“What Helps the Pain?” It Asks

“What helps the pain?”

She thumbs at the digital detective- a tablet with the same answers built within charts without charts within other charts - and wonders what to say.

“Every one of these options takes money,” she thinks to herself (herself means: out loud in the hospital lobby with her child).

“None of these are covered by insurance,” she explains to her teen, who’s avidly reading a page in her giant science book about X-rays, before watching the “ready-and-action” electromagnetic in person, first hand. (First hand should be an X-ray pun, but it isn’t.)

“Did you know the person who invented the X-ray essentially, accidentally, killed his wife from radiation by testing his experiment over and over on her, before it was refined?” the mother says to the child who looks like she did not want to know this fact.

“I guess it’s saved so many lives since though… But at what personal price?”

“Bed rest is the only answer on this form that doesn’t require out of pocket funds,” she adds, as the teen goes back to her science book, hoping the mother can let her read in peace. “Other than the meds, which I’m on all of. Or the injections which I’ve done too many to count and they’ve never once helped. My body hates steroids.”

The child keeps reading.

“But chiropractors, massage therapy… that stuff takes money to put to the test. Bed rest is the only thing that’s really free… but it comes at the cost of far too much else. For many, not working when they can’t afford not to work.”

She Googles the fact about the inventor of the X-ray and his wife and realizes it’s more of a myth than fact. Technicians had horrible radiation disease which dated to amputations and deaths back then, but the wife was merely a part of standing in as the famous hand behind a more famous man and his success… and now we don’t even know her name.

“What helps the pain?” It asks.

According to science, money. Risk. Nameless women in history, and weary teenagers in waiting rooms. But money. Always back to money.

“I’ll check bed rest,” I say out loud…

And then I do.

I write every weekday here and haven’t broken that promise since beginning this working memoir and magazine of sorts; I know your support is precious… time is fleeting… and none of the above should be taken for granted.