I've been wondering and pondering whether to write about this at all or not. Today I decided to just get it out. It's very personal and painful and there's always the chance I'll post and then immediately delete it like so many of my other posts recently, but here it is, for now at least.
Contains talk about gastrointestinal issues, colonoscopy, medications, pain, depression, anxiety and despair.
How it started
My current pain episode began on the 1st of December. Lower stomach pains so bad I thought I was gonna die or at least pass out. I wished I could pass out. It continued. And continued. For weeks. A couple of times spouse had to call an ambulance because I couldn't cope and my own pain meds did fuck all.
Fast forward a couple of months of examinations, fuck-ups, more examinations, a whole lot of waiting, and they finally figured out I needed a colonoscopy.
I've had one done before, years ago, before my current chronic pain situation got this bad. Even then the procedure hurt so much I nearly fell off the table and the doctor had difficulty finishing it. Due to this, and my current extreme sensitivity to pain, I thought I'd ask if they could do it under anaesthesia. However, the queues to this procedure are currently very long, and before I could call and ask, the central hospital transferred my examination to be done at a private health centre in order to relieve their queue situation.
When the nurse called to book my time, I asked about the possibility for anaesthesia. She said that it's not possible at the private health centre and that if I want it, it needs to be done at the hospital. She assured me though, that the techniques in the examination have come a long way since I had my previous procedure 13 years ago and that it's possible to give me strong medications beforehand to reduce pain and that with these it should be fine, even for me.
So, once again I had to weigh between two bad options: 1) a possibly very painful procedure done and over with in two weeks or 2) waiting months with my current pains for it to be done under anaesthesia. Because I was desperate to find a cause for my pain sooner rather than later, I chose the first option.
Spoiler alert: I really shouldn't have.
How it went
Earlier I wrote a bit about the diet restrictions I had to endure for the week before the procedure. It was annoying and the food was gross, but it did make the prep for the examination about as painless as it could be in my situation. Which is to say, not very, but tolerable. I sat on the toilet for 14 hours straight, save for a 2-hour break around midnight at which point I collapsed on the bed and dozed off for a bit, listening to an audiobook and the rumbling of my stomach.
To say I was exhausted in the morning before the procedure would be something of an understatement.
When I got to the health centre, they first gave me a sedative to calm me down from my anxiety/panic attack. It helped a bit, but not fully. I was grateful for the bit though, as at least I was able to breathe with relative ease. They also put in an IV. On the first try my vein burst and I got a huge bruise on my hand that hurt for two weeks. Luckily they got it in on the second try. Of course, got a bruise there too, that also hurt for two weeks. Fragile veins suck butt.
Just before they were to start the procedure, I was given The Good Stuff through the IV. As in, a hospital grade analgesic they use in anaesthesia and surgeries. It made me feel all fuzzy and dizzy and I lost sensation to most of my body. Unfortunately not my colon though. The very first second the doctor started the examination, I had such a jolt of pain in my lower abdomen that I couldn't help but cry out.
Doctor was just short of amazed and remarked to the nurse something along the lines of "Can you remember a time when the patient made noises during this procedure?"
Yes, they really used the phrase "made noises". (For possible Finnish speakers reading this, the exact words were "potilas ääntelee".)
Anyway, the doctor refused to continue the procedure because of the pain it was causing me. In my delirious state I actually tried to talk him into doing it anyway, because I felt like I'd done all that prep, suffered all that torture and anxiety in vain, and I was not having it. I was unsuccessful in my persuasions though and he said that he's gonna refer me back to the hospital and we'll try again under anaesthesia. The very thing I knew I should've asked for but in my desperation did not. I was devastated, and burst into tears right then and there. To make matters worse, the doctor also said that "probably your symptoms are just because of the pain and there's nothing else wrong".
Just. Pain.
"Just."
Again.
Fuck.
When I got home, I was tired enough that I slept almost the entire day and night. When I woke up the next day, I just wanted to die.
How it's going now
That feeling hasn't much left me since then. I've also been incredibly, unreasonably exhausted physically, due to... who the fuck knows. At first I thought it's just the after effects of the colonoscopy week but now I don't know any more. In February I got a prescription for a medication I had years ago that's suppose to help with pain tolerance. It's an old-fashioned antidepressant, but in small doses should help with pain.
Reader, it has not helped with pain.
What it has done is made it impossible for me to get any sleep. The common side effects do include sleepiness, but I thought that's because it's one of those... what's the opposite of stimulant? That. Anyway, I did not expect it to be due to the fact that I can't seem to be able to fall asleep at all, and when I do finally doze off, I have dreams so vivid, weird and detailed that I think it'd be better if I just stayed up all night playing video games, because that way I might actually get some rest. So yeah, I'm sleepy alright, but not sleeping.
My brain is such mush that I have trouble speaking. I can't find words, let alone string them together. I read, but do not understand. I read my own text, and I can't be sure if it's even a comprehensible sentence. I can't trust my own speech, my own writing. I stare at spouse, desperately hoping that they might catch the words I can't get out, directly from my brain. Sometimes it even works. Perks of being together for 13 years, I suppose.
It's like I'm constantly at that point in Alice in Wonderland where she falls down the rabbit hole, except that I keep falling and words and thoughts and feelings keep floating around me, but I don't know how to catch them or what I'm even trying to catch. But I do know I'm falling into a black hole. All the time. And in that black hole are my usual, familiar thoughts of being a worthless waste of space and how it'd be be better for everyone if I just made myself and all this pain that goes along with my existence disappear.
Of course the physical exhaustion doesn't help. The things that usually distract me from my mental pains are now out of reach because I can't even sit at a table, let alone walk around for more than a few minutes. I huddle on the sofa, trying to play for a bit, until my hands and mind shake too badly. Knitting, drawing, puzzles, books, everything seems to float further out of reach as my energy reserves dwindle.
So I decided to stop the medication and see if that might fix... something. At least I might go back from this absolutely dreadful and horrible sleep to my usual bad sleep. I didn't take the medication for very long, but I still have to taper it in order to reduce withdrawal symptoms.
It'll take a few weeks. Until then, I am once again in waiting mode, clinging desperately to the edge of a tiny scrap of hope that things might at some point turn for the better. Or at least I try not to think about the fact that it just... might not. And that this is what my existence will be from now on.
I hope it won't be, but like said, that hope is tiny. And shrinking by the minute.