The next to last trip David and I took to Hobart, Oklahoma to see Charlie and Mikalya we went into Walmart to walk around. They was remodeling the store and a lot of things was on clearance. Charlie and I wandered down the Health aisle where I found a lot of products we use on sale.
Charlie showed me this lidocaine pain relief patches which were part of a bigger haul we picked up at Walmart off the clearance section.. A lot of it was clearance items allowed me to restock my medicine cabinet, and this happened to be one of those things Charlie insisted I grab.
He had already been dealing with back and shoulder pain while he was up there, and Michaela’s parents had told him about these patches and how they helped them. So by the time we were shopping, he was pretty convinced I needed to bring them home. He kept telling me, “You need to get those for your knee… you need to get those for your shoulder,” because those had been bothering me off and on too.
So I went ahead and got them. At the time, I wasn’t thinking of it like a big “review product” or anything. It was just one more thing in the bag from Walmart that got brought back home and set in the bathroom cabinet and honestly kind of forgotten about for a few days.
Then real life happened. A few days after we were back, David came home from work and he could barely walk. His knee was really hurting him, and you could tell just watching him move around the house that he was struggling. That’s when I remembered the patches.
I went and grabbed the package, opened it up, and put one directly on his knee to see if it would help at all. The patches didn’t magically fix everything, but it did take some of that sharp edge off. Enough that he could move a little easier and wasn’t wincing every time he stepped.
And when you live with someone, you can tell the difference between “still hurting” and “at least I can function a bit better.” That moment is what changed how I looked at the patches and why they’ve become a staple in both the upstairs and downstairs restrooms.
Because in our house, things don’t get kept around unless they actually serve a purpose in real life. Not just something that sounds good on a box, but something you can actually reach for when someone is hurting and still has a day to get through.
I’ve been dealing with my own shoulder pain too, and after seeing how David responded, I know I’ll be using them for that as well. Charlie was the one who pushed me to try them in the first place, and for once, I’ll admit he wasn’t wrong. Michaela’s parents had already spoken highly of them, so it wasn’t just coming from nowhere—it just took us actually bringing them home and seeing it for ourselves.
Now they’ve just become one of those things that sit in the bathroom and get used when needed. Nothing fancy, nothing complicated, just something that helps take the edge off when pain shows up in the middle of real life. That we can share with David’s mom when her knee is bothering her.
Thank you,
Glenda, Charlie and David Cates
