I hadn’t realized how much I am hurting until I started to take the post-op painkillers.
It started in the ER. My stomach hurt, but the pain was not killing me. So I was a bit surprised when they hit me with Dilauded -based on what I know it is a narcotic in the morphine range. It went in IV, and first I felt a spreading warmth all over my body. Then I was like a spreading sense of relief – knees and hands and shoulders and back and… well, all over. The part I noticed least was my belly. Yes, it stopped hurting, but it hadn’t been that bad to start with. It was all the other parts of my body that were so relieved.
I was drugged, but not wiped out. Not going to sleep, able to hold a conversation as long as it wasn’t too complex, able to follow what was going on other wise. And I didn’t hurt.
Afterward I was dealing with the effects of the operation itself – I hurt some if I didn’t move, more if I did. But it wasn’t killer pain as long as I was careful. But when they hit me with the post-op IV morphine, the thing I noticed was the lack of pain every where else in my body.
The first day or two at home I was pretty steady on the Darvocet every 5 or 6 hours, and part of that was due to pain, and part of that was to keep pain from getting out of control. It never got bad – the worst was a few times when I moved wrong and that only for a few minutes. But again, what I noticed was how it lessened the pain in other parts of my body – pain I was so used to having that it had just turned into back-ground was… well, it was still there, but it was no where near as bad.
Tonight I finally talked to Catherine about it. She pointed out the amount of over-the-counter pain medicine I have been taking – Excedrine and Ibuprofin and others – for months. When I first started working at the assisted living I knew it was going to be hard on me – I am not as young as I once was, and it was going to mean suddenly being on my feet for long hours, and being physical in patient care with lifting and other activities. At the beginning I took meds before my shift started, at lunch, and at the end of the day. After a few weeks it leveled off and then started doing better. But by mid-December the amount I was taking was going back up, and the times I didn’t take it but wanted to were more. I added herbs – Cayenne, to be specific – and Icy Hot to a bunch of places all over my body. It helped, but that is all I can say about it. When Catherine got some Vicodine for her back in January I wished I could take some of it. (I didn’t, because of the possibility of drug testing at work. But I sure wanted to.)
So I am suddenly aware of some things that have me worried. I had Fibromyalgia years ago and it was miserable. I finally got over it with a mix of herbs and other natural treatments, and have done pretty well for a long time. Still, I have had times of aching all over for weeks or months, with little relief from most treatments. It was something I had to deal with, and after a while it would get better. Over the last couple of years it has probably happened more often… something I have not really wanted to admit even to myself.
And now this feels a lot like that and it has me worried. If it keeps getting worse it is going to be… well, I’m not sure.
Bright Blessings -
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