There can be such fine lines between doing and not doing, trying and not trying enough, managing time and wasting it, finding balance and not balancing at all.

I’ve driven now twice since not having drove but a handful of times in 17 years. While both times were only a few blocks away it is a starting point. Next time I’ll turn left and go down farther to the shopping center about a mile from home. Most likely repeating that quite a few times before trying further.

I’ve hit a few lows in wondering if all this is just too good to be true. This is because in order to maintain pain relief from the original CRPS Type 2 diagnosis and the several secondaries along the way, I have to do physical routines daily in order to keep it from ever being what it had become. These routines can cause their own pain because of the lack of activity and movement as a result of the injuries and illnesses that either initially or had eventually overcame me. Many of those things that I did to comfort myself from reaching the edge were some of the same things that were to my own detriment. Hanging my legs off the bed in order to try to sleep because my feet and legs were either too swollen, allodynia, hyperalgesia, burning etc. Using pillows, several, in order to prop myself into positions to ease pain, but at the same time it taught my body to develop even more damage.

Ever tried. Ever failed. No matter. Try Again. Fail again. Fail better. ~Samuel Beckett

We aren’t taught how to be able to care for ourselves in simple manners that are the greatest of all. We’re told go exercise, lose weight, quit smoking (if you do) and that’s about it anymore. Great advice, but it’s only advice. There isn’t any teaching in it and people leave still wondering how, how in all of it. If you have chronic pain of any type it’s because something in you, illness or injury has lasted beyond 3 months (used to be 6 months for that classification).

Some people do get the pain medications, the opioid management, pain management, lumbar or cervical block injections, procedures etc. Yet none of these get people healthier again. None of them teach living with pain. They either disguise pain awhile, fail, or side track a person from learning how to themselves. Other medications such as SSNRI’s and Anti Seizures such as Cymbalta and Neurontin are over prescribe, handed out like candy and more adverse than the opioid itself. I promise you that. Opioids taken responsibly is less a problem than the lifetime problem that stays with you long after getting off those other types. We may have natural opioid receptors in our brains, but our brains (and minds) aren’t meant to be altered to the point future damage.

I’m not anti opioid.  I’m anti leave someone where they are when there are other options in relief that aren’t suggested or believed in by mainstream western medicine. I believe in CAM or Complimentary and Alternative Medicine. I believe in the Gohl Program. I believe in Integrative Pain Medicine.

Yet these services are rarely offered, or are not covered by insurance. I myself was denied for Acupuncture my second year into all this. (2003). I could have been cured, or in remission right away, but instead we keep people bouncing the healthcare systems, costing billions, left disabled, unable to contribute to society, getting sicker when we have the capability to get people back into their lives. If we do, even more billions are lost in profits, revenues and work for the working class. Damned if you do, damned if you don’t and that’s the world we live in. If it’s not about me it’s about you. Will it ever be about us? I already know the answer to that.

I’m glad that The Academy of Integrative Pain Management previously The American Academy of Pain Management has merged the concept of healing by both standards of care. I’m thrilled to have been a State Pain Policy Advocacy Network Leader (SPPAN) which is a project of of the AIPM/AAPM for several years. I’m happy to have been former California Ambassador, Executive Board Member, Advocacy Director and Healthcare advisor for the International Pain Foundation 2011-November 2016. I’m happy to still be a Medtronic Patient Ambassador. I’m glad to have represented iPain as a member of the Opioid Prescribing Taskforce via the Medical Board of California and for being 1 of perhaps 3 patient advocates who were apart of the Revised Standard Guidelines for Prescribing Controlled Substances For Pain. I’m happy that I attended with and testified on behalf of pain patients with the California Medical Association (DeSaulnier)

I’m not happy that I fell hard in the midst of the CDC Guideline for Prescribing Opioids for Chronic Pain — United States, 2016 as they were being implemented, recommended and circulated. The Guidelines for Prescribing Opioids for Chronic Pain CDC. I’m blessed to be part of the public record, written and on the last call pertaining to the Guidelines. The call that determined whether or not to enact the recommendation. Which had been determined before the call had ended in case you didn’t know.

Instead of saving lives and allowing physician’s to care for their patients under their own oath it instilled fear in providers to prescribe or even address pain at all. I do not care that the Guideline’s were meant for primary care doctors because it caused fear for all doctors including pain management specialists.

I have to be a responsible patient, yes? I have to be in compliance, yes? Yet there is little to no responsibility or consequences for non compliance in others or those who believe they are above anyone else. Everybody’s pain day will come, if even by old age alone.

I’ve lost my reputation online, but offline my words are different. I’m different. This doesn’t mean I’m a different person it means that perceived perception, written content and context is taken as you will. Believed or Imagined. Generally just a fantasy in your own minds.

I’m diverse.

Online I no longer care. I’m both polite, knowledgeable, caring and I’m blunt, potty mouthed and adverse. Yesterday was the 1 year anniversary to the second time I attempted suicide as a result of pain and errors and not just my fear in it all, but the fear in overdose, the fear to prescribe, the fear to keep your medical licenses, the fear of the DEA, the fear of scrutiny, the fear to take care of your own families and I actually understand. I actually feel your side of it. I feel you when you’ll do almost anything to maintain your reputation even if you’ll lie to do it.

When you can feel my husband of 31 years side of it, or my 3 children’s broken heart in it.

Maybe I’ll care again the same way I used to. Though I hope not because I really cared too much about everyone else, what ever one else needed, or wanted. Right now it’s all about me and overcoming the challenges of living through what I can’t ever change for me in this lifetime, or what I can never take back in the option of suicide, but I can still help change it for others.

They are fine lines, after all.