Waking Up

What it’s like (for me) waking up in the middle of the night.

If you happen to be on your back, you feel terrible pain in your neck. As you wake up, you realise it’s also in your SI joints, then elbows and hands. Every finger feels like it’s on fire and your elbows like someone is smashing them with a hammer. Your knees protest, are stiff and painful, and when you try to move your legs, they shout NO!!! Then you realise that your knees have also joined the cacophony of pain…

If you were on your side, the shoulder and arm you were lying on are screaming. Your knees too. You shift, but the damage has been done. Your pain refuses to dissipate. Your neck joins in as your stiff fingers also make themselves known You shift, but the pain refuses to leave.

And hours later the pain does react a bit and you sleep again. Or it doesn’t respond And you stay up from midnight to the next day, trying to function despite falling asleep while reading aloud to the children durinhg the day.

If your husband is in town, you lie awake, desperately hoping he will soon wake up so your pain meds can be taken without feeling guilty for the noise they make (extras because I’ve taken ‘all’. Jjumy meds throughout the day.)h

I can’t wait for these to pass. Every single day pain wakes me. Hmmm