My Antidotes for Chronic Pain: Joy and Awe

Chronic pain is a bitch.

A mean, angry, manipulative bitch.

She stomps on every aspect of your life, laughing maniacally.

She steals your sleep.

She robs you of mobility.

Your social life disappears because you can’t sit without discomfort. You can’t stand in place for more than a few minutes. And walking? That only triggers intense nerve pain in your “bad” leg with just a few steps.

Your dogs don’t understand why you no longer take them running, hiking, or even for a short walk. You worry they’re becoming depressed.

The bitch forces you to relearn how to do everyday activities: how to dress, shower, move from room to room, clean, sleep, anything and everything to avoid increasing the pain.

To evade the worst of her wrath, you remain still, which is so unlike you.

The yoga ball you’ve used as an office chair for years is your only place of ease and comfort during the day, or when you can’t sleep at night. You’ve watched more online TV and videos in the past few years, especially in the wee hours of the night, than you have your entire life, sitting on that yoga ball, waiting for the pain to ease. You’re grateful for Starlink, even though you can’t stand its CEO.

You relearn how to sleep using a wedge or pillows to force you to stay in a single, mostly pain-free position, because rolling over brings fresh agony and wakefulness.

Pain is the bitch who shrinks your world to what’s close and tolerable.

She teaches you lessons you wish you could avoid but probably need: take nothing for granted, especially your health. It can all change in an instant.

***

I won’t go into detail about the source of my injury and pain—sacroiliac (SI) joint dysfunction—or the stupid, tortuous four-year-plus journey through the medical and insurance systems I’ve traveled to get a definitive diagnosis by eliminating all other possibilities. Soon, I hope to get surgery that will stabilize the joint for good. This ordeal has been enough of a Debbie Downer for me; I don’t want to burden others with it.

There have been brief, better times, like when a steroid injection provided complete relief for a few weeks, or the tendons squeezing the joint and leg nerves began finally loosening toward normal. But the steroid wears off, or I suffer a re-injury, and I’m reminded of what I’ve lost to that bitch. I fall back, hard and deep, into my pain cave, having to start yet another climb up, clawing my way out of the darkness all over again. It’s exhausting, especially as I near seventy.

Will I ever run again? Last year was my 50th year of consistent running. It’s what I love, especially on trails with my dogs. “Runner” has been my core identify since I was eighteen. I want to reach my 60th consecutive year.

To counteract the creeping despair, I don my Stoic hat, a reminder to focus on what I can control: my attitude about and reaction to chronic pain.

Sure, I get angry and frustrated. Pretty much daily. I let those emotions boil, briefly, then take them off the burner because they don’t help in the long run.

What does help?

Awe and joy. Turning my focus to the positive and feeling grateful when moments inspiring those emotions arrive. Refusing to dwell on the negative, on what I can’t do.

Sounds cliché, right?

Maybe it is, but it works for me.

The arrival of spring in the Idaho mountains I get to call home again makes this renewed focus easier to sustain.

***

Throughout my chronic pain ordeal, the overarching lessons are letting go of what I can’t control (the health care system and its delays; insurance pre-approvals and requirements) and paying close attention to the positives in my shrunken world, no matter how small or inconsequential they may seem in the bigger scheme of life.

Best of all, I’ve learned one can enhance their ability to find some awe and joy in even the smallest things by focusing eyes, ears, time, and energy on what’s already all around you. Reset your mind, and your awareness and outlook inevitably follow.

Science backs that up.

I know this won’t shock anyone who has followed my blog: the best and most reliable source of daily joy for me is my dogs. Watching them play with each other and neighborhood dogs; running my fingers through their thick fur when they come close for attention; observing their interactions with the natural world, even when lately that’s mostly been our yard. Medicine of the best kind.

And right up there with my dogs as a source of joy and awe is the natural world. Of course, that’s also where I feel most keenly how much my world has shrunk these past few years. The worst has been since the start of this year. I can no longer run or hike forest trails with my dogs. I couldn’t take them xc skiing this past winter. And lately, I can’t even take them for a short walk on their favorite country roads. I hope that, following surgery and a quick recovery period, we’ll be out there again this summer.

In the meantime, I’ve turned my yard into a place where I can be outside with my dogs. Almost daily I see evidence of nature’s wonders that bring me joy and make me smile.

Some examples:

I’m delighted, awed, and grateful for all the birds visiting my yard, especially now that the migrating songbird species are arriving, busily searching for mates and nesting spots. Last year I installed two nest boxes on my fence rails and watched as some mountain bluebirds eyed them before departing for the winter. I was eager to see them return, but tree swallows got here first. Just days ago, I watched at least a dozen of them perform their aerobatics through the yard and sagebrush fields beyond the fence, some stopping to poke their heads through the hole to inspect a box’s potential.

Tree swallows competing for the new solar-powered interior camera nest box.

A couple of weeks ago, I installed an extra box, one with a solar-powered interior motion-detection camera that uses Wi-Fi to record short videos and send alerts to my phone. The software tags these “moments” (15-second videos) as Prelude, Nesting, Brooding, Nestling, and Fledgling, based on the stage of the nesting and life cycle captured. I worried a nesting pair wouldn’t adopt the camera box this year, given its newness on the fence, but already the tree swallows are seriously checking it out.

A tree swallow checking out the interior of the nest box, 4-21-26.

I fondly remember a tree swallow pair that adopted a box on the fence rail at my previous Idaho house. They’re amazing flyers, catching bugs to eat mid-flight near sunset. That pair loved to tease my dogs by strafing them whenever they sat or snoozed near the box in the yard. I have a wonderful memory of the day Conall sat still, right beneath the box, and cocked his head side-to-side, watching and listening intently. That’s when I knew the chicks had hatched and were noisily asking for food.

This past week I’ve enjoyed stumbling upon early wildflowers emerging from my lawn. Their seeds must have blown in with the wind. Even a dusting of overnight snow doesn’t deter them. I’m not able to visit those same wildflowers where they bloom in the forest this spring, something I’ve done for many years, so to find them occurring naturally in my yard is a gift.

*Tiny bluebells blooming in the yard, wild strawberry leaves nearby, Chann’s paws for scale.*

The wildflower garden I planted from seeds last summer is emerging. I love seeing which plants I recognize from their leaves, like lupine and yarrow, and look forward to learning to recognize the other plants once their flowers emerge.

I’m grateful for the technology that allows me to open an app on my phone (Merlin, from Cornell Lab), hit the record button, and learn the identities of all the species near my bird feeder or singing from the nearby fields. Most recently: mountain and black-capped chickadees, goldfinches, western meadowlarks, tree swallows, Sandhill cranes, robins, red-winged blackbirds, Canada geese, magpies, Wilson’s snipes, mourning doves, Eurasian collared doves, Brewer’s blackbird, crows, Northern flicker, dark-eyed juncos. I’m learning to identify birds by both sight and song. I enjoy watching their behaviors.

A few days ago, I felt joy when I saw the osprey pair I first noticed last year had returned to their nest, perched high on a pole above the road leading to my neighborhood.

*Osprey pair back on their nest atop the pole to the left.*

The bulbs I planted around the house last fall are emerging, including my father’s orange daylilies. I was concerned about the daylilies because they never bloomed last summer, making me fear the trip back from Vermont to Idaho was too much. Or maybe I’d just planted them where they didn’t get enough sun. I wasn’t giving up on them; they hold too much meaning for me. Last fall I moved them into a raised bed container that gets full sun. Their leaves are just now poking up through the dirt, making me happy and hopeful.

I’m grateful for a neighbor, Cathy, and her small dog, Cosmo, who drop by several afternoons each week on their walks so Cosmo can chase a ball in my yard while Chann chases him, and Conall gets some extra love from Cathy. Not only are their quick visits joy-inducing times for all involved, but having someone who is also facing medical challenges and healthcare issues, who understands, offering empathy and understanding, is huge.

*Cosmo (red jacket) runs after they yellow ball Cathy threw for him, Chann on his heels.* Old man Conall (now 11.5 years old) supervises from a safe distance, hoping Cathy will come over and give him a shoulder massage. It was a brisk “spring” morning, snow falling against the mountains to the east, 4-16-26.

I’m also grateful for another neighbor who occasionally brings her Rottweiler puppy, Tilly, to socialize with Chann and Conall in the yard. Tilly is shy, and Chann can often be too eager to play at first, but after a few minutes spent hiding between her human’s legs, Tilly gets brave and plays with Chann. Conall, the old man, supervises from a safe distance (inside the house) so the younger dogs don’t bump into him.

Chann and Tilly play, making me laugh with joy. Conall is in the house, vocalizing his unhappiness, but I don’t want the enthusiasm of the younger dogs to knock him off his feet. Later, with Chann in the house, Conall got to interact calmly with Tilly.

My fenced yard is becoming an unofficial off-leash dog park for neighbors. In that way, I’m creating a new socializing option for myself. I’ve always loved watching dogs play with each other. It makes my heart sing. My happy place, wherever it happens. That was the driving force behind my decision to create and operate Maian Meadows Dog Camp for some twenty years. These dog playdates in my yard feel like a miniature version of dog camp, minus a lake for swimming and sleepovers in rustic cabins.

I’m grateful for the two smiling and upbeat women in the check-in booth at the county transfer station. When I take my household garbage there, the boys ride along. Their excitement starts when I dump all the wastebaskets in the house into one bag, then load them into the car. As we approach the station (which offers stunning mountain views the entire drive there and back, another source of joy), I roll the back passenger window down halfway so either or both boys can stick their heads out in greeting. (There are always tracks of drool down the outside of that door.) By the time I reach the sliding window of the booth, whichever woman is there already has already opened and has two XL Milk Bone treats in hand. Smiling broadly, she leans out to give one to the dog looking out the car window (usually Conall), and hands me the other to deliver. We wish each other a good day or weekend, and I drive through to where garbage gets tossed onto a pile. It’s that quick, that simple, yet so wonderful for me and the boys. A ray of social sunshine every week. I periodically restock their supply of treats, because a lot of dogs pass that booth on a weekly basis. I could pay to have my garbage picked up at my driveway, avoiding trips to the transfer station, but I far prefer this approach. This week, to show my gratitude for these simple yet meaningful exchanges, I handed them a thank-you card and a box of Girl Scout cookies. After all, the women who offer treats with smiles, providing simple joy to me and my dogs, should get some treats and affirmation in return.

*Some Girl Scout for the wonderful ladies at the transfer station who give us treats and smiles.*

I’m grateful to the neighbors walking on the road past my house who hear my dogs woo-wooing at them from the yard and respond with a wave to me and often their own woo-woos to the boys.

I love it when my dogs howl, whether at the coyotes who were yipping and howling in nearby pastures during mating season last February and March, day and night. Or at the Forest Service smokejumpers in spring training, flying a Twin Otter in big circles over our valley, wildland firefighters practicing their jumps and descents, activities often eliciting full-throated howls from the boys listening and watching from the yard. Why howl at an airplane? I have no idea. Maybe because we rarely hear emergency sirens, which always elicited howls from my previous Malamutes, Maia and Meadow, living in a Seattle suburb. Or perhaps there’s a certain pitch to the Otter’s rotary engines that hits their brains like the pitch of a siren. Whatever the reason, it brings a smile and warms my heart because it feels as if my father (who was a Boeing test pilot who died in 2009) is talking to us from the universe’s stardust and the boys are talking back, letting him know we’re happy in this house in Idaho that his love for (and inheritance gift to me) made possible.

Conall is always first to howl at airplanes. Chann’s not sure what Conall’s howling at, but like good little brother, he chimes in, providing backup.

I’m keeping my father’s memories close to me in a new way that is providing much-needed distraction from pain while adding fun to my life: I’m recording the audiobook version of my book about his life and test pilot career, Growing Up Boeing. I invested in inexpensive materials to create a home recording studio in a spare bedroom. Choosing times when my dogs aren’t howling at coyotes or airplanes, or woo-wooing at people walking by on the road, I read a few pages aloud most days, using an audio-editing program called Audacity to record and save the files. An audiobook editor will stitch it all together, removing my errors, and help with uploading it to Amazon. It’s been fun to learn the process, and revisiting my father’s life through the stories he and his colleagues shared with me two decades ago is a joy. A good reminder of just how lucky and amazing my life has been so far.

And finally, I’m grateful to feel the itch to write again. It has been awhile. Besides getting back into a blog posting habit, I recently responded to a request for submissions from a dog-themed magazine for articles. The prompt: How and why do you choose the dogs you do? It was a fun and easy article for me to write, with photos to illustrate. I’m pretty sure they’re going to publish it in their summer edition.