A friend dealing with health issues recently asked me if I remember not feeling like I do. The answer was swift: No. I remember sometimes feeling better or worse, but I always remember pain. I was able to function as a kid. I was active, in marching band, pretty much doing whatever I wanted. I just hurt and had to sleep. My friend feels it’s a misfortune that he can remember running, playing football, and feeling physically good. He has been struggling for a lot of years, but he has that memory, and I think it haunts him. I think my dad, turning 88 in a couple months has the same memory. He was an extreme distance runner for a time, running ultra marathons, regular marathons, and just running whenever he could for as long as he could. He was in his 40s when he started having physical issues. But he had all those years of having a body that did what he wanted it to do when he wanted it to do it without protesting every step of the way. Now that old age has curbed his ability to “power through” physically, his memory is enhanced with stereotypical rose-colored glasses, I’m sure, which makes it all the more difficult for him to accept his “new” old body. So I ask myself: Am I lucky, as my friend says?

It’s true you don’t really miss what you never knew. I truly don’t remember jumping and playing without my body asking me what the heck I’m doing to it. I understand now as an adult that my brain was sort of picking on me – alerting me when it didn’t have to. Since fibromyalgia wasn’t really a thing back then, doctors chose different diagnoses, juvenile rheumatoid arthritis, hypoglycemia… I got desensitized to aspirin immediately from being prescribed regular doses, and if I’m completely honest with myself, I was conditioned into listening to my pesky brain more than I should. I’m not saying I didn’t really hurt and that I could have talked myself out of hurting, but I think the cycle of pain was locked when I was a child. When as an adult I finally had a diagnosis that explained that, yes I hurt, but it’s just my brain lying to me, I could start a conversation with my brain and push myself harder, negotiating with myself to do what I wanted despite the inevitable consequences. Now, getting older and dealing with increasing non-brain pain (which is actually enhanced by my fibro brain), I do look back with fondness when I could say, yeah whatever, do it anyway.

I also remember wonderful dreams of running through fields, endless green fields, without tripping or panting heavy, or twisting leg joints, no pain whatsoever. It was my favorite recurring (rarely, but still) dream. I don’t have those dreams anymore. Now I have dreams that involve trying to cross a street or climb a set of stairs but I can’t because my legs won’t hold me because of the pain, and I wake up to pain in my legs and hips. I miss the running dreams.

But is it better to have just gone through life with pain? Would it have been better if my running dream was reality and I could look back with fondness on my prowess? From my perspective, I vote yes for my friend and my dad. The experience, even though past, is better than not having that experience. My friend and my dad hold those experiences close – they are essential to their identity. When I examine my life, I have more than pain, but pain is a strong component of who I am. I feel proud of what I have accomplished despite pain. Would I still be proud of myself without the pain component? I hope so, but it is what it is.