Monopoly on Pain

He looked me in the face, feeling all proud of himself and said, “I feel like I have a monopoly on pain. Unless you went through what I went through you have no idea what real pain is.”

I just looked at him, meeting his intense gaze, and I made some textbook comment like, “Wow, I can’t even imagine what it must have been like for you,” not wanting to invalidate all that he’d been through. But, seriously, how ignorant can one be?

Each person experiences pain differently. What might hurt you might not hurt me. What hurts me, may not affect you in the same way. You might not think something I struggle with is a big deal, but it can pain me the same amount something more significant, in your eyes, hurts you. I may never have gone through what he went through, what seemed like unnatural, idiopathic suffering, I may not have been able to battle through what he had to, but I’ve had my own challenges, I’ve experienced my own pain, in a very real way.

Everyone has something. No one’s life is a walk in the park. We all just have different capabilities, different capacities, to deal with challenges. Some people successfully live with their hardships though it knocks them in the face every single day. Others have learned to compartmentalize, able to push it deep inside the recesses of their minds, only accessing it when there’s a lesson to draw out. Some crumple and fall apart in the face of challenge, others man up and face it head-on, becoming only stronger for it.

How often though do we use pain as an excuse? Is that ever valid? Sure, it may be a reason, but that’s a whole different animal than an excuse.

Commenting that one has a “monopoly” on pain? That just seems arrogant almost. What kind of trump card is that? Okay, yes, empathy is given for free but respect needs to be earned. I can empathize with him, it hurt, he was in pain. Scratch that, he’s clearly still hurting, he’s in pain even now, but to discount everyone else’s hardships? I’m sorry, I can’t respect that.