Fuck. Okay.

Amidst the hell I've been living through every single day, I decided to see if I could get help with my throat and vocal cords. If you weren't aware, I have a voice many online describe as very cute and soft. It's been nice, but apparently it's caused by some kind of strain on my vocal cords. I still don't know where it comes from. My voice spontaneously became this way in high school and it's never changed back. So, yes, it's helped me in a transgender sort of way, but recently the pain has increased. I've decided it's been long enough. I need help.

When I started talking to the doctor today, he told me that my voice does sound like I'm straining just to speak, like my vocal cords are being hurt. I heard this once several years ago. Don't remember who said it, but it was also a doctor. Anyway, the first thing this doctor said to me was, I need to see an ENT for this. He pointed out that I've seen ENTs before. He asked if I've said anything about it. I told him no, I never thought it was important.

He told me it's basically my responsibility to tell them my problems and if I don't speak up nothing is going to happen. It was said in a little bit of a condescending way. Then he insinuated that if I'm trying to change my voice, this is the wrong way to go about it. I think he knows that I'm trans, that seemed like a really unnecessary jab. I mean, I guess he's right, if only because straining your vocal cords is probably hurtful. And yeah, it is.

I felt like since nothing was accomplished this visit, it was going to be a waste of time and money. I asked if I could mention one other health problem. He told me he's the only one working today so I'd better make it quick. I talked about the compression headaches I've been getting for most of my life. How I can never wear headphones. How anything that presses on my ears hurts. How I can't wear certain types of earplugs. How I can't wear glasses whenever they rest on my ears. He pointed out that I'm wearing my face mask just fine. I told him it does hurt too, but it's not quite as bad.

He gave me an explanation and talking to that I haven't heard in many years. It made my heart sink in my chest. He told me that I have hypersensitivity to touch everywhere. I'm aware of this. I've lived it for my whole life. But anyway, he told me that it sounds like fibromyalgia. I haven't heard that word in years either. He did everything. He explained with demonstrations. He squeezed his arm and told me if he did that to me I'd scream bloody murder. He sounded almost annoyed with me. He was talking to me like I was an idiot.

I did at least manage to convince him to give me a referral to a rheumatologist for fibromyalgia. He explained to me that it needs to be diagnosed by a rheumatologist or a neurologist.

But, yeah. Getting a referral is not a bad thing, but the more pressing thing, the thing that's really upsetting me is the subject matter. Fibromyalgia. Hypersensitivity to touch. I'm going to go into a lengthy explanation, my backstory. This might be triggering.

Content warning for health, medical problems, doctor visits, malpractice.

For all of my life, ever since I can remember, I've had this hypersensitivity to touch. In elementary school it was extreme. Somebody touching me felt like a punch. I got into fights because I thought somebody attacked me when they didn't. In middle school, it was worse. When I told people about my hypersensitivity, they took advantage of it. Some kids started poking me and hitting me when my back was turned. They would try to gaslight me and pretend they didn't do anything. I got into fights because of it, again.

But high school is where everything broke. I don't remember what led up to it, but I had a mind-breaking revelation thanks to somebody on Discord telling me my health problems are insane and I need help. I essentially discovered that my mom had been gaslighting me my entire life and telling me I'm "just sensitive" to every little thing, everything that bothered me, when a lot of what I experienced was real pain, autism responses, RSD and more. I was 16 years old. My main doctor was still a pediatrician because I was still legally a child. I went to him with my mom and asked for help. I explained everything in detail, all of my sensitivity, all of my pain, all of the problems I was facing in my daily life.

I distantly remember that he had basically no idea what to do about any of this. I don't really know how this happened. And after this, my memory is really a blur. I've tried to forget a lot of this, admittedly. The rest of the year was a nightmare. Constant, endless doctor visits, one after another after another. Neurologists, rheumatologists, foot doctors, physical therapists. Pain management clinics, pain specialists, general care practitioners.

And over and over again, nobody had any idea what was wrong with me. Lots of different doctors speculated about me. Nobody ever had a concrete answer. Nobody ever fixed me. I found the word Fibromyalgia online. It fit, and so I started calling myself that. I told new doctors I had that, and they dismissed me. They didn't believe me.

One time, I saw an neurologist. I explained everything I could about my pain. While I was sitting there, I started popping my joints just to relieve pain. He asked me anxiously, what are you doing? I told him it helps. His manner became very agitated, disturbed. He sheepishly told us something like we'd have to come back another time. And after we left, we found out we were blacklisted. Every time we called him, the nurse told us that he was no longer our doctor, that our neurologist had been changed to somebody else. We never heard back.

Another time we went to a pain management clinic at a specialized hospital. My mom had to drive us for hours. My mom and dad came. My dad complained in the waiting room. He told me that because of my health problems the family never got to go on vacation, never got to go on road trips, never got to go to Disney World. And he has regrets over his life and basically I'm ruining his dreams of spending vacations with his family. Oh, and when the doctors finally came, they expressed they had no idea what to do. They sent me to aquatic therapy, which ended up being a very nice reprieve. But ultimately when we came back to that hospital a while later, we saw a different doctor who insinuated that all of my pain is made up and we are trying to waste their time. They called the head of the hospital to basically kick us out.

One of the primary things going on was the running theme of blood draws. I had a terrible experience my first two times. Now in hindsight I know that I'm just a fainter and I fainted during those blood draws. But I refused to ever do one again. I was begging doctors left and right to do one with anesthesia. Of course, this is not typical. Every doctor denied me. They said there's tons of legal reasons why they can't do that. They told me instead... Not that I'm a fainter, but that I need specialized pills. My new primary care doctor after my physician basically drugged me. He gave me some so-called anxiety pill that made me effectively drunk. The entire point of this was to get a blood draw just to check my vitamin levels and look for deficiencies. And you know what's ironic? I finally got such a blood draw just a few weeks ago. I'm not deficient in anything.

The effect this was having on my mind is something I can't really describe in words. It felt like I had to express pain no matter what. It felt like I had to solve everything, get everything fixed. Mentally, I was about 12 years old even though I was 16 in my body. And so I exaggerated my pain to doctors. I became something of a hypochondriac. And this led to even more distrust. The first time I saw the plastic surgeon who would eventually fix my nose, I told him I had hypoxia. This set off so many red flags for him that he refused to treat me until a psychiatrist, not a psychologist, medically declared me as mentally sane. I should have seen this for what it was. He did not believe me and decided that I was mentally ill. But I sought that declaration for years.

And during this, my problems got worse, especially CRPS, that stands for Complex Regional Pain Syndrome. I did not have it or experience very much of it at the start, I think. Again, this is kind of a blur. But what I do know is, over time, I started to feel numbness and tingling in my feet, then my ankles, then my legs. As the months went by, it got harder and harder to stand and walk for extended periods of time. I was sent to physical therapy where I was misdiagnosed with plantar fasciitis, which means I don't have an arch in my foot. I actually do. But the treatment in physical therapy only made the pain worse. It felt like the more my legs and feet were used, exposed to the elements, the worse my pain was. They were hypersensitive and they should have been given a break.

But remember that I was going to school during this. Every day of the week I went to school. I stood up and walked between classes. When I was sitting, my feet were touching the ground which triggered my pain more. Long story short, I tried to get help from the nurse and staff, but they refused. They told me it would be improper to have a wheelchair on campus and it would affect their image. With no other options, my parents registered me homeschooled and withdrawed me from my school. I missed out on a lot because of this.

But the medical drama continued. It continued all the way through 2020, until I eventually gave up. Because I was still under 18, I was sent not to a mature care center, but to a sensory care for autistic children where all the other kids were 5 or 6 years old. We did stuff like play with toothpaste, brush our teeth, play with food. See what tastes are tolerable. Sensory input like water and soap. I went to a few of these. While the staff were nice and definitely did not judge me for being so much older, it still felt humiliating, demoralizing, dehumanizing, infantilizing. And at one point I was referred to a hypnotherapist. I was told that this was the better option because I definitely couldn't handle acupuncturists. Needless to say, Hypnotherapy does not cure Fibromyalgia.

And of course, because this happens in every one of my stories, my mom was a dick the entire time. She had this idea that she could fix me herself if doctors couldn't. She kept buying miracle cures, things like essential oils. She tried to get me to do yoga many times. She claimed that meditation and peace of mind will save me. And she constantly, constantly gaslit and guilt-turtly made it out to be my fault. She would claim that I obviously don't want to get better because I'm not exercising. And every time I told her I can't exercise because of how much pain I'm in and how it does not ever relieve any pain, she would ignore it.

I also want to add a little bit more about my legs. After I left school, I started getting this narrative in my head that I was disabled forever. I used a walker for a few years. I never got a wheelchair, but I used a walker and everywhere I went I took it. I often got weird looks. People around me, my mom, and even the voice in my head all told me I don't really need the walker, I'm just making it up. But I kept going. I kept pushing this idea. I mean, I did still feel the CRPS. I had to lean on my walker all the time. I could still walk, it was just so painful I needed support.

At some point the pain in my legs just disappeared, vanished. I still don't fully understand what happened. I have several explanations, one of which involves conversion disorder, which I was told I had a few times. But for whatever reason, at the end of 2022, I regained my legs.

Finally, at the very end, I decided to push everything behind me. I decided I wasn't disabled, that all that chronic pain and stuff was fake. That maybe I actually was just imagining all my sensitivity and maybe I'm fine. Maybe I don't have fibromyalgia. Maybe I can function if I just try hard enough. After everything I've been through, all the surgeries, all the appointments, all the doctor visits, all the driving with mom, all the walking with the walker, all the mind games and mind melting, you really can't blame me for giving up. You can't blame me for repressing everything.

Anyway, trauma dumping backstory over. The reason I brought it up is because, well, that stuff hasn't been relevant in years. It's been so long since I ever considered myself... like that. A cripple. Even with my arm situation now, my ulnar nerve syndrome is so bad I can barely hold my phone. I call myself disabled sometimes in front of my friends, but secretly I avoid identifying with it.

To have this traumatic past thrust back into my face so suddenly during one of the worst times in my life is... I can't describe it in words. It feels like fate itself has it out for me. Like I am just trapped this way. Like I'm cursed.

Hell, something very similar happened a few days ago. I was a completely different person in 2022 who believed something very personal. I can't share it here. And something has happened that's brought that back to the present too. I can't avoid it anymore. And now I can't avoid the Fibromyalgia anymore either.

What the hell am I going to do? I can't go back to 2018, to 2020. I can't just... be that person again. I know I'm seeking out doctor visits constantly now, but it's because I really need it. All the problems I have now are real, right? I'm not just imagining everything, right? I know for a fact I didn't act or fake it in front of that doctor. But what if I did? Can I really handle the rejection of more doctors telling me I don't have anything?

And yeah, I hear you, head voice. Why make this entire long rant, this gigantic Trauma Dump backstory, just to complain about one doctor visit? To that I say, why not? It's not like this matters to anyone else anyway. No one will see this. This is something I'm writing just for me. I'm crying out into the void. The only chance that someone will stumble upon this is either by messing with the number IDs in the URL of my blog or finding it in the hidden posts. And to do that, that person would already have to be interested in me. So is it really a problem then? If they care, they'll read it.