I've so had it. I try to stay positive, try to be hopeful, try to think of the bigger picture, but in all honesty, today I'm fed up.

I haven't written here in awhile simply because of the malaise of chronic pain. I actually had a decent summer pain-wise, and after my… Read full post »

During the past few weeks or so, I've noticed that on some mornings, I've been waking in a state of depression, which is a bit alarming as I know all too well just how devastating a full-blown clinical depression can be.

Obviously, I'm struggling deeply with the wear of chronic physical…

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It's been over a month since my last post. During this time, my dad had a heart attack, which required a week in the hospital, then quadruple bypass surgery, which required another week, and now rehab, where he's been for seven days and will be there for seven more.

To call… Read full post »

Well, Open Salon has done it again. In my darkest hour, I poured my heart out in a post, feeling somewhat guilty for expressing such a bleak mood concerning the bleak circumstances of my life, yet instead of chastisement (which at this stage of my life I still fear), OSers opened…

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The pain is overwhelming today. I thought I was really onto something with my last post, and maybe I am, but that doesn't console me right now.

Pain like this is ruthless, brutal, cruel. A few days ago I was on top of the world, which makes this crash all the harsher.

It's…

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I awoke this morning with an aching emptiness, as I knew this was a day that I was going to take a much harder look at myself, without the crutch of abusive substances.

What's been a little disturbing lately is my glass of wine in late afternoon, after my day is pretty… Read full post »

It's been a little over a year since I wrote my History Repeating post about the plague that engulfed Europe in 1347. Like a number of essays on this blog, it was inspired by a show on the History Channel, which just happened to air again yesterday.

I was just as fascinated…

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It caught me completely off guard. On Wednesday I was walking down Washington Street, a main shopping avenue here in Hoboken, and I was suddenly overcome by what I can only describe as a deep sense of peace.

The night before I did some jaw exercises, which mysteriously alleviated the pain…

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It would seem impossible that I could live a life without painkillers at this moment. This morning was a bad one that required one morphine pill, a Xanax and three Vicodins to get the pain to a somewhat bearable level, but I can no longer stand what these medications are doing… Read full post »

While shaving my head a few minutes ago (when's the last time you heard a woman say that?), I thought about my old therapist, for some reason. A couple of months ago, her daughter had called to tell me that she'd finally passed away of Alzheimer's.

I was a patient of this…

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Ever since I can remember, I've always questioned the meaning of life, even as a teenager, which back then made me think that I was insane...seriously. While all of my friends seemed to go about the daily business of boys, school, skin issues and just general life, I always had a…

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To my new OS pals:

When I signed up for OS, I didn't read the Terms of Service (TOS), but my friend Joe did and alerted me promptly. The language is downright scary! It basically says that everything we write is automatically licensed to OS, which OS can use as it… Read full post »

Today the pain is relentless and over the top. I just got off the phone with my friend Anne and I was sobbing. I said the truth that I've been thinking of for awhile now, which is that I don't want to live this way anymore. It's not that I don't…

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In my last post, I said that if all things really are relative, then the truths I learned about emotional health during my years in therapy should at least have some application to healing my physical state, which is one of chronic pain.

So I decided to do a five-day diet of…

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Make no mistake, I'm experiencing the mother of all boredom attacks.

I can't remember when my life has felt this dull. With all the things I love to do--write, paint, make music, dance, bike--you'd think something would catch my interest. But nope. I got nuthin'. I don't even feel like watching TV… Read full post »

I was procrastinating on Saturday, as usual, so when I went to pick up my pain medication at the pharmacy across the street, I found that they'd closed a little early, and I was absolutely freaked that I wouldn't have enough meds for the following day, yesterday (Sunday).

For someone in chronic…

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Sometimes I think this illness is just a waste of time, a waste of energy, a waste of potential, until I remind myself that as long as I keep up this journal, none of the journey is wasted, particularly if it can help another person.

It ain't easy, though. And it's…

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I think I'm losing it. Seriously. The pain level has mysteriously upped a few notches, and I'm just beside myself.

I got up at around 4 a.m. to go to bed (my cat woke me up from the couch) and it struck me while walking to the bathroom that my whole life…

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I have a piece of paper taped to my wall next to my drawing desk, on which I long ago scribbled the definition of chaos theory: "The more complex the pattern, the simpler the underlying reality."

I heard it on TV once, and I read it often, as science and the human…

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I've been reading a lot about Buddhism lately and I like it. It doesn't mince words. The very first thing Buddha teaches is that "life is suffering," and the religion basically goes on from there. What a concept. I suppose it's not surprising that I'm drawn to a religion that takes…

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Something remarkable happened this week, and I'm almost superstitious about reporting it.

I had an insight, which was this: How I feel about this pain, every single experience I have of it, precisely repeats how I felt in my childhood. The pattern is almost an exact recreation of the players and the…

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It's Saturday now. It's taken me two days to absorb the consultation at the Hackensack Pain Clinic, where after a long discussion about the details of my health history, I was told I would most likely be in pain for the rest of my life.

While I was told about treatments that…

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I watched the Farrah Fawcett documentary, Farrah's Story, last week about her two-year battle with cancer, and it was extremely moving, particularly since she's seemingly so close to death. Rarely do people document their health ordeals in this way, and what struck me most was her journal writings, w…

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The pain has returned, as have the painkillers. And so has despondency. Perhaps the worst thing about a period when the pain is moderate and endurable is that I tend to get overly optimistic, hoping that my jaw/face pain is on its way out for good. When it inevitably returns, my…

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Oh, man. Today is really bad. There's just something about this pain that is so debilitating, so crushing to the soul. I tell people it's like someone injected acid into my face and jaw, and lemme tell ya, it's hard to imagine at the moment what could be worse in this…

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