Pain Management

 I think I learned to manage pain at a very young age.

I could get lost in my crafts, playing with my dog, or with my dolls.

They were more than things I enjoyed.

They were distractions.

Little places I could escape to when the world around me felt too much.

As I got older, I still loved creating things.

But I discovered another kind of distraction.

Helping people.

Taking care of others.

Caretaking became a way of life for me.

Practically my entire career was built around serving others.

And there was nothing wrong with that.

I genuinely loved helping people.

But I wonder now what was underneath it all.

Was there a little girl who had learned that focusing on everyone else was a way to escape herself?

A child who longed to get away from the world she lived in?

Maybe helping others became more than my purpose.

Maybe it also became my hiding place.

I could focus on their needs instead of my own.

Their pain instead of mine.

Their problems instead of the feelings I didn’t know how to face.

I don’t judge that little girl for finding ways to cope.

She was doing the best she could.

She found places where she could breathe.

And perhaps that is where my journey with pain management really began—not with learning how to make pain disappear, but with learning how to find somewhere safe to go when life hurt.