THE PROBLEM
We all know that being in abject pain can have a profound affect on the way we live our lives; emotionally, physically,
professionally, etc.
I try not to tell people about my pain, since they are powerless over it. They kinda wince half knowingly and say I'm so sorry. I do however, explain the syndrome to the people closest to me. I say imagine for a moment that your in pain. Imagine your facial expression and how you eyes close a bit, you begin to lose your peripheral vision. When one is in pain, you lose your peripheral vision both literally and figuratively. We become myopic. Things around us either disappear or go out of focus; including but not limited to loved ones, hobbies, current events and the like. When it is at its worst. it can be like seeing life through a tunnel.
SOME HOPE
I recently searched "pain advocates" on Google and found myself on the phone with a very nice lady from one of the many non-profits PM help groups out there (a very good resource for pain sufferers that are having problems with dr.s or need help with coping skills.) She told me that I needed to embrace yoga, stretching and other things that I just couldn't wrap my head around. Never the less, it stayed in my head. How could I improve my position? How do I rewrite my future? After wracking my brain for a while, I decided to accept the fact that my pain wasn't going to get much better than it currently is, although, of course, I still search for a cure and better therapies for my SCI (T-11-T-12). Being "Sick and tired of being sick and tired," I'm not satisfied with being medicated into last Tuesday. I've just learned to be happy with the level of comfort that my current meds afford me (current meds not currently being afforded by current ins. co., working on that though). If we let pain define us, it becomes our identity.
THE QUESTION
We must become bigger than our pain, but how? I'm not sure how, although, I live with the challenge to find out daily, except of course, when the pain is so strong that I can't think of anything else? So how can we be bigger than pain? That is the $64,000 question. Who knows, but I'll take a bunch of $6,400 answers. I owe it to myself, my loved ones and my future to find as many as possible
THE ANSWER?
One $6,400 answer for me is maximizing the good days. I make a list and get only I know when it is right to finish it. Having grown up with a very strong work ethic, it took a long time for me to distinguish between being lazy and needing to take a time out, or day out for that matter; an option that sadly all of us can't do, either because of work, children and the like.