The pursuit of pain is INSANE!

In the last couple of months, I have noticed an increase in the glorification of the pursuit of pain.

Last month, I attended an assembly with my grade 9 students. It was meant to be a motivational assembly that encouraged grade 9's to get involved with their school and try out new extracurricular pursuits in teams, clubs and the arts. However, the speaker's focus was on his experience with the Spartan Death Race and other similar pain inducing adventure races. While I admire someone who takes on new pursuits in their 40's and who works hard, I can't support someone who deliberately causes their body pain and then glorifies it and encourages it in others. The Spartan Death Race is a three day race that involves no sleep, little food and events which deliberately put the racers into a hypothermic state. INSANE!

Plus there is the gain in popularity of S&M lifestyles as promoted by the 50 Shades of Grey series of books (and many spin offs) promoting the pursuit of pain for sexual pleasure as a good thing. Yet as anyone with fibro or chronic pain can tell you ....  we long to feel pleasure rather than pain, and would give anything to replace that daily knawing agony with nothingness. The joy of feeling nothing - how wonderful would that be? Those who think we must experience pain to know we are alive, again, they clearly aren't chronic pain sufferers.

I find it insulting to the chronic pain community that people can trivialize pain in these ways. As someone who suffers from pain everyday and who strives to find ways to relieve that pain, I ask.... why don't these people try walking in my body for a day, maybe then they would find more positive pursuits?!?!