It's time for the B word again.
B-R-E-A-K
I feel like all I do these days is take breaks, then announce how I'm back on the horse, before taking another break almost immediately. I think I've taken three breaks in the last 2.5 months. In fact I think my last non-break only lasted about 1 week? It sometimes feels I'm writing a blog about dilating but then never actually dilating.
But stop! What's the rule about beating yourself up about not dilating? Don't do it.
Even though I feel like all these breaks add up to a whole bunch of doing nothing, they have all been for pretty legitimate reasons. On the surface it might seem like I'm being lazy (and there is definitely a strong element of that) but it's also about trying to find that balance between doing nothing and doing too much.
Dilating Progress
My goals for this past week were to 1) Not be on my period (success!), 2) get back into a routine (lol) and 3) try out my new lubes properly (half a point). 50% isn't too bad.
I've honestly had a terrible week and that's saying something in 2020. On Thursday last week I got an awful phone call with some bad news that our beloved family dog had experienced a really traumatic injury and was gone. Gone, gone. It was such a huge shock. No one seemed to know what happened.
The next few days were difficult. I know he wasn't a human but he really was a part of the family and it was not at all his time to go. I was pretty flat all weekend, we all were, and when we weren't flat we were setting each other off in tears.
So yes, I took a break from the bloody dilators. I didn't want or have the energy to do any dilating. It didn't seem important, even though I know that it is and I felt guilty (even though I knew I shouldn't feel guilty..). I took a longer break than perhaps I needed to (7 days today) because I've been learning a lot about the science behind how stressors in our lives can actually exacerbate pain, even if they are nothing to do with the area in question. I figured if there was ever anything that was going to mess with my brain chemicals it was grief and I decided that on top of everything else I didn't want to put myself through a bad dilating session.
So that's the incredibly sad story of this week folks. It's also why there was no post on Sunday (I'm sorry). It's been rough but it is getting a little better each day.
One good thing that did happen this week was that I stumbled across an absolutely fascinating video put together by the Vulval Pain Society and hosted by Sheren Gaulbert. Sheren is a Pain Science Educator, a VPS Trustee and a Pain Relief Cognitive Hynotherapist.
I cannot emphasise enough how great this video is for understanding the fascinating processes behind pain, which is one of my favourite topics EVER. It's the only thing that put a smile on my face this week. So a big thank you to the VPS and Sheren Gaulbert.
Here's the top 5 things I learned from this video:
Pain Amplifiers are what keeps pain persistent over time. They can be things like stress, fear, anxiety that increase chemicals in your body such as adrenaline and cortisol. The amplifier does exactly what it says on the tin, it amplifies your brains pain response. With persistent pain this means you can have a pain response that is out of proportion to the actual 'threat' level. The amplifier doesn't necessarily need to be directly related to your pain either. It might be something else happening in your life at the same time that affects the way your brain perceives a threat (for example, grief).
Pain muters act in the opposite way to amplifiers. They increase chemicals in your body such as endorphins, serotonin, oxytocin and dopamine that mute your brains pain response, bringing things back down to a reasonable level.
Often the processes behind persistent pain are automatic and so it seems very difficult for us to be able to exert any control over this. Sheren explains that are not trying to gain conscious control over unconscious processes but are aiming to understand why that process is happening and what stimuli might be amplifying your pain response. The idea is to then to take action to reduce those amplifiers and increase your muters. For Vaginismus I believe this could be for example a set of beliefs that you hold about sex being painful or it could be anticipation of pain because you've felt pain before, or even an external and unconnected source of stress.
The bucket or bath analogy, which many of us will be familiar with, is the premise that everyone has a bucket representing their individual capacity to cope with the things that get thrown at us in life. The more things that we have to deal with, the more full the bucket gets, until at some point it spills over the top. Sheren explained a similar situation with persistent pain. Because of persistent pain, our bucket or bath may even on a normal day be very nearly full to the brim with amplifiers so it might not take much to cause it to overflow. It makes sense that we are highly sensitised to what may seem like a situation that shouldn't theoretically generate a lot of pain.
Sheren also discusses a lot of tools and techniques that can be used to alleviate vulval pain conditions. Of particular note are Graded Motor Imagery (GMI) which can be a useful visualisation technique for those of us with Vaginismus, and also Cognitive Hypnosis and Acceptance and Commitment Therapies . I have come across these briefly before but not in relation to pain conditions and I am super excited to read more about them!
In summary, WATCH THE VIDEO. It's awesome and I'm glad to be able to leave you with at least one positive thing this week.
Looking ahead to next week:
I think I have now successfully demonstrated that you never really know what life is going to throw at you from day to day. I don't know how the next week is going to go, but here is what I'm going to at least aim towards. It's good to at least have positive intentions.
Slowly drag myself back into an every-other-day routine with my dilators
Look into getting a gratitude journal
Continue mindfulness exercises to reduce amplifiers like anxiety and stress
Use the Emjoy app to do some self care
Signing off for this week, catch you next Wednesday!
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