End of May Check In

I have been living with an expanded awareness of pain levels, painkillers, emotional roller coasters and subjective reality for the last two weeks. After noting the heavily feeling-toned prose of my earlier posts, I decided to put my critical analyst cap snugly back on and engage in some dosage experimentation. After successfully determining the patterns of my emotional, physical and mental responses to prednisone under varying dosage levels, I began a regimen that minimized my discomfort while sheltering my loved ones from the worst parts of my emotional cross hairs. (One dose late at night followed by one late in the morning – 5 mg each.)

So as long as I time it just right, each day I can have 2 periods of lucidity bracketed by complete loopiness at one end and a hint of homicidal rage at the other – oh the fun to be had! I also figured out that the loopy feeling did not actually get in the way of my doing highly technical work, I just need to work at a slower pace than usual – more human like in fact.

And although I am not exactly pain-free, the level is low enough that I can function somewhat normally – from a 7 to a 3/4 on a scale from 0 to 10. The remaining drawback is that I feel stilted, disconnected and unable to read anything requiring deep concentration, i.e. all my normal “recreational” texts. I also was less willing to be around people so I have spent a great deal of my time alone. Even for this introvert it was a bit more than I liked so I decided to take a break from the pills. So I backed off the meds slowly over the last few days … till of course the full level of the pain came screeching back. Ai yi yi!

Sigh … Angela picked up my refill a few hours ago. I do not really have a choice at the moment; I have lost the ability to repress my awareness of the pain. Ah … the sweet smell of defeat … or is it success … I dunno.

I am frankly tired of talking about this current misadventure. I want so badly to share some other insights that have been bubbling up lately. So I am going to change focus for a short while at least. I promise I will keep folks posted as to any progress (or lack thereof) during this healing crisis. But for now, I am moving on.

Thank you everyone for your prayers, love and understanding. It really means a lot to me.

love,
Katrina

Posted in

Submitted by katrina on Sun, 05/31/2009 - 4:15pm.

Deborah Bella (not verified) | Sun, 05/31/2009 - 4:48pm

May you find a healthy way to manage the pain, quickly and with ease. May you ultimately heal through and through. Much, much love to you.

»

katrina | Sun, 05/31/2009 - 9:32pm

And may the gods of healing smile up on you as well.

love,
Katrina

»

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Recent comments

  • Claire-Marie Le Normond (not verified)

    Wish I could be there. Very well spoken.

    15 weeks 2 days ago
  • David Salisbury (not verified)

    Katrina,
    I wish you all the blessings and power you need on your journey. Thank you for these words. It is good to remember that returning to work (and thus returning to grace) bring a chance for us all to rest and have joy.
    Wishing you joy in the Work.

    David

    17 weeks 4 days ago
  • Sigre (not verified)

    Dear Katrina- Thorn reposted your blog and happy am I. Your passion, always so immense, comes blowing out in these words. So akin to my own heart and soul that it makes me have a bittersweet smile.

    The Storm is only now coming to the edges of our universe and yet it will sweep and consume all that is. In the end, our beautiful universe will be so much...more? Different? Complete? Who knows?

    All I do know is my soul came here to witness and be part in this period. I cannot shrink from the work. I am here with you, fae sister!

    17 weeks 5 days ago
  • Macha NightMare (not verified)

    Thought-provoking piece, Katrina. Thanks.

    I don't know what to call myself either. In Pagandom, I've taken to referring to myself as a Witch at Large. In the interfaith world where I'm active, I call myself a Pagan. Sometimes I call myself an uppity woman or a Second Wave Feminist. I've never really thought to publicly identify myself by my sexuality, het woman, which is very "white bread" and old-fashioned. Not only het, but serially monogamous for the most part. It seems almost a liability these days to say you're het, but I am proudly and happily so. I tend towards intellectualism but only have a BA, which doesn't carry much weight, at least in public and professional worlds, no matter how much you've studied, trained, and can articulate, even teach.

    My biological heritage is Irish, Dutch, French Huguenot, Euro-mongrel. My social heritage is Roman Catholic on one side and conservative Methodist, temperance-crusading, women's rights and education on the other, with distinct East Coast sensibilities, now mellowed by more than half a century living on the Left Coast. My maternal political heritage is conservative Republican (altho what my relatives might think of current trends in the GOP I cannot imagine, since they did have brains and they did think and they did have a social conscience), yet I am much farther left in my outlook than any elected official I know. My paternal political heritage is blue collar Democratic, except that my dad broke with his family on politics and allied with my mother's family's conservatism.

    I'm a former hippie, a home-birth advocate, a home death and green burial advocate, an opponent of capital punishment and resorting to warfare to resolve humankind's differences. I support the right to conscious self-deliverance. I rejoice in any and all consensual expressions of love and eros. I'm a lover and a mom.

    I have never missed voting in an election and I disrespect those who don't avail themselves of this hard-won right. (I have ancestors who fought the Brits in the American Revolution.) I support workers' rights. I recognize our interdependence on this planet, so could be called a greenie. I'm a committed environmentalist in my day-to-day life (in terms of eating locally grown food, expanding public transit, recycling, preserving open space and wildlife, opposing exploitation of natural resources [strip mining, oil-drilling, nuclear facilities, agribusiness, monocultures, clear-cutting timber, overuse of pesticides, genetic modification, etc.]) I want to make the city streets "safe for dancing," as my old friend Tony Serra said when he ran for mayor of SF on the Platypus Party ticket.

    Well, you got me going there, my friend. Thought-provoking read, as I said. ;-)

    xo,
    Macha

    34 weeks 2 days ago
  • Eridanus (not verified)

    Lovely azaleas!

    [cough][gag][snort][sneeze]

    Just lovely...

    I know what you mean.

    36 weeks 5 days ago
  • Anonymous (not verified)

    I feel you. There is too much bs- particularly when people decide that their temperament is tantamount to truthful and ignore everyone else.
    I get irked by immature extroverts or closet introverts who ignore you REPEATEDLY and then pretend you're out of line for being upset by the time they can't pretend you didn't say anything anymore. I find that the same people will ignore you if you blow up right away, too, and that it's because they just don't think that honoring what you value is important to maintaining a relationship, or even worse: that you don't know what you value at all and that it's all a mind game for their pleasure or annoyance. Then they call you passive-aggressive, aggressive, moody, touchy and temperamental. I call them "not listening".

    36 weeks 6 days ago