The Pain Scale

Honestly, I really didn't comprehend this article entirely until I read it for the second time. This is a very dense article, but all in all, I think this article is emphasizing the fact that everyone has different levels of pain they are willing to tolerate before it really starts to bother them. It's funny that we read this article this week because in my forensic anthropology class, we are learning about how people respond to different levels of pain. An athlete (especially a male athlete) is expected to tolerate higher levels of pain, otherwise he's considered a wimp if he complains. One who is not an athlete would probably be really uncomfortable if they experienced the amount of pain an Olympic athlete deals with on a daily basis. Bliss mentioned that "after a year of pain, I realized that I could no longer remember what it felt like not to be in pain" (178). I believe most athletes agree with this statement because they become so used to the fact that they have this ache or pain while they perform, that as time goes by, they don't remember what it was like not to have this pain while training. But, as I said before, yeah as time progresses one may not notice their pain as much, but how does one actually measure pain?? Measuring one's level of pain is entirely subjective, what's painful for one person may not bother another in the slightest bit. I did agree with Bliss when she mentioned "the pain scale measures only the intensity of pain, not the duration" (179). Someone could be suffering from a chronic disease that they've had their entire life while someone else could be suffering from an serious injury that occurred at last night's soccer match; both are suffering, but these two levels of pain are entirely different because of their duration. The person with the most recent injury knows that his/her injury will eventually pass while the other's chronic illness "is terrifying not because of any specific torture, but because it is eternal" (179).