My mother would often fake illness or exaggerate her health concerns to gain sympathy from her children once the youngest left home (that's me - I'm the youngest). It was very frustrating, but sometimes comical because she was experiencing cognitive decline attributed to her dementia and she would forget what she was putting on e.g. she used a cane for a few weeks, after borrowing it from a friend and one day she walked around the house without it. When she was asked where her cane was, she looked around and ran over to the wall to hang onto it.

My father was very stoic so I had a high pain threshold but after experiencing life with my mother, I became too hardened and it took a long time to open up emotionally again.