Illuminating musings about constant and chronic pain
See the comments in this post by cjsmith, starting at the original post she made in ouchygrumpy (plus the comments there too).
I'm extremely thankful that I'm no longer in constant pain from my neck tumor or from my spinal surgery recovery, but the experience affected me deeply and gave me a new understanding of what dealing with constant and/or chronic pain can be like. I learned that when dealing with others' pain, some people "get it" and others don't (with a continuum of levels in between). And I learned that others' treatment of a person with constant pain can be very different if one has visible signs of pain or pain treatment versus if one does not. Certainly my treatment when I was wearing my cervical collar (as seen in my icon here) was very different (and sometimes annoying in a different way) from when I had no external indication of my serious ongoing pain.
I'm extremely thankful that I'm no longer in constant pain from my neck tumor or from my spinal surgery recovery, but the experience affected me deeply and gave me a new understanding of what dealing with constant and/or chronic pain can be like. I learned that when dealing with others' pain, some people "get it" and others don't (with a continuum of levels in between). And I learned that others' treatment of a person with constant pain can be very different if one has visible signs of pain or pain treatment versus if one does not. Certainly my treatment when I was wearing my cervical collar (as seen in my icon here) was very different (and sometimes annoying in a different way) from when I had no external indication of my serious ongoing pain.