Epidural #31

I receive epidural #31 tomorrow. I received epidural #1 in December, 2013.

The past three weeks have been rough. My normal depression has been abnormally high in intensity and duration, along with anxiety. Thinking is difficult, making choices monumental. I'm having great difficulty accessing the part of my brain/mind that houses the tools to manage the psychological roller coaster. So, I just hold on, knowing it will end. But, it just keeps on chugging. I'm tired.

This morning as I was thinking about how to flip my perception -- (Something I do to find silver linings in given circumstances. Doing such can really shift my thinking patterns into a larger context of life.) -- the thought hit me, It needs to rest. "It" being my mental-health-navigational compartment.

The thought caused me pause and a sliver of clarity. I don't recall ever considering such. That that part of my mind -- the part that helps me so often, a part I think of as more mechanical(?) in nature -- needs to rest too. It makes sense; even machines need rest. In order to rest, that part of me, that regulator, has simply shut down...temporarily. Surely, it is temporary.

And perhaps it feels shut down because of the increased load that has been put on it the past three weeks. Capacity overload to an already taxed system wearied from years/decades of toil; especially the recent years managing polyradiculitis, metallosis, etc., and all their repercussions.

My hope is that the effects of my epidural tomorrow will help, and I'll once again have the cognitive, emotional, and physical energy to navigate better. One of my concerns with this recent, almost incessant, struggle is that a pattern of negative loop thinking will create a pathway that becomes more difficult to divert. That has happened before. And, if it happens again, I may need to hire professional help to get back on track.

Six weeks ago, in my last round of cervical spine trigger point injections, I received 20 mg less steroid medication in my injections, 100 mg instead of 120, an experiment, which I asked to give a try. (I get the cervical spine, trigger point injections every twelve weeks alternating with the every-twelve-week lumbar epidurals.) I did not fare as well as usual and had to take higher-than-usual daily doses of prednisone (which may be a factor in the more intense emotional roller coaster). It's hard for me to believe that 20 mg could make that much of a difference...but maybe it does.

There has been a more-than-the-usual amount of butterflies in the back yard, most of them Yellow Tiger Swallowtails. I've enjoyed watching them, how they sometimes float and sometimes fly. One flew really high into a tall tree. I had no idea butterflies could fly that high. I looked up the subject on the internet and read that people flying gliders have seen butterflies as high as 11,000 feet! What seems such a delicate creature is actually quite strong, equipped to endure winds and the cooler temperatures at higher altitudes. Fascinating.

Another thing I thought about this morning:
I don't have much of a support system, when it comes to people checking in on me. But then, seldom do I ask for support. After years of this chronic condition, it's just so "routine." And I seldom engage people anymore, because of the energy expenditure required. I'm not quite sure how to put this without maybe coming across as "woe is me." But this morning I thought, My epidurals are like a haircut. That is, they are so routine they seem no more significant than receiving a haircut. Why would I ever ask for support when it comes to getting a haircut? But I know epidurals aren't haircuts. And (in reality) I don't think others think of them as haircuts.

I doubt most people think of epidurals at all, mine or anyone's.

~*~

9/08/20, 3:15 PM, just before leaving the house for my 4:00 neurologist appointment to receive
epidural #31:
Hubby hands me a card that had arrived in our mailbox. Normally our mail doesn't arrive until 5:00 PM or so. The card is from a long-distance friend in Chicago, just checking in and letting me know how much I'm valued. She even put a cycling postage stamp on it. (I'd like to get some of those stamps.) The Listeners had perfect timing.