After I'd been out of commission for a few months, my pastor made a passing reference to "these chronic conditions." I corrected him—my condition wasn't chronic, it was just slow to abate. Now, five years on, I still don't know what to call my dis-ease and wonder whether I will ever feel “normal” again. But my dictionary defines chronic as "persisting for a long time," and there's no denying it's been a long time.

If I resist the word "chronic," I hesitate to claim "pain" as the problem. I've told doctors often that I don't really have pain. Rather, various discomforts and malfunctions, sometimes manageable, sometimes incapacitating, have wreaked havoc with my life and expectations.