40 Things your character can do when in Pain

Let me guess, you’re writing a fight scene and your character seems to be able to brush off every punch without so much as an “Ouch.”

Hey, don’t worry! We’ve all been there. Being a writer is hard. Especially when you characters are feeling something that you can’t relate to. I was struggling just like you so I made a list. Here are a few ways your character can respond to feeling physical pain.

Things your character can say in response to pain:

• “Ouch”
• “Ah…”
• “Gah!”
• “Ow!” (once or repeatedly)
• Curse
• Laughing (evilly, or out of fear)
• Coughing
• Whimpering
• Screaming
• Groaning
• Struggling to speak

Things your Characters can physically do in response to pain:

• Squeezing eyes shut
• Crying
• Trying to kick or hit people who are trying to help
• Panicking. Going into fight or flight mode
• Wincing
• The sight of their own blood making them feel sick, and refusing to look at the wound
• Clenching or grinding teeth
• Spitting blood after being hit in the face
• Anxious. Heavy breathing. Not sure what to do
• Filled with adrenaline and hardly aware they’ve been injured

Things your character’s body can do in response to pain:

• Eyes watering after being hit in the nose
• lurching forward as if they might vomit
• Vomiting
• Instant bruising
• Pain spreading from injured area through the whole body
• Unable to breath after taking a blow to the diaphragm
• Feeling dizzy from loss of blood or loss of air
• Pounding in head

After time your character might experience:

• Swelling
• Throbbing pain
• Ugly bruises
• Stinging pain
• Body feeling tired or weak/Injury slowing character down
• Injured area feeling tender to touch
• Sore muscles
• Numbness
• Blood drying and becoming crusty around cut or wound
• Clothes being soaked in blood and getting “glued” to the body

The cool thing about writers is that we’re all different. So if you have any go-to responses you would like to add to this list be my guest.

Thanks a bunch!

— Nerd

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