Infinitive complement

• contemplate: THE STORY OF THE CRIME The story of the crime is one that is most painful to contemplate and to record.

• watch: It's been quite painful to watch the process ( !

• listen: The dubbing is technically accurate - it matches the lip movements - which means that it is painful to listen to.

• touch: This is a corn beneath the surface of the nail plate which may be very painful to touch.

Modifies a noun

• spasm: This can make normal mobility impossible and can also cause painful muscular spasms.

• stimulus: Responding to painful stimuli, left pupil reactive to light, right not visible due to local trauma.

• urination: They include: fatigue, frequent and painful urination, diarrhea and rectal irritation or bleeding.

• cramp: Some common symptoms of cp include muscles going floppy or tense, difficulty in grasping things, painful cramps in the arms or legs.

• neuropathy: Painful diabetic neuropathy Average dosage: 200 mg 2-4 times daily.

• contraction: If she has a constant painful contraction or soreness in her womb.

Modifying Another Word

• excruciatingly: The first session saw the squad pound out the miles and burn their thigh muscles on the excruciatingly painful sand dunes.

• intensely: The symptoms result from an accumulation of uric acid crystals in the joints, causing an intensely painful inflammatory reaction.

• acutely: It was acutely painful to Leslie to be photographed in a major Gwent newspaper wearing a traditionally ludicrous hat.

• agonizingly: Running was fine but anything which required me to bend my legs into any sort of position suddenly became agonizingly painful.

• extremely: For their size, they can be extremely painful.

• unbearably: I found it unbearably painful to look at them.

Used with adjective complement

• become: As time went by the knee became quite painful on exercise and started to swell a little.

• prove: This will prove painful to your privates in the hungover morning.

• seem: At the time, these things may seem too painful to go through and so are not done.

• sound: The Stylish option also brings an expandable divided gusset, which sounds particularly painful.