I Need Grace to Live with Chronic Pain

Sometimes chronic pain is terrible and you can’t get enough rest to return to normal pain levels. That happened after Hubby’s return home from the hospital. He felt like he might have a blood clot, so I drove him back to the out-of-town hospital. Instead of being transferred from our local hospital, he had to go through the ER.

This ER is known to be awful. We waited over seven hours, sitting in hard chairs. When Hubby checked in he told them his pain was a 3-4, which was a horrible mistake. He is not been chronically ill long enough to know about the pain scale.

Everyone in the waiting room when we arrived had long since gone back to see a doctor. Finally Hubby asked the registration people when he might go back. They took him back after that. His scan was revealed to show no blood clot, even after an extensive sonogram. The cardiologist saw him too, which helped him to become calm.

This is similar to what I see when reading.

After this night in the ER, we were sent home. The sun was rising and we were dead tired. My chronic pain spiked again and I went to bed. I wish that I could have slept longer, but did get 8 hours. This was a pajama day, and my plan was to do nothing. Thankfully we could just rest.

I used heat on some parts of my body and ice on others. I couldn’t function without it for the next few days. We even had to turn down time with our grandchildren. This was a really awful feeling, because we live for those visits.

I’m better, but Hubby’s knee is really hurting. His doctor saw him yesterday and said that it wasn’t anything serious. But, he’s limping around. He’s almost 80 and is just now beginning to experience joint pain, and his muscles aren’t going to recover like they did in the past.

Next on the appointment path was my follow-up brain MRI. I wasn’t really nervous, but knew the possibility existed that this tumor had grown. The MRI was uneventful, because I took Benadryl beforehand. Since the contrast once made me react by vomiting, I’ve learned to always pre-medicate.

After the MRI, I had another appointment with neurology. The doctor was to discuss the findings of this MRI with me. Well, the MRI hadn’t been read yet and the doctor never came in. I was greeted by a messy-looking NP who didn’t seem to know anything. She had a screenshot of one of the MRI pictures and added the one 3 months ago next to it.

She tried to see if it looked as if it had changed and said that she thought it looked about the same. I wasn’t buying that because the new one was brighter white and looked larger. I asked her what was the diameter, because I belived that last one was 1.6 cm.

She attempted to measure it, but gave up and said that the radiologist does the measurements. Of course, they made the appointment at a time when there would be no results. After a few more minutes of her saying nothing new, she concluded the appointment. It’s nice that she got paid for nothing.

I do hope to see the test results on MyChart tomorrow. These are usually read more quickly, so I will message the nurse soon if nothing shows up on Monday. It makes me nervous, because I asked the nurse if I had a definitive diagnosis yet. She said that it was probably a meningioma, but it could only be known with a biopsy.

She had a smirk on her face when she answered me. I hope that I will soon not need to see her again. I’ve been told to return in 6 months, where I can look forward to another MRI. With a previoius hospital payment plan payment, my MRI deductible payment was over $2200. I added that amount to the hospital payment plan. This is really adding up.

I also discovered that my GP collaborated with an endocrinologist to see what steps he should take concerning the hyperparathyroidism. The next step is a 24 hour urine collection to see if I have primary or secondary hyperparathyroidism. He also told me that I have Stage 3 Chronic Kidney Disease.

My health and Hubby’s continues to grow worse. I really worry for him, because cancer is such a nightmare.

The price for medical treatment is more than we can afford, especially with our terrible monthly premiums. But, we just have to try. Prices for medical care are so out of control!

I pray daily for better health, or the grace to endure all the sickness that comes to me. I don’t say that without looking inward, really trying to be honest with myself. God has given me grace, so far, in this life of suffering. I trust that He’ll continue to provide that as well as the inner joy only He can give.

2 Corinthians 12:9 – “But he said to me, ‘My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.’ Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ’s power may rest on me.”