#I didn't believe it until I looked up the symptoms of what a silent migraine is without the pain

[justsomeectoplasm]

Ever since I learned silent migraines are a thing I have been suffering but now with understanding.

[trixree]

Oh hey! A thread I can contribute to!

When I was 13, I went through a whole day of school with a tear in my left lung. I was experiencing what is called a "pneumomediastinum" or a "mediastinal emphysema", which is what happens when air starts to collect in your chest cavity and put excruciating pressure on your heart and the internal structures of your throat. Usually, a pneumomediastinum is attributed to some sort of traumatic injury. I was just sitting in fucking English class.

It started as a feeling of pressure in my chest and throat. I remember asking a friend in that class if that was what heartburn felt like. Over the course of the day, it steadily got worse and worse until I was having pain swallowing and breathing. I described my symptoms to multiple people (teachers, parents, other kids) as "there are stones in my throat" and "I'm trying to swallow while someone chokes me and punches me in the chest over and over again." My symptoms started at 10am (I would have rated my pain then at about a 3) and by 5pm that night, I was in so much pain that I literally couldn't turn my head even an inch to the side. My mom got home from work, took one look at me as I was sitting upright, stiff, and silent while a constant stream of tears rolled down my face, and immediately drove me to Urgent Care. At this point, I would say I was an 8 or 9. I was in constant, excruciating pain.

The Urgent Care doc told my mom that "someone has a case of 'I don't want to go to school tomorrow'" while I sat there telling them through silent, exhausted tears that my pain was at a 9. The only reason I didn't say 10 was that I've had chronic migraines since I was even younger. My mom insisted on an X-ray and the doctor sheepishly came back into the exam room fifteen minutes later to tell us that he has called an ambulance because they "believe my lung has dropped." Apparently, in the ambulance, I was chatting up the paramedic about Criminal Minds. My mom has a picture of me strapped to a gurney giving her a thumbs-up.

I spent six days in the hospital. The ER doctor touched my neck and there was so much air trapped in my throat that it, and I'm quoting him here, "sounded like rice-krispys". I was unable to lift anything heavier than a lunchbox for three months after I was discharged.

Because I was a young AFAB kid that wasn't hysterically crying and screaming in pain, because I was cracking jokes, because I was articulate, because I was just not performing pain well enough, I wasn't taken seriously until someone actually looked at my lungs. And this isn't even a one-off thing! I have at least half-a-dozen other stories where something was wrong with me and medical professionals were too busy doubting my pain-performance to treat me. This is just the most severe case of it.

And don't get me started on how having a mental health diagnosis makes this whole thing worse. Not only are you not performing pain well enough, you also simultaneously performing it too much. During my most recent hospitalization (I was diagnosed with POTS- postural orthostatic tachycardia syndrome) the paramedics that were treating me stopped listening to me as soon as I provided my medical history. They were receptive to my symptoms and what I was experiencing up until the point where I said, "I have generalized anxiety disorder" and then all questions and information from that point on were directed to my significant other. I was only told that I needed to "calm down" and "relax" in the same tone as one might tell a toddler intent on eating playground sand "that's not food, sweetie."

Many of us chronically ill folks (especially AFAB) live in this magical space where we are both not tellegraphing our pain clearly enough and exaggerating it.

im so sick of tiktok nurses and doctors trying to mock their patients for coming in and saying their pain is at a ten but not performing the pain for them

every time ive been in the hospital near death i was simply too exhausted to perform pain for these people. it was a ten on the pain scale but they thought i was faking it for whatever reason until they got my lab tests back and realized i would need to be checked in for quite a while

like maybe you, able bodied young doctor/nurse who has never experienced chronic pain and disability cannot fathom me rolling up near death and a flat expression unable to scream and holler about my agonies but I assure you some of us are just too fucking tired to scream about something we generally live with every single day

on god wanna punch the smug off their faces.