Can You Live with Pain?
If you’ve ever talked to a doctor about a persistent pain, you know frustrating it can be. Talking about pain represents a huge challenge. What words can describe an experience that, for many people, is so intense that it defies language? One of the intriguing features of pain is that people all have a slightly different perspective on it, and these varying viewpoints are reflected in the language they use to describe these experiences. I frequently hear of people uttering noises to convey what they are feeling. Or they resort to tools of poetry like onomatopoeia, in which words sound like the experience they experience like “sizzle†or “zap.†Most patients resort to using metaphor to describe how pain feels and how that feeling travels through their bodies and psyches. If you say that a headache feels like a sledgehammer, everyone knows exactly what you’re feeling. If you complain of an excruciating ankle pain, people who experienced the same feeling can understand you. Metaphors offer rich visual images of pain’s power as well as insights into its illusive nature.
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