Monday, October 14, 2013

Nagging Leg pain

Having missed most of Thursday, and all of Friday, I had to laugh (to myself of course) coming into the office this morning with my calf wrapped in an ace bandage. For the record, it stopped helping around 10, the throbbing jumped up the volume and has gotten worse since. (BOO). Anyhoo... I went into my co-workers office to ask her a question (having not really been here since Wednesday) and she says, "you have something wrong with your leg"? What I wanted to say was, "no, this is the latest fashion trend, all the cool people are doing it!" But instead I told her the truth. What happened next never surprises me. Now I am the only one (to my knowledge) in the building that has MS. I do not currently have handicap parking (in time grasshopper), and while I do/can have several accommodations, I don't really take advantage of any, currently. I did for school.

I do use FMLA, but even that I tend to use very sparingly. Not because I am in denial (don't need to even go there!), but because I rarely need to be out because of my MS/ and or migraines. I am able to keep both very well maintained. When I am "out", I am OUT! The term "sick" always cracks me up. I don't have an immune system, the medication I am on (Gileyna), doesn't help. So getting a bug is caused from what? Good question! One would say its from my low immune tolerance caused by my MS (instant line to FMLA) others would say people get colds, that's life, that's why you have sick time- not protected under FMLA. But while most people recover from a cold in a day or two, I do not!

That brings me back to my leg pain. I started thinking about it and of course what better method to really hone in on a date than my blog. For those that follow, I mean it when I say I really do blog "Behind the scenes" to not only let it be known what goes on behind my awesome smile, but so I can keep track. For the last several years when I would be asked when I found out I had MS I would instantly say October, 2005! It wasn't until recently (moving to our new house), I came across copies of my initial MRI's from that fateful month... in 2004. The 2005 MRI's that I had a copy of and I always used as my "date" were actually my one year progress follow-up. Everything I thought, timewise, shifted! Crazy! So with my leg pain, its like anything else, the Dr will ask, how long has this been really bothering you? I started looking through and noticed, a wow, a while!

Now I have been taking Baclofen for leg spasms for ah like ever. So I think a part of me has written a large part of the pain off to really bad spasms. I mean, what is the the difference between pain and spasm? They both hurt. Isn't a spasm pain? So how would you know if a leg spasm pain is more pain? Not to mention the question- how long has it been like this? I did mention the "pain" at my last appointment- 3 months ago and I have mentioned it in the past. The answer came at looking at my Baclofen prescription, which is already crazy high. For the record that makes you sleepily and I take something for fatigue already... so I continue in PAIN, not so much a spasm, although who knows. I do know this, I like to think of myself as a tad bit more observant to those around me (or those that don't show up for a couple of days)...

Just my thoughts from behind the scenes of MS, doing battle- kicking butt and taking names (left leg still works!)

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