Raging Pain, Raging Rage

Okay, you know what? NO. THIS IS NOT HAPPENING. I have been in a flare the past two days because I ate some potato chips I suspected of being gluteny but remained unconvinced about. Or that's my theory; I don't really know for sure. All I have to say about that is, what kind of universe am I living in?!

The pain's been so bad that the past two nights I have been unable to fall asleep. I finally did get some sleep both nights after talking myself down into it, which I've gotten pretty good at over the years.

Last night I tried Lidocaine -- a topical numbing gel -- as well, but, as usual, it did nothing. Or, if anything, it made it burn more. This morning the pain was still crazy, and by the time I got to school I had been sobbing on and off about it for three hours. So in hopes of stemming my crying before meeting with my advisor, I went to the bathroom and rubbed some more Lidocaine on, thinking that miraculously it would make a difference this time.

But once again, it didn't do anything -- and this time, I can clearly tell that it's made the pain worse.

I would just like to say pubicly to the brilliant doctor who prescribed me the Lidocaine: genius. You were the biggest ripoff of my life. $500 for you to tell me things I had already learned over the course of my endless research. $500 for you to ignore my concerns about a possible other condition (interstitial cystitis) and lump all my symptoms under the umbrella of your speciality. $500 for you to treat me like a car in for a lube -- a tube of numbing gel that I told you made my pain worse. $500 for you to send me a survey about how my vulvodynia makes me FEEL, because don't we all know that's the kind of research that's going to lead to a cure.

I'm sure there are good doctors out there studying this condition. This guy is not one of them.

$500, insult to injury. Five hundred dollars! Hey, can I be a vulvodynia doc too? Wham bam thank you ma'am!

Okay, I just need someone to be mad at because my crotch is on fire and I have a final to take in forty minutes. And there's really nothing I can do about the pain at this point. Pain killers won't work. Ice would, but I don't know where to get any, and anyway I don't know how I'd sit on it during the final. At least I'm not worried about the test itself. I will do fine, if I manage to concentrate.

And then I will go home and do whatever the hell I can to transition out of this flare. Which might include mailing some hatorade to a certain doctor at the Cleveland Clinic. Bozo.

Update: There's nothing like a good old-fashioned computer-science test to soothe my mind. My mood has reversed. Now I'm going to make lentil soup, and when it's done I'm going to pour it all over my body and go to sleep.

P.S. I think I did a really good job not swearing above.