Pain level is 7.5 this a.m. – meds don’t help much some days. It’s a beautiful sunny day down by the beach. I’m sitting here listening to the Beach Boys, remembering my innumerable long walks. My fibromyalgia and arthritis have robbed me of that ability. I’m chair-bound most days, unable to walk unassisted. I may be robbed of my mobility but my memory is darn good. I have the benefit of revisiting those gloriously adventurous, almost endless days of walking all over the world…from one side of Paris to the other, from Sacre Coeur to Napoleon’s Tomb…loving every step on the road less traveled, never passing the same sight twice. And even here, at low tide, I remember walking the firm sand, picking up beach glass, leaving footprints that marked my shoreline progress. Some days I’d walk on the beach from one community to the next. I’d wander all day and forget where I parked my car, then I’d have to call someone to pick me up. Do you wonder why I didn’t just turn around and walk back the same way I came? Well, here’s my rule: Never go back. If you can make a circuit that takes a new route, one you have not taken before…that’s the way to do it. But never go back. The nonwilderness hiking rule is hard and fast…never backtrack. Backtracking is seeing again what you’ve already seen. It’s not a challenge. Life is short and backtracking is mostly a waste of consciousness. When abiding by that simple rule, what is the worst that could happen? Maybe you’d have to stop for coffee and wait for a bus? But never, ever go back. However, right now, as I look at all the joggers, walkers, strollers, and bikers passing by, I wish I had the ability, the option to go back…to backtrack to the days of endless exploration and discovery. A minute ago, when I began reminiscing, I thought those memories were a good thing. But now, I find myself resentful. I’m envious of those people parading in front of me. Seeing their freedom, I’m jealous and I long for active days gone by. I notice their sandy footprints knowing these are impressions I can no longer make. I remember and I feel twinges of tremendous loss and sadness. I find going back in my memories has suddenly become painfully difficult. This kind of backtracking, this recalling what you no longer can do, is not at all uplifting and not the least bit positive. I think, “What I lack is perspective”. Yet just now I glance up from my realizations and there directly in front of my car is a young man in a motorized wheelchair. With a noticeably firm grip on the steering knob, he carefully maneuvers his way across the street. He is obviously vulnerable to every hidden rut and daunting curb. He’s paying intense attention, concentrating on getting himself safely across to the other side. His perspective is in this moment…not yesterday or tomorrow…but right now. What am I paying attention to? Where is my concentration and perspective? Is this young man wasting his precious moments in resentment while traversing the street? Perhaps he’s never been able to walk, much less wander the cobbles of the Champs Elysees. I glimpse him at the bus stop ahead chatting and laughing with the others waiting there. How dare I be resentful after having such an active, full, and carefree life. I have no reason to be sad or grief-stricken. So many have never had the incredible opportunity to experience what I have. If I let my focus on my memories drift from fond and free to become a source of resentment and grief, I have lost the perspective of gratitude and the joy of today’s grace. Beneficial recollection is a matter of perspective and gratitude is the gift that keeps on giving. In my book, “Just Because You’re Suicidal Doesn’t Mean You’re Crazy”, I talk about making everyday choices on what to focus. It’s easy to lose focus on what you have and thus drift towards what you don’t, predisposing depression and in my youth, suicidality.  I realized over time that I must make this important decision every day. When it is so easy to return to resentful remembrance perpetuating pain, both physical and emotional, it becomes incumbent on me to purposefully decide to do the opposite instead. When we realize we have lost our perspective, then backtracking to grateful memory is not only positive but an enhancement of consciousness. I can make the choice, like this young man today, to keep my grip firmly on my steering and my perspective gratefully on navigating today in a positive way. 

I’M TIRED OR SOMETHING My good friend just told me she is paralyzed with malaise. This is much the same situation I had just revealed to her. I sit here, with her in mind, wondering the same exact thing she tells me she wonders. I’d give almost anything to know what causes this malaise or something whatever it is. I never know when it is going to happen either. Why does it come when it comes?  It does not seem to matter whether you have big plans (goals to look forward to) or little inconsequential plans (no big deals going on) or none at all (no stress to get anything done). It happens whether I just finished a big stressful project (exhaustion from relief of putting forward a huge effort) or just returned from fantastic time off (let down from a lot of downtime back to up tempo living). At one time I thought it was too much too look forward to, too many plans piled on top of each other.  So I got rid of some of those too big plans and I still felt the same way. I contemplated that perhaps it was because I felt incompetent to get the targeted things done, or that I didn’t have the expertise to do it completely or sufficiently. So I began developing a cadre of competent advisors and confidants who I could rely on to help me. I still felt the same malaise. Knowing who to call on simply did not prompt me to call. Then I thought, could it be that I am tired of life? Could I just be saying, “I don’t want to be here anymore and I’m bored with it all?” That’s suicidal talk if I ever heard it. But I’ve been suicidal before and seriously so. Being suicidal from age 8 to 32 is seriously, majorly suicidal and I should be an expert on feeling suicidal. After all, I am a suicidologist and I write books on how to overcome it, (“Just Because You’re Suicidal Doesn’t Mean You’re Crazy: The Psychobiology of Suicide”). Moreover, I know contemplating suicide is only an effort to make a person feel better. It is a simple and effective coping mechanism. Contemplating freedom from every daunting and incomprehensible problem promises peace and nothingness. But I know I don’t want death – I just don’t want this malaise. Feeling suicidal can strip you of energy and desire. But I have desire. I have tons of desire. I have so much desire it eats me up. I don’t have to kill myself because it kills me just sitting here contemplating what I cannot get up and do. It sounds like “depression” says my mental health counselor self. Well, this is not depression as noted in the bible of mental health disorders, the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Health Disorders.  I laugh at funny things. I sleep well. My appetite has not changed. I don’t feel like dying. I’m not persistently sad. I do things I have committed to do. I do my volunteer work and get plenty of satisfaction from it for as long as that lasts, which does not seem very long. But what I am is tired and in pain and for some reason seem to be extremely bored. I am on the only regime of pain medication that can be done at this time. The pain is tolerable. I simply do not understand it. I have a mission in life – I know what I want to do, what I feel I am called to do. I have hundreds of unfinished undertakings. Now comes the existential questioning. What in my life has given me pause to go forward?… What has disillusioned me so much that I cannot move towards my own goals?… What has given me the idea there may be no point in going forward? …What has happened and how am I interpreting it?… Has anything happened that has not happened before or has taken me by surprise and destabilized me? Well, let’s see… doubt and financial insecurity…disappointed by unrealized expectations…disappointing news and loss of some opportunities considered integral to my ongoing plan of achievement… questioning my overall achievement plan as to its viability…my new diagnosis of glaucoma and celiac disease and a notice that a dear and long-time friend has cancer. Well, let’s see…I guess if I were to be my own counselor, I could see why I felt stymied and “dead in the water” (maybe an unfortunate use of metaphor). I owe myself 100 bucks for professional consultation. Pay up. This is a cash business. And, not so dang amazingly, I do feel better. Thanks for listening.

I have been absolutely paralyzed by my increasing pain level. If I have to go see another “pain” specialist I’m going to scream my bloody guts out. I just got a text from a colleague who is a nurse. She suggested I change my medication regime. She’s on vacation right now. Sitting on the beach some place. I’m not unusual.  I deal with degrees of severe pain 100% of the day and night from combination of back pain, arthritis and fibromyalgia. Most of us who face this challenge have tried nearly every combination of meds usually used for auto-immune disease pain combined with severe arthritis or some other inflammatory or degenerative disease.  Doctors say it’s the number one complaint they hear.  It’s complicated and patients as well as docs are concerned about addiction. As a person in recovery for nearly 30 years, I refuse to get myself in a position of having to depend on a drug to live. I fought too hard to be free and I cherish my freedom. For that reason I have to be the nightmare patient when it comes to pain control. I’ve had so many “come to Jesus” talks from clinicians about taking pain medication before the pain gets out of control. Substance P, which is the neurochemical that prompts the feeling of pain in the body can develop a life of its own. From the about.com website, Substance P is responsible for the bodily interpretation of pain. It is a neurotransmitter communicating with other cells in the brain, spinal cord and, in some inflammatory processes, in joints. It’s best known to activate in low back pain, fibromyalgia, and arthritis. Bingo!  Got it. Got it all.  Substance P must be having a regular hay day in my body. But that is neither here nor there. I’m not writing this for someone to feel sorry for me and not even to relate to me because of their pain. There are thousands of us in pain all the time. Have you looked around lately?  Have you noticed the increase in number of handicapped parking places? Have you paid attention to the number of people using canes and walkers?  There is a heckuva lot of us out there and it does absolutely no good whatsoever to feel sorry for ourselves.  As a matter of fact, it makes things much worse. Because when you spend valuable time and brain energy feeling sorry for yourself, you cannot solve the immediate problems that are facing you at the time… like how to get the rockery mulched before winter, or how to get your bedspread washed when it won’t fit in your new washer/dryer.  So, here it is. I know I cannot hike any more. I can’t bike any more. I can’t even walk any more. The only exercise I get is picking up things I’ve dropped – and due to my arthritis I get more than my share of opportunity. And even that is neither here nor there. I can still think, and talk, and write and that is absolutely here and there in a big way. So, this morning, after getting the text from my vacationing friend, I thought, ‘I’m getting depressed and starting to feel sorry for myself.” What I need to do is to go someplace and sit somewhere different.

thinking