Have The Confidence to Trust Your Instincts When It Comes to YOUR Health

At last I am able to blog – all be it I am laying horizontal but at least I’m not on quite such strong medication for now. You see I want to share with you what’s been going on here, in a bid it gives you the confidence to go with your instinct, intuition, inner wisdom, gut (it’s all the same to me), and how we should all insist we are treated as an individual and listened to when it comes to our health. EVEN if we are a chronic pain sufferer.

So almost two weeks ago something in my lower back went ‘bang’. It literally made me scream out loud and for a flash I was transported back in time seven years to when my back first went ‘bang’ and my spinal journey began (I was diagnosed with spondylolisthesis).  If I had listened to my ‘gut’, rather than keep listening to others, maybe I shouldn’t have been surprised that my back had given way again – I actually felt something move in my right lower lumbar. 

You see I have been telling the physiotherapists at hospital every week for the 15 weeks that something was not right, and hasn’t been for a long while. I think they believed me at times, but the standard answer was ‘we simply don’t know what it is’ – it’s probably chronic and linked to everything that’s gone on prior. Ok maybe they didn’t know, but I just feel like I’ve been banging my head against a brick wall.

What I’ve learnt is that when you became a chronic pain sufferer as I have, it seems that every back pain is attributed to chronic pain. But hang on – what about if the pain is ‘real’ and is there for a reason? To tell you something is not right? And I’m not just talking acute flare ups on top of chronic pain. I remember asking my pain counsellor just this and he told me that you have to listen to your body. He gave an example of somebody with chronic pain who actually worked as a hypnotist, and used their skills on themselves to rid the pain signals. Great they had no pain, but actually it turned out they had a genuine medical issue that needed attention and they got in trouble with their doctor for not going sooner – at times it feels you just can’t win.

Looking back my body had been giving me clues that something wasn’t right, in particular the cracks, clunks and pain coming from deep within my pelvis. I have been using all the chronic pain techniques taught to me including hypnotherapy, emotional freedom technique, pacing, pilates etc. But the pain and noise have remained. Time and time again my concerns have been dismissed, getting told that all people get the odd noises. Yes but the ones I am getting are so deep, painful and stop people in their tracks as they say “is that your back?!”

Despite all of this, and myself not wanting these signs to be ‘real’, I recently secured a job – the first in years and a massive step forward. But guess what? I’ve already been signed off sick, and had such intense pain and muscle spasms the only thing left to take at one point earlier this week was morphine.  Still no-one knows what is going on, including my GP who said to me as I cried buckets "It’s shit – you are too young for all of this." 

Well whatever ‘this’ is, I am determined to get to the bottom of it, not be fobbed off, be treated as an individual, and continue to listen to my ‘gut’ which is telling me five years post spinal fusion, something is not right. I see my consultant on Monday….

Until next time xxxx