A Writer’s Diary Entries From Late March, 2002
Saturday, March 23, 2002
1:30 PM. I think this is the worst day of my life. I never got back to sleep last night, as the pain was unbearable. I’m having a hard time writing this, as my handwriting is so unsteady, and, of course, my palms are sweating.
I went to the ER of West Regional Hospital at 6:30 AM or so. By that time I was in such pain that every step hurt, and my left foot had become all tingly. The doctor ordered a shot of prednisone, a steroid, and another shot.
With my little gown and bracelet on, I waited in my hospital bed for about half an hour for the nurse to come in. She said sciatica can be excruciating; she knew because she had it when she was pregnant.
The shots were administered in my right buttock because the pain is in my left side. Before I left, I signed lots of forms and got a prescription for the steroids.
The pain from the shot pretty well knocked out the pain from the sciatica for a while.
I dropped the prescription off at the pharmacy at Walgreens, where I feel like I’m living these days. (The doctor at the hospital told me to keep taking my other drugs as well.) After buying some groceries at Publix, I went back to Walgreens to pick up the new prescription.
Since I got home, I’ve basically been in bed. I feel awful. It’s not just the leg pain – which I swear is moving into the right leg, too – but I’ve been queasy and nauseated and my heart has been racing, which I think are symptoms of the steroid.
I remember when I had asthma as a kid in Rockaway, and the doctor prescribed what must have been a steroid; I immediately threw it up. So I’m a little (okay, a lot) afraid to take the oral steroid – or to be honest, many of the other medications.
I just tried to eat a little, and I’m feeling slightly better now.
When the triage nurse called me in, she thought I had chest pains, but that was another guy she got me confused with, and when he went by, he said, “I’d trade places with you anytime.”
Of course he’s right. I don’t have a life-threatening illness, unless I have a tumor, and I don’t think I do.
I don’t know what would have happened if today had been a workday, but right now I’m not going to think about my job or any other stressors. I need to get well. I haven’t been exercising, reading the New York Times, or doing anything that I normally do. I feel as though I’ve aged thirty years in three weeks.
I just had my California veggie mix and took the two prednisone tablets with milk. I guess if they affect me, I’d rather it be sooner than later. I also took a Triavil.
Prednisone’s main side effects are nervousness and insomnia, and so they might precipitate a lot of anxiety. The pills tasted foul.
God help me. I feel so alone. It’s hard to believe I’m the same guy who came here in early December, or the writer of last September in Eureka Springs, or the guy who relaxed, despite anxiety, all last summer in California, Chicago and New York.
Will I get through this?
Aunt Sydelle called, wanting me to come over and drive her to the beauty parlor. But right now I can’t help my elderly aunt. She said she was going to make the effort to drive herself there.
My parents are far away. I have no friends who can come over.
I will either come out of this broken or stronger.
Why am I such a baby? My hospital bracelet reads “Richard Grayson, M, 50.” What a disaster I am.
*
5 PM. I’ve just been on a crying jag. It felt good. Reading the New York Times, I found myself thinking how weird and mysterious life is, and I started humming “Send in the Clowns” and filling up five or six tissues with tears.
It’s a funny old life. How did I get here at 50? I’m in pain, yes, and I’m even starting to get pain in my right leg now, but I’ll get through this. I’ve gotten through other bad times. What made me think I’d gone through the worst of this?
Oh yes, this will be a long, difficult struggle, and there will be times when I won’t want to go on – but I will. I hugged the little teddy bear I keep on the knee of the big stuffed lion on the floor.
Who wrote “No one is ever alone”? There are people out there who will help me and people whom I’ll help. There are writers and artists and filmmakers who help me.
I went out again, to the library and to the ATM. And I didn’t vomit – not yet, anyway. But I don’t like the idea of all these medicines.
Monday, March 25, 2002
6 PM. Yesterday afternoon was pretty awful, and the evening and night were even worse.
Late yesterday I did take the two prednisone tablets, but today I took only one at lunch, and I think I’m going to stop.
While I tend to catastrophize and be moody, I’m sure the drug worsened my symptoms even if it may have helped my back.
I still had that excruciating ankle and shin pain last evening, and taking the Vicodin was useless.
I not only watched or listened to the entire Oscars show, but I was also up the whole night except for maybe an hour or two. I was sweaty, not just in the palms of my hands and the soles of my feet but all over.
This afternoon at school, several people commented on my “sunburn” after I took the prednisone, and Toni Appel and Steve Friedland both said that prednisone is a strong drug that I need to be careful with.
I really don’t know how I got through today at work.
At 10 AM, I had a meeting with Deb Kenyon from CALI, who showed me some of the material on their CD and website and gave me ideas on how they’re used in academic support programs.
From there, I went to Shahabudeen’s 11:15 AM Con Law ARP session, sitting through his awesome lecture and hypos on equal protection, and at noon I did the same for Dave Halpern’s Con Law ARP, which was also on equal protection.
In both sessions, I handed out evaluation forms, and most of the students gave both of their teaching assistants 10s on a scale of 1 to 10.
After I got back from lunch (and buying lumbar support), I met with several students, including Emanuel Smith, who asked how he could keep from getting so nervous and worried about school.
Yeah, like I’m the right person to lecture anyone on handling anxiety.
Still, this taking of one task at a time made today easier, even if Steve Friedland did scare me by saying he envisions me as co-running the law school’s August orientation with him.
After I came home at 5 PM, the phone rang almost immediately, and it was Aunt Sydelle, who needed to talk with me for half an hour.
Anyway, right now I’m very stressed out, and I have terrible diaphoresis (he wrote with a towel under his sweaty hand).
I didn’t keep my appointment with Dr. Davis since he said he’d refer me to an orthopedist if my sciatica didn’t clear up by today. I also brushed off Betty from the other chiropractor’s office.
Tomorrow I’ll see Dr. Riley, the orthopedic resident at NSU’s Health Care Center.
Although I do feel slightly better today, I don’t know if this signals Improvement – for I felt better on Saturday and worse yesterday.
I’ve felt like a total mess for the last four weeks and probably even longer than that.
I probably should go into the pool now, as Dr. Hall suggested, but who has time? I’ll just rest in bed when I can.
Before the Oscars last evening, I watched the movie Ghost World, a videotape I got from the Davie library on Saturday. It did divert me.
Mark Bernstein said he’s sure that my sciatica is brought on by stress. Let’s face it, I’m trapped, or I feel trapped, in a job that I’m not suited for, one where I feel like I can’t be myself: an alternative writer-type guy.
No, I would not like to be working in a coffee bar like Vincent or Bealls Outlet like Jonathan, but I felt so much more comfortable as an undergrad instructor. I don’t seem able to relax.
Yet how can I give up my job in such a short time, especially when I need to pay my rent and bills and when I need health insurance more than ever? Or am I just not going to give myself – and the job – a chance?
I’m nervous, of course, about Thursday’s exam-writing workshop, but even if it’s torture, I can probably bullshit my way through it.
On Thursday evening I get to see a psychologist, and Friday is a holiday.
I just wish I could have really enjoyed this winter in South Florida. But I guess I don’t feel as desperate as I did yesterday. There’s always a way out.
Tuesday, March 26, 2002
6 PM. Last night I fell asleep around 8 PM, and I slept till 3 AM, when I felt bad pain in my ankle and shin. (I didn’t start getting sweaty palms until I began writing this entry; I haven’t had diaphoresis since this morning.)
After taking some medicine, I managed to get even more sleep.
In my last dream of the night, I awoke when I found myself driving my car and about to make a left turn with a lot of traffic coming in the opposite direction; I could feel the car starting to stall out, and I panicked.
That’s exactly the position I’m in now: I feel myself dealing with the anxiety and depression symptoms that grew so bad in late October 2000. I have brain fog, and I obsess, and I feel incredibly nervous, and I catastrophize.
I explained all this to Dr. Riley when I saw her today at the Nova clinic and told her about my experience in the ER. She said that next week I’ll see Dr. Frank, the resident who’s an orthopedic specialist.
She told me to drop from 40 mg. of prednisone to 10 mg. a day. But I think even that much of the drug is too much for me. Well, it did help the sciatica, which is a lot worse today, but I’m scared of what it’s doing to my mental stability.
Dr. Riley also changed my prescription from Triavil 2/10 to Triavil 4/25, which she said I could take three to four times a day. (The prescription won’t be ready until tomorrow because Walgreens had to special-order it.)
I’m still feeling very messed up and really scared. My throat hurts, and I worry that I’ve caught an infection because prednisone is an immunosuppressant.
Hell, I worry about everything. I’m going to stop writing because my palms are too sweaty.
*
6:30 PM. I’m both restless and tired. It’s hard to understand how fast my mental state has deteriorated. Of course, anxiety breeds anxiety. Dr. Riley said I should be able to stop the cycle if I up the Triavil, although as a younger doctor, she prefers the SSRIs.
We’ll see. At least I’m getting help.
Would I be able to relax if I just quit my job? Probably not, although the job pressure is undoubtedly what’s making me crazy.
But remember, I felt pressure even as an adjunct and graduate student in Arizona. Over the 2000 Christmas vacation there, I began feeling better.
So while leaving my job would probably make me feel a little better, I would also have a lot of anxiety about not having a job.
Teresa, who moved today, says that Stephanie is with her and checking out colleges from Bard and Vassar to NYU and Barnard – says that I’m too busy to have a nervous breakdown, but I think she doesn’t want to be bothered with my complaints.
I do wonder what triggered these depressed and anxious feelings, but it must be the sciatica, obviously, and then the stress of the computer getting stolen and Aunt Sydelle’s problems.
I think I was coping well for quite a while. I feel relaxed when I come home from work: I take walks and watch videos. What changed?
Dr. Riley, just like all the other health professionals, doesn’t believe the sciatica stems from my mental state – although surely there has to be a connection.
It wouldn’t be unusual to become depressed by sciatica, the pain, and the limits placed on my life. Dr. Riley said I could go back to exercising if it didn’t hurt me, and I think I should do that and try to do as much of a Body Electric workout as I can.
In fact, I need to try to make my life as normal as it ever was. Eventually the sciatica will go away, and so will the anxiety. It’s just a question of time.
Sat Darshan said maybe I should try to become officially disabled, which is something Josh also suggested last fall in New York.
The thing is, I think I’m perfectly capable of working. I’ve always wanted to live in the world. That’s why I made all those wonderful trips last year and why I applied for the job at Nova.
Right now, do I wish I hadn’t applied? Yes, but there’s no telling how messed-up I’d feel if I were still in Apache Junction.
(Sat Darshan said, “We always love you, whether you’re in Florida or Arizona or in a padded cell.”)
After all, right now I could be stressed out simply by teaching adjunct courses again. At least if I’m going to be stressed out at work, I should have a good-paying job, no?
Hey Richie, you’re going to be okay. Have faith. You’ve gotten out of this before.
And while I may not be able to see this now, there are always alternatives, and if I need to quit my job and return to Arizona and be agoraphobic, my family will allow that to happen.
Except, as Susan once said to me, it may have been acceptable to do that at 17 but not at 50. I wish I could have put anxiety behind me. I wish I had learned from Susan how to deal with it better so that I would now have some resources I could count on.
It’s hard to start all over again and fight this thing, but maybe I’ll come out of it cured for good. Wouldn’t it be loverly to be an ordinary man (to mix up titles of My Fair Lady songs)?
This will all pass somehow. Maybe the anticipatory anxiety about the anxiety will prove worse than the experience. Too bad I didn’t get the side effect of euphoria from prednisone.
Why does it suddenly seem so hard to get through the night? Well, I’ll try to relax as best I can. I can’t do much else.
Thursday, March 28, 2002
7:30 PM. I like Dr. Steven Koncsol, the psychologist I saw tonight. At first I was put off by his wearing a suit, but he turned out to be very funny, very Jewish, and very flamboyant: he sort of reminded me of the comedian Gilbert Gottfried.
He had me sign a lot of forms for “The Psych Team” (it’s weird to go to a place that has that emblazoned on the door), and he took my history, and so after a pretty short time, he probably knows me fairly well. He even might have been a few years ahead of me at Brooklyn College.
He wasn’t thrilled with the meds I’m taking – I know Triavil has gone out of fashion – and he seemed to know what he was talking about when he spoke of panic attacks.
About my job, he said I shouldn’t leave before a year and that I should view it as “finding your voice – to put it in a way a writer can understand.” He said they hired me knowing that I was creative and that I needed to make the job my own. He’s probably right about that.
He also thinks it would help to find a companion my own age. (“Sex, feh, that’s for when you’re 18, but it’s good to share your anxiety with someone around your own age who’s your intellectual equal.”)
He obviously spotted my inability to make a commitment: “Short stories are nice, but maybe you’re ready to write a novel.”
And he said I should view taking the bar exam as an intellectual exercise and not worry about being admitted to the Florida Bar as an attorney if I don’t need to.
As for bankruptcy, “If it didn’t bother you the first time, why should it bother you the second?”
Dr. K said that while returning to my parents’ house may be a nice fantasy, I wouldn’t be able to stand it after three days, that I can’t recreate the past.
We have an appointment for Saturday next week at 9 AM. “I’ll make coffee,” he said. “Oh no, that’s like saying ‘Have a drink’ to an alcoholic.”
Last evening’s massage session was good, but it hurt – and then I took a warm bath with Epsom salts. I dozed off around 9 PM and slept soundly after taking the Triavil 4/25.
This morning my car’s battery light was on, so I took it to those creeps at Firestone, who put in a new alternator for a ridiculously high price. But I was able to get to and from their place by taking Nova’s shuttle bus from the Medical Center just across University Drive.
Nobody showed up for the exam writing workshop, which spared me any anxiety. Mark Padin had class in the room before that, and I chatted with him for half an hour.
I got really good responses to the evaluations in Spencer’s Civil Procedure ARP and the one Damon and Keith do in Property. (One person wrote, “Fire Padin and hire them to teach the class.”)
I also heard more about getting teaching assistants for next fall. I’m still learning who the first-year students are.
Dr. Koncsol said he could tell there were parts of my job I liked, and dealing with the students is part of that. He also said that dressing up is just a uniform, and even sanitation workers can’t leave their jobs at work in this age when we all have beepers and cell phones and laptops.
As for going on the Web and writing Sat Darshan and Mark B, as I did today – “as long as you look busy at work.” Yes, I’ve got to view my job as a game.
This morning I exercised, and I knew I got my sacrum out of joint – so I saw Dr. Davis, who did an adjustment. He said it’s frustrating that my sciatica isn’t improving “because you adjust so easily” – and he thinks it’s true that psychological factors are playing a part.
Anyway, when I got home tonight from the psychologist, I called Aunt Sydelle. At one point in the conversation I said, “You do know I’m gay, don’t you?”
“Well,” she said, “I sort of figured – but it doesn’t matter, I love you just the same.”
I also called Dad, who said I sounded good.
I know I’ve got a tough row to hoe (is that the right metaphor, or have I gone totally crazy?), but I feel hopeful tonight.
I’ll read the rest of today’s paper tomorrow. This is the first holiday since Martin Luther King Day, over two months ago, and I’m going to try to relax. Yes, my sciatica is painful, but the pain is no longer constant. I feel like it will resolve within a few weeks.
On Thursday I see the orthopedic specialist, and on Friday I see the chiropractor and a week from Saturday I see the psychologist. Tomorrow I’m going to the dentist.
Now that it’s almost April, it’s getting hot out. So I’ve basically survived the first quarter of 2002, and I know that I’m better off than I was a year ago.