Living with Chronic Pain: My Struggle to Feel Alive Again

30-She/Her and They/Them-Virgo-ISTP-Child ofAtom-Chronically Ill and Chronically Chill. Eternally tired and disabled goblin with a wife and one (1) child (a ferret). When I'm not at doctor's appointments, trying to endure The Outside to get whatever exercise my lil atrophied legs can handle, drawing, gaming, or napping, I'm trying to fling myself into Reactor 4. If God or Godzilla won't irradiate me into a superhero, then I'll have to do it myself. I was recently diagnosed with Arachnoiditis, lumbar and cervical. Apparently, because my cervical cysts are "symptomatic", I'm now one of about five or six to *ever* be diagnosed with this condition. While I'm glad to finally have some answers, that also leaves me in the situation of having a very, very small community globally, and with our move to Florida coming, I can only hope my new doctors and specialists have at least the bare minimum knowledge of the condition. I'm in immense pain every day. I used to be fit and perky, walking about 1/2 mile back-and-forth to work everyday, 1 mile total, and that didn't include the hours of waiting tables on my feet all day. I liked to work out a bit every morning, and could cook myself a least very simple meals, like omelets. I have no quality of life now. I'm pale, sickly, exhausted, aching all over, jumpy and twitchy one moment and trying to keep my eyes open the next. I can barely do any of the things I love anymore, even sitting up to play video games can make me nauseous, dizzy, and trigger migraines. On My worst days, I have to use a wheelchair. I'm bedridden, mourning my past self while trying to stay awake long enough to make it to bedtime. If my suspected narcolepsy wins, I nap for at least two hours, and an then unable to sleep all night. It's an endless, painful cycle, and medication, even strong meds like vicodin, morphine, and belbuca, can only do so much. I do desperately need the pain to settle enough that I can go back to drawing regularly, playing the video games that I love, finally back to keeping up with my wife and LIVING again. I miss long walks, trips to the zoo. I'm so, so tired, and I just want to feel like a living, breathing person again.