Chronic PAIN Relief

Many people suffer Chronic Pain
and some can become addicted to drugs or alcohol in the search to find relief. I have a herniated disc in my Thoracic Spine, that is the top part adjoining the neck. Mine is a genetic defect and cannot be repaired, as it is inside the vertebrae. I was referred to a pain management clinic a few years ago, and would like to share some of the main techniques i was taught to manage the daily high levels of pain. While i was at the clinic, i was in a group of around 15 people all suffering from long term chronic pain, we all had the same program regardless of the injuries or symptoms.
Boosting Endorphin Release
Endorphin are the bodies natural opiate and these can be stimulated to be released by exercise. We started with simple stretching exercise and combined that with walking. The exercise for stretching can be found on many websites, and the walking they had us measure our laps around an oval over 15 minutes. The idea is too use the stretching 3 times per day and if any sharper pains hit us to use it again. The idea with the walking, is too increase the pace of walking so that you cover more distance in the same time everyday, then increase the amount of time to 30 minutes and keep increasing the pace over days. These simple low impact exercises can be combined with stair climbing, once again using timing to increase the pace over days. Anyone in any doubt about your ability to do these things, should check with their Doctor before doing anything to increase the heart rate. These exercises also decrease your weight, and this helps put less pressure on your body as well.
The use of exercise, is combined with the following techniques to reduce the level of daily pain.
Deep Breathing, Mindfulness and Meditation
Many times people say they cannot Meditate, however, most people can practise repeating deep breathing with focus on a word or a short sentence. They also asked us to focus in on the exact area that we felt the most pain, and to try to hold that thought and isolate the precise spot. This was strange as usually we avoid thinking directly about the pain, and this seemed counter intuitive. The idea is that is very difficult to hold your mind on any one thing, but to keep bringing it back to the focus on your pain or the word or sentence or the deep breathing. It is hard to hold thought on any one thing and by doing this we find that our pain level decreases for a time after the Mindfulness exercise. You should seek to do this type of training twice a day for at least 5 minutes and over time increase that to around 15 minutes.
Eliminate Drugs, Alcohol and Smoking
These things are depressants and increase our perception of pain, while smoking is shown to increase the sensation or level of pain recorded. Seek support from your Doctor to reduce your pain medications over 2 weeks, from the start of this program of pain management. Support groups can assist with addiction to Alcohol and/or drugs and these can be helped by seeing a mental health professional, ie. psychologist, psychiatrist or other community based counselling services. Those unable to stop the use and abuse of substances may need to do a detox or rehab, and then attend 12 step groups for assistance in stopping and staying stopped.
Distract yourself from Pain
List and think about activities that you enjoy, then make time to do those things more often. When we are thinking about things we enjoy our pain levels are often very low, and so by programming time to do these things, we can decrease the amount of time we are in chronic pain and decrease the level we perceive that pain to be.
Record your Progress
Rate and record your levels of pain from 1-10 at various times of day, like after awakening, after arriving at work, after lunch and say perhaps every 2 hours. Keep recording these levels as you practise the program of pain management and note the improvements and set backs on paper. This is the key to note and recognise the levels are better, and how often during the day. We can reprogram our thinking, to begin to say the pain is managed and the levels are much less of a problem in day to day life.

I wish you all well and hope this article can assist some people.

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