Back pain and more

Coffee shop celebration: John, me, Theresa, Gene

On Christmas Day, trying to find somewhere to have a decent cup of coffee becomes a real task. Those of us who hang out at Avellino's are spoiled, and regular coffee from Starbucks just isn't the same. The coffee shop is usually closed on Christmas, but two of the employees agreed to open from 8-11 just for coffee, no food, not even regular cups, just to-go paper ones. We didn't even hesitate: we were there before 8:00, waiting for the door to open.

And then here comes Theresa, loaded down with a piping hot quiche right out of her oven, a wonderful fruit salad, champagne and orange juice, with silverware and enough for everyone in the whole place. What a treat! We were intending to go out for breakfast after coffee, but there was no need. Theresa said she was honoring her mother, as Theresa is spending her first Christmas without her, since she died a few months ago. It was lovely and much appreciated. Festive and totally unexpected.

Sort of like my back pain: totally unexpected. I slipped and fell on our Thursday hike, scraped my knee and took a hit on my right hip as well. Since this is becoming a usual thing with me, I didn't think much of it. I was able to get up and keep going, and as soon as I got home I cleaned up the knee, which wasn't as bad as I thought. The hike had been pretty wonderful, a perfect thing to do after all the Christmas festivities. But then on Thursday, when I woke I had a little twinge in my right sacrum area. Nothing I hadn't experienced before.

But as the day went on, although I did all my usual walking and exercises, that area where those pins reside in my lower back began to get really sore. I figured it's another one of those sacroiliac joint pesky pinched-nerve situations. But it feels different: it's so painful that I had trouble sleeping Friday and Saturday nights, and today, Sunday, it's not any better. I've had many back pain scenarios before, where moving in a certain way will make me cry out in pain, but it came and went, depending on how I moved. This is pretty constant pain.

One of the nice things about keeping a blog is being able to go back and search for things that happened earlier. I remembered something similar having occurred back in 2011, more than nine years ago, and I went to a chiropractor who had been recommended to me. His name was long gone from my memory, but there it was! Tomorrow I'll call first thing and see if I can get in to see him. Tuesday I already have an appointment scheduled with the acupuncturist, and he always helps. But until then, it's pretty much all that is on my mind.

One of my blogging friends, Rian, who writes on Older But Better, has recently been dealing with terrible back pain, that just appeared suddenly. Mine was caused from trauma upon trauma, but in her case, she couldn't even walk. It's been almost a month and she's still in serious pain, with diagnostic tests showing nothing, no reason for it. I know why mine is hurting: I keep getting sciatic pain from two six-inch-long pins that reside in my right sacrum, from a pelvic fracture and trauma that I experienced almost twenty years ago. (If I could just fall on my left side, for heaven's sake.) As my sister has reminded me, any of these earlier injuries will come back to haunt us as we age.

I missed the walk with the ladies yesterday, because even though I can walk around, I cannot stride and move fast without discomfort. Getting up from sitting is the most painful movement, but after a few minutes of loud moaning and exclamations, it gets better and I can walk around with difficulty. Yesterday I went off to the pot store for some strong CBD that I can take internally. While I was at it, I also purchased a topical cream to add to the one I already had. Since the old one wasn't helping, the new cream was an effort to see if another formulation would work any better. It doesn't.

But I do have to say that the strong CBD tincture gives me some relief, but not for long. It does take the edge off for a few short hours, and I could sure tell when it stopped working. CBD doesn't make you "high" at all, and the difference with and without the tincture is noticeable, but I'm still in pain. As I sit here in bed with the laptop, I can feel that radiating pain from the pinched nerve, but I can deal with it. My friend Rian couldn't get out of bed for days, so I'm counting my blessings. Today I'll try going to drive to the gym and see how riding the stationary bike works with this pain. Plus, there's a sauna that might feel really good right now.

It's not like pain and I are strangers. I have experienced really serious pain, and I was addicted to OxyContin when I broke my pelvis. Back then the doctors didn't know how hard it would be for people to stop taking that awful opioid. Yes, it's effective with pain, but it's also extremely difficult to stop taking it. My doctor in 2000 had prescribed it without my knowledge; it was just one of the pills that the nurses gave me when I was flat on my back with the external fixator holding my pelvis together. It was a desperate struggle to free myself from that drug, so I can understand why so many people are unable to do so.

These days, I don't even like to take ibuprofen or acetaminophen for pain. I will take two or three tablets, but they really don't do much except mask the discomfort, and anything that does that encourages me to overdo. Pain can be a friend, if we allow ourselves to pay attention to what it's telling us. What it's telling me right now is to be good to myself and stop worrying about the number of steps I'm getting in for the day. It's amazing how strong a motivator my step counter is for me. But that should be secondary to getting better. R&R is hard for some people (rest and relaxation) and for some of us, it takes effort to relax!

Today I might get into the pool at the Y and see how swimming feels. Since I decided not to visit my sister in Florida next month, as I've done for the past eight years, taking a new look at the pool here is on my list of things to explore. When I first started swimming with Norma Jean at her pool, I would come back home and try to keep up the activity here. But the difference between swimming outdoors in a wonderful pool and struggling with the heavy chlorine and very crowded indoor pool here caused me to give it up. Time to see if I've changed my mind.

Well, here I am again, having written a rather mundane post about getting through my most recent misadventure, instead of remembering to count my blessings and be glad I'm still functioning, mostly. My dear partner sleeps next to me, my tea got cold before I finished it off, and the adventure of getting to the coffee shop looms ahead of me. I've got lots of things to watch on Netflix, Hulu and Amazon, so there no way I'll be bored, but I prefer working up a sweat and feeling my muscles getting a workout. I think I can still do that, so I'll give it a try today.

Until we meet again next week, I sincerely hope you have a wonderful New Years holiday and take care of yourself. Hopefully I'll be back to my old self by then. Sending you all many virtual hugs and thanking you for being there.