35. Pain is Physical; Suffering is Mental.


Reproduced from Prologue, first posted on Jan. 3, 2015.


Pain

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Photo by Daphne Zaras http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tornado#mediaviewer/File:Dszpics1.jpg

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.CSIRO_ScienceImage_10413_Project_Vesta_fire
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Like tornadoes, earthquakes, tsunamis,
acute pain can devastate in an instant.
Like the reign of a cyclone or volcanic eruption,
pain is unbearable in its duration.
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Chronic pain persists like a bushfire,
blizzard, flood, drought or heat wave:
excruciating, depleting, extensive,
destructive.
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Chronic neuropathic pain, with its multiple symptoms,
is complex megadisaster: earthquake, tsunami, and nuclear blast;
or supercell thunderstorm with hail, lightning, cyclonic wind, and flood;
or volcanic eruption, with fire, lava flow and permanent damage.
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However widespread the disaster,
we overcome and recover.
Pain is physical; suffering is mental.
Suffering is just the sky’s dry argument.
We do not let pain become suffering:
we triumph.
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CSIRO_ScienceImage_10409_Eucalypt_regrowth_after_Black_Saturday_bushfires

Eucalypt Regrowth after Black Saturday Bushfires



Tornado, Photo by Daphne zaras, in public domain. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tornado#mediaviewer/File:Dszpics1.jpg.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Dszpics1.jpg

Bush Fire. By CSIRO Australia.  CCA 3.0 Unported license.
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:CSIRO_ScienceImage_10413_Project_Vesta_fire.jpg

Eucalypt Regrowth After Black Saturday Bushfires.
Photo by Robert Kerton, CSIRO, Australia.  CC0 AS-A 3.0 Unported License.     http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:CSIRO_ScienceImage_10409_Eucalypt_regrowth_after_Black_Saturday_bushfires.jpg

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© 2018 K-KLokePhD

03. Sudden Onset of Chronic Neuropathic Pain

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Many long hours after the biopsy surgery,
I wake from anaesthetic—
my entire body wrapped in strange new pain:

an invisible tight broad metal band
corsets my lower chest wall—
I can hardly breathe;

my lower body crackles, crunches and bursts
with sensation—
if only I could stop them.

My two legs have stopped being identical twins:
right leg is hypersensitive to the gentlest touch;
the left is completely numb.

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Bonfire4,  English Wikipedia, original upload 8 September 2004 by Fir0002

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© 2015 K-KLokePhD


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Bonfire. Photo from English Wikipedia, 8 September 2004 by Fir0002.
CC AS-A 3.0Unported License. http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Bonfire4.jpg