The resources on this page are intended to compliment the Foundations of the Nervous System course at CHANGEpain.
Session 1 – Understand Pain
Pain Education Resources
Understanding Pain in less than five minutes (5 minute YouTube video)
Why Things Hurt, By Lorimer Moseley (15 minute TED Talk)
Books you may consider readings:
Understand Pain, Live Well Again, By Neil Pearson
Managing Pain Before it Manages You, By Margaret A. Caudill
The Pain Detective, Every Ache Tells a Story: Understanding How Stress and Emotional Hurt Become Chronic Physical Pain, By Hillel M. Finestone
If you are interested in learning more about prioritizing an increase in function and an improved quality of life in pain treatment and management, you may enjoy listening to this webinar on Functional Measures for Assessing and Managing People with Chronic Pain with Dr. Jane Ballantyne (1hr).
Between Sessions Assignment
The first session of the Foundations of the Nervous System program covers a great deal of pain education. With this understanding of pain, I would like you to write out a list of things that may be increasing and decreasing your pain because the way they affect your nervous system.
Remember that nerves are incredibly adaptive and neurons can be changed by almost anything – how we move, by input through our skin, how we stretch, what we think, what we see, our environment, what we believe, our emotions, what we put in our body, etc.
Below is a list of ideas for you to reflect on. It is by no means a complete list, but I hope it will help you to expand your sense of the ways that you can address your pain.
Questions and factors to consider:
- What increases your pain?
- What decreases your pain?
- Things that make you laugh
- Activities you enjoy
- How much do you move? Too much? Too little?
- How do you feel about having to be active?
- People that you most enjoy spending time with
- People that you feel a lot of stress or anxiety around
- Diet
- Sleep – Poor? Not refreshing? Good?
- Drug and alcohol use (including smoking)
- Past experiences
- History of abuse
- What do you believe your pain means?
- Current stresses
- When did the pain first start? What was going on in your life at the time?
- Financial concerns
- Anything that makes you stressed, scared, or fearful?
In session two, we will look at how we can combine education and self-awareness to empower a self-management approach to pain management.