Chronic pain turns you into a different person over time
I don’t even mean that in a dramatic way either. It just slowly changes how you think and move through life. You stop looking forward to things the same way because everything comes with a cost afterward. Going out, working, cleaning the house even sleeping wrong can ruin the next few days.
The physical pain sucks obviously but the mental exhaustion is what gets me most now. Constantly pretending you’re okay while feeling drained and uncomfortable all the time starts wearing you down after a few years.
I’ve tried a million different things at this point just trying to make daily life manageable. Some help more than others. Lately I’ve mostly just been trying to avoid feeling completely useless on bad flare days, whether that’s stretching, caffeine, kratom, natural 7oh, whatever works that week
Mostly wondering if other people feel like chronic pain slowly changed their personality too because I barely feel like the same person i was before all this started.