- Subscribe to RSS Feed
- Mark Topic as New
- Mark Topic as Read
- Float this Topic for Current User
- Bookmark
- Subscribe
- Mute
- Printer Friendly Page
Coping with chronic pain
Hey guys, I couldn't find a thread for managing chronic pain- sorry if this already exists! There is the chronic illness support squad which is similar though 🙂
So I guess this is a thread for sharing experiences relating to pain and offering peer support and coping strategies (when asked for). This isn't a place to advocate for 'cures' or certain treatments, but more just for hearing each other and sharing things that have helped cope with the mental, emotional, physical, etc impacts of chronic pain. This is a safe space so if you do want to share, you can share as much or as little as feels comfortable for you (while keeping the guidelines in mind of course). There's no pressure to go into detail. Everyone is welcome, regardless of if it's you or someone else experiencing pain, or if you just want to know more, and there's no 'gatekeeping' here. If you need help about anything, big or small, diagnosis or not, we're here for you 🙂
Try to be mindful of others who might be I guess 'vulnerable' when talking about things- e.g. try not to make promises or pessimistic/optimistic generalising statements about what will happen and what people with certain symptoms can and can't do. Try sticking to talking about your own experiences and how they impact you, while being mindful and respectful of other's experiences too. Also everyone's experience is valid no matter how 'severe' it is. It's normal to compare yourself to others who have it better/worse than you and a whole range of emotions can come up from that, and that's okay. But that doesn't make anyone's experience more or less valid, and we are here to support everyone!
If anyone else can think of anymore guidelines we should stick to so that this is a safe thread that would be cool! Or if there's something you want to change about how we approach this thread- that's okay! Cause I feel there's a lot to keep in mind when talking about this stuff!
Edit: If you need more individualised support than you feel this thread has to offer, you are of course always welcome to make your own thread about what's been going on for you. If stuff is really hard and some topics might be triggering for others please put a trigger warning if you think it's still appropriate for this part of the forum, otherwise it might be more appropriate to make a thread in the 'heavy feels' or 'something's not right' sections of the forum. As always if you're feeling unsafe or needing more intensive support, please check out these resources as we do care about you and want you to be safe
Just coming on here to vent. My arm is still hurting from having a cannula to get an MRI for my other pain and it's getting to me 😞 I just don't know what's wrong or how long it'll take to fix. The doctor said it's not showing any physical signs of being hurt so it must have been that the needle hit a nerve. I don't even know what that means. She said it doesn't seem like there's much point in getting an ultrasound. So now I feel like I'm not doing anything to fix it and it's hurting and throwing me off and making it difficult to do stuff without constantly being aware of it
Why is everything nerve pain? Does nerve pain mean it's in my head? I feel like I need to stop worrying about my health all the time. Sorry if I said anything triggering here
Hey @Lost_Space_Explorer5 , I'm sorry that your arm is still hurting and that your doctor isn't giving you much support to work out what's going on. I can definitely understand that feeling of wanting to actively do something to fix the pain - did your doctor give you any advice on what to do about if from here?
Nerve pain definitely doesn't mean it's in your head. Even though there aren't always visible signs of nerve pain, it can be incredibly unpleasant all the same! Invisible pain is absolutely still real and valid ❤️
My FND was going so well but now everything hurts from my hips down. I hate nerve pain.
Aw @Tiny_leaf I'm sorry to hear. I imagine it would be very uncomfortable. Do you know what may have triggered it? I'm glad to hear that your FND has been generally better though!
I have no idea, it was really sudden as well.
Though it could be my weird nervous system responding to hypermobility-related knee pain...
But the pain's all gone down again fortunately.
@Tiny_leaf I'm so glad the pain has gone down again now - that sounds like it was really painful. 😢
Never written in this thread before (think it's a great idea) but i guess i'm seeing if anyone has any tips...
I have bipolar 2 disorder and very long story short, i'm still in the process of waiting for meds to fully work.
I've always had issues with fatigue. But it seems to have gotten worse recently. Don't know if it's just bipolar flare ups, medication side effects, fatigue from dealing with this for so long... Anyway I'm normally really good at pushing through. But at the moment it's hard.
And I'm so harsh on myself. Even though my bipolar disorder is pretty severe, I'm very high functioning. So I expect myself to continue to be high functioning. But then when my fatigue kicks in, it's hard. It's like the bad fatigue triggers my depression symptoms which trigger the fatigue. Or other way around. It's exhausting and I feel sapped of all my energy.
Like last week at TAFE I told one of my lecturers I'm struggling with some work at the moment because of my bipolar disorder. He was very nice, which I knew he would be. But I feel so bad that I can't live up to my high expectations.
And because my fatigue is invisible (like all the other bipolar symptoms), I sometimes doubt if it's valid/real. Am I making it up? My familly can't see it. And it's hard to get people to understand how bad it is. And then I feel bad when I can't do as much as I normally do.
So yeah I guess I'm just seeing if anyone has any fatigue management tips/dealing with feeling bad about not doing as much as you think you should.
For fatigue I normally work on things a tiny bit at a time and then rest. I get things done a lot more easily then, and pushing through fatigue can make it worse,
It also might be worth doing some troubleshooting to figure out what the problem is.
Have you been getting enough sleep?
If not, working on that might help your fatigue. You can literally take a nap now if you need one?
Are you able to take some time to something calming and enjoyable and see if that helps?
Study and mental illness can be tiring, and you might be burntout. If doing something relaxing helps, you might need to let yourself rest.
Do you have any physical illnesses or other things that could be making you tired?
For me if I've got less energy than normal it can sometimes be my iron levels, but there are lots of things that can make you tired.
Sometimes it can be good to see a doctor if your symptoms change to make sure there's nothing else going on.
Thanks for your replies @Savannah-RO and @Tiny_leaf
Yeah I always get a decent amount of sleep. Sometimes I take naps to help me get through the day.
Agree that doing things a little at a time is good. But I'm still not very good at the rest in between, I feel bad about that part.
I agree it's good to check if something else is going on. Everything is so complicated and interconnected. I've heard about iron and fatigue being linked.
My physical health has always been dodgy, even before mental health issues.
I've had lots of stomach problems in the past. Parasites, gastritis. I still have food intolerances.
I'm currently under a naturopath for literally everything cause my body and mind are a mess.
Burn out is a possiblity. I've burnt myself out in the past. But I've just recently left school for Tafe, and it's way calmer. But hasn't made a difference to fatigue. I'm now less stressed. So idk.
Feeling like this has become normal, so I expect myself to keep pushing through and feel bad when I can't. I have high expectations of myself and not really good at admitting I'm sick so I am still pretty busy.
I'm trying to learn to rest, but it's hard. I need distractions. And sometimes watching Netflix in bed isn't enough. When I was at school I overworked myself to try and distract myself from the fact that I felt crap. But that lead to burn out. I'm trying to learn from that and I definitely rest more than I used to.
Thanks
Hey @Akinna,
Thanks for sharing. Fatigue is a really tough one to pinpoint which can be really frustrating and make us feel powerless. The community have given a lot of good suggestions to look into so I will try to add different points if I can. You mentioned that you have been seeing a naturopath for some things. Have you mentioned your fatigue to them? They might have some suggestions 🙂 In my experience, if I am ever feeling particularly fatigued, I will chat to my doctor about my options and if there are things that we need to investigate. I also try to avoid caffeine after 12pm and try to sleep at a consistent time each night which can give you a better quality sleep. I also read something lately about having genuine 'rest'. I know for some of us, 'rest' is usually accompanied by guilt, stress or worrying about doing nothing. There is an article here that explains a little bit about what I am referring to. Do any of these things resonate for you?
Hey @Taylor-RO
Yeah I've mentioned fatigue to naturopath. It's nothing new, an ongoing issue getting worse and I'm getting fed up with. A lot of stuff going on with body and mind.
Don't drink caffeine and have pretty regular sleep times. I am conscious of doing lots of things to help me sleep.
That's a really good article, thanks for sharing. Definitely resonated with it. Maybe I'm not getting genuine rest.
My mind neverrrrr stops. I constantly overthink. Distractions from thoughts and emotions is a survival technique. Includes lots of watching Netflix and listening to stuff as I try to fall asleep. Probably affects genuine rest.
Hopefully once meds fully kick in and my mind and emotions calm a bit it will be easier to get genuine rest.
But I think there are some points I can try to apply even now.
Thanks for your help!
Hey @Akinna
Thanks so much for sharing this with us. I can relate to so much of what you've said. I sometimes think it's odd that I can feel so fatigued, but also my mind is going a mile a minute! 😅
Something that definitely helped me was getting my medication right. I'm glad that you're working with your supports and I'm super hopeful that they will help! What are you watching on Netflix at the moment?
Yeah makes sense @Emily-RO that right medication will help with fatigue, glad that's helped u and hopefully soon it will also help me!
Gotta love having a mind that never stops 😆
I'm currently rewatching friends. Definitely a comfort show that makes me smile. Then I might start rewatching the the Big Bang Theory. I've only watched it once and love it, it's quite similar to friends. I love comedies. When you're struggling with depression it's good to find something that makes you laugh.
Proud of myself- feeling very depressiony, apathetic, unmotivated at the moment. But managed to convince myself to go into the surf today for a bit, only body boarded but it was nice and now I'm going to jump off the jetty with my sister and her friend ☺️
Hey @Akinna
Thank you for sharing this with us, it will be interesting to hear how other people cope with fatigue so I hope this can open up a good discussion around this! The cycle of depression and fatigue that you described sounds really difficult to live with, especially when you are putting pressure on yourself to do your TAFE work as though you don't live with a mental illness. Its awesome that you let your lecturer know that you were feeling like you were falling behind because of your Bipolar. I am also glad to hear they were understanding. It is so important that you remind yourself that just because you cant physically see your bipolar, it is there and it does effect you physically and mentally. You need the extra rest to survive and that is entirely valid and okay 💛 You shouldn't always have to push through!
I now have 'concrete' evidence that my pain is 'real' because the mri I got showed nerve entrapment! I've been asking my parents to apologise for saying it's in my head and I feel kind of happy now that people will believe me and there is something else that might be able to be done 🙂
Hey @Lost_Space_Explorer5, I am sorry that your parents invalidate your pain. That must be so upsetting and frustrating. I am getting the sense that you find the MRI results to be a little bittersweet in the sense that you need 'concrete' evidence for people to take you seriously. Is that right? At the same time, as you said, it can sometimes be a nice feeling to be able to work towards better managing whatever is going on 💖
Thanks @Taylor-RO ❤️ yeah it is bitterweet, that's exactly right- it's like why did I need the evidence in the first place to be believed? 😞 And like even then I'm worried people won't believe me. And yeah it's nice that there might be something else that can be done 🙂
Really happy to hear youre getting some answers though @Lost_Space_Explorer5 ! Were hoping that it becomes more manageable with time - But i hope you can keep us updated with any news 🙂
@Lost_Space_Explorer5 ouch nerve pain sucks...
I'm so glad you know what's going on now though.
Just dislocated my shoulder 😠
It popped back in but wow that hurt. I literally just lifted my arm and one of my bones just decided to go on a holiday.
Oh no @Tiny_leaf that sounds incredibly painful 😭 Sending you lots of love to help your body recover and feel better!! 💖💖
@Savannah-RO yeah...
Like I've had worse pain but never such a strong feeling of "that bone should not be there"
Anyway, it's the arm that I use my walking stick with, but I have to rest it so I've had to swap arms. But I've got a sling now, and the doctor I saw is happy that it's back in place and thinks it'll be fine with rest.
Anyway... don't do dislocations...
@Tiny_leaf I certainly hope that I never have to experience a dislocation, it does not sound like a good time at all 😫 I am glad you saw your doctor about it and that things will hopefully be okay with some rest!