Day 13: Pain-what it has taught me

Hi again. This is something I have been wanting to post about but have been struggling with how to post about it. Just the title has had me thinking because I thought about just titling it Pain but I am not sure I am thankful for the pain and then I thought about "lessons learned through Pain" but I don't know if they are really lessons that I have learned. So I finally came up with the title I have now. This is something that I am not always thankful for because pain isn't enjoyable and I sometimes lose sight of things. But I am thankful for it. Before you make judgments that I obviously haven't been through that much to be able to be thankful for it-let me explain why I am thankful. I have lived most of my life with chronic pain and I have been through alot and I am still going through alot. It is never easy in the least bit to go through it but I have learned so much from it. The obvious reason is that it has made me stronger than I ever could be if I hadn't experienced what I have. I have realized I can deal with alot more pain than I thought I could. My tolerance for pain has definitely increased that I can handle alot more pain now than I could before. It has taught me to be thankful for the little things and how to take life one day at a time and even sometimes one hour/minute at a time because it is all I can handle. I can also relate to people that I am better equipped to help others. I can relate to people in wheel chairs because I have been there even if only for a short time. I can relate to people with chronic pain because I have been and still am there. I can relate to others who are shut in because I have been there. I can relate to others who go through undescribable pain because I have been there and thankfully no longer there. I can relate to people who suffer through depression because of the pain because I have been there. I am not trying to complain or come across as oh look at me I have been through so much-I am hoping I am coming across as showing reasons I am thankful for the pain and what it has taught me and it was never for nothing. I really wish we could learn stuff without going through the pain because it is never something I want to go through and never want others to go through either. But sometimes I remember that in the end it will help me become a better person and a stronger person and it won't last forever and it makes it a little easier to bear. I am not saying that we have to enjoy pain because I can't imagine any reason why or how anyone could but that when we go through it, we can know that it can teach us something and we are not going through it for nothing. That we shouldn't become bitter because of what we have to suffer through. We all have pain and we all suffer and some more than others and we can learn from it. I don't have any answers why there is so much pain and this is not supposed to be an answer why-I just know that we can learn from it and use it to make us better people and be thankful for what it teaches us. I am slowly learning patience through this also. I am not a patient person naturally and is something I really have to work at and going through surgeries and long recoveries has been helpful in learning patience. I am hoping that I have been able to get my thoughts across clearly. I do want to say that it seems through suffering I have found God and I think that He doesn't take away the pain but gives me strength to get through it. I don't understand this but I think that God hurts with us but maybe He knows what we can handle and He sees what we will learn from it and He allows it. I think God won't allow what we can't handle and He must step in somehow but I don't know for sure. I am only trying to grasp at understanding here and this is just my thoughts on this and understand I could be very wrong but that is what I see. Feel free to correct me if I am wrong. Anyways that is why I am thankful for pain-what it has taught me.