Monday, January 18, 2010

Feeling PAIN of Others

How many times have we heard over the years or claimed to feel the pain of other's? My mom has claimed to feel my pain, my Master feels pain in the same area's as I do and when he had his heart attack when he was 38 (He's 42 now) I swore I felt his.

Usually it's passed off as coincidence or that we are experiencing it from our minds. Just the thought of it makes us hurt.

An article in my monthly Pain Monitor from the American Pain Foundation piqued my interest further.

The article from Reuter's is located here: The Brain May Feel Other People's Pain

I'm left to wonder if we really feel some one elses pain or if our brains imagine the pain, therefore, we feel it.

It's been said twins especially identical feel each other's pain and perceptions.

Is this a connection of closeness?

In the article people are stimulated by images of pain. This would mean no closeness or physical connection.

Interesting all the same.

Until next time...

2 comments:

Snowbrush said...

Thinking that you feel someone else's pain is a bit like watching "Saving Private Ryan," and thinking that you know what WWII was like. I will add that the problem with pain such as you experience is not just how much it hurts at any given moment but that it never goes completely away. This causes a person (you, in the case) to build his or her life around the fact of pain. Imagining--or even feeling, if such a thing were possible--someone else's pain for a few minutes falls far short of the experience of living with pain. I would even say that it diminishes one's view of that person's very real and very ongoing suffering. After all, your husband and your mother presumably carry on the kind of normal life which is impossible for you, yet they say that they know what your life is like. I doubt it.

His kajirah said...

Hi Snow

Agreed! I imagine that I can feel the pain of others, but really I only know that pain is pain and it hurts. This allows me to relate and understand. And for others to try and feel mine, again they can imagine it, or try to, but realistically no one can come close to believing that they can feel "my pain".

I can understand the flashes of painful looking photos before ones eyes as sudden stimulation to the brain and even body.

It might not be a link to actually feeling another persons pain, but "the fear" of pain itself.

I find the various possibilities interesting because I'm hypersensitive to varying degrees, situations, feelings, emotions, and pain.

Abilities of psychic perceptions of sorts for as long as I can remember.

'course even that could be chalked up to coincidence.

Scary sometimes, too.

I'm not even sure if I made a bit of sense in my babbling here..

I wish you a pain eased evening, Snow.