You mentioned that you'd joined the Pain Association and was that through your GP?
It was my lady GP mentioned it to me I think she was looking for the leaflet but she couldn't find any. So what she did was to give me the phone number and said that the Pain Association had actually been to the surgery and delivered you know what the actual Pain Association was about and what they do.
So it was her that suggested a try-out. I said “Is it not for things like cancer pain and that, you know, real”. “No, no, no” she says “It's for all sorts of types of pain.” So I got in touch with them just before Christmas it was last year and I joined and I got offered a place on the course and that was February or March, April because it ran for 7, one day a week for 7 weeks and I did learn quite a lot from it. I must admit. There was a lot of things said in it that I'd never really given much thought because sometimes simple things that…
Tell me about what you learnt?
Things like pacing, things like, well the relaxation tapes I was aware of anyway but making affirmations.
Can you explain a bit more?
Well, just sort of thinking about you know if you are feeling very hot, if the pain feels really hot, sort of closing your eyes and thinking about something nice and you know like a nice cool blue veil just sort of slipping over you to kind of help to ease the pain or sort of seeing yourself in a room, in a nice comfy chair and just sort of floating there and this lovely veil of relaxation and comfort just kind of slipping over you.
Just things like that really. It's quite difficult to explain. Well I'm not very good at explaining it but things like that, that I never really thought of before, but the pacing was a good thing, you know about how you can pace your day. And something else that we've spoken about like a cup being half full and half empty, you know if you're feeling pain and what not, you know that's taking things out your cup, what can you do to help put things back in your cup to fill it up again, things that relax you, that comfort you, that may make you happy, just things like that really.
Just small things that you maybe never give a thought to but can make a difference and that's obviously the social thing about, meeting other people with different kinds of pain and just seeing what they go through and how they cope with it as well, it's quite amazing really.
Just as I say how things like that can help not take it away but they do help but it's like everything else you know you have to kind of practice using the relaxation tapes and you've just got to kind of practice the pacing. You've got to know when to stop when you're doing too much. When to rest and the affirmations it's sometimes difficult to concentrate but it can happen, you know. |
