December's Journey

Hi, Friends,
Just want to update you on my healing journey. As you know, I will be attending the MAPS (Minnesota Advanced Pain Specialists) pain clinic's chronic pain program beginning December 3 and going until the 28th. Thankfully, since my insurance deductible and copays are met the entire month's program will be covered 100%. I am very thankful.

The program will begin with 1 hour in the salt water pool doing water exercise. The next hour will be what they call land therapy that is primarily stretching, followed by lunch, an hour of education concerning everything you can imagine that relates to pain and why it becomes chronic, and ends with one hour of relaxation. In addition to that I need to fit in 20 minutes of cardio a day, probably walking on a treadmill, which I can do there or here at home. Every monday they will have a goal setting session during the education time and upon discharge, the team will help me set up goals as I move out and into my own life again. In addition I will have access to the pool for 3 months and unlimited and indefinite access to the chronic pain support group that meets twice a week. Sounds amazing, right??

So...though it does sound amazing on one hand and like something I really want/need to do, on the other hand, it is pretty difficult for me to imagine doing this much stuff in one day, let alone 5 days a week for an entire month. It is more like a dream and something I can't really believe I can get through. Thus the reason I am posting this here.

I know it is a lot to ask of you, but if you don't mind, I am going to use this space to cry out for some encouragement now and then. I am SO alone here in Cambridge. I have one good friend that I trust enough to be real with and she's quickly becoming a very dear friend but definitely not a supportive system. It is interesting how in order to build a support system one often needs to be able to actually GO OUT into the world and BE with other people. We have managed to go to church here - if you know us, you know church is a very tough thing for us...we're just not into it very willingly. It took us 5 years to get back into a church where we felt safe and then we moved :). I met this friend, Jayne there. The people in Minnesota are just not the most friendly. I think I still have the Minnesota "nice" my eye, blog I did on my blog if you are interested in learning more about that. The way you deal with discomfort here is through passive aggression - even in the grocery store! It can be quite a shock to us Nebraska farm folks! Anyway, back to needing you. I can't do this alone. To be honest, I'm not even a little nervous...I'm quite terrified! BUT I'm going. I think in this process I've developed a bit of agoraphobia - the fear of leaving home, can't imagine it but really, I do often have to choose to leave the house quite volitionally. Last Sat. we decided to go to Duluth after I had an intense morning meltdown and was truly, seroiusly wanting to die. It's just bizare how extreme it is when your brain's chemistry is so depleted. The nice thing is that I'm learning to stay in the middle and not get too excited or too bummed :) good skill I think, I guess I'll ask about that in one of the upcoming education sessions.

There will be 2 other new people with me and 4 people in a program that has been going for 2 weeks. We will do some things together so I wll be around some people and that will be good for me.

Thanks for letting me be a bit raw right now...I'm trying to stay positive and looking at this as my new "job" for the next month.

me