On Numbness

numb  

/nəm/

Adjective Deprived of the power of sensation.

Verb Deprive of feeling or responsiveness.

Synonyms adjective.   torpid - benumbed - stiff - insensitive verb.   benumb - stupefy - grow numb

Bands of greys layered upon canvas. Or the real answer to the question "so, how are you feeling?" for the last two years of my life, I've gotten quite good at deflecting such probing questions! I would apologise, but it's part of a coping mechanism, and I don't think I've actually had that much control over it if I'm honest.

Anaesthesia is amazing. I would be dead right now if it didn't exist, and there's a good chance my son would be too. So is Wikipedia, observe:

Anesthesia, or anaesthesia (from Greek αν-, an-, "without"; and αἴσθησις, aisthēsis, "sensation"), traditionally meant the condition of having sensation (including the feeling of pain) blocked or temporarily taken away. It is a pharmacologically induced and reversible state of amnesia, analgesia, loss of responsiveness, loss of skeletal muscle reflexes, decreased stress response, or all of these simultaneously. These effects can be obtained from a single drug which alone provides the correct combination of effects, or occasionally a combination of drugs (such as hypnotics, sedatives, paralytics and analgesics) to achieve very specific combinations of results. This allows patients to undergo surgery and other procedures without the distress and pain they would otherwise experience. An alternative definition is a "reversible lack of awareness," including a total lack of awareness (e.g. a general anesthetic) or a lack of awareness of a part of the body such as a spinal anesthetic.        -Wikipedia

When I gave birth I did not feel a thing. My labour was, medically speaking, 3 minutes long. That's 3 minutes from the first incision to a little pink wrinkly thing being whisked away to another table to be wrapped in a far too large nappy and a towel. I know mothers. I know so many birth stories along the spectrum from 'it just popped out in the bath' to the ordeal of induction and cesarean. I know mothers who have had every kind of birth you can have. When I listen to their stories they include all of the pain and discomfort but also the feelings and emotions that they went through, even those who had epidurals. And I am jealous, because I was just numb, physically and emotionally.

Anaesthesia means that we can undergo medical procedures that used to be impossible. The rest of the Wiki article goes on to talk about the first human trial of ether on a patient who had tumours but was afraid of the pain of the operation to remove them. The ability to temporarily block the sensation of pain means that more people undergo and survive surgery these days, and therefore survive conditions that can be treated by surgery. Which is amazing.

The mind also has the ability to shut off in certain situations. Temporary dissociation is encouraged during a 'natural' labour to take the mother's focus away from the pain and onto a speck on the wall or other completely unassociated item in the room. Victims of abuse are able to (sometimes) have involuntary selective amnesia, sheilding them from the horror of their experiences at times so that they can function. I do not claim to be an expert on these things by any stretch of the imagination.

These numbings both physical and mental/emotional allow things to be done that couldn't be done under normal circumstances. But normal circumstances must resume if life is to continue. You could stay under anaesthetic for the rest of your life, but it wouldn't be a life. Through counselling you can process the trauma you have been through and come out the other side and live. Numbness is a good thing, but it really should have an end. I am beginning to notice that I pause and think really hard when someone asks me how I am, because I'm actually trying to remember the words to describe what I'm feeling. I have gotten upset at a couple of things today to the point of crying about them. Then I realised that I was crying because I was upset and suddenly not being upset because the fact that I was feeling upset made me happy! I think I've finally gotten there. That's quite good isn't it.

As I've been writing I've remembered my first memory after he was born, being scared because he wasn't crying. And now I am, again.

Tea, tea and chocolate I think. Good night!