I can remember it very well but it might be because it lasted so long. I had a sinus infection from a cyst and tonsillitis, which resulted in having sinus surgery and a tonsillectomy. The day after the surgery I had a bad reation to the codeine they gave me for pain and I couldn’t tolerate any kind of pain medication. It was a mix of throbbing, swollen, raw pain in my throat and pressure behind my eyes, and then the ear pain started and it felt like white-hot lasers in my ears and through my head. I couldn’t cry, I couldn’t do anything for long stretches except bear it, sitting there just telling myself “breathe in, breathe out.” It was hard to control the panic, the feeling that I could not bear it, the fear because it was not getting better.
Then again, I think it was the emotional distress and the psychological stress that makes me remember it the most. Pain by itself is easier to bear and I do usually forget it. I know there have been other times when I felt extreme pain and I don’t have vivid memories like that. I think that’s why most women can ‘forget’ pain from childbirth, because it usually ends up being a happy memory so they associate that pain with happiness in the end.
My labor and delivery were not so much painful as taxing even though my dreamlet weighed 9.5 lbs and was birthed without drugs. There was one moment during that event, though. After several hours of contractions a switch flipped in my brain that said, “Time to push now” The bickering nurses said, “No, no. Not time to push.” Not pushing when my body thought I should push felt like being ripped in half and I can, in fact, get back to that sensation pretty easily.
As bad as that was it pales in comparison with assorted toothaches I’ve had. Abcesses, dry socket after wisdom teeth came out, all far, far worse than any other pain I’ve felt. If I think about it tears will form in my eyes but I wouldn’t say I can completely recall it.
Migraine is bad, bad, bad. Those who are lucky enough not to have them really have no idea how bad it is. Six days a month, though–you should really be taking something for it. Take it from me, eventually you will find something that works.
As for me, I am thankful every day (or, at least I should be thankful) that I now longer have “stomach migraines.” Take the worst migraine you’ve ever had (non-migraneurs, you can have largely the same pain by socking yourself repeatedly in the head with an aluminum baseball bat) and add projectile vomiting! What a fun memory from my early teen years!
I’ve heard of people not being able to remember pain, Scylla, but I have very vivid memories of it. There are two that spring right to mind. The first was when I had a minor surgical procedure done with local anesthetic. I really wish they coulda knocked me out. The second was a migraine headache so intense that nausea brought on by the pain made me vomit. I can readily recall those pains, or many others. The pain of a recently-drilled tooth, or of walking on a turned ankle, or even something as minor as a papercut, are all easily recalled. No more difficult than remembering a tune or a voice.
I can recall the pain of waking up sans pain killers from my 8 1/2 hour 17 vertabrae spinal fusion like it was yesterday. It was white hot and excrutiating. I did shallow breathing to combat it, then started dry heaving from the anestesia. They mercifully knocked me back out shortly thereafter.
I don’t think I’ll ever forget the agony or intensity for as long as I live. I obviously cannot recreate it, but I recall it clearly and hope to never relive it.
If I were inclined to prayer, I’d offer up one of thanks every night that my migraines went away my sophomore year in college.
My tactile and kinesthetic memories are quite vivid, and I can recall pretty much any severe pain I’ve ever felt. Only two things top the migraines for sheer intensity: Getting shot in the forehead, which was like being hit with a red-hot hammer (complete with a distinct sense that my brain was rattling around in my skull), and getting knifed in the belly, which was like having a line of ice-cold fire etched into my skin. Calling them up makes me shudder convulsively, but I can do it.
Happily, I can call up much nicer sensations as well.
Velma’s point about emotional & psychological stress influencing how one remembers & experiences pain is a good one.
My worst pain was an episode of costochondritis I had in grad school. It’s an infection in the cartilege of the chest. Doesn’t sound like much, but when it’s bad, it’s really bad. I could breathe, knew it wasn’t an asthma attack or a heart attack, but the pain was so severe I was crying from it for hours. I finally had my roommate take me to the hospital. Anyway, I was very frightened because this hurt so much more than my worst migraine. Up to that point, migraines were my 10 on the pain scale. So, I think because I was scared & didn’t know what was going on, I remember it pretty clearly.
But migraine pain, although I know it’s bad, is not something I can remember nearly as well, even though I’ve experienced it more than once. I hated the migraines when I’d get them, but knew they’d go away given time, quiet, a dark room and pain killers.
I can vividly remember the worst pain I have ever felt. It was when I was getting a crown, and they didn’t numb me enough, and they pressed the crown on very hard over a raw exosed nerve for like 15 seconds. It was absolutely horrible. That is the main reason I have not been back to the dentist in a long time. Any kind of pain associated with the dentist is the worst in my book. I would rather have shots and surgery and stitches than go to the dentist.
I get some kind of migraine that doesn’t respond to Imitrex or other standard anti-migraine medications – the only thing that works is a hefty dose of ibuprofen and opiates. Although usually I can’t feel it in my memory, I can at the moment, because another one is coming on. Grumble.
The worst pain other than that, though, was when I was waking up from surgery and they were inserting a catheter to drain my bladder. It was only a soft flexible rubber tube, but it felt like a red-hot iron poker – so painful that I woke up despite the residual anesthesia screaming and flailing. It was horrible. What made it even worse was when I found out, a year or so later, that it didn’t have to be so painful – I had a urology appointment where they did a similar procedure, but with a fiber optic camera instead of a catheter, and before insertion they pumped lidocaine jelly through my entire urethra so that the camera didn’t hurt at all. But evidently my evil surgeons had never heard of using local anesthetia for inserting catheters …
In the interest of full disclosure, I will admit that I did black out briefly while falling to the ground. Matters would have been far worse if the bullet had hit straight-on. Fortunately, it was a ricochet that came in at a steep angle.
I have no trouble remembering pain. All it takes is someone touching my left foot and I remember the feeling of wrenching all my toes off my foot at once (all torn ligaments and cartilage - not skin).
That’s my 10 - when I had an impacted kidney stone, it was a 9.
Depends on the pain. I can’t remember or ‘feel’ the pain of labour, but I CAN still ‘experience’ the pain that accompanies a severe attack of acute glaucoma even though it has been a number of years since the last one occured. Maybe because I had hundreds of those but only 4 kids.
Blissfully, I can’t remember how it felt at all. I fell and shattered my left tibia/fibula in shalf a dozen places, a couple of inches above the ankle, so badly that my foot was pointing in the opposite direction. Seriously, it looked like I had a spare ankle. My uncle was sitting in a car, windows closed, a few yards away, and says he heard the bones snap. And they couldn’t give me drugs for several hours, because they had to get a foot & ankle specialist into the ER to decide whether I needed immediate surgery. Considering it was Thanksgiving weekend, you can imagine it took a while to dig someone up.
Boy, am I glad I don’t remember how it felt. Even the 4 surgeries I had afterward to repair it were no fun, but pale in comparison. Sometimes drugs are your friend. I’m curious to see how childbirth might compare.
I can remember some pain. Not all of it, though. I don’t remember when I got my wisdom teeth out, even though that hurt really badly. I do remember the weird-ass fracture I may have gotten in my leg, which was the worst pain I ever felt–the bruise lasted two months, but, for whatever reason, I could still walk on it. It hurt, but I could. I don’t remember the pain from breaking my finger, even though I still have a permanent bruise there (it’s been over a year and a half).
My worst pains are pretty trivial compared to some listed here - just migraine and a really bad sprain - but I can remember them at least as vividly as I can remember most other sensations.
I also feel quite strong phantom pains while watching someone else who is hurt or injured.
