Chasing My Dr. House

The phone call regarding her dad being transported to the hospital with chest pains happened a few hours after the headache that started Cara* down a path she’s still on today – 8 years later. Thankfully, her dad recovered from his mild heart attack. Cara, however, still lives daily with a severe headache.

* Her real name, used with permission.

 Still No Relief

Treating the initial headache with Advil did nothing to get rid of the pain. A burning, tingling feeling blanketed the right side of her head. After a week of suffering, she visited her general care practitioner who prescribed blood pressure medicine. Still no relief. Her doctor then referred her to a neurologist, a cardiologist, and a pain specialist.

Her CAT scans and MRIs came back normal. The neurologist had her try several different migraine medicines. Still no relief. Frustrated with no relief and no answers, Cara asked numerous people at her church to pray over her.

After months of enduring relentless pain, she felt her identity had become the girl with the headache. An identity she loathed.

Chasing My Dr. House

Desperate for answers to the cause of her ongoing pain, Cara went to a well-known integrative and holistic clinic. Identifying and treating unresolved medical issues is their specialty. “I felt like I was chasing my Dr. House,” Cara shared. (The TV medical drama House focused on diagnosing and treating the unusual medical cases that came into Princeton-Plainsboro Teaching Hospital.)

With high hopes of an alternative approach to her pain, Cara began getting IV magnesium treatments, taking steroids, sitting in barometric chambers, drastically changing her diet, and doing acupuncture. These treatments only offered small benefits, so she stopped doing them. More MRIs were done, but still no sign of a cause for her unrelenting pain. “I began to think the doctors thought my pain was all in my head,” Cara remembers.

A new general care practitioner prescribed a medicine for depression that also helps with burning pain, as well as nerve block injections in her neck and head. Still. No. Relief.

Physically Dependent

After a year of enduring pain, Cara agreed to visit a psychiatrist. It was during that time that she and her husband Phillip wanted to have another child, so she was cautious about the medications she was prescribed. She began taking a small dose of a sedative that calmed and numbed her whole system. But soon it became ineffective.

A fertility specialist helped her conceive the child they desired. The psychiatrist switched her to a group of medicines called benzodiazepines, knowing these would be safe during her pregnancy. But she had to wean off them near her delivery due date.  Thankfully, her son Hill was born with no problems.

After the birth of her son, she began her medicine regimen again. Once when picking up her prescription, the pharmacist questioned how she could be functioning while taking such a high dose of the medicine. With his words in mind, she came to the shocking reality she was physically dependent on her medicine even though it was no longer really helping with the pain.

Desperate Measures

Desperate situations often call for desperate measures. Loved ones and several of her doctors encouraged Cara to go to the Cleveland Clinic for an evaluation with a neurologist for chronic headache pain. Cara and Phillip agreed it was worth a try and drove to Ohio for her evaluation. The neurologist recommended a program called iMATCH, which stands for interdisciplinary method for the assessment and treatment of chronic headache pain.

Cara and Phillip believed this program could be the solution, so she signed up for the three week treatment. “You’ll be in a hotel with no kids. You can make some new friends. Spend time with Jesus. Treat it like a vacation,” a well-meaning friend said.

The first morning at the hotel she loaded into the van with the other patients. The crazy, disabled ones. The ones not like her, she thought. Her assigned neurologist knew her medicine was a huge problem, so he took her off it cold turkey. With a determined resolve, Cara said, “I don’t want it anyway. I want to be better.” Biofeedback and progressive relaxation were also part of Cara’s treatment plan.

The detox from her meds lasted five days. While detoxing, Cara was given IV meds to help prevent her from having seizures. Not sleeping at all was part of the detox fallout.  By taking her sedatives away, Cara’s anxiety was heightened. Sounds and smells were heightened. At several points, Cara felt like she couldn’t do it. “I felt like I was living in a nightmare,” she shared. “The pain was unbearable.”

Lowest Pain Level

Cara struggled the first week and a half with anger toward God for not healing her. In a moment of quiet, she felt God say, “I have healed you. You are holy and blameless and my child. Your flesh healing will catch up either here or in heaven.”

During the second week, Cara had detoxed and was no longer physically dependent on her meds. However, the other patients at the hotel were being treated for migraines. And she didn’t have migraines, so she wanted to leave. But she hung in there, hoping for relief from the pain.

With the third week of treatment finished, Cara went home at her lowest pain level in years. She still had some headache pain, but she was no longer dependent on the benzodiazepines. “I felt alive again. I was almost manic feeling,” she remembers. Reflecting back, Cara admits, “I wouldn’t have done that treatment had I known it was a withdrawal detox. God used the guise of chronic pain rehabilitation to get me there. I’m so thankful He did.”

The true test came about 5 years later when Phillip was in a car accident and prescribed the very pain killer she had broken her addiction from. Having it so easily available could have been too tempting, but Cara shared that taking his medication never even entered her mind.

Don’t Talk About My Pain

When I interviewed Cara this summer, I asked her about her level of pain now – 8 years later. She replied, “It’s always at about a 7 or 8 on a scale of 10, but it’s at a 1 in as far as how I let it impact my life. People ask me if I can live my life in constant pain. I say yes, I can. I’ve accepted that this is my life. I really don’t talk about my pain, because it’s not my focus. Enjoying time with my family is my focus.”

Cara, Phillip, Noah and Hill

 

Each of us learns something from our struggles, so I asked Cara to share what she’s learned. She said, “I’ve learned to know my limits and set boundaries accordingly. It’s OK to say no so that I have margin. It is extremely important for me to eat right, drink water, get enough sleep, exercise often, and spend time with God. I’ve prayed for healing, but it hasn’t happened yet. I choose to trust Him anyway, because my struggles have strengthened my faith.”

Having the support of one’s spouse, especially through 8 years of struggle, speaks volumes. Phillip’s words loudly demonstrate his understanding of “for better or worse, in sickness and in health.” He tells Cara, “You are the strongest person I know. To live with all the pain and do all you do.”

Leave a Reply (below): Sometimes specific words come to mind when I interview overcomers. Endurance came to mind when I interviewed Cara. Would you have endurance if you daily faced pain that was a 7 or 8 on a scale of 10? Once you really think through this, please take the time to leave Cara your words of encouragement for being such a strong example of endurance during her tough challenges.