On a scale of 1 to 10.........

I know just how you feel!
Did you ever let these words pass your lips? We might think we know, but there's NO WAY we can get that far under a person's skin and into their heart!
A friend who lives in a power chair told me recently, Nobody knows how hard it is to be this disabled! And she is that disabled with a disease she didn't ask to have, was born with and knows is progressing rapidly. NOBODY - I mean nobody - can know how SHE feels even someone else in somewhat similar circumstances.
The thing about pain is that it's a lonely business! We can't share! I have my own pain stories. I know how many times I have wished (probably not on my most spiritual days) to "zap" someone else with my pain so they could see how intense it is.
Just in the last few days another friend said, Everyone has their own problems! She was feeling the intensity of the pain in her life. 
There is no meter to measure one person's pain against another person's pain. This isn't bridge where one card can trump another. This is real life lived on the razor's edge!
I absolutely hate to answer the question that doctors and nurses love to ask, On a scale of 1 to 10, what is your pain? I think the question is totally useless as every person/patient handles and perceives pain differently, and there's no factor for that fact. There have been times when my physical pain was so intense that I wanted to answer 15!
There is a story (which I thought was attributed to D.L. Moody but the web says either Persian proverb or unknown and the picture another source) about a man who had no shoes and felt very sorry for himself until he met a man who had no feet. It's all about perspective! It's all about who's inside the pain! And, clearly, some pain is worse than other pain! Having a baby or a kidney stone or an attack of pancreatitis are infinitely more painful than a sore throat. But, that being said, the person with the sore throat doesn't have a kidney stone so the sore throat is the pain of the moment.


And no, you don't know how I feel and I don't know how you feel! What matters is whether you and I care more about someone else's pain than our own!

O, by the way, I had time to write this blog post just now because I got a pain reprieve from the dentist. I was supposed to have 2 fillings today but the dentist office has no electricity! Darn! :o)