My back is killing me.  My house is a mess, and I can’t bend over.  I can get the kids to help a bit after school, but they have tons of homework, and music lessons tonight.  I haven’t been forced to sit still for so long since I was confined to bed for the end of my first pregnancy, and I like it even less now.  At least then there was a positive outcome to staying in bed.  I can get up and walk around.  I can sit for a while if I get up and change positions before the pain kicks in.  I can’t lean forward even a tiny bit without something to hold onto.  I got a recommendation for an orthopedist from a fellow Weight Watchers member, but I have a week to wait for that appointment – this has gone way beyond chiropractic.  Thank goodness for Cymbalta, though – I’m not feeling sad and self-pitying as much as pissed off that I’m stuck like this – before, I’d be much more mopey.  I don’t know, though, that pissy is better than mopey for the people who are stuck hanging around with me. . .

It’s been painful, way down low, off and on for a couple of weeks and really bad for the last five days.  The kids have had to help me with pretty much anything that involves bending forward without holding onto something.  So I was really happy when I felt a lot better this morning (after the morning nap, not first thing.)  I had a list – clean the ceiling fan blades, sanitize the stinky cat boxes, hang up some fabric, maybe even sew something – but first, we were really low on groceries.  I made my dinner menus, compiled the grocery list, set off for the store.  Got everything just fine, made sure to bend at the knees and all that, just to be safe.  Got out to the van, loaded the bags in, carefully lifted the case of seltzer out of the cart and went to put it in the trunk when my back snapped.  I saw stars.   I yelled really loudly.  Crap.  Crapcrapcrap.  Instead of getting stuff done, I took four advil, propped the heating pad on a bunch of pillows in the family room and watched a couple of hours of The Daily Show.  The kids mostly made dinner, Audrey even served, and now I’m waiting for hubby to show up with some Naproxen Sodium because the advil isn’t doing squat, and the muscle pain and tension is running up my entire spine and giving me a headache.  Ironic, too, that I slept through my chiro appointment this morning.