I’d have to pay for the cleaning even if I walked off without getting it done. It’s their way or the highway. They had me try a more “gentle” hygienist and she was even worse. The most recent one is less painful although they still don’t use any painkillers. I go to a federally funded clinic with less expensive dental care than the private practice dentists in the area whose services I cannot afford.
I forgot about the cattle prod tests. I had it done once, and they stopped midway because I was holding my breath or something I wasn’t supposed to do and it was hurting my brain. It seems like it damaged my brain permanently because I’m more prone to stress in certain situations than in the past.
Holy $%^! I will admit that other than migraines, a broken arm and a bought of pluracy (which runs a close second) I have not had much experience with pain but I cannot imagine a pain much worse than your sciatic nerve going haywire.
A few years back, I got out of bed, starting walking to kitchen and felt like someone shot me in the back, feel to the ground and completely incapacitated. The pain does not last, goes away instantly with no lingering effects once you get off that nerve but over the next 3 days I was completely bedridden and woke up more than once feeling like I was being purged by the Spanish Inquisition!
While we are talking about pain, what does it mean exactly 'to throw out one’s back?"
I’ve heard of this but never experienced it, but just in rising suddenly from my chair yesterday I did something to my back, it was so bad this morning that it took two people to help me get out of bed and then I needed 10 minutes just to put on my underwear. I suddenly walk like a 103 year-old and I can’t bend or twist. I called the doctor but they said it sounds like a strained muscle and to rest, use ice, and wait for it to get better.
Is this what they mean by throwing out the back, or is it something else?
Holy cow, I really feel bad for you all suffering from chronic pain. I hope you can find help. I’m fortunate in that most of my pain issues seem to have resolved:
cluster headaches (the worst pain but haven’t had them in a couple of decades).
TMJ (again, seem to disappear with the cluster headaches).
Toothaches (have a slight one right now as I’m in the middle of getting a root canal and crown. Fortunately it is controllable with ibuprofen.)
Hiatal hernia - stomach wanted to move in with the lungs, blargh! Resolved many years ago.
Torn ACL - saw stars (like a cartoon) but not as bad as the stuff above.
Pain from the first three were unrelenting and fierce and that’s why (for me) they were my worst. One thing that’s kind of weird (and may be related to my diabetic neuropathy) is that I get a jolt of pain when I watch TV and see someone fall… Does that happen to anyone else??
Interestingly, no one so far has mentioned my own personal worst pain: I had the shingles in a line along my spine. Every breath hurt, every movement… just walking down the front steps of my house to get to the car so my husband could take me to the doctor was insane. Turns out I got to the doc in time and he got me on the medicine and nipped it in the bud, but I was miserable for quite a few days. That and my herniated disc are the worst I’ve ever had the displeasure of experiencing.
My heart goes out to folks living with any kind of chronic pain.
Similar to this for me. The worst pain I ever had was a pinched nerve in my neck. 0.1 degrees of rotation to go from “hmm, a little bit painful” to “stars in the eyes, world shrinks, lose all control of limbs” explosion of pain.
I’ve been through a lot of pain in my life. Broken bones (fingers, toes, ribs, nose), skull fractured once and skin sliced to the bone, a fist-sized abscess caused by Necrotizing fasciitis and the massive open wound that required a month in a burn ICU and multiple surgeries, teeth broken off at the gum line, and a badly ruptured disc in my lower spine complicated by congenital spinal stenosis which has left me in constant pain for 25 years.
The back is the worst. I’ve been in greater short-term pain on occasion but the constant, unending pain at a 3-6 level that starts in my lower back and radiates all the way to my knees (sometimes lower) that had been there more than half my life and affects every part of my life.
The only times I have been pain-free over the past 25 years are when I’ve been so highly medicated on IV narcotic pain meds that I’ve been completely non-functional.
OMG Nerdessence, I’ve had fibroid issues but nothing like what you’ve been through! That made my hair stand on end…
Never given birth, wisdom teeth extraction sucked but not that bad, no kidney stones or gall bladder attacks.
I’ve had the pinched nerve in my neck problems. I slipped getting into the shower a few years ago and messed up something in my neck. Ever since then all it takes is a twist around the wrong way and I can’t turn my head for a week.
Also the acid reflux, my boyfriend has wanted to drive me to the hospital a few times when it has acted up.
So that’s kind of what I have, but the nerve is in my face. Specifically for me, the pain is along my cheekbone and behind my eye.
Dr. Righteous, I have heard others say that Shingles pain is worse than anything, ever. Of course, the kidney stone people might disagree, but let’s call those tied then.
Debridement of second and third degree burns is not so much fun. Even less fun is having the bandages changed later on as the nerves grow back. That just makes you go straight to feeling nauseous while screaming and then you pass out.
I have been stabbed, broken bones, herniated a disc and had a couple of internal surguries and NOTHING compares to exposing all the raw nerve endings on your lower legs to air. Just this gawdawful white hot flash as if your lower body had just burst into flames. Then your brain clicks the off button. Standing up while wearing those bandages is the only time I’ve ever actually been able to feel my blood vessels expand as the blood started moving into my lower extremities. Nossir. I’d take death over that again without a seconds hesitation.
My father was a Green Beret, a Vietnam War vet, and a lawyer. At the same time (apparently Dad got his money’s worth when he sold his soul to Satan). While he’s never been an over-the-top macho kind of guy, let’s just say he’s not exactly prone to overt shows of emotion or demonstrations of physical discomfort.
About 10 years ago he had his first case of kidney stones. For several hours (or what seemed like it) I sat next to the gurney upon which he was curled into a fetal position, crying like a baby.
The worst kind of pain is the kind that never stops, that becomes a constant part of your life, that even on your best days is always there nagging at you.
Okay, if we’re talking intensity, probably the worst pain I’ve had personally is a sprained spine, due to the inability to move without both the pain and the fear of more pain, plus the fear of falling down and having yet more pain. Another horrendously intense but mercifully brief pain was a severely scratched cornea. Fortunately, they heal very quickly, but for the duration, any amount of light was like an ice pick through my head.
Hm, yes, good point. I had first and second degree burns over my chest and upper arms from spilling a big pot of boiling water on myself, and that was indeed very painful. Couldn’t go out in the sun uncovered for two years after that to avoid scarring. They covered me with gauze and kept soaking it down with some green liquid, and whenever they lifted the gauze to check my skin, the steam just billowed out from it. Oddly enough, while the worst of the burn was on my chest where the main impact of the water had been, the arms were more painful, possibly because the nerve endings were more intact there or something.
When I try to think of what’s the absolute worst pain, it seems to me that what feels worst is whatever I’m going through at the time. If my tooth hurts, then toothache is definitely the worst. Headache, sore throat, stomachache, period pain, spine sprain, cornea scratch, charley horse, twisted ankle, each one is the worst until it goes away and something else replaces it.
But the only one that nearly made me crash my car was during the first period after my tubal ligation, when I found out that the cut end of one of my tubes had apparently adhered to something inside my abdomen. It felt like someone was pulling my guts out with a hook. I had to pull over on the freeway and scream for a while before I could continue driving home. The tube has stretched since then, so the pain isn’t quite so intense, but it’s still pretty gut-hooky every month.
Actually, olivesmarch mentioned burns in post #20, that’s the one I replied to just above.
I’m hoping my gallbladder issues (if such they be) never reach the level I’ve seen described here by multiple people. I mean, whatever is going on in there has hurt like the Dickens from time to time, but not quite at the “worse than childbirth” level.
Does that happen to anyone else??