Headaches

Dad has been complaining about headaches again.  I feel miserable as I can't fix it.  I can't make it go away for him.  I can't force his brain into better functioning.  He continues his spiral downward.  He hates all of it.  He has moments where he recognizes that he cannot remember well-- what he wants from the store or whether or not he's eaten lunch or what day it is.


In my mother's house, in order to get her to recognize that I was feeling physically unwell I had to burst into tears.  I taught myself how to do this.  If I told her I wasn't feeling well without the tears, I was not heard.

After I moved in with Dad, the first time I got physically sick, I burst into tears.  I was amazed to discover that I no longer had to do this in order to get medicine or treatment.

The other thing I had taught myself as a young child was a form of pain management.  I am still able to "make myself dizzy" as a way of disassociating from physical pain and then stopping the dissociation at will in order to check on my pain.  The P.C. doc was astonished to find out that I could control that process.  As an adult I was astonished to find out that my experience was not typical.  I thought "everyone" could and did make and unmake themselves dizzy as a response to physical pain.

Disassociation is not relegated to those who have some form of D.I.D.  [D.I.D. used to be called M.P.D. or multiple personality disorder].  If you've ever zoned out while reading a captivating book or driving long distances on a highway in your car, you were disassociating.

I don't think Dad zones out on his his headache pain.  He looks and feels miserable.  Over the counter headache tablets do soften his pain.  But the real problem remains.  He is having more frequent headaches now and an increase in confusion.  He doesn't call it confusion.  But he does know his brain is failing.

And so there is the problem of getting the V.A. docs to respond to his concerns and maybe work him up to make sure that the bump on the back of his head is just a bump.

sapphoq on life