4 RANT LOAD

[vakkotaur]

(This has been brewing a while...)

Subject: "Get over it" & injury

I've had a few physical injuries in my life. They have all, technically, healed but a few have "left their mark" on me.

The usual odd scrapes and cuts are simply forgotten, except for the most recent, and they'll soon fade from memory. A couple burns left me hurting a bit longer, and while I recall them, they're over and done. From my appearance, it's as if they never happened. A thumb smashed in a car door left me visibly changed for a considerable time, but that, too, is over and done and you can't tell which thumb it was.

But I've also had broken bones from various youthful misadventures and such. A spiral break of my right leg, a break of my right forearm, and a break by the last knuckle of a finger. The leg did heal, but if I stand in what seems a normal and comfortable stance, my right foot points outward a bit rather than straight forward [Addendum: I'm informed this was not a result of the break, but was the case since birth - I hadn't noticed it before the break.] The forearm healed just fine. There is still a bit of a bump by one knuckle and I can "feel" some weather with it.

Technically, all the injuries have healed. But of the three more severe injuries, it can't be said that my body is "over them" as it has not returned to a truly pre-injury state. Other folks have fared better with similar injuries, and other folks have fared worse. Many people have had the good fortune to have never had a broken bone. Others have were fortunate enough to have them heal and not be changed aside from the inconvenience of a few weeks in a cast and perhaps being a bit more aware of what they do.

Those are a few of the physical injuries. Physical injuries are not the only kind there are. There those which can leave no visible scars, no blood, no breaks to show up on X-rays. Most of these, like most physical injuries, are minor things that heal quickly and are forgotten as fast. A few can be more severe, like the broken bones. And like the broken bones, survival and healing don't necessarily mean things are restored and made right.

Some people may have a "thick skin" (interesting analogy, eh?) or have who knows what advantage. Just as some people's cuts heal faster than others. But that's some people. Not all people. This is why it bugs me when some people tell others to "Get over it." That, to me, comes across as thoughtless and ignorant, if not outright evil.

Maybe they've "gotten over" things. Maybe even worse things. But consider how silly a faster healer would sound when telling a slow healer to "get over" a cut or broken bone. He, after all, was healed days ago, so shouldn't another person with a similar injury from the same time have heal as fast? He must be doing something inept and wrong. Nevermind that the same treatment was applied.

Would these people tell me to "get over" my bumpy, touchy knuckle by sheer force of will? Would they tell me to straighten my foot by "getting over" the break [Addendum: or genetics]? Such a thing is absurd. No thinking person would even consider suggesting such a daft thing. But when an injury isn't visible... somehow people stop thinking and say some damned stupid things.

Comments

[rillifane.livejournal.com]

I was going to answer this but its your journal so you say what you want here. But it has inspired another post in my journal.

[vakkotaur.livejournal.com]

Fair enough. It seemed a bit long to post as a followup to an entry of yours, and there are a few folks on my friends list I think ought to see this. My point is that an injury is an injury, and different people will heal with different results.

I do not deny that there are some who abuse the fact (or concept, if you prefer) of an injury. Those people do a disservice to themselves and others by contributing a sort of transferred "boy who cried wolf" effect in which even those who may have a real injury are casually dismissed as whiners.