The Gift of Pain - Chapter 7

To read chapters 1-6 of My Story – The Gift of Pain, click on the links at right.

I don’t know about you, but reading through this story again, I’m ready for it to be over! Stick with me. There are only a few chapters left.

This is not a happy story. It is also fairly one-sided. In spite of the pain and sickness of the past several years, I have 

• enjoyed my children and celebrated their achievements, 
• made new friends and savored time with old ones, 
• loved my husband and my family, 
• laughed with friends and relished the good times, 
• dug dipper into the Word and worshiped my Savior. 

With each new trial that has come our way, I have grown to rely on God more and more and for that, and all the other blessings He has given me, I thank Him.

I have set the LORD always before me;
Because He is at my right hand I shall not be moved.
Psalm 16:8 (NKJV)

As I lay in the outpatient recovery room, I began to feel the pain as the anesthetic wore off. Steve called over a nurse and she administered meds through my IV. They brought a small measure of relief but very quickly wore off.  He summoned the nurse again and explained that my level of pain was back to a '10'.  He asked if there was any way to relieve my suffering. Each time they administered drugs, the relief was negligible and the searing pain returned.

I mentioned that the pain also appeared to be coming from my left shoulder, but no one took notice and the afternoon dragged on. One by one, the other patients that were in the room for the same surgery were released to go home as they recovered suitably.

Finally, I was the only patient left, still in terrible pain, with no break in sight. The nurse, exasperated, said she had given me every form of pain meds available. If I needed anything stronger, I would need the doctor's approval.  They summoned the surgeon and he appeared. He was exhausted from a day of performing surgeries and a bit annoyed at being called. The nurse informed him of my pain level and their attempts to control it. "She says she's still at a 9 or 10. She wants something more. It doesn't make sense because we've given her high doses of meds all day and it doesn't appear to be helping at all."

"Give her whatever she needs, so she can go home," were the doctor's words. "She probably has a high tolerance to the medication since she's been dealing with chronic pain for years."  Finally, they administered straight morphine and my pain diminished to a dull roar. They finally felt I was stable enough and I was released to go home. By the time we arrived home, my pain had skyrocketed once again.

I had been taking Oxycontin for two months prior to my surgery, as my pain had escalated. Now, I increased my intake from every four hours to every two hours with morphine for breakthrough pain and still, I felt no real measure of relief.

This is where things get very foggy. The rest of the events, as I relate them in this chapter, are recalled to the best of my ability. I sat with Steve to help me remember how things transpired while I was in this black hole. It is still a blur, but I believe this is how things occurred.

Two days after surgery, Steve couldn't bear to see me in such agony and called the doctor's office to see if we could go in before my week follow-up appointment. He was reminded that the doctor was in Italy on vacation and we were scheduled to see him in two weeks, when he returned.  I had not slept since I got home from the hospital. I would drift off and awaken, sobbing with the pain. There was no position where I could find relief. I was literally overcome with mind-numbing pain, in my hand, my elbow and stabbing in my shoulder.

Within a couple days, I couldn’t bear it any longer. Steve called our own health provider and scheduled an appointment with the first doctor available. I had never seen her before and she really knew nothing of my condition prior to this, since it has been handled through Worker’s Comp. She was convinced that my pain was aggravated by depression, as I sat in her office like a zombie, barely able to raise my head or put two words together. She prescribed me an anti-depressant and scheduled me to see my regular doctor in a couple weeks.

I went to get my stitches removed, a week after surgery and the nurse asked me to turn my arm over so she could get at the stitches on the inside of my elbow. I could not raise or turn my arm and cried out every time she tried to manipulate it. She was very sympathetic and somewhat alarmed that I was still experiencing so much pain. She called in another doctor on duty to have him look at my arm.  Again, I expressed how the pain seemed to be focused on my shoulder more than the surgical sites. He had no answers for me and increased my Oxycontin intake significantly.

Finally, the surgeon returned and I went for my follow-up appointment. He was annoyed that I was still wearing my sling and said that I probably pulled a muscle in my shoulder when I was in surgery, because they had my hand over my head to get at the inside of my elbow. He insisted that I remove the sling and live without it, or I wouldn’t heal properly.

By this time I was on the highest dose of Oxycontin that the doctor could prescribe, taking it every 4-6 hours. I was taking morphine for break-through pain, anti-depressants, anti-seizure meds and God only knows what else.

I was drugged-up and messed up and begging for relief. I would lie in bed, crying and begging God to remove the pain or take me out of my misery. My prayers seemed to bounce off the ceiling. I moved from the bed to the sofa, constantly struggling to find a comfortable position, but there was none to be found. I prayed to die, since I knew I couldn’t continue to live like this.

Can't you see I'm black-and-blue,
beat up badly in bones and soul?
God, how long will it take
for you to let up?
I'm no good to you dead, am I?
I can't sing in your choir if I'm buried in some tomb!

I'm tired of all this—so tired. My bed
has been floating forty days and nights
On the flood of my tears.
My mattress is soaked, soggy with tears.
The sockets of my eyes are black holes;
nearly blind, I squint and grope.
Psalm 6: 2-3, 5-7 (MSG)

On July 4, I finally left the house. The whole family was going to my cousin’s house for a barbecue and fireworks and I didn’t want to disappoint the kids by staying home again. I knew I could escape to the back bedroom if things became unbearable.

I was walking across the family room when, suddenly, I tripped and fell forward. I reached with my right arm to catch myself on the coffee table. As I did so, I heard a loud pop and felt my shoulder jerk. I screamed in pain and thought, “I’ve done it now.” Whatever had been bothering my shoulder before, this certainly couldn’t be good.