Broken bodied and still here
I have all sorts of pain and I’m living through it. Barely.
I woke up at 5 am with a swollen face yesterday, my third molar being a colossal bitch and the left side of my face throbbing, making me wish to be half faced. I can work with a half face, with the side of my face where my amazing jaw line can still be seen.
I also have a limp. A trauma of the knees showing up after 5 years of running, lifting weights, and belly dancing. I am a museum of pain. I am running on pain killers and half lit rooms and avoidance of literally everything.
“When 70% of your body is in pain, not much will grant you respite.”
I am supposed to write and edit articles, apply for jobs, start my sewing classes, show up for therapy, and go for a few other x-rays and appointments. I am avoiding everything, and I’m being excessively stupid for doing so but I just don’t want to do it.
How else to put it? When 70% of your body is in pain, not much will grant you respite. The smallest thing such as my mother expressing her disdain over my coffee consumption can tick me off. When on other normal painless days it would make me laugh(because I would be too caffienated to care). I do not have it in me today.
“The most fun part of acknowledging my pain is to belittle it myself.”
Sometimes I think my pain showed up at an opportune time. I do not have a job to show up for, an office to travel to, or the obligation to make any form of public appearance. An amazing time to be nursing unbearable pain!
The most fun part of acknowledging my pain is to belittle it myself.
“There’s a pandemic out there, surely my discomfort is nothing compared to it”
“You’re making excuses, lady! You have jobs to look for, chewing food properly isn’t a priority.”
“Your body hates you.”
I have, for the longest time,told myself to adhere to the masculine narrative of pain. Which is to simply not feel it or brave through it like a champ. Anything less than that is a failure. How can I be a badass otherwise?
“Pain is a mini form of death and to not feel my fullest everyday is a feeling I’m not good at bearing.”
I don’t feel like I’m being a good enough adult if I can’t tolerate my pain or when I run away from the dentist’s chair like a frightened little child. All while admitting to the dentist that, ‘I think I’ll die even if the bluntest tool touches my teeth’. Pain is a mini form of death and to not feel my fullest everyday is a feeling I’m not good at bearing.
Pain is also guilt maximized for me. I don’t behave my best when a few important corners of my body are in discomfort. I am grumpy, on edge, irritable, and just wanting to be left alone. The slightest hint at my inability to valiantly brave pain will throw me off into spirals of incompetence.
“I don’t think it’ll be received well if I declare to the world that I am just a delicate bruised flower who can only survive in the best of circumstances.”
I don’t even know what it means to put on the internet a very raw confession of my weakness. I don’t think it’ll be received well if I declare to the world that I am just a delicate bruised flower who can only survive in the best of circumstances. After all, we love wars, victories, and winners. I am not one.
The only thing I can do today is write. So I’ll write about my pain, my fragility, and about my own understanding of how while bearing it all, I’m also bearing perceived judgement from others about my pain.
