(no subject)

[bedlamsbard]

So horrified by what happened in Boston earlier. I wish that there was something that I could say or do; I just sat and watched the news reports on Twitter and the CNN livestream until I couldn't stand it anymore.

It's just so awful.

*

I don't know how to segue from that into something else, so I'm just going to do it.

I (finally) went to the health centre today to talk to a GP about my wrist pain, which recently started moving up into my hands and fingers. Unfortunately I don't really think that today was the best day to do it, since I wasn't really in pain today, so I ended up saying to the doctor, "Well, it did hurt, but it doesn't now," and just having a kind of confused narrative of the events and the various aches and pains I've had over the past few months. (In fact, I woke up this morning, and if I hadn't vowed yesterday that the one thing I was going to accomplish today was to make an appointment at the health centre, I probably wouldn't have done it -- there was one point where I was seriously wondering if I'd imagined being in pain over the past few weeks.) I'm mildly convinced that the GP thinks I'm a crazy crafting hypochondriac typist. And I also think that I shouldn't have used the word "but" at any point during that session. ("I've been in pain the past few weeks but it doesn't really hurt today." "I think I have this lump on my wrist but I'm not sure it's related." "This kind of motion hurts but this kind doesn't.")

GP suggested that it was probably repetitive strain and just to keep doing what I've been doing: wrist braces, painkillers, "laying off the hobbies" for a month or so. (I'm willing to craft less, but not to give it up entirely; one reason I started knitting while doing other things is because if I'm not doing anything with my hands, I tend to start peeling bits of skin off. I used to come out of movie theatres with bloody hands and lips -- I still remember doing just that from TTT. Anyway, I'm not stupid, I'm not going to knit or spin if I'm actively in pain.) If it hasn't gone away or gotten better in a couple of months, she said that she'd test me for rheumatoid arthritis.

I don't know. I walked away from that going, "Well, that was pretty pointless," but at least I did it, and I'm proud of myself for that.

Comments

[starlady]

Did she test you for nerve damage? Because your pain sound to me a lot like what my pain was last year before I went in to see a GP and was told that I have an RSI, specifically golfer's elbow...even though it had actually first manifested in my wrists. And at that point instead of sending me home they sent me to an RSI specialist, who assigned me to PT, which I've been doing semi-regularly since. The PT was able to recommend many changes to posture, typing mode, etc, that have vastly reduced my pain and improved the RSI. Obviously I am thousands of miles away, not a medical professional, etc, but if you have nerve damage/inflammation they can tell that whether you're actively in pain when you're in the appointment or not, if they examine you.

[bedlamsbard]

No. She listened to me ramble, asked a couple of questions, had me bend my hands back and forth a few times, and that was it. I didn't get any specific advice or recommendations of things to do. (I mean, when this first started back in -- February? -- I changed my typing posture, which did actually seem to help -- I'm not in pain while typing, just knitting.)