The Never Ending Cold Sore!

It really amazes me sometimes just how much pain, of any kind, affects your day to day life. My life, these days, is a constant and continual guessing game; I never know whether I am feeling crappy from the leukemia, the drugs, or one of the side effects, of either the leukemia or the medication. This week, I am relatively certain that it is this dag-gone cold sore.

This thing has lingered for three weeks now, and last night was the very first night, in three weeks, that I actually slept. I did wake up once, to slather on Neosporan, but other than that, I slept the entire night. My first thoughts upon awakening was; “That was certainly a great night”! I am such a dork, but I realized that the past three weeks, my sleep was filled with tumultuous thoughts, and constantly being aware of that darn cold sore. It was either stuck to my top lip, the pillow, or just throbbing and bleeding all over.

The day time hours were spent whining to Joe and hobbling around the house feeling miserable. I really am not sure that the fatigue and over-all crappy feeling was 100% the cold sore, or if something else was brewing. My ear hurt, my head ached, my eyes were sensitive and sore, and I had pain down my neck. The over-all fatigue didn’t help to brighten my day, and as bad as the nights were, I just kept wishing for the next day to be here.

Well, I am here to say that Mr. Cold Sore is finally on his way out. Sleeping was such a pleasure and my tumultuous thoughts were pleasant ones again. I suppose that is what intrigued me the most about this episode; my night-time, subconscious thoughts and the way they changed, as soon as the pain subsided.

What it has also taught me is to be WAY more sympathetic to those in pain, whether it looks like a “small” injury or not. I also realized that when around others in pain, I need to speak more slowly and softly, and to not over-power or overwhelm, their brain. I know that for the past three weeks, everything seemed louder and everything seemed a bit more difficult to process.

I am thrilled that this episode is mostly behind me and from now on, I will be a more empathetic person!