Pain in Times of COVID-19
Amy Hill
By Karla Mundo, Laguna Niguel, California, U.S.
I woke up thinking of pain, feeling it. The pain that most of us cover with an “everything is fine.” The pain that women cover with make-up. The pain that in many cultures is drowned in alcohol. The pain that we keep secret in the most profound part of ourselves, for fear that It might be something of concern. The pain that many suffocate with a variety of activities, occupations, as a way of distracting from it.
The thing about pain is that when you have it … it’s so strong, so unwilling to let you sleep, rest, smile, pretend not to feel it. Pain, like love, can be an intense and long-lasting relationship. Pain, unlike love, is not something we wake up hoping for. We do not look forward to pain every day. Regardless, pain finds its way in, physically or emotionally, when you are dealing with health issues.
In daily life, there are body aches, headaches, minor pains … but I am referring here to the kind of pain that makes you weak, concerned for your life, vulnerable, and prone to crying. I am talking of the unbearable pain that almost makes us lose hope. The kind of pain that is not relieved by the infinite joy of the life we love. It is a pain that has overstayed its time.
Pain reminds you that clenching your teeth, crouching in the fetus position, breathing, holding tight, and praying cannot make it go away. It is here to remind you that something is wrong with your body. What can it be? you question. After all, you have not missed a doctor’s appointment, you have been doing testing all year long, and on the surface, all seems right. You have been exercising, eating wholesome food. How could this pain be so strong, so diminishing, so hopeless?
Pain has always found a way in when we lose someone we love, when our kids get sick, when there is another war overseas, when we have seen the face of a child living in extreme poverty, when a friend or relative tells us a story about their fight with cancer and now with COVID-19.
My grandmother died at the beginning of COVID. It was very painful, helping my 70-year-old aunt put grandma’s stuff away, to empty the apartment where she used to receive us with joy, just weeks ago. How could it be possible? I know she lived a long life– still, I felt her loss. It’s not that I did not know how it feels. I lost my grandfather when I was 12, and friends and many other relatives through the years, way too many.
Then I heard from a wave of people about being sick at home or at hospitals. It felt as if an immense tsunami had hit so many I love. Some lost their fathers, grandfathers, mothers, cousins, aunts, friends. I heard and read stories of strangers and their battles, and how many in their families were ill, in pain. Some recovered, millions of others stopped existing.
Pain travels, it is well-known internationally. For a year now, all over the world, pain, accompanied by fear, has entered our households with the name of COVID-19. The thing about pain is that when arrives, you cannot trick it. You might numb it with Advil, Tylenol, or aspirin for a while. You might distract it. You can only face it with compassion.
You see, the thing about pain is that does not discriminate. No one is immune to pain, there is no vaccine for it. For some, when pain leaves, there is light, hope, laughter, strength, joy.