Oh, Zcoder, I'm sorry you're in so much pain.

Have you ever talked to a mental health therapist? It sounds like having an empathetic listener was incredibly helpful for you - even a social security evaluator. You might find it very healing to talk through some of these traumas.

I'm really sorry you don't have the outlet of jogging and doing martial arts. It can be hard to lose the things that are "keeping you sane." And I've had back problems before myself, so I can imagine it would be difficult to find an activity that got your heart rate and respiration up enough to help much. How about those recumbant bikes? Or is that not in the budget right now?

I agree with Kureha's doctor. The labels aren't helpful. And a responsible doctor wouldn't slap a label on someone based on one short interview. My younger son's gf's dad recently had some really bad psychiatric reactions to one of his medications (for a physical illness). He started raging or something, so the family called the police who wanted to take him to the hospital. He refused to go, and he weighs like 600 to 700 pounds, so I guess making him go wasn't an option. So they called in a pdoc who talked to him in his bedroom for half an hour or so. She comes out and tells the guy's wife he has bipolar. WTF? Really? You're going to say someone has bipolar after interviewing him one time for 30 minutes, during a domestic dispute, with a couple of cops standing there in the same room the whole time? Really? Where's the common sense?