What's mildly irritating you today?

[Lola Bunny]

Haha....well, had dinner tonite so I won't be up missing y'all

[infinite monkey]

The haughty librarian hacking up a lung.

They keep the haughty ones upstairs. All the nice ones work downstairs.

[infinite monkey]

My back.

The worst is sitting. And my job is sitting. It hurts so freaking much...neither PT nor meds nor time is getting rid of the base pain. It still radiates out and just doesn't feel right.

The PTist says she thinks I irritated a disc. Well you know what? I think it's something much worse than that, at this point.

Add to that (guys plug your ears if you're sensitive to women's issues) my perimenopause, which my doctor can surely no longer deny. Don't have a period for two months, then have one for a week, then a week off, then back again.

How come it all feels related? How come all I can think is my spine and innards are slowly rotting away while the whole world worries about whether I go to work or use my time off? And the good feelings I was having, the thoughts that I was going to be OK? Ha! Very funny mudderplucker. That's a good one. Say it again.

It's OK, I'll rot and die alone and it really doesn't matter in the grand scheme. I have one person in my life who actually will give me an encouraging word re: all this crap...even is she is a bully. I hate to admit it, but I guess sometimes I wish I could get a dovely coo coo, or a friendly cluck cluck, or even a there there, from my fellow hens. As is usually the case, when I finally decided to speak up, everything blew up...and when the dust settled and everyone had sung their kumbayas...LOOK...over there in the distance. It's that monkey girl. She looks so, I don't know, alone. Good, serves her right.

Did I start out about my back? Well, gee. How'd that happen?

[orthodoc]

Infi, sending out positive vibes (I'm not sure how to do the coos and clucks, but I'll try ...). Low bad pain SUCKS. It stops us in our tracks and makes the day miserable. I'm sorry yours is persisting. Pain could be due to a number of things; when it doesn't behave as 'expected', i.e. low back MSK pain, it's time to look elsewhere. Sounds like it's time for a visit to your GYN in any case. Get some workup done, figure out what's happening so that you can approach the problem together. If you've done this and been blown off, try another GYN if you can. And have your PCP keep pulling the threads together so if it's not a GYN issue (the back pain, I mean) you can keep working on that. Sorry you're still in pain.

[infinite monkey]

Thanks. I appreciate it. I don't feel as though I deserve it, but I appreciate it.

Just feeling sorry for myself, beaten, down. This too shall pass.

I'm sure very soon I'll be my usual "I don't need anyone I don't need help I can do it all myself" which hasn't been proven to work but it serves to protect.

[DanaC]

Ouch honey, I feel your pain.

Literally as it happens. I put my back out today doing Carrot's physio exercises with him.

Hopefully it'll pass by morning, but ya just never know with backs.

[BigV]

sorry about your finger infinite monkey, and your back.

[SamIam]

Originally Posted by infinite monkey

I hate to admit it, but I guess sometimes I wish I could get a dovely coo coo, or a friendly cluck cluck, or even a there there, from my fellow hens. As is usually the case, when I finally decided to speak up, everything blew up...and when the dust settled and everyone had sung their kumbayas...LOOK...over there in the distance.

Fuck those old hens and fuck their clucking, too. I'm sending you a purr-purr.

[infinite monkey]

Thanks you guys.

I want to go home and take a bath and go to bed. It's that kind of day. I sure do miss my clawfoot tub though. I have a teeny tiny tub.

[Undertoad]

IM, I am not a doctor or psych-doc, and I have never played one on TV.

In fact I have only played a few things, and all on stage. In "You Can't Take It With You", I played the son and xylophonist, and in "The Crucible" I played an evil town authority.

So I am completely a lay person on this. But you have had soooo much stress in recent times. I wonder how much of your back pain AND perimenopause are actually stress-related and not an actual injury.

I know that this is not uncommon. The mind-body connection, you know, is more powerful and complicated than we think. Like when I went on psych drugs for panic, my life-long battle with irritable bowel disorder magically went away and never came back. That's some powerful mojo.

I also know that in times of stress, my body has done some damn weird-ass things to me, and back pain was a part of that, to the point where I just had to lie down flat sometimes. But it wasn't an injury. It was all muscles tightening up and eventually they caused pain.

[infinite monkey]

I played the mom in "They Run In Our Family" in Jr Hi.

I also play the fool in real life!

Oh, I certainly agree about the effects of stress on the body. I think my upper back spasms are most certainly related to stress. So stress affects me somatically as well as emotionally. It's just that...they tell you to listen to your body. I'm listening and it SEEMS to be saying "you need some serious doctorin'." But I know there are things they want to eliminate first, hence the physical therapy. And at some point I end up looking like a crazed hypochondriac. I have no patience because I think if it IS something serious how far will it get before we've eliminated everything else?

I may be sensitive to that, too, because I ran into an old buddy at the funeral home. She's been fighting ovarian cancer and is back in treatment and she's so wonderful and strong but that is something that scares the hell out of me.

I'd like to actually ASK for a hysterectomy. Crazy, huh?

Right now I feel like I'm on way too many meds: the ones I've been on for depression for a long time and more recently for anxiety...and now for blood pressure and hormones and temporarily for pain.

BAsically it's making me all very tired and that doesn't help. I melted down a bit yesterday and I was so very disappointed because I actually believed for a minute that maybe, just maybe, these recent events had put things into perspective. But no, I am once again having to resign myself to the chronic nature of my, well...personality.

So I revert to old crappy me and then I feel badly for being crappy me.

Hey even keel folks. Can you tell me what it feels like? I can't even imagine. It has to feel really great. I am of the envy.

Thanks T.

[Aliantha]

Infi, you have heaps of support around here from lots of people. You need to go back and read some of the posts where people show you their love and concern just to remind yourself. There is more than one person who cares about you here and if you're honest with yourself, you must know that.

I'm really sorry you feel so low though. I hope somehow you can pull yourself out of this hole that just seems to keep getting deeper. Honestly, I'm starting to really be concerned that you wont until you hit the bedrock, and we all know it's a long way up from there. Grab onto something before you keep slipping girl. Pull yourself up by the bootstraps. Whatever cliché you need to use really. Just do it. And don't forget, you are loved. You've told us many times about your wonderful family. Don't forget they will want to help you too if you let them. xxx

[infinite monkey]

Oh golly gee willickers, this shouldn't drive me batty but it does.

So there's this new chick in the office. New as in she just showed up one day, in tow of our interim "get this office in shape" woman. And new as in she's like, 12.

Very sweet girl. Very sweet. Very very sweet.

I say 'like' a lot. It's actually a conscious thing: I'm either joking or using like for the weird sort of emphasis the word gives a sentence. I'm certainly aware when I'm using it. And of course being an 80s girl valley girl wantedtobe, 'like' is not a foreign word to me.

This girl is not joking, nor is she aware of it. To top it off (and this is really the kicker) she ends every sentence with an uptick in the intonation at the end...like every sentence is a question. I know that's a young person thing. But OMG (and I say that in the most valley girl way I can) it makes me bughouse. I just heard her leave a voicemail and leave her phone number. "It's 555-555-1234?" I mean, that's how it sounds. I don't know how to convey that in a post.

It's kind of funny, but her voice carries big time, and she's only two cubes down. And, really, I don't know what her job is. One time in a staff meeting she said she was *my job title with 'analyst' taken out and 'assistant' inserted.* Whaaaaaaaaaa? I didn't know I got an assistant. Good, I could use one. In other correspondence, they call her an officer (that's the preferred term for our counselors, don't know why. Counselor was fine for me at my old job.)

I just don't know what she does? I mean, like, she seems very capable? And like, she is very sweet? And I know she will, like, be very valuable to us?

(Another cow orker, another young lady...but older than this one...who is very mature and wonderful and I really like her and all that...but she says to me she says "I think it's sweet how naive she is." I said "Oh, I know, but I'm old." But what I wanted to say was "Honey, life is gonna kick both your asses up and down the street. When you've been HALFWAY around that block, you let me know."

'Cause I'm so wise and all. *snickers*

So I'm teasing about her while teasing myself. It's all good, like, you know?

[infinite monkey]

Oh, and thanks Ali for your kind words, and to anyone else I may have missed. I got all discombobulated.

[BigV]

I do know. You described it so perfectly I could hear it as a ground my teeth and my way through your post, y'know? (*squeak*)

aaauuugh!

I pity you fool. earplugs? some jean claude van-damme high kick to the trachea?

good luck. please post no audio files.