"We suffer more in imagination than in reality" - Senaca

I've recently been on a journey to find an effective therapy for my chronic pain(migraine). It's exhausting and draining and horrible, sure, but the thing that is the worst for me is the idea that some therapy will work. I'm terrified that this journey will end, it will have a simple solution, an easily accessible medication, and my pain will go away. One of the reasons, the reason I'm more comfortable talking about, is that my pain is real to me in a world, and in a mind, where few things can have an intense reality like pain. Generally, I ocillate between being unconvinced of my own existence or critically aware of it. I'm all jumbled up, my head is a swamp of ruminations and thought-stopping illusions, but my pain cuts through it like a knife. When my migraines are the worst, there are no more thoughts, just pain. This isn't stopping me from looking for a treatment though, and I mostly think of it as an interesting quirk in my relationship to my pain. The thing that really scares me, that might hold me back, is that I will get an easy treatment, the pain won't be there, and it was never as bad as I thought it was. In fact, this thing that has defined me, been a bouy in the storm of OCD even, was never real. It was attention, self-obsession, and it can go away easily because I'm blowing it out of proportion. I don't believe I'm lying, I'm scared that I'll be told it is a small thing or that it's not there at all. I'm oversensitive. I'm crying for help. There is no migraine, there is only OCD. It's silly to me as I write it, with a headache of course, but this is the thought plaguing me. This is what holds me back and urges me to not call my neurologist back, I'm scared it will have all been nothing, and then it will be gone.

I hope everyone is holding up okay! I’ve been seeing a lot of scared posts and whatnot lately, so I just wanted to make this post to remind ourselves to practice our uncertainty! I want to share a few response prevention lines that help me calm down! My thoughts do not define who I am. Maybe I’m a bad person, maybe I’m not, but I have a lot of things I need to do now. I’m going to practice not knowing for sure. I don’t have to solve this problem. I am choosing to sit with this uncomfortableness!

Maybe I am a horrible person. Maybe I do deserve to go to prison forever. Maybe I do deserve to not be with my mom for the rest of her life. Maybe I do deserve to be shanked to death in a prison…. Or maybe I don’t. Sitting with that uncertainty no matter how horrible, helps you to think rationally. Hope you’re all thriving today. “Maybe” has helped me through my worst theme so far. I hope it helps you too!