Could a new pain be isolated?

January 14, 2015

Sitting at my computer has become more painful, now that I can’t find a comfortable position for my foot. I didn’t fall or trip or do anything else to it, but one day it started hurting. Usually my pain is in joints or in more “common” areas like my back and neck. The top of my foot was a new one. So I waited for it to away.

But it didn’t go away. I meant to mention it to my new podiatrist when I went to get examined for new orthodics, but I was so excited about the orthodics that I forgot to mention it. When I went to pick up the new orthodics 2 weeks later, I still had the pain, and this time I remembered to mention it. She said that the area I’m pointing is actually related to joint. Immediately, alarm bells went off in my mind. A joint?? Could I really have a new joint acting up?? She explained that there was a ligament there that had probably gotten stretched too far some how. She said it should fix itself within a few weeks, but it had already been a few weeks. The next step would be to immobilize the foot. Um, no thanks! Well ok, I might have. But first she wants to see if the new orthodics help. I sure hope they do!

But in the meantime, I’m left to wonder if this new problem is isolated or if it’s part of my connective tissue issues. It’s possible that it’s isolated, right? Right? I mean, if an otherwise-healthy person can have this problem, then I can too, right? Right?

But it’s also possible, even likely, that it’s an extension of the pain that I already have in my wrists, toes, knees, fingers…. Every few years I get pain in a new set of joints and it doesn’t go away. It can’t be “healed.” I haven’t had any new joints join the list in several years so I’ve been lulled into thinking this might be it. But I should know better. Despite all of my hard work and all of my improvements, I still have the same autoimmune diseases, whatever they are, that caused the problems in the first place. I’ve always assumed that sooner or later all of my joints would succumb to this. I just hoped it would be later rather than sooner. And when I pictured it, I didn’t picture this particular spot of pain that I never knew existed in relation to a joint.

This isn’t the end of the world. Actually, in my world, it’s relatively minor. The pain isn’t actually what’s bothering me at this particular moment. What’s bothering me is that I don’t know how to proceed. If the orthodics don’t help (and with my luck, they probably won’t) then should I bother to immobilize the foot? That wouldn’t be good – I wouldn’t be able to wear my new orthodics, it would throw off my balance, it would probably aggravate my hip, and it would be a real bitch to deal with in the cold, snow, and ice that come with Boston winters. And it probably wouldn’t do a damn bit of good. But then again, if there’s even the tiniest chance that it could help, that I might be preventing future pain, don’t I owe it to my future self to try?

Or would I just be deluding myself by thinking there was a chance this could possibly be an isolated condition?

Sadly, it’s a situation that we with chronic illness have to deal with far too often. Every pain, every extra-tired day, every ear infection or sore throat or sneeze or…. we have to question it all. My foot is simply today’s question.

6 Comments | Educating, Expectations, Frustration, Healthcare, Pain, Rants, Symptoms, Unpredictable | Tagged: | Permalink
Posted by chronicrants

Vagina vagina vagina

January 9, 2015

I ate an incredible chocolate chip cookie today. It gave me a lot of pleasure. It was just delightful.

I’ll get back to the cookie in a bit.

Like many people, I have two hands, two eyes, a mouth, a liver, two lungs, a heart, two legs, and many other body parts including, yes, a vagina. So if I can talk to a doctor, a friend, an acquaintance, or a stranger about pain in one of those other body parts, why is it considered taboo to discuss pain in my vagina or any other body part involved in procreation?

I don’t personally have vaginal pain (aside from the occasional yeast infection, etc.) but if we discussed these things more openly, it wouldn’t have taken me years to find out that the blood clots I got with my period weren’t normal. And while I don’t happen to have pain in my vagina, vulva, or related areas, plenty of others do.

The taboo seems to trace back to pleasure. Apparently, the problem with discussing vaginas and penises has to do with the pleasure we get from them. I got a lot of pleasure from that cookie this afternoon, yet it isn’t socially inappropriate for me to talk about my mouth. There’s just no logic to it. Apparently sexual pleasure is to be shamed while all other pleasure is acceptable, at least in my culture. But who does that help? I see absolutely no reason why that should be the case.

Many people of all genders express discomfort when discussing genitalia. I don’t get it. Every single one of us is here as the result of sexual organs. Think about it: would you exist if no one on the planet had a uterus? The vast majority of us are here because of a penis and a vagina, even if they never came into contact with one another. It amazes me how many men think vaginas are only for sex; unless they were born through C-section, they once came out of one!

Today I learned that a friend has vaginal pain. She had never mentioned it before, referring only to more socially accepted forms of chronic pain. She said she’d probably never discuss it again. But why should that be? And the topic of how pain in other parts of the body affects sex really needs to be a post all its own. If you have chronic pain, has your doctor ever asked if it’s had an impact on your sex life? Mine haven’t. But they should have. Every single one of them (in the appropriate specialties) should have!

So I’m saying it loud and proud: I love my vagina! It is as important a part of my body as any other (and more than some…. I’d give up an appendix or tonsils before I’d give up my vagina!) If you have pain or other symptoms in any body part that’s taboo to discuss, feel free to share it here. I will give it the respect it deserves, and I suspect most of my regular readers will, too. After all, it is as much a part of your body as your shoulder, your skin, and your kidney. So why not discuss it?

Which is why I titled this post the way I did. Let’s start with at least being able to say the word itself!

11 Comments | Educating, Frustration, Healthcare, Insensitive, Isolation, Pain, Rants, Relationships: Family & Friends & Dating & Sex, Symptoms | Tagged: , , | Permalink
Posted by chronicrants

Dear doctor: Those symptoms you ignored were signs of a real problem

January 7, 2015

I don’t expect every doctor to know everything there is to know about medicine and health. I don’t even expect them to know everything there is to know in their own specialty. But when I present the same symptom to many doctors, and it’s common enough to be written on one of those silly internet lists, shouldn’t at least ONE DOCTOR have known what was going on??? Or at the very least, they shouldn’t have brushed it off!

Back in my mid-20s my fingernails began to curve. Before that they were pretty typical nails, I think. Then suddenly, they curved downwards as they got longer. The first and middle fingers were the worst on each hand. I just cut them recently so I can’t take a photo today, but trust me on this; it was really noticeable.

I didn’t assume there was a major, life altering problem, but it definitely wasn’t normal, so I showed my doctor. He brushed it off, saying it was nothing. I showed my next doctor after him. Same response. I showed many doctors, both internists and specialists. Some said it was nothing. Others weren’t sure, but said I shouldn’t worry. Not a single one suggested that maybe it should be investigated. A friend said it could be a vitamin deficiency of some sort. My doctor didn’t agree. So what could I do about it? Looking things up online wasn’t so easy just a few short years ago, and I had bigger health problems to worry about.

I came across this short list, What Your Hands Can Reveal About Your Health, a few months ago, and I haven’t been able to forget about it. That’s because it was so clear about this problem that none of my doctors addressed:

Curved nails

Soft nails that curve likes spoons can be a sign of iron-deficiency anemia, says Dr.Leffell. The condition, called koilonychias, can be due to such malnutrition, gastrointestinal blood loss, worms, gastrointestinal malignancy, or celiac disease. See your internist who can check your iron levels.

Now, obviously my doctors screwed up in other ways. I had low ferritin levels for many years, but none of my doctors addressed it. It wasn’t until I sent myself to a hematologist that I finally received the iron infusions that got my levels up to where they should be. And I had symptoms of Celiac Disease for many years, but doctors kept telling me it was IBS, or IBS and reflux, or IBS and stress. Nothing improved until I put myself on a gluten-free diet. So really, the finger nails were just one more symptom that was ignored.

But why were they ignored?

I will never know why multiple doctors chose to brush off my concerns about very real symptoms of very real illnesses. I’ll never know if other patients were similarly dismissed. But I do know that an injustice was done.

I am so grateful that I took my health into my own hands. It’s not easy, and sometimes I forget to fight back, but I’m trying. And every time I come across another symptom that my doctors overlooked or brushed off, it’s a reminder that it is worth every bit of effort I expend to continue pursuing the treatments that I believe are best. From now on, I choose to see my curved fingernails as a reminder that I need to make my own decisions about what is relevant to my health. I won’t be brushed off again.

6 Comments | Decisions, Educating, Expectations, Frustration, Healthcare, Insensitive, Isolation, Medication, Rants, Symptoms | Tagged: , , | Permalink
Posted by chronicrants

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