Disclaimer: As always, the wonderful world of Harry Potter belongs to JKR, I'm just playing with her friends for a while.
She always felt a small amount of pain. Not a lot, but it was always there. She supposed that curse scars were like that, that they never fully healed.
It was at that moment, at the Ministry of Magic, that she realized that she could die in this endeavor with Harry. It was then, that she realized how dangerous her friendship with Harry really was.
Of course, intellectually, she always knew, but in her heart, she just assumed that everything would be ok. When she woke up in the Hospital Wing, and Professor Dumbledore told her how serious her injury really was, well…it was a shock.
Even with this realization, she never once thought about distancing herself, either from Harry, or the Wizarding world in general. It would have been easy…but it would have been wrong.
She was fine with a little bit of pain, with the scar, because she would always know she did the right thing.