How do you measure pain?

[Kathy]

Mark- I think that is a pretty good description, probably as close to good as it gets.
Childbirth for me was off the chart. I did not scream, yell or curse... I cried, whimpered and prayed for the child to come out, an epidural or death. I didn't even want to touch the baby for a good 30 minutes, I was so worked up from the ordeal (this was where all the foul language took place). In my opinion, if you can yell or talk, it isn't hurting that bad.

My day to day pain level is between a 2 (with meds) and a 7 (meds wearing off). I do have occassional days where the pain is an 8 or 9 and all I can do is lay in bed and pray for death (literally). All I can think about is the pain and how to make it stop, I can't move and just tense up due to the pain. I have hurt so bad that I couldn't even get up to get my medication to make it stop, knowing that the medicine would help and still could not get up, so I laid there and suffered until my husband got home to help me.

I think the pain level is hard for us to define because we are very tolerant to the pain. We don't know life without some level of pain at all times. Then, we are on a bunch of medication to hide the pain. So, yeah without drugs, it would probably be a 10 all the time; but with them it is usually manageable. I always tell the dr. the pain level I experience without drugs as my pain level (I then tell them what it goes to with drugs).