August 11th, 2019

Welcome to my blog on living with pain. This is going to be a journal of sorts of daily life when you are in constant pain. Most people think living with pain is living in constant excruciating pain I think. It isn't always excruciating. But constant pain will drain you. Trying to work full time and function after that is nearly impossible. I work at a desk all day, I have a tumor in my upper abdominal muscle, it is called a Desmoid tumor, or Aggressive Fibromatosis. You really need to be treated by a cancer specialists to manage these but it is not considered cancer anymore because it can not spread to other parts of the body. But because these things are made out of Fibroblasts, the body's own basic building block, if you try to remove it surgically they tend to recur and come back worse than the first one. So this is the background of some of my pain. The other source is I have severe osteoarthritis in both knees and have been told they are so bad I should have total knee replacements but am too young so we are doing everything we can to hold off until we have no other choice. 

 So today, Sunday August 11th I woke up to the joy of feeling like someone is trying to break a lower rib on the right hand side. This after a typical night of not sleeping well. I can only sleep on my back or left side because the tumor makes it nearly impossible to sleep on my right side. The last measurements on it was 8.3 x 7.8 x 4.7 centimeters, this was at the beginning of July and I think it is still growing. I experience nerve pain where I feel like someone is jabbing me with hot needles from right under my right breast to my belly button. We are starting Gabapentin to help cut down on those particular fun sensations. We are now trying Meloxicam to help my knee pain. The knee pain is significantly reduced but so far still dealing with the nerve pain. I think today's pain is from moving a couple of lightweight chairs yesterday. Which means for today I will not be doing much at all. I am becoming more housebound when I am not working because sitting straight up in an office chair causes quite a bit of nerve pain because the muscles used are strained due to the tumor. Most days when I get home all I want to do is crawl in to bed until the next day, but I know I can't because life needs to keep moving. 

Today I am not going to do much, I want to help get the chairs in but doubt I will be able to do much but hold a door open or move small items. I won't be bending down at all because I am positive I will need to take a Vicoden to deal with the pain afterwards. Imaging bending at the waist with a 3.25 x 3 x 1.75+ inch stone in your abdomen right under the lower part of your rib cage. It is uncomfortable at best. I am exhausted already and want to crawl back in to bed but I can't. I also want to cry because looking at the day ahead I am already overwhelmed. 

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