Ever herniated a disc? A few years ago I got to experience what that is like and it was horrible. In fact, I herniated two. 0/10––would not recommend. Physical therapy wasn't fun either, just so you know. Let's just say I'm thrilled that that period is behind me.
After Redditor organized_mud asked the online community, "What's the most physically painful experience you've had and what did it feel like?" people shared their stories.
After reading some of these, it's safe to say I consider myself very lucky. Ouch.
"In the end..."
Suffered a testicular torsion when I was 16. Woke up one morning with a dull pain in my balls. In about an hour, the pain was radiating down my legs and I couldn't move. It was about 90min between realising something was genuinely wrong to be shot up with morphine prior to the operation to save them. The pain reached its very peak when the doctor gently felt my balls to check them. He barely touched them but I could not hold back my screams.
In the end, they saved both of them and they're still going strong. I spent the next week doped out of my mind on pain meds. I was so paranoid that I thought if I moved wrong, the stitches would come undone and my balls would fall out.
Moral of the story, don't dismiss ball pain.
"I was stung on the chin..."
I was stung on the chin by a large iridescent blue wasp while on safari in Botswana. It felt like I had been shot in the face by a searing hot, venom-laced harpoon and then my face went numb all day.
Dear God.
This is proof that we are not meant to be out there in nature. Nature is terrifying.
"My immune system decided..."
My immune system decided my legs were a problem and started breaking down the fat layer. Giant, blackened sores that oozed orange fluid... I would've preferred jamming my legs into a wood chipper.
"Breaking the screws..."
Breaking the screws that held my spine together. I sheared the heads off of two titanium bolts. I passed out. Imagine voluntarily putting body parts into a garbage disposal.
WHAT.
"Imagine voluntarily putting body parts into a garbage disposal" is a sentence I never want to read again.
"When I was very young..."
When I was very young, I fell into a bathtub full of just hot water. Had 2nd degree burns all over my arms and my back. Still don't like bathtubs.
"I occasionally get cramps..."
I occasionally get cramps in my calves and it's the worst pain I've ever felt every single time. I can't even describe how it feels. I just know that nothing in my life brings me to the floor and makes me feel so utterly helpless like that. I think that's the worst part honestly. Just trying to stretch and rub it out while feeling completely desperate and helpless.
"The first migraine..."
The first migraine I ever had stuck out as particularly bad. I'm sure I've had objectively worse ones, but I was a teenager and it was the middle of the night and nothing had ever hurt so bad before. I shoved my head in a pile of dirty laundry to block out the light and hoped I wouldn't die.
"I still have an indent..."
Walking into a huge trailer hitch on a truck. They don't move. I still have an indent on my shin 20 years later.
"I had a tailbone cyst..."
I had a tailbone cyst, but thought that I had just bruised my tailbone, so didn't get it checked out. The cyst got worse and worse to the point where I couldn't sit/stand/lay down comfortably, no matter what position I was in. I couldn't sleep at all and was on the verge of tears from the exhaustion and pain. Finally, I asked my dad to check it out, still thinking it was just a bruise, and he took me to the doctor to get it drained.
The pain I had been experiencing for the 2 days prior was NOTHING compared to the doctor cutting and draining the cyst. She got out 1/4 cup of fluid and I nearly passed out walking back to my dad in the waiting area.
"I just remember..."
Recovery from a c-section after giving birth to my daughter. They sent me home with pain meds (Percocet and ibuprofen that I took for a few days) but I started relying so heavily on the Percocet that I would wake up reaching for the bottle before I even thought about my daughter. That freaked me out so I tossed them. The ibuprofen didn't do sh!t no matter how much I took so I just healed from it with no medication at all.
I just remember having to lie in bed so often, that each time I absolutely had to get up (husband was home with me for a month postpartum, thank god, so he often brought our daughter to me to be nursed and held), I just groaned and cried, sometimes just screaming. It felt like someone took a knife to my abdomen each time.
Okay...
...now that I've been suitably horrified, a couple of herniated discs don't sound so bad. I am cringing (and personally can't get over the whole "body parts in a garbage disposal" thing).
What's your most physically painful experience? Feel free to make us cringe by talking about it in the comments below!
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