Please, Don't Be Sorry.



Posted: Wednesday, August 31, 2011

by Casey Starkweather

I hear "I'm sorry," a lot. Why? Well, because I have Fibromyalgia. And although I am a private person, some of my friends and some of my coworkers know.  My supervisors, for one, know. I actually told one of them recently (the other two quit!) about why I was in pain so much. She asked me if I was alright, and I was tired of lying. I have my bad pain days. I also have my depressive days, but that's a different story. That day, at work, was an extremely bad pain day. Lifting over fifty pounds was impossible, and even just ten was hard. But.
I do not tell my friends and coworkers for their sympathy. It is not that I do not appreciate it. I do, greatly.

However, I get tired of people apologizing for MY pain. In America, at least here in the South, people tend to apologize when they don't know what else to say. Instead of saying sorry, they could try something like "Oh, that explains a lot" or "Thanks for being honest with me" or even, especially coming from me, "Thanks for trusting me". But not "I'm sorry."

Here is what I'm curious about. Are you sorry that I told you I have massive amounts of pain that is manageable with pain pills and ointment and braces? Or are you sorry that I'm in pain? Or, do you just not know how to respond to "I have Fibro, and if you don't know what that is, I basically have Rheumatoid Arthritis"?

I told my supervisor for two reasons. The first being that I feel odd about taking high dosages of pain killers at work, I rarely do, and I have had weird reactions to them. (Like extreme giggling.) I also told her because I trust her, and I feel better knowing that someone besides that one guy who knows me too damn well, knows that my pain is very real and that there will be days when I'm going to be in a lot of pain. There will also be days when I am in very little pain. I have a high pain tolerance, I have to. So those days are almost no-pain days to me.  But the days when I don't want to get out of bed, or the days when it's impossible to move, or the days when I'm limping because I cannot put weight on my ankle/knee/hip?  Then having that support, among my friends and coworkers, those people who understand that I'm in pain and not to take the snapping literally, it helps. It helps a lot.  Being twenty-one and knowing that I will be in pain for the rest of my life is hard, but having friends that care, even if they don't know what to say, makes it easier. So don't be sorry that I have a genetic medical condition that causes pain. Only be sorry if you don't support me through the tough days and the good days. Sorry is just a word, it cannot fix a problem. And sometimes, those problems, even severe pain, can turn into blessings, if we just give them a chance.
Casey is an 21 year old college student, majoring in History, Minoring in German. She plans to go to Law School, or if that fails, to get her Ph.D. She writes articles based on personal experience, in the hopes that someone will learn from her mistakes and with the hope that she can change someone elses life.

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