"Spoons": an article on explaining what it's like to live with chronic illness.

I met a woman who'd had chronic pain for a while. She'd just kept going and going, and when it finally had been too bad to bear for some weeks, she went to a hospital emergency room. She was a nurse. She waited, and waited, and finally saw a young doctor who didn't listen to her, and told her there was nothing wrong with her.

She went back home and sat down with a knife and called 911. She just wanted the pain to stop. That's all she wanted. And that was the best way of stopping the pain she knew. She was a nurse, and knew how to do it right.

They came and got her to someone who listened, and they drugged her up for a good night's pain-free sleep, and got her something in the way of pain management and recovery. And she's alive today.