Part two Overcoming Chronic Pain

Introduction

Chronic pain can be disabling, distressing and frustrating for many people, partly because it does not respond well to medical treatments. It is a condition that affects the person with pain as well as their family, friends and work colleagues.

Many people find themselves in a cycle of pain and distress, which has an impact on several aspects of everyday life:

The chapters in Part Two offer information and practical strategies to help you cope better, one day at a time, despite ongoing pain. You can use the Guide to Overcoming Chronic Pain (see p. 10) to guide your choice of which areas to focus on.

Cognitive behavioral approaches can help change the way you view the impact of pain on your life and your future. For example, learning to set specific, achievable goals can help you to tackle activities more successfully. Learning how to pace daily activities and using relaxation skills will allow you to increase what you can do in a manageable way. Getting fitter can affect how you think about yourself, your life and future, improve your moods and the impact of the pain, enabling you to believe that it is possible to achieve many of your current goals.

Learning problem-solving skills can mean being more confident when you hit obstacles. Understanding and identifying mood changes and negative thinking styles, and how they relate to your pain, can help you manage depression and low mood. Developing a more balanced way of thinking and challenging unhelpful thoughts can enable you to manage negative thought cycles that might otherwise have made you avoid doing certain things.

Changing the way you manage anxiety, anger and depression can mean being less emotional and more confident about getting on with your life despite the pain. Learning techniques to count your successes, such as using positive self-talk and giving yourself rewards for your own efforts, can help boost your self-esteem. Relationship difficulties can also be eased by being clear about the type of support you need from others. All these changes will help you to focus more on achievements and less on pain.

Relaxation techniques can help give most people some ‘time out’ or skills to use in stressful situations. For some people, relaxation in itself can give some relief from pain. Accepting that long-lasting pain is part of your life can be difficult and frustrating and may take some time. Using acceptance skills to manage the things you can’t change can lead to a sense of contentment. It can also open awareness of new possibilities in life and lead to more confidence in handling the limitations the pain brings.

Experimenting with all these different skills in different ways, steadily and realistically, may enable you to return to hobbies, study or full-time or part-time work.

6

Setting goals

This chapter aims to help you understand more about:

•   What goals are

•   How to set goals

•   How to achieve the goals you have planned