RSI, Depression, Art, Blah
Sunday, April 8, 2012 at 2:13AM This is going to be my first large journal entry written here using voice dictation software to spare my hands. I am used to expressing myself through typed word and find dictating to a piece of software awkward and difficult. I need to push through this though because in the past I used to find writing to be such a fantastic processing tool and since getting RSI I have missed it immensely. While I get the hang of the software, the tone of my writing will probably be strange, possibly incoherent and quite rambling. I am doing this for myself and so would not hold it against anyone who took one look at all this and decided not to read it.
In my mind there is a certain degree of shame I feel when complaining, I imagine a voice (mine, yours?) saying that my problems are self-created, that I have no fucking right to complain in a world of far more misery than I experience in my own silly little life. In a sense, it is true, my problems are minimal and I think it's important for us to always remember that about the things which trouble us because it keeps us humble and reminds us that the world is not ours alone. However, the shame I feel tends to send me spiralling into an ever deeper depression, one where I feel pathetic for not being stronger, better, whatever, so tonight I am going to practice the fine art of having a good old-fashioned whinge.
I have had RSI well over a year now. When I first started feeling the discomfort, while doing the video editing that was my day job, I suppose I tried to push through it for awhile… just like everybody does . I don't really remember trying to push through it for very long, what I do remember is being shocked by how quickly my hands, wrists, arms started feeling worse. The feeling like carbonated soft drink fizzing along my arm, the way my hands went numb and I panicked. What's the best thing to do when you panic about a physical ailment? Why research it on the Internet, of course! The horror stories about permanent nerve damage and ruined lives terrified me, I remember calling my partner while he was at work and bawling my eyes, terrified I had ruined my hands.
My partner, such a good man, calmed me down. I went to the doctor who diagnosed me with carpal tunnel and told me to get wrists splints and painkillers from the chemist. I took a few weeks off work, I figured that would be enough time for me to heal, after all the injury only seemed to be recent.
It wasn't carpal tunnel. My doctor was an idiot, one of those people who would not admit their ignorance even when it effects other people’s lives, instead they bluff their way through things to the point where she would have had me undergo expensive surgery that would probably not have even helped my type of injuries and in fact may have exacerbated them. I won’t waffle on with boring details, long story short I found a hand therapist who diagnosed me with tendinitis, I saw her for about four months. Then I saw an osteo and now I am seeing a different hand therapist. I am also about to embark on an eight week course with a student in the Alexander technique. I have damage to my radial nerve, ulnar nerve… ugh, boring details.
The thing people don't understand is that there is no exact cure for RSI, in fact it's still not understood entirely. So the healing process is kind of a trial and error type thing… An expensive exercise in trying many different options, trying to decide which things are worth investing time and money in, both of which tend to be precious and scarce resources.
The thing people don't understand is when they look at other people's lives and think they know the solutions to their problems is that outside perspective is different to lived experience. The thing people don't understand is that their well-meaning suggestions often unintentionally feel like accusations, the unspoken message being “the solution to your problem is simple” the implication being that I am either stupid, lazy, useless or a combination of all three.
During this whole time, I have not been working. Finding work where I don't use my hands too much is tricky, depressing and can feel overwhelming. I can't even drive for long periods of time, even short periods can be difficult or impossible on an especially bad days. Probably, maybe there is a job out there for me but finding it has been tricky especially when I have a panic attack while navigating the catacombs of seek.com.au, my hands twinging all the while.
So I am financially dependent on my partner for the time being because no I do not qualify for the dole or anything, I would have to become a permanent resident and to do so we would have to pay a lot of money and wait two years. I repay my partner for this support by doing the things I can do - cooking, cleaning, domestic duties that mean he doesn't have to stress when he gets home and because he just had a stressful year at work, I am told that this help has been much appreciated and he does not resent my financial dependence upon him.
But nobody likes being dependent on another person, it's an incredibly vulnerable feeling, and one that deeply affects your sense of self-worth.
And it means our freedom is limited, it means I haven’t the money to spare for art supplies. See, the thing is, if I want to continue to have a sustainable art practice, I can no longer do little drawings and paintings, I need to work big but big is expensive… so I have to wait, wait until I have a job, wait until we have the money to spare…
And we have been waiting for me to heal. But I'm not sure I have healed at all. People tell me I should take a break, stopped going online, stop making art. Just stop. It is easy for them to say that and it should be simple but here is the thing…
I grew up on the Internet. This is the place I would go to in my darkest hours, this is the place where I can hide away yet reach out to people at the same time, this is the place where I have constructed my identity. And art? Well, without art, to be perfectly honest and lucid… I don't feel as if I exist, I don't feel as if I have a point, a meaning, a reason. Without art, I truly feel as if I am nothing. I guess you could call that passion, perhaps dependency, perhaps sickness. I hate to be melodramatic but sometimes when people suggest I give up my art, it feels as if they are suggesting that I should shrivel up and fade away to grey, beige, empty, nothing.
But ok, a break is not giving up these things… Simply leaving them behind for a while or practising moderation. But how does that work? And what do I do during the breaks? And how long do they last? The breaks are empty periods for me, unable to do the things I love, to channel my energy and passion into these things, I find myself falling into a frustrated, resentful sort of depression.
And then people make more practical suggestions… Get a job, exercise more, take Prozac, you'll feel better! You know you will! Because we live in a world where weaknesses is not tolerated, sadness is not allowed, man the fuck up already.
But you know what? I'm in mourning. When I was deeply depressed teenager, the thing that helped me pull myself out some very dark places was the dream of being able to spend a lifetime making art… And of really, truly achieving personal greatness with my art. Over the past ten odd years I have worked my butt off on that dream, I moved away from the country and to a big city for the dream, I worked so fucking hard for that dream.
And the sick irony is that my hard work might be what has damaged my arms and hands so badly.
So yeah, I'm in mourning, mourning for dreams I might have to let go of to some degree, mourning that I may not be able to shoot for the stars. Is it wrong, is it egotistical that I truly wanted to achieve incredible things? Is it pathetic, spoilt, snivelling, stupid of me that I feel so deeply depressed at the prospect of having to readjust my goals?
It probably is but it's also how I feel. I am working on readjusting my goals, learning new management strategies, realigning my passions… Trying to find a way forward, to learn to cope with this in a healthy, functional manner.
But for awhile, I really truly feel like shit. I really do. Maybe this makes me pathetic but aren't we all kind of weak and pathetic in some way? For awhile, I need to have times where I cry almost all day and feel incredibly, immensely hopeless, frustrated and useless . I don't know when I will heal, I don't know if I will heal, what I do know is that I will probably never be able to create art for nine hour stretches of immersive, passionate loss of self ever again. If I am to be healthy, to some degree I might have to let go of one of the biggest loves of my life.
That is not going to happen overnight so please excuse the melodrama in the meantime. Thankfully, I confine the excesses of my depression primarily to spaces such as this. Those who know me in real life are always shocked to hear I often struggle with depression as apparently that does not translate in “real life”.
Ultimately… yeah, it's just RSI, everyone gets RSI. Most days I cope, my partner tells me he's impressed by how well I cope so I guess I'm actually doing okay. However, there are days when it does feel like the end of the world, it really does and I'm a bit sick of feeling ashamed for feeling that way. It's 2AM, my eyes are puffy from crying and fuck it, I'm going to just post this because I'm entitled to my fucking vulnerabilities. Hell, I think I’ll go watch this TED Talk for the seventh time and feel better about myself:
Yeah. That helped. I think. I think I should probably sleep.
Reader Comments (8)
I think you've taken too long of a break from having a good old whinge. I think your post is more of a humble update on your life in general and there is very little true whinging in it.
Many people I know, including me, have battled to various degrees with nerve pain in their wrists. Although most are very weak cases, in time, once you recover a bit more you'll hopefully find that somewhere out there will be the right equipment to help you use the computer in comfort rather than pain.
Good luck with your recovery.
On a side note, I'm amazed you managed to get this out using Voice Dictation software. Either this took you hours or that software is getting really good nowadays.
You're not being melodramatic, you're not acting spoilt or pathetic or anything of the sort. As you said, you're in mourning - and that's perfectly understandable - and everyone mourns differently. If we all handled grief the same way, well, we'd understand it better and have set coping procedures, an instruction manual for when things go wrong.
Anyway I won't say I understand exactly what it's like; the most I can do is empathise and remind you that you've got wonderful people around you who love you regardless of whether you reach the stars you were aiming for - and also that there are billions of stars In the sky so chances are you'll find another that'll perhaps not be as high as you'd originally hoped, but still burns brightly.
Also, a bit of advice I read somewhere that has really helped me with my own feelings of shame regarding depression: Telling someone they shouldn't be unhappy because there are people out there worse off is like telling someone not to be happy because there are people out there who are better off. So there!
*hug*
Hey, that was really well written. I think you are basically reaching the point where you can stop giving the dictation disclaimer; I'm sure that felt 'stiff' while you were writing it, but it reads really naturally.
As I read this, I kept coming up with things to say and then you went on to say them.
So yeah... Honestly, we've experienced such a change in our understanding of RSI, and encountered so many incorrect opinions about it (eg your dickhead doctor), that I think it's important to kinda spread the word a bit with a piece such as this one.
Also: your recent exhibition was freakin' awesome and through the remainder of your life you will have many more. You may never reach the level of accomplishment that you've always aspired to, but then nobody ever does - art is the process of taking genius ideas and doing your best to bring them into the world, and either being somewhat disappointed with how it turns out or embracing happy accidents, but never ending up with what it looked like in your head. The same is true of careers, but multiplied by a thousand.
Sending love, and I agree I thought that was well written and totally natural. I think your already adapting by using the dictation software.
I'm gonna float some ideas that might help because you need as many as possible Your free to reject them all no worries and they're here and so might inspire ideas of your own.
I think this could force you into new avenues of creaivity. you may also adapt by doing very short peroids of work on your tablet and computer. and finding shortcuts. You could use sketchup, a really easy 3d modeling program to make a drawn looking 3D environment like a house and garden.for gentlemen bird. You can then take stills of that set for the angles you need and you just have to add the characters to make a comic, or whole comic series. . I'm making a video at the moment using skeptchup.
Job idea: an extra for TV and movies. Extras need to be available 7 days a week like you and able to wear clothes and stand about like you can :) No hands needed. I knew someone at college who was a guy in the pub in a scene from a bbc comedy and someone in the street in a movie..
Please don't give up hope because, adapting to your new state could bring out creativiy and inginuity that wasn't needed before. You have a gorgeous voice too and a tiny bit of narration on your videos would be good.
Yeah probly a lot of dumb ideas but you never know :)
A couple of links. Again they took me 2 mins to investigate so don't worry about dismissing them
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M-wLOfjVfVc
http://www.google.co.uk/search?q=beach+walking+in+sand+art&hl=en&safe=off&prmd=imvns&tbm=isch&tbo=u&source=univ&sa=X&ei=6eqLT7LCFKOx0QWyvpHlCQ&ved=0CFgQsAQ&biw=1920&bih=966
Goin thru the exact same thing. I feel like this thing will never go away, and I can't accept it. I can't accept compromising my artistic dreams, which, like yours, are very high and the source of my happiness. Good luck to you. I hope our arms heal.
Ps, have you looked into Sarno's Tms theory?
I know exactly your fears, and worse.
My back has multiple discs that have decided it was time. One goes, you do things differently, cause one to go worse. Two herniated into my spinal column, then the insurance ran out. I looked around at the people I could count on, and there are literally none.
Just enough $ from whom I hatched to keep me in pain pills and living elsewhere, instead of even an attempt to resolve. By now, 4 yrs later, what I was willing to have done has been paid for 4x. 1 month at a time. Instead I am worse. I am alone. Were I to have surgery that required the body cast for a double fusion, there is not a single person who could be here to even so much as say hello, let alone give a damn.
Eat the SSRIs. Eat the opiates. Eat the benzos. Drink when you can. You don’t get better, you just feel better for a while. Opportunity cost will hit $350,000 lost/missed in 2013. My greatest fear is the very (one and only) person who all too often, comes up with reasons why life is so tough for her… which could mean instant homelessness, loss of all possessions and car, and then I get stupid questions like “It’s not like you have any worries… I don’t know why YOU are depressed…”
So many black days, and no understanding of the fear and outright hatred of my own bloodline and why it exists.
Sigh indeed.
I am currently going through the same thing, RSI because of excessive computer usage (programmer..)
I complety understand you, RSI is like having a carpet pulled under your feet. It feels retarded to know this is done by you because you worked too hard.
You suddenly find yourself with so much free time and you freak out - what in the world do you spend time on?
Personally I tried to expand my hobby list as much as possible (music, yoga, books, etc). I also try to stay hopeful and really notice and cherish small improvements with my hands.
Like you said though, some days I feel broken, unable to express my self, totally hopeless.. luckily it passes eventually :)
I noticed that healing is such a roller coaster.. ups n downs all the time. I know that's how healing from RSI works but it always bums me out when my hands hurt slightly more than before.
Best of luck, I hope your situation improves and you can regain the ability to do what you love :)