My head hurts

little life update: a big fat bummer

Me and (the newly crawling!!) Tommy during spring break

A couple of my good friends have been texting me, checking in on me. I really appreciate this, even if it take some days to respond, because it makes me feel loved. Like, they really care. But I also hate when they do this, because I can’t but help feel like a burden when I respond. “How are you?” they ask. And I want to say “Fine! Great! Couldn’t be better!” Because that would be easier and because I wish it were true. I hate having to say “Not good actually” because I just feel like a resounding bell, an annoyance, a big fat bummer. But still, I’m honest with them because they’re my friends and because they’re bothering to check in on me which really matters. I’m honest: “Not good” I respond.

I am so frustrated with my body right now. I wish I could force it into submission, will it to be better, pray enough prayers to get it to behave.

For 72 days, my head has been hurting. The headache started all of a sudden, out of the blue, BAM. While I was making a coffee. It was my birthday, in fact, and so it’s easy to remember because it made for a bummer of a birthday. Anyway, my head has hurt every single day since then.

Some days, the headache is very mild, barely there. I mean, I can still feel it—but it’s very easy to ignore and ignore it I do. Sometimes I have a string of good days and I think the headache is finally going away…but it doesn’t. Other days, it’s moderate. Annoying, but I can try to focus on other things. Other days, it’s raging pain. It makes me so irritable and crabby and although I can do my daily tasks it feels exponentially that much harder. Nothing helps. Not Tylenol, not the ER department, not resting, not sleep. Exercise does not seem to exacerbate it.

I’ve been trying to get help. But it turns out that neurologist office and my insurance and whoever schedules imaging don’t care enough about me and my pain to get along with each other. It feels emergent to me, but it apparently isn’t very emergent to any of them. So it’s been a very frustrating and ongoing battle to rule things out. I finally got an MRI only to learn I need something called a MRV. I am still in the waiting period to get answers. If it turns out that I’ve developed chronic migraines, well okay, we can deal with that. I’d honestly be relieved to have an answer so I can move forward. But first we have to rule out other things and so we are in that very frustrating process right now. In the meantime, I’m in pain.

I’m finding that you can do a lot of things when you have a headache. When you have one every day, you have to.

I have three little kids that depend upon me and need me to tend to them. I have clothes that need to be folded, meals that need to be made, rooms to be tidied.

And I don’t like being crabby all of the time. It’s not fun for anyone—including me! So I’ve just been trying to suck it up, plaster a smile on my face, and go about my days. I’m still hopeful for the future, still dreaming about another baby, still waking up every day hoping the headache is gone.

Is this what it’s like to live with chronic pain? You just feel it…all of the time…and try to just live your life? I’ve gotten a teeny tiny taste of my what my older sister lives with, and it has shaken me. I don’t feel cut out for this, but really, who is?

We went to Wisconsin over the kids’ spring break, and although the headache followed me there, it was a very nice time just to rest and not do anything. I didn’t realize I needed the break until I was there. I came back feeling rested and energetic just to have several severe pain days in a row upon return.

I told Rob a few days ago that it feels like I am standing at the bottom of a dark hole. I see light above me, but I have no idea how to get out of this hole. (Probably a bit dramatic, but hey, you try not to be dramatic when your head hurts every day.)

I can only take it a day at a time for now. Hopefully hopefully hopefully I can get answers, but in the meantime, one foot in front of the other. If you’re the praying type, I humbly ask for prayer. I don’t pretend to know how prayer works (and if I’m honest sometimes I wonder why I bother) but I am going to keep praying and praying and clinging to the fact that God is faithful because deep down I know that to be true and because, well, I don’t know what else to do.

At my in-law’s bison farm in WI over spring break