decoherence

Tag: chronic pain

  • Health Update

    It’s been a rough couple of months as my doctors lowered the dose of my pain meds. I’ve been done with the withdrawal process for a few weeks now, but as you may expect my baseline pain is higher now. I’m trying to adjust to the higher pain levels, but it hasn’t been easy and…

  • Upcoming Withdrawal

    Here we go. Today I start a lower dose of my opioids. I get why my doctors are forcing me to do this–there is a real abuse epidemic that needs addressing. As a result, (from what I understand) Kaiser now has a policy that everyone chronic pain patient must be under a certain dose, regardless…

  • Personalized Cluster Headache Scale

    I suffer from chronic Cluster Headaches. My meds generally keep them under control and keep them low intensity. On a typical day, I suffer 2-3 long-lasting KIP 2 or KIP 3 headaches. However, for almost two months now I’ve been hit with a bad cycle of Clusters, getting hit with 2-3 long-lasting KIP 5 or…

  • False Binary: Real Harm

    [The following essay was published in the Fall 2013 issue of Cultural Encounters. I’ve reverted many of the editor’s changes which were made because the original phrasing was “too heterodox” for publication (for example, restoring the original title and thesis statement), made a few other light edits for accuracy and clarity (like updating the link…

  • Crossed Signals

    My body is doing this weird thing where it interprets hunger as nausea. So when I go a while without eating, my stomach will start feeling bad and the feeling will keep growing the longer I don’t eat. But since the underlying issue is actually hunger, once I eat something I invaryingly feel fine. Of…

  • Shockies

    [This post is part of my Medical Conditions Series.] Every other month or so, I get an episode of nerve pain that is completely separate from my testicular pain and my cluster headaches. Each episode lasts from 1-3 days. It always starts with a patch of my skin becoming extra sensitive, as if it had…

  • Testicular Neuralgia

    [This post is part of my Medical Conditions Series.] It feels like my left testicle is being squeezed and yanked out of place. (And that is not an entirely inaccurate description of what has actually happened.) And yes, it feels just as miserble as it sounds. The pain varies in intensity, but it never goes…

  • Cluster Headaches

    [This post is part of my Medical Conditions Series.] I suffer from Chronic Cluster Headaches. Cluster headaches are the sadistic older brother of migraines. Like migraines, they are their own disease, not a symptom of something else. Think of migraines as a rebellious teenager, and clusters as migraine’s methodical, disciplined older brother that has gone…

  • Depression

    [This post is part of my Medical Conditions Series.] Most people who suffer from chronic pain also struggle with depression. I am no exception. Intense, continuous, chronic pain is objectively horrible, and knowing that I don’t have any effective way to treat it frequently plunges me into despair. My depression is tightly linked to my…

  • Medical Conditions Series

    I have a whole host of medical issues–some are chronic and disabling, and others are episodic or merely disruptive. Over the next few blog posts, I’m going to give a brief description of each of my main conditions and how they affect me. Hopefully, these will help you to see what my disability looks like,…