I am Leaning in a Better Direction

The pain gauge over the last three days has been lowering. Speaking with my palliative pharmacist, letting her know that my current regimen still needed some tweaking, she recommended adding a little more of one med which is specifically for bone pain, in hopes of reducing the dosage of another more general pain reliever which is harder on the body. I only seem to be experiencing one side effect of the bone med, and that is drowsiness. I can live with drowsiness! I know things are constantly changing, but currently feeling hopeful. A 3-day trend is something to get excited about.

I slept pretty well on Monday night! This was after taking two of the CBN lozenges. I slept from midnight to 2am, then went quickly back to sleep until 6am! Took my 7am pills early, and snoozed until my 8am pills. Tried that again last night (Tuesday), but not with the same results. There were many wakeful moments, but very short ones. See the graph–the orange peaks are awake times. I was calm and comfortable and fell back to sleep quickly every time.

Today (Wednesday) is day three of the med dosage modification and it seems to be working very well so far. Whenever I take a pain reliever, I note how much I take and what my pain level is. Last night when I went to *bed, I wasn’t experiencing ANY discomfort. I wasn’t expecting NO discomfort, just LESS discomfort. I prayed several times in gratitude for that, that I could just lie there and fall asleep comfortably. That has been something I have always appreciated even before now, but especially now, obviously. So today, after yesterday‘s success, I put a little more time between doses of the med I’m trying to take less of. In other words, I took them every 4 1/4 hours instead of 4 hours. That seemed to work out just fine, yay. So tomorrow I will try taking them every 4 1/2 hours and see how that goes.

Yesterday, my PT gal came by and we went through my balance and strengthening exercises. She said I was looking really good, and gave me a couple of new ones to add. I have two visits left, but can always add more if needed. I feel like I know what to do now and won’t need any extra instruction.

Here’s something interesting. This took so many weeks to occur that I almost didn’t notice it. After I was diagnosed in February, the first symptom was discomfort in a few spots in my spine. I would feel achiness and fatigue there. Slowly over time the discomfort spread from the spine into hotspots in my ribs, moving around during the day and night. My spine eventually stopped bothering me, which I didn't notice until recently. And now even my ribs rarely bother me. Currently the hotspot is my right shoulder blade, and my original lumpy bumps. The pain relievers, ice, Willow Balm patches, and lidocaine patches, (which I am using less frequently the past few days), has me pretty comfortable. I’m thrilled to be able to say that! Because my ribs have calmed down, I can actually sit in the recliner for a while now. This is the recliner I thought we needed to get rid of thinking it would never work for me. I have started sitting in it on Monday mornings which is when I take my osteoporosis pill, and you have to sit up for an hour after that. I didn't expect pain to slowly work its way through an area, then improve, moving on to a different location. What does it even mean? I don’t know. I just know that I will appreciate being comfortable whenever it happens.

*“Going to bed“ sounds like I’m changing my activity. When in actuality, I am lying on the bed 97% of the day and night. So, “going to bed,“ actually means turning off the TV and closing my eyes. Haha!