Every time I go to the emergency room, I’m asked to rate my pain on a scale of one to ten. “One being pain-free, ten being the worst pain you’ve ever felt,” says the nurse.  The triage room simmers in silence as I decide whether to answer with patience, sarcasm or resignation.

The only times that I’ve ever been pain-free have been in emergency rooms, after injuring myself, when I’ve been administered a large dose of morphine.  I vividly recall the first time: I’d fallen down a flight of stairs and dislocated my shoulder.  The ER doc gave me a shot preparatory to pushing it back into place.  My mother’s chagrin sat palpably on her face.  I reclined on the gurney thinking, wow, my legs don’t hurt!!!  Of course, I couldn’t feel them, either.

I’ve described myself as having been born a decade too late to die in infancy and a decade too early to have been cured.  Doctors in the 1980s determined through testing developed years after it might have done some good for me, that my original disease had been a viral encephalitis.  One of my sisters has the same malady and I never hear her complain about pain; I don’t know how she does it, but her disposition is sweeter than mine in many ways, so that’s probably the explanation.

I’ve developed this response to ER nurses:  “On a scale of the pain I normally have every day, to the pain I figure my mother experienced dying long and slow from cancer, I’m about halfway in between.”  Or closer to one end or  the other.  Chronic pain can make me grumpy; I don’t know how other people handle it, but after  a sleepless night of spastic leg cramps, I just want to drink  my cup of coffee and snarl at all the other sentient beings in the household.  A doctor recently asked me to tell her how much pain I handle every day, and without thinking, I responded, “I’d rather not.”

In the 1970s, my neurologist gave me Valium for my legs.  I went cold-turkey from 10 mgs QID during my freshman year of college, having realized that I lived in a fog of disconnectedness. At various times in my life, I’ve self-medicated with alcohol, relied on doctor-prescribed narcotics, and tried meditation.  I do stretching yoga, take hot baths, and listen to classical music.  I’m here to tell you: None of it works.  The pain thrives.

So here I am: trying to live complaint-free.  I think I’m well on my way as to the things other people do.  I find myself processing what previously would have prompted quick retorts, and thinking about the other person’s feelings.  I haven’t called anyone an idiot under my breath in weeks.  I don’t yell at other drivers as I used to do, and I even let a few in line ahead of me.  My tipping percentage has increased.  I don’t send food back to the kitchen.   I feel nicer.

But this monkey on my back, pain.  Oh how hard it is not to complain about his smirking presence!  The crunch in my neck, the stiffness in my shoulder, the sharp jabs in my SI joint, the burning in my legs.  Sometimes when I’m listening to the symphonic tinnitis in my ears, my eyes closed, hands extended, about to stretch, I think:  If God only gives you as much as He thinks you can bear, He must have a higher opinion of me than I do.

So, fair warning:  Don’t ask me about my pain.  I might complain.  I’ll need another few weeks to figure this one out.  Still hopeful though:  silence is not complaining, right?

*exit smiing*