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Chronic Pain & Me
In December 2017 I was diagnosed with Cervical Cancer for the first time. I didn’t know what “having cancer” would entail and I never expected the level of pain that it would cause me both physically and emotionally. Although I managed to find myself in remission from the cancer itself, it left me with a stark reminder of it: constant pain. We flew through the basic pain killers going from paracetamol to morphine to fentanyl pretty quickly as well as drugs like Gabapentin to try and control the neuropathy that formed in my feet initially due to the chemotherapy. By the time I finished treatment the neuropathy began to spread…
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Gear
Here I am spun out on gearWill tomorrow be less full of fear? Don’t worry it’s all legal,Free too, for those that are frugal. Each prescription goes, if you think I’m a drain,To fight the good fight – the war on pain.Because the nerves won’t listen anymore,They have panic attacks no matter the score. Adhesions don’t know how to healLeaving me unsure how to feelUnable to trust my own two feet on the floorDid you think I was joking when I said it’s a war? Like my body is on a spreeDesperately seeking a space to be freeTrying to find a moment of peace for my mindOverwhelmed by all my…
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Two Years On
Two years ago today I attended my first colposcopy appointment. I was 29 years old and I had just had my second baby. I was pretty much exuding happiness, tired happiness, but happiness nonetheless. Cancer. It’s a word none of us want to hear, ever. Not for ourselves or for those around us. It’s deceitful, it’s cunning and sly. It hides and it eludes is. It puts those who are diagnosed with it through hell (and that’s putting it mildly). It’s the word I heard by the end of that first appointment. As time goes by I become increasingly aware that I’m able to examine this memory from different angles.…
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The Thing about pain management…
Pain management is a really tricky thing. It’s a like trying to walk through a whirlwind to find the middle of the storm, a place of sanctuary and peace. Once you climb up the opioid ladder there aren’t many places left to go, and it becomes less about medications and more about exploring alternative avenues of pain relief. Acupuncture is highly recommended to help with neuropathic pain (nerve pain from broken or damaged nerves) and also to help with the hot flashes from the menopause. But it IS hard to find an acupuncturist who has the relevant experience of dealing with a cancer patient with damaged nerves, but I’m still…
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Remission
Remission;Feels like a lie by omission,This is just an intermission,A fire awaiting its ignition, It seems like I am waiting,For a little cell to begin tainting,While I spend every minute hating,This disease that spends no time wasting, Corrupting my flesh, my blood, my mindMy existence here is timedI’ve never felt so blindMy future already signed When it comes I shall fight,I will not lose the light,I will struggle with all my might,For those who shine so bright, Remission;Feels like a lie of omission,This is just an intermission,A fire awaiting its ignition.
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A long overdue update
Oh goodness, it’s been such a long time since I did a proper update. Things have been hard in so many ways. Now I’m just trying to think of where to begin to really update you. I guess a while back in July seems a good place to start, when I first heard the term “long term prospects” and was told that palliative care would be starting to had over to the pain clinic. This was amazing news but with the end of my radiotherapy came the beginning of my neuropathy. Neuropathic pain is notoriously hard to manage. There are drugs available to help but they often aren’t the loan…
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Cervical Cancer
Of the five gynaecological cancers this is the one that I have battled. This is the cancer that has robbed me of organs, has caused me so much pain, meant I’ve been through treatment that has stripped my nervous system and left my immune system in tatters. This is the cancer that has made me want to fight to make sure every woman knows her own body and how to ensure she stays healthy ❤️ So, here we go, your very own crash course in cervical cancer: Cervical cancer develops in a woman’s cervix (the entrance to the womb). It’s thought to mainly effect sexually active women between the ages of…
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The Eye of the Storm
During the middle of some of the most intense pain flares I’ve had, I seem to have found the eye of the storm. A place where I can stand and breathe where I can dream of being pain free. It takes some finding, and sometimes I question if I’m really in the middle of it or just so overwhelmed by the pain that my body just gives out. I suppose it could be either. When it starts I can feel the buzzing in my feet begin to increase and then it starts to creep up my legs, slowly at first, as if teasing me “ooh, you know what’s coming but…
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Telling it As it is
Now, every time I witness a strong person, I want to know: What darkness did your conquer in your story? Mountains do not rise without earthquakes ~ Katherine Mackenett Tuesday, 19th December 2017 The day that the darkness began. This was the day that I first heard the word cancer. That I saw the look on the doctors face and I first asked if I was going to die. The day I phoned my mum and sobbed down the phone to her “What if I am dying Mum?”. This was the day in my history that will forever be written as the one that the C-bomb exploded on, casualties still…
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A New Path
I remember being a little girl playing mummies and daddies knowing that my ultimate goal in life was to have my own family. I wanted the perfect bloke (and I did pretty well on that front, even if I do say so myself), the house, 2.4 kids, you know, the whole 9 yards. I wanted that more than anything else. I think it’s why I struggled so much when people asked me what I wanted to “do”. I loved what I studied but I always wanted to answer that question with “be a wife and a mother”. That’s why when I was diagnosed with cancer it felt like a particularly…
