Ten Takes I’ve Learned About Living With Pain

Pain. Aches. Headaches. Wounds. Hurts.

We all deal with them in our lives. There’s no escaping it. Pain is a part of life physically, mentally and emotionally.

At sometime, in some way, we will endure painful things. Thankfully, many times the pain passes quickly. Other times it lingers. And sometimes it becomes an unwelcome part of life for longer than we’d like.

I had migraine headaches as a teen and for much of my adult life. They would come and go and thankfully, I would go long seasons without one and then the next one would hit.

I’ve had other pains and illnesses as we all have.

And then I gradually became aware of increasing back pain and sciatic nerve pain. I’d watched my brother and my mother-in-law suffer from sciatica and I’d distinctly thought to myself, “I hope I NEVER have sciatic issues.” On the heels of this thought I optimistically thought, “Oh, I surely won’t.” Fast forward time to find me battling sciatica. Not a lot of fun. I wouldn’t wish it on my worst enemy as the figure-of-speech goes.

Yet, I’ve learned lessons from walking through this and I wouldn’t trade what I’ve learned from the experience. I’ve seen and felt God’s faithfulness and I’ve grown {a little} in compassion and empathy.

I started jotting this list a long time back to make its way into a post.

In the last year I’ve talked to friends and prayed for friends battling their own pains ~

Here’s just a few physical things they’re dealing with ~

*  headaches and neck pain

*  burns and broken bones

*  back pain

* sciatic trouble {makes me shudder}

*  hip and leg pain

*  continuous headaches

*  knee pain and joint pain

Pain can’t be ignored.
I’ve learned a few things about it and here’s a list of a few things I would have been glad for someone to share with me.

1. Living with pain really does affect quality of life.

2. Everything is harder when you hurt.

3. Pain is real. It’s not made up in your head.

4. You can choose your attitude. You can look for good. It won’t take the pain away, but it gives you a good focus.

5. Yet, don’t discount the pain. It is real. YOU are dealing with it. It doesn’t make you less important or less of a person.

6. You can’t use tough things as a crutch to get out of life or manipulate people, yet at the same time it is ok to admit to the pain and to needs and that you can not do things or keep up like you were able to.

7. You may not feel like spending time in activities that you used to. It’s the pain. Pain can challenge your emotional and mental feelings as well.

8. Pain is plain debilitating.

9. Pain is very wearing. Pain slows you down and triples the time and effort required for normal tasks.

10. Pain causes overwhelm. Simple things can loom large. What once was an easy or even effortless task can now look mountainous. 

One more thing about pain. It’s often viewed as a bad thing. Because, let’s face it. It hurts. No two ways about it.

Yet, pain is also protection. There are people who can’t feel pain. They can seriously injure themselves or burn themselves and not even realize they are doing it. Their body and nerves don’t signal their brain and therefore they don’t trigger the reflex to draw back or protect your body.

Here’s an excerpt from what Wikipedia has to say about it ~

“Congenital insensitivity to pain (CIP), also known as congenital analgesia, is one or more rare conditions in which a person cannot feel (and has never felt) physical pain. Because feeling physical pain is vital for survival, CIP is an extremely dangerous condition. It is common for people with the condition to die in childhood due to injuries or illnesses going unnoticed. Burn injuries are one of the more common injuries.”

Isn’t it interesting how something that hurts can also protect us from harm?

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