{"id":1668,"date":"2015-05-21T02:00:48","date_gmt":"2015-05-21T02:00:48","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/gooddaysbaddays\/?p=1668"},"modified":"2015-05-19T22:14:00","modified_gmt":"2015-05-19T22:14:00","slug":"chronic-pain-when-it-seems-as-if-youre-playing-a-losing-game","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/gooddaysbaddays\/2015\/05\/chronic-pain-when-it-seems-as-if-youre-playing-a-losing-game.html","title":{"rendered":"Chronic Pain: When It Seems As If You’re Playing A Losing Game"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Maureen<\/a>Lately, my pain experience has been much like playing that arcade game where you hold a hammer and wait for a thing – sometimes an artificial mole, sometimes something else – to pop up from one of the many holes on the game playing board. When you see the “thing,” you’re supposed to hit it with the hammer, driving it back down the hole and scoring points when you do. Seems simple, and it seems as if it would be easy to win.<\/p>\n

Alas…<\/p>\n

No sooner do you drive one mole\/thing down into its hole, but another pops up on another part of the board. Okay, you think, I’ll get that one, too. But, as you reach over with your hammer, you notice a\u00a0third<\/em> mole thing pop up from a different hole. And a\u00a0fourth.\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n

No matter how much you work at it, you’re playing a losing game. The pain, like those mole things, won’t go away, but rather seems to relocate as soon as you get one area even moderately under control.<\/p>\n

Of course, I’m not doctor, and we all have to work with our docs to cope as best we can with the physical and psychological parts of our pain.<\/p>\n

But the spirit – now, there’s the part that can be more difficult. Why? Because it can become easy to get so frustrated that you throw down your mole-thing-hammer and give up, letting the spirit curl up inside and retreat. Yes, easy, but I try to work around it.<\/p>\n

I fill up every “hole,” every area where there is minimal or no pain, with gratitude – praising and thanking God for the relief there, specifically there. \u00a0I use the recognition of relief, however faint, in some parts of the body to turn into faith that some lessening is possible, and I trust that this could “spread,” just as, sometimes, the pain can spread.<\/p>\n

In short, when I feel frustrated that pain won’t completely go away and it seems as if I’m playing a losing game, I give my spirit something else to do, something positive, and this helps me tremendously as I go back, yet again, to my medical team, treatment protocols, and other tools.<\/p>\n

When the spirit is busy with pouring forth its goodness, it cannot turn sour! It cannot retreat!<\/p>\n

Peace,<\/p>\n

Maureen<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Lately, my pain experience has been much like playing that arcade game where you hold a hammer and wait for a thing – sometimes an artificial mole, sometimes something else – to pop up from one of the many holes on the game playing board. When you see the “thing,” you’re supposed to hit it…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":548,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3,360,43,4,1047,578,1247,1246],"tags":[44,1721,1722,30,1720,1723],"class_list":["post-1668","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-chronic-pain-and-illness","category-determination","category-encouragement-in-life","category-words-of-encouragemnent-and-info-for-all","category-good","category-goodness","category-rising-above-tragedy","category-uplifting","tag-chronic-pain","tag-frustration-with-pain","tag-help-for-pain","tag-pain","tag-pain-that-hurts","tag-the-spirit-and-pain"],"yoast_head":"\nChronic Pain: When It Seems As If You're Playing A Losing Game - Good Days...Bad Days With Maureen Pratt<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/gooddaysbaddays\/2015\/05\/chronic-pain-when-it-seems-as-if-youre-playing-a-losing-game.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Chronic Pain: When It Seems As If You're Playing A Losing Game - Good Days...Bad Days With Maureen Pratt\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Lately, my pain experience has been much like playing that arcade game where you hold a hammer and wait for a thing – sometimes an artificial mole, sometimes something else – to pop up from one of the many holes on the game playing board. 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She expected to be writing scripts. God had other plans. A few years after her graduation, Maureen was diagnosed with a life-threatening case of organ-involved lupus. Her life turned upside down as she grappled with the effects of the illness and other health conditions that ensued. She was no stranger to serious health challenges; even as a child, Maureen had survived numerous bouts of pneumonia, flu, and other infections. But lupus made her take a fresh look at her life goals - and took herlifelong, strong Catholic Christian faith and writing in a direction she'd never imagined. Today, Maureen writes and speaks about walking with the Lord while living with chronic pain and illness. Her most recent book is \"Don't Panic!: How to Keep Going When the Going Gets Tough (Franciscan Media). She is also the author of, \"Peace in the Storm: Meditations on Chronic Pain & Illness\" (Image Books\/Randomhouse), \"Beyond Pain: Job, Jesus, and Joy\" (Twenty-Third Publications), \"The First Year: Hypothyroidism, Second Edition\" (Perseus) and \"Taking Charge of Lupus: How to Manage the Disease and Make the Most of Your LIfe.\" She writes the syndicated column, \"Living Well,\" for Catholic News Service, and has also written for Saint Anthony Messenger Magazine, Journey for Women Magazine, The Upper Room Magazine, LupusNow, and Arthritis Today. Maureen's health continues to be a challenge, however she feels honored to be able to bring her perspective, from experience and knowledge, to others. \"Good Days...Bad Days with Maureen Pratt\" is a new way for Maureen to reach people who carry the burden of illness and pain in their lives, or who care for someone who does. Through the blog, she hopes to bring issues of health, wellness, and spirit into focus and, especially, inspire others that, no matter what health challenges, illness, or hardships they endure, each person can find a good way to realize the wonderful potential God has placed within each heart and soul.","sameAs":["http:\/\/www.maureenpratt.com"],"url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/gooddaysbaddays\/author\/mpratt"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/gooddaysbaddays\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1668","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/gooddaysbaddays\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/gooddaysbaddays\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/gooddaysbaddays\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/548"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/gooddaysbaddays\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1668"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/gooddaysbaddays\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1668\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1669,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/gooddaysbaddays\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1668\/revisions\/1669"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/gooddaysbaddays\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1668"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/gooddaysbaddays\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1668"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/gooddaysbaddays\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1668"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}