#pain things

[antiadvil]

In another round of "turns out I just have really bad migraines" I learned today that a neurological migraine symptom can be dissociation 👍 so I guess that's why the entire last year feels fake and I have to keep googling words/phrases because they don't sound real? 😀 I'd say cool good to know but none of my emotions feel real either so 💅

[heartofspells]

I love the way you write Sirius and his thoughts, so when I came across this line I immediately thought of you. Sorry

"I just wanna feel the rain for a bit"

You know that whole 'flushed with love' thing? Yeah, that's currently me. And don't ever apologize for something like this (even the crossed-out sort). I love this so much.

Soooo. I'm not sure if you actually wanted a thing, but I made you a thing because this line inspired a thing. So here's a thing as a thanks (and also because I haven't done that other thing with the thing and that bit of a thing that's a car. it's coming, but still developing, you know? it'll come. it'll also be a thing)

Also, um...I'm now sorry. You'll see why. (but it's the music, it really is. i can't help myself)

He inhales deeply, the rush of cooling breeze blasting over his face as he leans his head back against the wall behind him, eyes falling closed. He can smell the storm coming, the crackle in the air from the building electricity raising the hairs on his arms. Most people have always thought him mad when he's mentioned this, but he's proven them wrong time and again. Because the storm always comes, brings the darkness with it, the surge of destruction, sometimes far more permanent than anticipated.

Sirius wonders when he'd started thinking in so many ridiculous fucking metaphors. Possibly during the First War. Maybe after Azkaban, when his freedom but not freedom had sprung back to him so suddenly. Or, possibly, he's always been this way and never noticed until now. Either way, it's absurd.

The house creaks and groans around him. He dulls it to a faint static of sound in his mind, always trying to not pay close attention to where he is now. He was never meant to come back.

The door opens, hinges squeaking as it swings. Sirius should deal with that, but he doesn't and never will. He doesn't care all that much. There are more important things, like trudging through dark rooms filled with darker things, black and scalding memories that take him over far too often. Like sitting in a window and waiting for a storm and rain he'll never feel.

"All right?" says a soft voice above him, and Sirius cracks his eyes open, taking in Remus' face staring down at him. His expression is light, easy, but Sirius can see the dark tinges of concern in his brown gaze. It's always there now, muting the color, dulling it out to something muddy instead of the gleaming honey Sirius had once known so well. Not that he can say much, really. He's sure Remus sees the same changes in his own eyes when he looks at him now.

Sirius grunts, and he draws his legs up as the other man drops down slowly in front of him in the window. They're silent for a while, Sirius staring out the opened section of glass, still scenting the air, Remus staring at him, studying him cryptically.

"Storm's coming," he mutters eventually. "Can smell it."

Remus hums, his gaze finally shifting to the window as well. "You always can," he comments. And Remus gets it. It's something he's always done, never questioning Sirius' odd proclivities and claims. Not once.

Sirius doesn't respond, and they continue to sit in mostly comfortable silence, at least as comfortable as Sirius ever is now. They remain until the dark, heavy clouds begin to roll in across the sky, scattering the light into odd segments before it disappears almost completely. Remus smiles.

"And he's right again, folks," he murmurs. Sirius nudges him with his foot, Remus reaching out to grip his ankle.

"I hate it here," whispers Sirius harshly, suddenly, the words breaking through from nowhere and everywhere at once. His head thunks back against the wall again.

"I know," says Remus quietly, eyes shifting and settling on Sirius. "I know you do."

Drops begin to patter against the glass of the window and Sirius' face scrunches a little before he can stop it, misery and hopelessness washing over him again. He only allows it to truly show in front of Remus, no matter how moody or sometimes volatile he may become in front of the others. Only ever Remus is permitted to see this.

"I just wanna feel the rain for a bit," he says, voice barely present now. "I haven't felt it in…fuck. Nearly a year. Never thought I'd miss it this much."

Remus stares at him silently before his eyes shift back to the clouds outside. Sirius tracks the racing drops over the panes of glass beside him.

"Okay." The word comes from nothing, and Sirius looks up at Remus, frowning in puzzlement. "Okay. Let's go, then."

"W-what?" stutters Sirius, heartbeat picking up and then faltering in his chest.

"Let's go stand in the rain," encourages Remus, standing and offering his hand to Sirius, but Sirius doesn't take it.

"I – I can't. You know I can't." And it sounds dejected and horrible to his own ears. He can only imagine what Remus hears, but the other man shakes his head.

"We'll be careful," he insists, reaching down and curling gentle fingers around Sirius' wrist. "C'mon, Pads. Feel the rain again. Come play with me."

The smile that breaks over Sirius' face is something that if Remus was ever asked about, he'd compare to a work of art, better than anything he's ever seen.

They move quietly down the stairs, skirting around Molly easily and anyone else who may currently be within the house. Then they're out the front door, Remus searching around cautiously before he allows Sirius to step away, exposing himself. His grip never relinquishes from Sirius' wrist as they dart across the street to the courtyard, and then Sirius is standing freely in the rain, arms outstretched just a little, head tilted back, water slipping down his face, wetting his hair, plastering it to his head. He doesn't care.

Sirius sucks in a deep breath, his lungs expanding, filling with more than just air. There's openness there, a subtle hint of freedom, chains falling away, even if for only a brief time. His chest shudders with it, legs shaking beneath his weight, but he doesn't cave to it. He stands, soaks it into his skin, savors it all, this beautiful thing he'd always taken for granted.

Remus watches him for a long time, eyes shifting around them periodically, but then he's there, in front of Sirius. His hands reach up, sliding easily over the cool flesh of Sirius' face, fingers pushing back into dripping hair, tangling until it's all a wonderful, perfect mess. He ducks his head, tugs Sirius towards him, and then there are lips on lips, the electricity of it rivaling that of the lightning Sirius knows will strike soon. The hairs lift again, flutter, stand up straight, at attention.

Remus' eyes are still closed when he finally pulls away, his mouth tinged a beautiful pink from the kiss, a sight Sirius has never and will never grow tired of seeing, not for the remainder of his days. Those same lips tilt upwards into a half-smile, eyelids fluttering open, brown no longer dulled but bright, glowing with that same light Sirius remembers so well.

"Harry will be back soon," he murmurs. "School's almost over. Few more weeks."

Sirius hums, his own smile spreading, but tempered around the edges. "Think Albus would let him come back here?" he asks tentatively. "Only for a day or two before he goes back to…to them." The smile slips away with the words, because he already knows the answer, and he hates thinking about Harry trapped with a family that doesn’t love him and never has.

Remus knows it too; Sirius can see it in the dampening of the shine contained in his eyes. "We can try," is all he says.

Sirius lets it drop for now as Remus tugs him a little closer, their clothing squelching as they press together, rain still falling around them. Sirius tells himself it's enough, just this, the storm and Remus and the promise of Harry at some point in the near future. He'll be fine. He can survive this, so long as he has them. He's survived far worse. And he's got years to look forward to with the people he loves. That's more than enough.

[nagdabbit]

I'm curious what you mean by a pain hangover? That sounds almost worse?

you lucky sob

you know that feeling after the massive amounts of pain? like after the headache goes away, or between period cramp waves, or like after a back spasm? when you don't feel the pain anymore, but you can feel the hole where the pain was, and your body is still kinda reacting like the pain is still there? like everything is tender and kinda fuzzy? that's a pain hangover.

[notyourmamasspoons]

lmao i hyperfocused so hard mixed with pain distraction reblogging that tumblr gave me the "you've reached your daily post limit" message. i've never hit that before

is this a new level of hyperfocus?

or is it a new level of pain dissociation????

the world may never know

[eeee-lye]

This one is very largely at the offline interactions of relatives, friends and acquaintances, who are operating on a tired social script that more often than not leaves me distressed and alienated.

Please, for the love of my sanity, stop asking me about my chronic pain.

I know you’re asking because you care, but I don’t want to talk about my chronic pain unless I volunteer the information, something I actually did do one night because it turns out my aunt from WA--someone I didn’t know very well before this last week--was one lone bastion of awesomeness who really talked to me and made me feel heard and empathised with. Or on this blog, where I can tell my story without having to select or filter, where people who follow allow me to control what, where and when I say it. Both this blog and my aunt give me free rein to be frustrated and tired and overwhelmed, to be real, and talk on my terms; both my aunt and my friends here are interested, and express that interest, in other things I do and experience and am. I don’t get enough of that to take that for granted, not ever.

I don’t want to have to say, for the five millionth time, what I’m doing about it, what can or can’t be done, what my medical options are, or why I’m wearing a splint again. I don’t want to have to trot out the same tired responses, because they are always the same--such is the nature of chronic pain. It is so exhausting to have to have this same conversation, this exact same conversation, over and over--often with the same people! Even when I say that things don’t change because this is chronic pain and medical folks really don’t understand or have many treatments for pain, a chronic condition/disability, I can’t get folks to understand. They’re married to a social script that says one should ask about their health, and even though I’m supposed to be the rigid, inflexible autistic with lousy social skills, they can’t dislodge themselves from the script.

(This is why I seldom ask specifically about another’s health, if anyone’s wondered why I don’t do that. It probably seems rude--I know Mum has taken to loud sighs and groans when she wants me to ask how her pain is, so I ask then--but since I don’t want anyone to ask about mine, I’m loathe to inflict this misery on someone else when they’ve given no sign that they want it.)

You’re asking because you care, but the impact is a thousand miles away from compassionate. Yet whenever I try to voice this to Mum, I’m told that they care, that I have no right to get upset because they care about me. It is unbelievably distressing having to explain again what I’m doing, what doctors I’m seeing, what meds I’m taking when I’m cracking open my pill container in public, what options I have, that there really are few options--to feel that I am only a broken thing whose point of interest is my brokenness, because nothing else about me is worth talking about.

If this is compassion, it isn’t working. It just makes me feel more alone, more alienated, more disabled--because I can never go back to being an abled person who gets to exist in terms of friends and accomplishments and card games and fashion dolls. After seven and a half years, surely you all realise that you’re getting the same answer every time you ask? So why do you keep asking? Why do you think I want to explain every time that no, my pain isn’t getting better, when you have the power to take me away a little bit from the shit that is honestly my life by treating me like a person who is more than just my disability?

I am doing whatever I can with the limited options available to me, and I would dearly love it if you’d assume that as a given and ask me about anything that isn’t my pain or my health.

[eeee-lye]

If I have to read another fantasy novel where the writer describes the protagonist being in agonising pain but they manage to push past it and do everything anyway, I am going to beat the writer over the head with my leather folder of pain med prescriptions.

Yes, people who suffer chronic pain become remarkably good at ignoring pain, speaking as one of them. I wouldn’t manage a damn thing if I couldn’t ignore pain, including the writing of this very post. However, there are also many things I can no longer do because of the pain, and most authors never show this part--the things we sacrifice in order to manage what we can, the things we love or want or need that have become impossible thanks to pain. They show the grand soldiering on, not the sacrifice--just the parts of my story that are palatable to abled audiences, not the entirety of it. Not the distress, not the loss, not the yearning, not the isolation, not the depression. Just the accomplishments, always done by our ability to ignore pain, even though this should never have become a requirement to do what little we can.

It is just another inspiration porn narrative, and I am so damn tired of it.

When an author describes a character who is experiencing severe or extreme pain and manages to do everything with no real problem other than their loving description of their agony, I know that they don’t know a thing about pain. I also know that the author is promoting exactly the kind of bullshit argument that stops pain patients from getting appropriate treatments, because we are told that we should be able to ignore it somehow and do everything. When our stories tell us this, over and over, that pain should somehow be ignored, why shouldn’t we as a society believe it to be true? Why shouldn’t our doctors and caregivers believe it to be true? If stories tell us how to be human, which they do, why shouldn’t this go unquestioned?

I know why I see this narrative over and over again, because it tells humans a story of how they wish to be human, but it breaks me nonetheless.

More than ever, as a chronic pain sufferer, I wish I were in less pain. Not so much as to make my life more comfortable, although that is surely true, but so as I had more ability to write the stories pain sufferers need to hear.

I wish I had less pain so I could write, freely, stories with heroes who experience pain the way I know it.

Instead I write this knowing these will be my only words for today, and I’ll have to hope that tomorrow, maybe, I'll have the spoons to spend on writing the protagonists I wish to read.

[eeee-lye]

I am tired and upset because I don’t even have the spoons to write out something that’s bottled up inside me, something I need to put to keyboard because writing is how I make sense of the world. Writing is how I survive. But I can’t do this because I’m too busy writing image descriptions. Because for some reason nobody else is able to do anything these last few days, so I’m having to do four posts a day and asks on top of those posts, even though we’ve already established that I can’t do both. (Because there’s posts in the queue for a few days, but it cannot go any lower; otherwise, if everyone goes missing again, there won’t be anything to post.) Because only two people from whom I can reblog here on Tumblr bother to be accessible to others. Because I have a blog that I love doing but is also fucking breaking me.

I know there’s reasons why not everyone can be accessible, but when I’m tired and upset and so low on spoons myself, I absolutely hate every fucking arsehole on Tumblr who doesn’t write an image description. Especially since I suspect several of them have more spoons than I’ll ever have. Why? Why can’t they do something that costs them so much less than it does me? Why can’t sellers fucking describe their own fucking product, for crying out loud? Why am I always the one doing it?

And yes, it’s not fair of me to call them all fucking arseholes, but it’s also not fair that I’m having to write all these image descriptions. And since I know why they’re important, since accessibility matters to me, I can’t not do this.

I’m tired and upset, so take this with all the salt; it deserves it. I’m really not in a state of mind where I can be nice or considerate; all I can be is tired and sad and and angry and bitter and human.

But right now I hate those fucking arseholes who don’t help others and leave a fucking physically disabled person to do it. It’s not fair. It’s not even close to fair.

Because this blog that is breaking me would be a lot easier if I didn’t have to describe those images.

And I don’t want to describe those images. I want to write that thing that’s poisoning my heart. (My dog died and I can’t even write about it.) I want to be able, sometimes, to write things that matter to me, just me, because I need it.

And the hilarious thing is ... I don’t even have the spoons left to be able to tell someone else how to help me. I don’t have the spoons left to answer a message or ask what happened to the people supposed to be helping me or put up a post seeing if anyone will replace the mod that quit or give a list of posts to a friend. I’m out of spoons on this sentence, in negative spoons, and I’m upset ... and I write out my feelings, because I don’t have to struggle with composure and saying things the right way and remembering to say thank you and telling people how to do the thing I need done. This is easier. This post is fewer spoons. Too many spoons, but fewer.

I just fucking wish I had more spoons, because I’m so damn tired of being so constantly in pain.

It would be so much easier, though, if people just described their own fucking posts.