What makes me an authority on pain?

I’ve been asked that question and it’s a fair one – after all, who am I? I haven’t properly introduced myself before because I wanted the blog to get started without any preconceived notions. I didn’t want anyone thinking that I was swooping in to tell you all how you should live your life. I wanted this to begin to grow on its own.

So, what makes me an authority on pain? The short answer is: I’m not. I’m not an authority on pain. Ready for the longer answer? Here it is.

I’m 46 years old (until May J) and I’ve had to deal with physical pain for a long time. When I was a child, I had many unexplained aches and pains; I was often told that I was exaggerating or faking, but I wasn’t. I was hurting almost every time I turned around. I remember waking up with pain and going to bed with pain, but none of it was ever specific enough to be diagnosed. And, I had terrible headaches. I remember my first migraine when I was in my early teens. It lasted for a few days and I had nothing to take for it other than regular aspirin.

As I got older, I developed mysterious joint aches; on my 20^th birthday, I had a joint scan and I remember the rheumatologist telling me that if he’d seen the results of the scan before meeting me, he’d have expected someone in a wheelchair. Yet I wasn’t. I was hurting, but it wasn’t unbearable, just sore.

So, over the years, between the unexplained joint pain (arthralgia, they called it), chronic and very frequent migraines and a back that was hurt – and still hurts to this day – by working as a nurse, I’ve had my share of chronic pain.

And then there’s my experience as a nurse. When I worked on the medical floors as a young nurse, I wasn’t as sympathetic or empathetic as I could have been – I just didn’t understand, despite my own discomfort. As I got older and more experienced, I became more aware of how much pain affected someone and how pain can make or break a person sometimes.

But, the most important lesson I had in pain and pain control, was when I worked in palliative care. For almost five years, I worked a few nights a month in a wonderful 9-bed home-like residence that cared for patients who were dying of cancer and one of our primary concerns was pain control. I learned so much from the patients and the other, more experienced nurses. Pain was such an integral part of most of our patients’ lives that it was drilled in to me how best to manage it.

In palliative care, we used medications and doses of medications that doctors and nurses may never see in regular hospital wards or units. The combinations and dosages had one goal: to make the patients’ remaining days as comfortable as possible.

So, as you can see, I’m not an authority – but I have seen and experienced a lot. What I bring to this blog is that experience and knowledge, plus the willingness to hear from you about your experiences and knowledge.

As my saying goes, you may be living with pain, but that doesn’t mean that pain should live your life.