Shifting Focus Away from Pain
Well intentioned, but flawed
Many of the approaches to persistent pain are barking up the wrong tree. They’re well-intentioned and well-meaning and partially well targeted.
The fact that the sights of the treatment are not correctly set means that whatever that treatment is, it can never be truly effective if it isn’t focusing on the main aspect which is driving someone’s pain.
Temporary relief often comes with many different approaches, but sometimes there is no relief at all.
No lasting Answer
Often patients in persistent pain have seen many of the best medical and alternative health practitioners they can find and yet still no lasting answer.
All these people they meet are undoubtedly very well trained in their field and doing their very best to help.
I’ve been one for them and for over twenty years although there are lots of recovery stories to recount, there were mostly failed ones when it came to persistent pain.
I understood what I understood, but the thing is, you don’t know what you don’t know.
And sometimes when someone offers you an idea that contradicts your beliefs on diagnosis and treatment, there’s a resistance that comes with that if it sounds idea too outlandish.
Worse for Patients
If that is the experience of trained professionals then it must be even worse for those patients suffering from persistent pain.
They place their trust in the medical profession to find the answer for that which is troubling them and that which they can’t quite work out for themselves.
When that system and the individuals in it are not able to offer the answer, or the methods they try don’t succeed, it leaves the individuals alone to manage their condition.
With pills, pacing, the life-changing effects of their situation and resignation that nothing further can be done to change what has happened to them.
Their life of persistent pain is there to stay.
Wrong Focus
However, when you realise that the focus of all the failed treatment approaches was simply placed on only part of the overall problem, you can see how it would only temporarily work, or never work at all.
Yes, the focus is on the pain because that is the complaint of the patient, but it’s the generation of that pain which should be where the real focus is.
The illusion that the site of the pain is the marker of its origin is a Cartesian approach that still exists in the current medical paradigm and it is the biggest failing of the healthcare system.
Failure of the System
When the approaches following that paradigm fail the remaining pain is managed with pills to block the sensation because we couldn’t work out the true meaning of it.
This represents an abject failure of our system for this group of patients.
Acknowledging the presence of that pain, its existence, its location, and relevant contributory pathology, or potential sinister cause of it are vitally important. All should be at the forefront of assessment.
But that should never allow the development of blind ignorance to elements which may be the true cause of that pain, and currently, that focus does exactly that.
Knowledge Can Create Ignorance
Who would believe that knowledge creates ignorance, but it does exactly that when we are trained to only look down one avenue for a cause of physical pain.
So many schools, universities and training programmes start with listing the technical justification for that approach.
It is dogma that works until the pain doesn’t respond to the structural viewpoint that was looked for, found and injected, cut out, or treated with pills.
That’s never to say that those approaches are not helpful because they absolutely are.
It’s just when they are used and are ineffective, it is very likely that they were the wrong place to start looking for that person’s origin of pain.
Change is Coming, Change is Here
Fortunately, there is a change coming.
Bit by bit.
Step by step.
Clinician by clinician, Lorimer Moseley by Lorimer Moseley, Georgie Oldfield by Georgie Oldfield and others like them.
The shift started with a move away from pain damage, which was only structure-related.
That nothing further could be done, and you have to live with pain.
Awareness of Other Influences
It moved to an awareness of other influences that generate that pain and an understanding of the science behind them.
It progressed to translate that science into applicable treatment approaches that can work with some patients over certain times, and there are now situations when patients in persistent pain can completely let go of it.
It isn’t a quick shift for the medical community or the general population.
It took hundreds of years for some people to change from thinking the world was flat.
They used to execute those that said it was round.
Some people think the world is flat again, but fortunately, we’re not hanging them!
Could I change?
It took me, as an experienced clinician who had seen thousands of patients in my career, to look at myself and my beliefs and ask myself if I was open to change in order to get different results for and with my patients.
I have to say it wasn’t easy.
But when I changed my focus, I got out of my ego’s way and started to change how I looked at this patent group and what could be done for them.
Fear Holds Us Back
I realised that the fear which was holding me back from accepting a very different viewpoint could be the excitement which drove me to investigate approaches that don’t just manage persistent pain but turn it off.
There are so many approaches now looking to end pain and no longer manage it.
The thoughts, feelings, movements and emotions that become the complex plethora of triggers causing persistent pain are being unpicked.
The future looks bright and exciting. The Pain Habit is part of that exciting future.
Blessed to See and Influence Change
The changes are likely to take longer than is left in my career.
But I am so blessed that I have been able to see change, influence it and be part of so many persistent pain pathways to recovery.
Patients previously resigned to a life of pain, becoming pain-free.
Join The Party
It is such a fantastic experience that I encourage you to join the party.
Therapists and patients need not accept that persistent pain should be managed.
That should never be the goal.
If that’s too hard a belief to accept, then ask what the belief system you hold to support that is, and ask yourself, would you ever be open to changing those beliefs?
My First Answer Was ‘No’
My first answer to that question was no, and if I’m honest, it was ‘no’ several times for several years.
Thankfully, something caught my attention, and that spark has gone on to help me so much in my life.
I have been fortunate to share that insight with patients no longer in persistent pain.
Our beliefs underpin all our habitual responses and are often so deep that we don’t know where to look to unpick them.
Whether a therapist or a patient, it’s worth the search because all the new habits that follow feel effortless.
It sets you free.
And if you think carefully about it...it sets you pain-free!
What’s next?
Take Your First Step to Recovery.
Join our FREE private Facebook group, The Pain Habit Community, to learn how others have successfully returned to a pain-free life and get support on your journey.
Subscribe to The Pain Habit YouTube channel.
Buy The Pain Habit book. Buy It Here.
