So how much pain are you feeling?

[geordie]

While this goes against dogma it doesn't really necessarily tell us anything definitive. Pain is a personal and internal thing, nobody can tell you what you are experiencing or how that compares to some standard.

See the article here.

Comments

[stasia]

I am hoping I get to use this pain scale when I'm a nurse.

Pain Scale

Stasia

[geordie]

Nice pictures, I didn't picture the animal munching on me level as fantastically bad though.

[kyrielle]

The best pain scale I saw rated it on impact on your ability to deal with daily life. Because based on 10 being the worst you can imagine, the scale is variable based on your prior pain experiences and ability to imagine pain. The same pain would be a different score, on that scale, prior to and after my experience with childbirth, I can promise you!

On the other hand, the "impact on your life" scale wouldn't've changed much. Although it will tend to downplay the pain levels of someone with a high pain tolerance, that's probably true of any scale.

[geordie]

I can remember pain that was sort of ringing through me and utterly impossible to ignore, but I don't remember what it was. I'm not going to give birth, but then hopefully you aren't going to have a DVT. That felt like having my leg chewed on by a carnivore. But I have no idea how it compares.

[kyrielle]

I hope not either.

And honestly, childbirth varies from person to person and delivery to delivery. The pain I'd state from Drew's birth (where I didn't even FEEL delivery as I had an epidural) would be greater than that from Ian's (which was unmedicated, but easier).

[geordie]

The various variations of childbirth are not something I envy anyone.

[rexluscus]

Seriously! Now that we know women report more pain, this tells us that...women report more pain. That's it.

[geordie]

Yes. There's no objective measure. All it tells us is that contrary to the rhetoric men complain less about pain.

[rexluscus]

Yes...although I confess, this was a cliche I hadn't heard of. Is the folk wisdom that men have a lower pain threshold? Cuz like women go through childbirth or whatever? I'd have thought the cliche would be the opposite since women are weak/have more feelings/whatever.

It's hard keeping all of these gender cliches straight sometimes.

[stasia]

"Men complain more about being sick."

"Women have a higher pain tolerance."

I think these are the two cliches in use here. *grin*

Stasia