobile phones repaired this year because of that exact issue. I constantly find my hands shake if I hold my arm out straight. And this has had a very big impact in other parts of my life.
One thing I can pride myself on, is my intellect. I may not have any degrees yet, but was told by the Dean of Students at the University of Alberta many years ago, that I would make a good university professor. That thankfully, is still in tact. But, the biggest cause of this is some major mental health issues. I won't list them all, but one of the worst ones is suicidal tendencies. I have had these pretty much since I was a young kid. I would often think the world would be much better off without me, that my parents would have an easier time of not having to look after a sick child, that it would be a lot less painful to be dead than it would be to exist on the bad days. Due to a very special ex-girlfriend, and someone who even as an extremely close friend, I would hate myself if I hurt, I made a promise with her that if things to too bad, I would not kill myself. Again, as most of you know, I have this incredibly sick sense of humour, so I just tend to make a game of it when I do get to that place. I play the "what would be the most dreadful/disturbing/bizarre ways to die" game. It is the only thing that stops me from going through with the ideas.
All of this leads to a very exhausted and sometimes very distressed and grumpy Jim. I do my best to pleasant, as modern society seems to despise unhappiness for whatever reason. In those moments I prefer to stay at home, and avoid as many people as I can. I know it isn't healthy, but at the same time, being labelled a grouchy old bastard isn't the best of ways to go either. I am doing my best not to be stuck in this rut, but no matter how I much I try at the moment, it just stays there.
One thing I have done is set a gofundme to get parts of my life back under control. I really desire, right now, is just some peace of mind and some space, and this will give me a good head start. The reason I wrote this today, is because I desperately needed to get this down on some sort of medium and to remind myself that I can't keep lying and pretending to myself that the condition isn't as bad as it actually is. I am really tired people, some days I want to be put out to pasture, and others be sent off to the glue factory. Yet at the same time, I want to fight this with every inch of my being, and do something to help others going through this, but right now, it is just tough. Thank you for listening to my candid and very honest post.
