David Gillon (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
davidgillon) wrote2014-11-01 04:11 pm
davidgillon) wrote2014-11-01 04:11 pm
Well that was fun...
... not.
Discussion of messy minutiae of one of my pain patterns below the cut. Not one to read while eating.... Mostly documenting it in the hope of fixing it in my brain.
So I have various patterns of pain associated with my bendiness and back problems that are recognisable and I can usually tell you how they are likely to progress if I don't do anything about them, and ditto if I do do something. Doing something usually consists of stopping doing whatever it is that is triggering the pain, but when that includes things like sitting or standing life can be somewhat limiting if you don't push the boundaries.
And then there's this one. Which fortunately only turns up about once a year, which is just far enough apart to reliably forget what the warning signs are.
I fell asleep on the couch last night, probably about 9PM I think, but I honestly don't know. I woke up at 4AM, not feeling particularly drowsy, so did some general noodling about on the laptop (while lying flat with laptop on chest - in fact I'd slept with the laptop on my chest). 6AM I started to realise I was getting backache, the cushion had slipped to an awkward position under my mid-back, but putting it right seemed like too much effort (awkwardly lift laptop down etc). 6:30AM it was getting a bit more noticeable, and I was getting a little drowsy, so I thought I'd see if I could get back to sleep.
By the time I got upstairs to the bedroom my back was screaming and my ribs were starting to join in, that's never a good sign. So I grabbed my back brace, strapped myself in, and got flat on my back as quickly as possible.
Sometimes the brace works, probably if I catch it early enough. Today it didn't. Not only didn't it work, it actually made it worse and my ribs were spasming by the time I got it off again.
As best I can tell the rib spasms interfere with my breathing to the point I start breathing very shallowly in terms of rib movement, but simultaneously sucking air in to try and get enough into my lungs, and some of it gets past the diaphragm, so I'm then getting pain interfering with breathing from both sides of the ribcage and from below. So I'm trying to burp that trapped air up, which just interferes with breathing even more, which makes me breath even more shallowly, and so on.
At this point the only thing that will work is submerging in a hot bath until the spasms go away. But of course it takes time to fill a bath that deep.
So I have the bath running, the pain is getting worse, in fact it's hitting my personal 8 on a 0-10 scale (and I won't use 9 or 10 for reasons, so you might argue that's really a 10). I'm desperately trying to massage the pain away, thoughts about dialling 999 are getting intrusive, and then the inevitable happens, and fortunately I made it to the toilet before I started throwing up. There wasn't much on my stomach, luckily, but dry wretching isn't exactly my favourite thing.
Fortunately by the time I was done wretching the bath was full, and a drowsy hour in the bath later I was mostly okay, but damn I loathe that pain pattern.
Discussion of messy minutiae of one of my pain patterns below the cut. Not one to read while eating.... Mostly documenting it in the hope of fixing it in my brain.
So I have various patterns of pain associated with my bendiness and back problems that are recognisable and I can usually tell you how they are likely to progress if I don't do anything about them, and ditto if I do do something. Doing something usually consists of stopping doing whatever it is that is triggering the pain, but when that includes things like sitting or standing life can be somewhat limiting if you don't push the boundaries.
And then there's this one. Which fortunately only turns up about once a year, which is just far enough apart to reliably forget what the warning signs are.
I fell asleep on the couch last night, probably about 9PM I think, but I honestly don't know. I woke up at 4AM, not feeling particularly drowsy, so did some general noodling about on the laptop (while lying flat with laptop on chest - in fact I'd slept with the laptop on my chest). 6AM I started to realise I was getting backache, the cushion had slipped to an awkward position under my mid-back, but putting it right seemed like too much effort (awkwardly lift laptop down etc). 6:30AM it was getting a bit more noticeable, and I was getting a little drowsy, so I thought I'd see if I could get back to sleep.
By the time I got upstairs to the bedroom my back was screaming and my ribs were starting to join in, that's never a good sign. So I grabbed my back brace, strapped myself in, and got flat on my back as quickly as possible.
Sometimes the brace works, probably if I catch it early enough. Today it didn't. Not only didn't it work, it actually made it worse and my ribs were spasming by the time I got it off again.
As best I can tell the rib spasms interfere with my breathing to the point I start breathing very shallowly in terms of rib movement, but simultaneously sucking air in to try and get enough into my lungs, and some of it gets past the diaphragm, so I'm then getting pain interfering with breathing from both sides of the ribcage and from below. So I'm trying to burp that trapped air up, which just interferes with breathing even more, which makes me breath even more shallowly, and so on.
At this point the only thing that will work is submerging in a hot bath until the spasms go away. But of course it takes time to fill a bath that deep.
So I have the bath running, the pain is getting worse, in fact it's hitting my personal 8 on a 0-10 scale (and I won't use 9 or 10 for reasons, so you might argue that's really a 10). I'm desperately trying to massage the pain away, thoughts about dialling 999 are getting intrusive, and then the inevitable happens, and fortunately I made it to the toilet before I started throwing up. There wasn't much on my stomach, luckily, but dry wretching isn't exactly my favourite thing.
Fortunately by the time I was done wretching the bath was full, and a drowsy hour in the bath later I was mostly okay, but damn I loathe that pain pattern.
no subject
Retching when you already have back pain is the pits.
Do you have an impressive set of grab bars around your bath? I find getting in and out terrifying, even though I've got two for my right hand and one for my left.
I've shared that same, fruitless "maybe if I wait it will magically get better" hope/wish/pattern. Ah! Life inside the chalk lines.
no subject
Annoyingly nearly ended up triggering the same backache last night, but was able to find my electric heat pad in time to stop it worsening, though I didn't exactly sleep well.
no subject
no subject