Comments Off on pain

By Dave, October 11, 2004 10:30 am

yesterday started earlier than I had figured when cat came down and reminded me that I had said mountaintop. Which is "the" flea market around these parts. Some are bigger but only happen once a month whereas mountain top is open weekly on sundays. We ate, loaded up, and went. The truck ran fine. The timing adjustment was most of it's problem. Still got a bit of a bite off but I suspect that is a fuel injector with deposits in it.

walked most of the lanes and found what I wanted on the first one that I had passed by the first time. got a cell phone case and headset. case is fine. headset is okay but not what I wanted but I don't know what I do want in one so this will do for the few times I will use it.

came home after stopping in Attalla (?) at a mexican restaurant that we had seen several times. I walked in and with the press of people (after church crowd) and screaming kids and lack of smells I associate with good mex food I turned and left. Cat agreed with me and we came home and had some barbecue that I had fixed Sat night along with some mashed potatoes and mixed veggies.

I thought about taking the rest of the day off but decided after cat went to gathering up trash to burn that I would get on the dozer and clear the area that we needed to reclaim for working on cars which is somewhat around the burn pile area. So to work I go. And soon encounter a new level of pain…

I scraped an area right beside the old burn pile that was about 30 feet long. then moved over about half a blade width and did it again, then turned and made a pass at about 45 degrees to the original clearing behind the pile. backed up and did it again taking a deeper bite into the years of undergrowth there. Then came the yellow jackets… all over the dozer and me.

I put it in reverse and rode it out of the underbrush. brushing them off until they got into my hair. 2 of them. about 9 stings on the scalp from those two. some of the ones that had landed on my arms stung but just test stings to see if I was the enemy I suspect. One on my right little finger set down and pumped it full before I got it off and the whole hand is swollen up back into the wrist. One on my left shoulder hit pretty good too as the muscles and tendons on that side of my neck are hurting and swollen today. I jumped off the still moving machine missing the track by yards and running and beating at the little bastards. stopped at about a hundred feet and killed the ones in my hair and got more of them off my clothes. Cat was running toward the dozer to try to stop it. Right into the swam so I hollered at her to get away and ran back into the swarm and hit the kill switch then ran away again and this time kept going till I got to the back of the greenhouse. where I killed some more on my clothes and screamed a bit from the pain. got cat (who wasn't stung in any of this) to get my comb and got the remains out of my hair, then one in my right shoe stung the side of my foot and I came out of that shoe and dumped it onto the ground and with a stick crushed it. looked up and several had followed us and were on my shirt. I suspect due to the ones I had killed on there. surprised that they had not stung me through the tee shirt but none did. pulled the shirt off with them inside and after brushing my pants again and getting cat to look me over went inside and shed the rest of my clothes.

no sting ease in the place. a bit of bactine on the ones I could get to and damp washcloths on my head. took 2 benedryls and 2 ibveprofen and lay down and entered the pain. interesting to say the least. was able after a bit of breathing to push it back enough to get up and do a couple of things then lay down again.

about an hour after the attack I got up, dressed and walked back down and picked up stuff that I had had in my pockets. realized it was too soon as the head swam hither and fro so came back in and took a bit more for pain and lay down again.

bill came by an hour or so later and we walked out and I got the truck and tarp and went down and we covered the dozer as it was supposed to rain. which it never really did.

came back inside and I had another dizzy spell which was helped a bit by crackers and peanut butter. drank some herbal tea which made the dizzies worse. finely got through with that and took another benedryl. bill went home and came back with some other stuff which I took and then went out for a while. came back to after a couple of hours and then went into regular sleep and dozed and woke the rest of the night.

Hand is some better today. am typing with it but is still swollen to the point of the skin stretched tight on the fingers and having indented knuckles when I straighten it out. but overall am ok. still hurt all over but tis to be expected. but I do have some better idea of what level of pain I can function under. and it's a lot higher than I had suspected I could operate at. tis all in the mind. I also noted that it was worse on inhale than exhale so took air in through the nose and out through the mouth, blowing hard. like pushing the pain out with each breath. that and the basic om madre padre hum on in and again on out enabled me to return to my center and function above the pain for a while at least. all in all, not an experience I would like to repeat but one which I did learn a LOT from…

Am going to take the day and rest up. just wanted to get this down while still fresh in my mind…