Open Thread

Off to emerg with me today. I've had so much pain in my neck and right shoulder the past 2 days that I can barely get around. I strongly resemble the hunchback of Notre Dame. Arthritis? Ruptured disc? I don't know. All I do know is that this is unbearable.

It's been a bad week with a lot of pain in my right hip too from the humidity. My regulars know that I have fibromyalgia and lupus (which can come with a lot of complications), so it isn't like I'm not used to living with chronic pain. That makes it hard to figure out if the pain I'm experiencing is par for the course that might just disappear tomorrow. I rarely go for extra medical help since I'm used to having to cope with the symptoms, but I feel like I have a knife in my back so I guess I should probably find out what's up.

I'll update you later on. First I have to suffer my way through a shower and then I'm off.

Hope your day/week is going a lot better than mine!

Update: What a day. I just met the second most aggravating doctor I have had the serious misfortune to encounter in my life. I'll write more about it later - maybe. In the meantime though, I still don't know exactly what's wrong because this useless doctor (whom I saw in a walk-in clinic after I decided I might not be able to sit through hours of pain waiting in emerg) refused to do any tests. No xrays. No blood work. Nothing. "It's the lupus". "You seem depressed."

Well, screw you.

Update #2 - after my nap:

I swear that was the most ridiculous doctor I have ever met.

Gems:

"If what you're telling me is true."

"You're just growing up." (I'm 47 years old.)

"I don't want to send you for tests if you're in pain since you're using the bus. Even if you had a car, I wouldn't send you."

That, along with telling me that I wanted "magic". Repeatedly asking me what I wanted him to do. My answer: "tell me what's wrong and what my options are -it's not like I can rely on Google - you are a doctor".

As for his "it's the lupus" bullshit - all the while claiming he has lupus too - he should know, one would think, that all kinds of problems can come up with lupus that aren't just "the lupus" and that require further investigation through those things called "tests". Why was an xray too much to fucking ask for??

Seriously. When I realized he wasn't going to do squat to at least find out what it was, I suddenly burst into tears because he was telling me it was hopeless. (I was thinking "fuck, I'm in pain and you don't even want to investigate it??) That's when the "you seem depressed" so "I'll give you an antidepressant" came up. If his fucking center or he had even taken a history they would have known I've been on an antidepressant for years for a complicated history of depression, including PTSD, and that upping my dosage was absolutely pointless and unnecessary.

Oh, and he tried to prescribe me Tylenol 3s when I had clearly written on my chart that I'm allergic to codeine. I made it very clear to him that I was not there for drugs - that I've been clean for 20 bloody years - and didn't want any drugs from him. I wanted a proper diagnosis. He told me I had "facet pain". Well, no shit Sherlock. I could have told him that. What I wanted to know was exactly what was causing it.

I wanted to know exactly what was wrong since my entire right fucking side from neck to knee has been causing me excruciating pain - worse than ever before - this week. I had also discovered that lupus can actually cause bone death in things like one's hip joints, but I guess that's nothing to concern myself about since it's just "the lupus".

Fuck.

When I walked out of there, I was in absolute shock.

Just before I'd been called in the office, I heard one woman say to another that "that Dr So and So is nuts". I'm sure now that she was talking about this guy.

I will be getting his name and sending in a complaint.

Oh - forgot to add. He asked me why I didn't go to my doctor.

1. My doctor's office isn't open today and I was in no shape to go anywhere yesterday after this hit, let alone on a transit ride on a bus and train of over an hour to his office. (I recently moved further from his office than I used to be.)

2. Just moved into this area so I chose a 5 min bus ride to that clinic.

3. I had called the clinic beforehand and she told me to be seen by a doctor there who could decide if I needed to go to emerg (along with not wanting to wait forever in emerg. Been there, done that with severe kidney pain and bleeding. No thanks.)

So here I am tonite. Still in pain and mad. Mad that he basically told me to just live with it without knowing what's causing it or how bad it is - without even a referral to physio or any other kind of treatment. I'm not a happy camper.

I know I have lupus. I know there's no cure for that thing called lupus. I do know, however, that problems related to lupus can at least be diagnosed and treated. Treating me like some depressed, lying, clueless patient who hasn't accepted that she's ill for life is not proper treatment.

I'll go see my doctor next week. In the meantime, if the pain is still too much, I will go to emerg.