Pain Need Not Lead to Suffering...

In the Today reading for August 27th, I read:  

"So often I either denied my feelings or was not aware of them. I tried to avoid feelings because I did not want to feel pain."

I've learned to look at emotional and physical pain and not avoid it. It helped me to realize that God does not give me pain to get my attention.  "Feeling pain is part of my being human. Pain tells me I need to change something (maybe only my attitude)."  As the reading also pointed out, without pain, we might also not be prompted to call a doctor and that could be our demise.

Pain got my husband's attention at 2:30 in the morning two nights ago.  He had to go to the emergency room so that he could relieve himself. Now I knew THAT procedure would be painful, but I had to stay home and get my sleep so I could be there to make sure our son would be ready for school the next day.

At the emergency room I found out later, that the nurses even had to phone the doctor on call to find out what to do when one attempt after another did not work at opening up a swollen passageway. The last attempt worked.   My husband got a snackwell package of cookies because the nurse had suffered knowing how much pain my DH had to endure.

Yesterday my husband rested for a few hours at home before going to work and making the best of it.  Last night we took it easy, and he slept well without a wee morning body problem. He rested so well that today he decided he would put in a bathroom sink.  The pain is subsiding and all seems to be working in the plumbing department today.

I've heard this in so many of our rooms that I thought it was a slogan for a while:  "Pain is inevitable - suffering is optional."    What if I don't struggle when I experience pain, but accept it and look at it and know it will pass? Then suffering might not even take root in me at all.