Chronic Pain: Just Man Up!

Everyone lives with some amount of pain, but what exactly constitutes chronic pain and what does it look like? The truth is that everyone answers these questions differently, and I am not going to try to delineate one correct answer. I will however give some observations of my own that might help you understand a life of chronic pain.

Medication The thing about chronic pain is that medicine is almost never a solution. For instance, if I were to take enough pain medicine to make my pain negligible over the course of the day I would a) be flying higher than a kite, and b) not be able to poop for a week! The truth is that many pain meds cause constipation. Guess what happens when you have lower back pain and have to struggle even harder to have a bowel movement? 

Pain Management People that live with what can be debilitating pain are not always debilitated. This means you may see them at the movies with their kids, or at the mall, or on vacation. What you do not see is the aftermath of those choices. The goal is not to avoid pain completely, but to avoid getting into a position in which you can no longer walk to the kitchen for a drink.

Two days ago I took my family to the sportsman club for two hours. We had a lot of fun, but since then I have been in what I like to refer to as extreme discomfort. I spent most of the day yesterday in bed. It is because of my ability to see the future of my pain that I sometimes use a handicapped parking space (with permit) even when my pain is not off the charts. If I know I am taking the kids to the movies in the evening it is important that I manage my pain well. I only have so much activity in me before I end up on my back again.

Weight Management I am morbidly obese. A lot of folks believe this is what causes my pain, and as a result of my laziness and gluttony I have caused my own problem. The truth is that my pain started over twenty years ago when I was 18. Guess what it is difficult to do when you live in pain (and this is on top of the difficulty everyone has with getting to the gym). A few years ago I lost over 100 lbs. through diet and walking. At the end of my journey my back gave out completely and I was in bed for months and back in physical therapy. I have managed to keep much of the weight off, but it is creeping back. Fat does not equal lazy, and skinny does not equal pain free.

Work This is the most frustrating aspect of chronic pain. The intricacies of dealing with pain management and working a normal job can be impossible to traverse. They are for me. Let us assume I have a great resume (which I no longer do), and great references (which I no longer do), great experience (nope), and the interview goes fantastic. "Ok, let's talk about your hours." "Well, I can work for four hours every third day if I can sit down on demand and at least once every twenty minutes. I may need to lay on the floor if I cannot sit down for more than forty minutes. Oh, and there are days when I will have to call in without notice because I wake up unable to move. If I bend, lift to much, sit too long, or stand too long, I will have to go home. There are other considerations, but we can discuss them later. Do you validate?"

I Live In Pain Too! Pain is relative to the person, you are not the one experiencing another person's pain. If you live with chronic pain, hold down a full time job, jog three times a week, and lead a yoga class on Thursdays, it does not mean someone else can do it too if they just man up a bit. The bottom line is that you cannot know what level of pain another person is in, and you are not privy to the choices they are making in order to be able to mow the lawn or take their wife on a date.

This is only a glimpse into the complexities of life with chronic pain that will hopefully make it easier to understand. There are many other aspects that could be discussed such as mental health implications, financial implications, the cyclical nature of pain, sleep deprivation and others. The bottom line is the same as with many other things, the view from where you are sitting may be from the nose bleed seats rather than ringside.