Too Broken to Cry

It all started with a trip to the doctor. I have been dealing with back pain since the age of 15, and neck pain since the age of 28. After a hernia at the age of 36, it felt like my back exploded like a watch. My mom wanted to come with me to the doctor in order to convey to him how much pain I was in because she couldn't understand why I wasn't getting pain medication or why he wasn't labeling me disabled. When we left the doctor's office, she began questioning me.

"What was that?", she declared.

"What do you mean?", I asked her.

"You were in there smiling and laughing," she responded.

I just shrugged.

"It's no wonder he doesn't think anything is wrong with you if you do that every time you see him," she continued.

"I never realized that's what I was doing," I said as we got in the car.

"Well, you have to figure out why you do that and how to stop it if you want your doctors to know you are in pain," she said, "I know what you're going through and even I couldn't tell there was anything wrong with you."

At that moment, I realized something was wrong.

- - -

About a year later I found myself in a Dialectic Behavioral Therapy class. We sat in a circle (really a square) going over techniques and up until that point I hadn't been taking it seriously, since it was mostly meditation (which I had done for years) and mental gymnastics that didn't seem to do anything for the pain that had landed me here in the first place.

As the group started, we were all told about how smiling could change your mood, even if you had to fake it. We were then told to smile, in an attempt to prove that statement.

So, we all started smiling. And oddly, I felt a little bit better. Not much, but enough to notice a difference. After a minute or two, the whole group was asked if they felt better, and oddly everyone had seemed to feel this good sensation. This had been a first for the group since most of the other things we had learned only worked for 1 or 2 people not the entire group.

They then went on to explain how smiling is connected to your brain in such a way that just the act of smiling releases dopamine, the happy neurotransmitter. And that's when everything clicked in my brain.

When it was my turn to explain what I had experienced, I told them that I apparently have been doing this for years without realizing it. I told them about my experience with the doctor and my mom, and how I never knew I did that until that day. And now I knew why I did it.

Over the next few months, I started looking back to see why I started doing this. I think it started pretty early on in life. My brother was 8 when I was born and from what I hear he was caught pinching me 3 days after I came home from the hospital. Like brothers do, we would always fight, but he didn't seem to pull his punches. If he did, my size compared to his meant he wasn't pulling them enough. Once my mom was accused of abusing me because he slapped me in the face.

Things only got worse when my mom remarried a man with 2 daughters. They were 7 and 6 years older than me. And they had the same problem as my brother did with pulling their punches. It wasn't too bad when only one of them stayed with us. They were both heavier than my brother and I would often end up with one of them sitting on my chest. That's when I learned to pass out from pain. Not only would it scare them off of me, but I learned to hide from my pain by blacking out completely. This led to me being able to sleep through some pains, but not all.

One of the problems I had was that my brother had conditioned me not to tell. Whenever I told on him, I got it worse the next time and stopped telling on all of them. It was so bad that one time we started fighting in front of our parents. I was fighting back as best as I could and eventually noticed them watching us and giving me encouragement. But I was tired of fighting, since it was always a losing battle, and figured if I started crying, they would step in and stop the fight since I was already in a lot of pain. Instead, they laughed at me and called me a crybaby and faker. So, now I knew not to tell because I wouldn't be believed even if I was already in pain.

The next problem I had was that both our parents worked. By the time I was 6 they were all teenagers and took turns watching me every other week. It wasn't too bad when only one stepsister lived with us, but when the other one moved in for a little while, I had to deal with both of them. At one point in time, one put me in the wrestling hold "The Camel Clutch", The Iron Shiek's finishing hold in which he stands over the person's back with his knees under the opponent's arms grabbing his chin and pulling back, while the other stepsister put me in a "Boston Crab", which is when a wrestler grabs both legs of the opponent and pulls back, at the exact same time. I equate it to The Big Show and Rikishi doing that to Rey Mysterio Jr. only no one was being easy on the little guy as they would in wrestling to prevent too much injury. Needless to say, I passed out on that one.

That stopped soon afterwards when my mom walked in on me under one of them and she explained they were way too big to be doing that to me anymore. Unfortunately, my brother kept at it. I was hog tied with duct tape at least twice and thrown in a closet. If I showed pain, I got more. Maybe he took the family idea that if you have one pain another would make me forget that pain too literally. I remember pushing on bruises and trying to laugh in elementary school. I had to stop him on my own though.

One day, he was chasing me around the house for something I did. He eventually tackled me, but in the wrong place for him. I had been playing with my Transformers which were dispersed throughout the living room, and I landed near my metal Optimus Prime. With him on top of me pounding me, I reached around for anything, and Optimus was right there, and I clocked him in the head with it. That was the last time he chased after me, but I'd still get hit or tripped from time to time. And oddly when he left for the Navy, I cried. So, I guess I understand how abused spouses can feel.

I know it's probably not the best thing, but I don't blame any of them for any of it. It's just what siblings do, and they were just kids. I like to say I grew up fighting giants. In a way, it's kept me out of jail as I try to avoid fights at any cost. I also think they were trying to toughen me up a little. The problem is that they made me so tough I laugh at pain. Another problem is that if I am in a fight I fight dirty and with weapons, since that was the winning way back then. What's worse is I don't know my own strength. When you give your all and your enemies just laugh at you, you learn to hit harder, and I've knocked people over giving them a high five.

I now know why, and how I started laughing and smiling about pain, but I'm still working on how to stop it. I find communication has helped, especially to let doctors know what my laughing cry sounds like and how you can tell it's not a real laugh. Usually, they come out when I'm talking about my pain and are not preceded by a funny statement. But it still makes it hard when you have chronic pain and laugh every time you talk about it, even if faking those smiles and laughs makes me feel better. But they say when you talk about something you think about it and when I think about my pain, I focus on it making it seem worse. So, if laughing and smiling keeps the pain at the same level it's at when I'm not focused on it, is it really hurting me? Yes, but I still don't know how to stop or if I even want to.