Affirmation Thursday (and Pain update)

(First, before I start...is anyone else "enjoying" the new OS Lion for Mac...where if you don't watch your finger on the mouse, your entire page will just go flying off to the right and disappear?  Horizontal scrolling.....lovely......AGH!  lol)

Okey dokey.....maybe I should have titled this, "Keeping It Real".....I decided to share more details because several have written and upon learning, understood in a deeper way....

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Am I the only girl who likes to control timelines?  Oh my....I truly am doing SO much better than my entire life before, but sometimes I have to stop and realize:  "Hey, I am NOT in control of this".

My favorite affirmations this week are:

I give thanks for the Divinely planned journey under Divinely planned conditions with the Divinely planned supply.

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Adverse appearances work for my good, for God utilizes every person and every situation to bring to me my heart's desire.  "Hindrances are friendly" and obstacles spring boards!

I now jump into my good!

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So, my pain and medication withdrawal update:

7 short weeks ago, I asked my doctor to wean off ALL my pain medications.  Rather than be vague, I will straight up tell you that I was on 300mg of a long-acting pain medication.  Three HUNDRED milligrams.  (You can click on the chronic pain, nerve damage, and spinal cord stimulator links to the right to read all about my diagnoses, conditions, medical test results, etc.)  If you have snacks and drinks, you can read the So What Happened To Me full story....Suffice it to say, there is plenty of medical proof for the medical blessings I have been given.

In early June, my pain lifted  - you can read that story HERE.   I went from 24/7 burning/searing pain to feeling amazing.  In seconds flat.  It was definitely a God-thing.

Now, 7 weeks is super fast and yet I was doing great...my first drop in dose was 100mg and I had 3 hours of restless legs and that was the sum total of withdrawal.  I was so encouraged (after having been warned I may feel like dying...).

At the outset, I wondered if doing so at this time was the smartest idea, as we typically go to Dallas sometime in June or July and that was going to drastically change my physical situation (8+ hour car rides both ways..).  I held steady on the current dosage while gone, but dropped again in dosage the day we drove home.  Ack.

As I hit 60 mg a day, I started to feel it.  At that point, I was on 30 mg, every 12 hours.  When I went to ONE PILL A DAY, 3omg total, I was putting on that smile but the behind the scenes reality wasn't pretty.  The first 3 days of each drop in dose, I would "feel it" but then my body would adjust and I'd have 3-4 days of feeling good before the next drop.

Until last Sunday I went to NO more medication (except what is called "BT - breakthrough meds, of which I am allowed 2 a day.).......

Well, I will just say straight up - Oh My Goodness.  My wonderful, LITERAL husband just stared at me with so much compassion but a huge question:

Why would a girl who was just walking 12 miles a week and just got her entire life back DO THIS TO HERSELF?  

I had to explain to him, again, the realities of being a pain patient.  (If you are a pain patient, you already know....)

The United States is having a war on pain meds.  Because of abuse and addition, ALL legitimate patients NEEDING these meds are being attacked.  It is humiliating to go to ANY doctor and have to admit being on these meds because they DO NOT WANT YOU AS A PATIENT.  Why?  We are ALL seen as "drug seekers".  (There are many "patients" who lie to get the meds, to promptly turn around the sell them.  Some for evil motives, others to simply pay their mortgage.)  But nevertheless, the nurses and docs at these clinics are TRAINED to be on the lookout for abuse and lies.

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And I was tired of it.  I have wires and leads in my spinal fluid, for goodness sakes...that doesn't "PROVE" I am not lying?  Answer - it does NOT.

To start off with, most pain patients are required to sign a contract stating that they will get NO other pain-related meds from any doctor unless in an emergency situation.  (I don't have a problem with this - just wanted to add this for those that don't know how serious it is...)

I was tired of being drug-tested 3+ times a year.  (Sometimes with stick tests in office and other times with it being mailed off.)  

WHY drug test me?  To make SURE I have the meds I am prescribed IN MY SYSTEM.   (Whereas, most drug tests are used to prove there AREN'T drugs in your system.)  Isn't that a shock?  To prove I'm not selling them.

(Willingly submitting for an employment drug test feels entirely different, btw.)  Knowing that any minute, any single thing you do or say could get you "kicked out" of the only place that helps you live your life.....


While I am very thankful there are doctors willing to put up with this mess, I wish there was a better system.  I'm personally in favor of a national database that shows what and where...to stop "doc shopping".

I just wanted a different life.  To be perfectly honest.  I wanted to go to EVERY doctor I have and happily announce what I had done.  That I was FREE.

So.  I have had tears this week, with the return of some pain.  

Am I proud of myself for dropping 300mg in 7 weeks?  ABSOLUTELY.  

But why more pain?

Well...to revisit the beginning of this post....I am NOT in control of the timeline.  Duh, Cheri.  Who am I to claim it will be complete in 7 weeks?  Silly silly Cheri.

Today, I had my pain appointment.  And guess what?  I was drug-tested to see if I am now on marijuana for pain relief (illegal in my state and never prescribed) because WHO just says, "I want to be off pain meds?"  This was a red flag.  I am serious.

GRRRR....

I passed the drug test(S)......Duh....and they then proceeded with my appointment.  Because I react extremely negatively to any "nerve" medications (which are actually seizure medications mostly)...I have gone back on a tiny dose of pain medication.....45 mg a day.   And we are not shelving the plans to get off again.

Guess what the doctor said?  Getting off that much meds in that short of time likely has thrown my body in to sort of a "shock".  Not a "dead in a minute" sort of shock, but just too much, too soon.  That encouraged me. I plan to get my sea legs back and work on my MIND.....my affirmations....

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I KNOW why the pain returned......there is another lesson for me to learn.  And I'm up for it....pain is a nice motivator.  :)

As my beloved friend Barbara said:  "As it says in the Bible, 

 "It Came........to PASS." 

Most people say it as one thing..............it CAME to PASS.....

But really....say this with the pauses....

It Came.........................To Pass.

So, while my journey has hills and valley, it IS Divinely planned.

Oh, and one more thing.  I sadly discovered that one thing that caused a massive fire BLAST in pain was drinking/eating sugary food items.  AGH!!!  So, on top of everything else, I have given up 90% of the sugar in my life.  Woo Hoo!!  Sugar is not healthy, anyway...but I didn't know if I could ever do it.  Fire in the butt sure helped that.  (BTW, my blood test results are not diabetes or pre-diabetes related......a former holistic-minded MD told me that SUGAR is the number one enemy of pain.  She cured herself of Fibromyalgia after everything she knew about medical science failed her.  This began her holistic journey and while she still can and does treat medically, she STARTS with food and things we ingest, every single patient.  She said it got her escorted out of a few Fibromyalgia meetings, as almost any pain patient will tell you.....sugar is one thing that makes us happy when nothing else seems to be working.)

I hope I covered everything...let me know if you have any other questions....