Mark H. Ryan's Pain Journal

My body is sore. My head is cloudy. I just had a full body tremor that lasted a few hours. My right arm would shake, then my left leg. My jaw would get tight, and my head would bob side to side off and on thru out the attack. Fingers and hands would be locked in place with periodic moments where they resembled someone with MD. I am racking my brain trying to figure out what was different today that could have caused it. I am so lost right now I barily remember the sentence I typed before this one. Fingers are starting to tell me I have typed too much already. More later. :)

Well. I should have known that I was going to forget to post last night but someone told me of documentary and my wife and I HAD to watch it. Under Our Skin is the name of it. It talks about Lyme Disease. My long lost cousin who I apparently haven't seen since I was 4 years old. Hi Rochelle!! Anyway, she told me about the problems that she was/is having and told me to go to a website http://www.lymeinfo.net and there is when a little bit of hope grew to a little more hope. The symptoms are too many to mention but I have far too many of them to not look into it. I am probably admitting my own stupidity but I have heard of limes disease and always thought it was what people who weren't clean contracted. Granted it is caused by bacteria and ticks but I really learned a lot from the movie and the various websites I have visited. I look at it like this, even if they do the tests and I don't have it, that is one more thing that I can rule out that I DON'T have. Silver lining,...

Well, I spent the full day yesterday laying in bed and trying to let the muscles relax and rest. Now it is time to get up and I am so not looking forward to it, especially with it being a little chilly out. It seems that "this" is stealing a little mobility each year. Over 5 years now walking with a cane... It makes me wonder where I will be in another 5 years. Scooter? Of course I would cope, I would have to. I have been blessed with a odd sence of humor and way of thinking about things. I can see me shopping for bumper stickers, and flame decals for the scooter. Anything to get past it... I have two kids and a wife that count on me to be a part of this family. I won't lie, I forget that a lot. I don't want it to be all about me. I downplay my illness because I have dreams and thoughts (blame tv maybe) and I see my kids getting robbed of a childhood because I am focused on the wrong things that make life... Life. I can't wait for our kids to get into sports, whic...

Sitting in the ER waiting room waiting for Kasaundra. Had to get a refill of my Tramadol. It is really sad that other people that try to manipulate the system ruin it for all the others that truly need the medications. I am taking low grade pain meds for high grade pain. Of course I am going to run out. I have to double up on the meds to get ANY relief. I, of course, am no doctor. Who am I to say what meds I should take. But common sence dictates that if there is a certain level of pain to a condition, you treat it with the same level of anti pain meds to lower or negate that condition. It's just sad. Sad that we as Americans cannot leave this world without twisting and turning something to fit our warped and selfish needs. Sorry this entry on my blog is a little more bitter then the other posts. I will try to not have this be a growing trend. I do want to add though that this is feeling more therapeutic then it ever has before. Maybe I need this. Maybe I need to just vent and let ...

I woke up this AM pretty much like any other day. I felt my head tremors a little more profound then other days but nothing more then I was already used to. Yesterday we had the neighbor boy over playing in our front yard with my two little boys and his niece. I remember just standing on the porch and watching all the excitement. Everyone was chasing each other lauching and smiling from ear to ear. For once in my life i saw that I had what I have always wanted. I had THAT yard. The yard where everyone comes to. The FUN house. A sandbox, cars and dump trucks. Toys layed out everywhere as if hit by the most perfect childhood cyclone. After taking my meds this morning, Neurontin, Flexril, Methocarbomol, Ranatidine, and Celexa. -I know it sounds like a lot but it's what was prescribed to me and has since then worked to add a little normalcy to my life- I layed there for about 30 to 45 minutes until the tremors in my neck stopped my head from nodding. Right before sitting up I no...

So, yesterday my wife and I went to the Cox Convention center where they were having a tattoo convention and a bunch of other stuff. Saw the lead singer of a band get wasted on drinking Yager straight while on stage. So bad that the guy threw 2 guitars at the back of the stage and started to rip banners down. He knocked off his bottle of Yager off the stage. Crazy! I got my very first tattoos there. Both on each forearm. Both in fancy cursive writing. One says my oldest boys name, Travis. The other for my youngest boy, Carter. I got them not as a showoff piece but more for me. I got them on my arms so that I can always look down and know my role in this world. I'm a dad. A dad that probably has a lot of room for improvement. I will say that I try. Hard. Probably a little too hard. I grew up without a dad as a lot of you can relate to. There was so many things that I should have know at age 6 that I didn't learn till I was 12. I have always been just behind the curve. Just a f...

I used my right foot to clear the small rock and jagged glass from beneath the most perfect tree I could find. Using my cane as almost a handrail, I sat down. There were mounds of ant hill to the left and right, but no ant in sight. Perhaps it was the cold air that blew, keeping them within the earth but, I'd like to think that they were giving me my space. Solitude. A chance to think unclouded and without worrying of what else I can obsess over or get angry about. Other then the faint sound of a helicopter over head, attempting to bring the news back with them, the sound of the wind thru the trees, and the birds echoing to the others, I heard nothing else. The sight though, that is another story. Beauty in it's most complex form, lay out before me like a play already in progress. Despite the park where I sit is by a elementary school, recess hasn't started, so now I find myself almost trying to "hurry" and relax before the sound of children replaces the sound ...