Pain...

Hello.

So my freshman or sophomore year of high school I started having pain in my lower, right abdomen (lower right quadrant or right iliac quadrant for any doctors out there). It was thought that maybe I had appendicitis and so they did a test, negative, did another test to make sure they didn't miss anything, negative, did a couple more, all negative. They then told me it was probably just a deep muscle pull and it would eventually go away. I'm almost done with my sophomore year of college and it is still there. Still pain, but now after hurting my right side for a little bit it decides to spread across my entire lower abdomen. It feels like menstrual cramps and sometimes acts like them, making my lower back hurt and my upper thighs, and if I have the pain more than once a day, it gets worse each time. I'm not so sure this is just a muscle pull...

It seemed to go away for a little bit and then suddenly these past couple weeks it has been awful. I am in pain almost all day, everyday. The other day I woke up, got out of bed, and ended up standing, bent over, next to my bed, unable to move because it hurt so much. I'm not sure what else Dr.'s can do since I've had a gajillion different tests. I worry I'll be in pain forever. Another day I just laid in bed and cried and begged God to make it all just go away, my headaches, my stomach pains, everything. Then a thought creeped into my head and I began to wonder if maybe I just deserved all this pain, maybe this was God's way of punishing me for the bad choices I've made in life. Then I started getting mad at God for putting me through all of this. There are people who have done things far worse than me and they don't have to go through this. Why me?

I sat there and felt sorry for myself for awhile and then began to feel bad for blaming God for this and being mad at him. I'm not excited about being in pain, but Romans 5:3-5 says "Not only so, but we also rejoice in our sufferings, because we know that suffering produces perseverance; perseverance, character; and character, hope. And hope does not disappoint us, because God has poured out his love into our hearts by the Holy Spirit, whom he has given us."

I don't enjoy pain and have never been able to tolerate it very well, but I think I can deal with it for the rest of my short life until I get to spend an eternity pain free.