Going with the flow: emotion regulation and coping

I’m in two minds about attempting to regulate emotions. From ACT, and in particular, mindfulness, I’m learning that trying to control emotions and thoughts is darned near impossible – and unhelpful. From the research on the effect of pain on emotions and subsequently on self regulation, goals and coping, it seems that pain strongly [...]

Theories of emotion, self-regulation and pain

Can chronic pain be a force that shapes how we go about responding to challenges within our environments?
Does chronic pain influence how we feel emotionally about daily activities that contribute to overall goals, and perhaps negatively bias the way we think about the process of setting and achieving goals?
I’ve already concluded that having [...]

Self regulation – what it is and what to do

So, if self regulation is about exerting control over thoughts, feelings, actions and physiology, how does it work?
When I skipped through some Google references last night (o font of all knowledge!) I found a good number of sites referring to self regulation and children – but not nearly as many relating to adults, or the [...]

Accepting low back pain: Is it related to a good quality of life?

The purpose of pain management is, in the end, of no earthly use if it doesn’t change a person’s quality of life. It’s fine to maybe reduce pain intensity (remembering that most pain reduction approaches seem to reduce pain by around 10 – 40%), and it’s great to improve function – but unless the [...]

Acceptance worksheets and more

Trying to help someone begin the process of accepting chronic pain is no easy task. My observation is that people need time to recognise that their pain problem is not acute pain  (so it won’t ‘heal’), and go through the process of seeking ‘the cause’ (so the ‘cure’ can be found), then begin the long [...]

Acceptance in chronic pain

It’s a truism that no-one really wants to have pain (and if they do, we probably need to ‘talk’!).  Accepting pain may be equated with ‘giving up hope’ or ‘giving in’ – perhaps acceptance is thought to be about resignation rather than acknowledgement.  In any event, very few of the people I work with seem [...]

What is an acceptable outcome?

Recently I’ve been doing some content analysis of the responses people entering our service have to the question ‘What is your goal for pain management?’ The question is designed to find out what it is that people want so that in some way we can work to meet their expectations.
Along similar lines I’ve been [...]

Goal setting — again!

This post is most definitely an opinion piece, because once again I’m struggling with the practicalities of goal setting with people experiencing chronic pain. There is no doubt at all that goal setting is an integral part of pain management – it’s designed to focus the input, make sure the underlying reasons for using [...]

How depressing: pain and depression

It must be one of the worst combinations – to have both chronic pain and depression.  It makes treatment much harder to stay with, it means much more effort on behalf of the therapist and the patient, and progress can be very very slow.
Most of the people attending tertiary care for chronic pain will have [...]

Develop your skills in CBT for chronic pain

I’ve never found one single book that covers all the areas I think are important for chronic pain management, but today I want to review one that I have found helpful – and I’ll review another tomorrow! I got this one about two years ago, and I’ve referred to it quite often, especially for [...]