The Mental Debt Struggle...

AntoMac

Indeed Keedie, looking at where you have come from is a good way to look at it.
Your £33k of debt in 2016 equates to over £40k in today’s money, so that’s a huge reduction from there, let alone the big chunk you’ve recently paid down.

Spending time on stuff other than debt busting has clearly also done you good. Maybe your pain management medication will start to help soon too (if you decided to start taking them that is   )

Keedie

Thanks @AntoMac, looking at the debt from 2016 really does put things into perspective in today's money. I feel like I've come a long way as I spent two years unemployed from July 2016 to December 2018 when I started my current job. It took a long time to get my credit rating back up and to get on top of bills and stuff to start clearing debts again. So in that sense, I am very happy with what I've been able to do so far.

Getting out of London definitely helped to focus on other aspects of life that are not all debt busting related. I feel more free. I've been very stressed about my finances, but I realised that with the set payments and overpayments, I may be able to clear £9,000 from my debt. But if not, that's okay. I will still have cleared quite a bit and it's still all going down slowly.

I did take the pain management medication and I'm still in a lot of pain, but I'll admit that it has taken the edge off it all. I'm more mobile and not wincing every minute, so that's definitely progress. I won't stay on the medication long term though. The referral letters for the pain management clinic and the rheumatology came through as I picked up the referral paperwork today from the GP surgery and I just need to go online now and book an appointment. So fingers crossed it won't be too long...

Humdinger1

@Keedie I am so excited to read not only about your fantastic debt reduction but also your career plans! Writing is such a natural strength of yours; you have a clear, very distinctive voice and your editing/proofing skills are evident too.  Onwards and upwards love Humdinger xx 

Keedie

Ahh bless you @Humdinger1! That’s so nice of you to say that, and that’s given me a nice boost of encouragement so thank you. I’ve always loved writing since I was a child but thought I’d never be able to make any money writing. But then I realised there’s lots of careers where I can write. 

I every day too and when I was unemployed, I read about 6-8 books a week. Now I read about 2-3 as I get tired and life’s busier. 

But definitely onwards and upwards. xx

LittleMissDetermined

Just checking in to see how you are doing @Keedie, I hope your appointment went OK yesterday and that they're sorting out your pain. 
LMD x

Keedie

Thanks @LittleMissDetermined for remembering and checking in on me, I really appreciate it. 

The GP sent me to A&E with a referral letter and my medical history and a copy of the consultation notes for further treatment. As when she examined the lump she suspected it was a cyst or blood clot and said I needed blood tests and a scan. Fortunately it wasn’t a blood clot based on my blood test results. But they think I have a ruptured bakers cyst that’s leaking fluid into my calf (which is 3cm in diameter bigger than my left due to the swelling). I had to Google the bakers cyst as I’d never heard of it, but apparently it’s some cyst that forms at the back of your knee and sometimes ruptures. That could explain why I’ve had trouble with my knees but who knows 🤷🏾‍♀️. 

I’m not sure when my scan is, as they may call me to come today if there’s space in the clinic, otherwise it’ll be on Thursday morning as they’ve given me an appointment at 9am. It’s in some sort of outpatient section within A&E called the Medical Ambulatory Care Unit. Didn’t bother to Google that one. But he explained 3 times how to get there, but with my brain fog, exhaustion and pain, I didn’t understand what he saying and I was too embarrassed to ask him to explain himself for a 4th time 😬, so I’ll just have to turn up early and hobble around to find it. 

I was in A&E for about 10/11 hours sitting on those attractive but uncomfortably padded purple chairs. So I’ve now got a fibromyalgia flare up as I can’t sit or stand for prolonged periods anyway and after sitting for so long waiting around, I’ve got a lot of pain in my hips, back and neck so I’m on bedrest today and called in sick at work. 

I was struggling a bit mentally on the weekend so I couldn’t do my Sunday Summary. But I should hopefully be able to organise my thoughts for this evening to post an update. 

Have a good day everyone xxx. 

LittleMissDetermined

Bless you, what a nightmare. I can’t believe you were there for so long! Not the best places to try and get comfy, even when you have a bed x

i hope they get you in for your scan soon x

AntoMac

Oh crikey Keedie, I’ve had a ruptured Baker’s cyst at the back of my knee and it was agony. You’ve done well putting up with that amount of pain. The good news is that mine is completely fine now so you will hopefully be all good soon.  I was prescribed strong painkillers (can’t remember what - helpfully!) but they did the trick. An amazing cortisone injection into my knee was the final step, which whilst painful at the time, was the perfect almost instant miracle cure.

Keedie

That's reassuring to know that things can be dealt with @AntoMac, but I'm sorry that you were in so much pain, I can definitely relate! I can't handle strong painkillers unfortunately, my body doesn't react well and they make me ill. So I have to have paracetamol and this new pain management medication has been making me depressed, so I've reduced the dose and take the paracetamol. Anything with codeine in makes me really sick and I can't even handle ibruprofen lol. 

Hopefully when I have the scan on Thursday they can confirm what's what, as they speculated the ruptured bakers cyst, but not one person can explain why I have lumps on my shin. So apparently, they'll be doing a lot of investigatory work if my knee doesn't show signs of a cyst having been there, so we'll see what happens. But I am in a lot of pain and even the Uber driver last night felt really sorry for me as it took me so long to hobble into his car and get back out again.

And it was a total nightmare in that waiting room @LittleMissDetermined! The senior nurse in charge came out and told everyone to stop asking for updates and where they were in the queue and that it was a minimum 6 hour wait (said after I'd be there around 4.5 hours). That was met with death glares and she scurried away. Then there was a couple of irritated and snappy arguments as there was one double plug socket and everyone wanted to charge their phone and only one socket was available as the other one had a fan and the waiting room had no window or natural light and with so many bodies, it was a sweatbox... and things got very shouty when someone tried to turn off the fan to charge their phone - oh dear!

Someone also excreted something unsavoury on one of the seats that I was about to sit on, and everyone told me not to sit there as it "needs to be sanitised mate!", yet no one would look me in the eye and say what happened. So I just avoided this seat and was standing until a lady felt sorry for me and offered her seat and I hobbled over, regretting that I'd arrived with only my walking sticks and not the crutches.

Then security had to remove one guy who'd been drinking and was starting to square up to people to egg on a fight because some dared to challenge him over changing the TV channel manually when everyone was watching a programme. I shrank inside, as I was scared things would get a bit out of hand, knowing that I couldn't physically run away. But security seemed to be familiar with this guy and I got the impression that he wasn't even a patient!

I feel really sorry for NHS staff, as no one was grateful for the treatment because of the wait times, and you could see how stressed the staff were, as at the end of the day they're human. The cuts to the NHS are just crazy, and the cracks are really showing. It seems like a stressful environment, but rewarding when things go right. When I was having my blood taken the lady told me that they were short staffed which made it worse. At one point during the day there was only one person taking bloods so it was taking so much time, so everyone was helping to get the blood test queue down, but that coincided with there being less staff in the blood lab to test the blood so it wasn't working. I couldn't do what they do, and so I really admire that. Especially as dealing with the public is hard at the best of times, especially when they're frantic and stressed about a loved one or sick. But even my understanding nature after 9 hours was starting to wane 😢. 

Jellytotts

Have you been seen by the pain clinic before?  I went with my DH and took in a lot more than he did about the importance of some pain meds to be taken regularly and without fail in order to stabilise things.  Some have a very short "shelf life" and only work for a few hours but when used in conjunction with others on a regular basis provid a "pain safety net" sort of thing to keep things at bay.  DH was very skeptical but I nagged him to take everything as planned and he found after a few weeks it did really help.  He takes regular breaks from each drug in turn (with the gp's help) and it ensures he doesn't get too reliant on anything.  His fibro flares have decreased since she's been on the regular meds and we also cut out all gluten which has a proven link to fibro issues.

our local pain clinic specialist is amazing and really helped us find the right path.  I hope you can find some respite from the pain and fogs.