Dealing with chronic pain and flying

I've had chronic neck pain for 24 years years, since an assault in the workplace.

My chronic pain is constant, it is 24/7. I am aware of the pain every waking minute of my life.

My chronic pain is no worse than anyone else's and probably better than a lot of other peoples.

My chronic pain can't be alleviated with meds or a few stretches.

Some days my chronic pain is just there, other days it's flare up and is worse, these I call 'bad days' restricting my movements and actions. Most days are just NOT bad days.

As a result of chronic pain, I sit, walk and move with purpose. I'm constantly changing position, stretching my neck, slouching my back to take the pressure off my shoulders, I end up with a bad lower back and in turn hip pain. I can exercise, I can take meds for that, I can improve the pain levels. I can make it manageable, but there's not a day when I'm not aware of it.

I get cramps in my wrists and pins and needles in my hands and fingers, making fine motor skills difficult such as writing and taking lids off jars etc. Repetitive strain from ironing, hoovering, sweeping and mopping are getting worse and I often can't pick things up or find myself just dropping items such as tea cups.

I have a 14 hour flight ahead of me next week. I recently took a 7 hour flight in business class, I was able to lie down, not flat, and stretch my legs, but I was still in tears after 5 hours, rather than the usual 2 hours. The only time my pain doesn't flare up is when I'm either walking or lying down flat. Neither of which I can do on a 14 hour flight and I doubt I'd bag an upgrade to 1st class.

The most I can hope for is a row of seats all to myself. It happens fairly often to me. Even 3 seats means I can lie flat on my back, legs bent and can curl up on either side. Plus sleeping does help to pass the time.

I've had numerous surgeries, treatments (physio, acupuncture, chiropractic) and tried various medications, but only ever get short term relief and the more meds I take, the more I need and the side effects of some of them such as Gabapentin have been horrendous.

The 14 hour flight and time difference will wipe we out regardless of the added pain on top, so my plan when I arrive in Australia is to check into the hotel, have a deep hot bath and go to bed. I will merge from my room when I return to normal, of which my normal is chronic pain, just without the tears.

International travel

 

Joburg to the UK

As an expat I make frequent long haul trips to the homeland. I can’t always plan these trips in advance to take advantage of special offers or travel outside of holiday times. I can’t plan when the next heart attack will be that I need to return home for. So as a result trips tends to be booked last minute. Usually with around a weeks notice. I compare prices, take into consideration the routes, the length of time for a stop over. I don’t fancy 9 hours in Dubai airport even with the use of the Emirates lounge.

I usually fly emirates, as I can fly into Birmingham where a friend will collect and return me, but the downside of this is I’m in transit for 24 hours.

My last trip I had about 3 days notice that I was going and the only flight available in economy was with Virgin Atlantic, direct to Heathrow.  I flew with virgin direct last year and to be honest the thought of catching a tube into London and a 3 hour train trip to Malvern after an 11 hour flight, plus passport and collecting luggage didn’t appeal to me again. But having little choice unless I wanted a 12 hour wait in Cairo, I flew with Virgin.

Now don’t get me wrong. There is nothing wrong with Virgin but I do prefer travelling with Emirates. For example on my last trip I was able to change my flight 3 times for less than £20 a time. Even if I have to catch a train from Birmingham its around £15 instead of £40+ from Heathrow as like I said I don’t always know when I’m flying to book train tickets in advance.

Already planning next years trip. I’ve just booked a one way ticket for my 1 yo who leaves SA in January and the 14yo flight is a return from SA so he flies back to school on January 10^th and returns end of July.  They're flying with BA for the first time.

Hubby and I are planning to spend Christmas 2014 in the UK, so all I have to do now is book my Easter trip to the UK, but you never know what may happen between now and then so I’ll guess I’ll just stick till the last minute as always.