Today’s Daily Prompt is an easy one for me but only in the sense that I know something you don’t. Let me explain:
Chronic Pain. Most people don’t understand what it does to a person. They will never understand unless they experience it themselves.
Chronic pain stays in the forefront of your thoughts, all day every day. When you’re in constant pain, it becomes part of your thought process. Everything you want or need to do, you must consider your pain. Everywhere you want to go, you must consider your pain. If you want to visit someone, you must consider your pain. Will I be able to mop the floor today? Will I be able to cook something today? Will I have the energy to walk into a store and grab a few items? Will I be able to sit comfortably to watch my grandson play ball? When I go visit my family, will they understand when I have to leave? Will there be steps or stairs? Is the toilet going to be too low? Will there be handlebars to grip so I don’t fall? Will the grocery store have a scooter available so I don’t have to walk? Will someone be able to help me if I have trouble? These are just some of the things I have to consider.
Not many people understand what it’s like to be in pain constantly. I pray you will never have to deal with what I deal with. No matter what the pain is from, it’s debilitating. Pain sucks your energy away. Pain thwarts your abilities. Pain causes depression, sadness, and helplessness. It causes loneliness because you retreat from the people and things that made you happy before, the things that made you who you are… It destroys your life as you once knew it. You’re not the same person anymore. It changes you.
I hope you will keep this in mind when you’re dealing with a person with a chronic illness. You just have no idea what they are going through.
Being Aunt Debbie 