Pain management in groups using a CBT approach – Why do it?

I’m spending a few days looking at practical ways for working with group CBT for chronic pain.  It’s the most researched form of CBT-based pain management, and offers some very helpful features for people with chronic pain.  I’ve looked at how groups can impart a sense of optimism and at how they help people with [...]

`Pain management in groups using a CBT approach – Why do it?

`Yesterday I started to look at why pain management using a CBT approach can work well in groups.  As I mentioned, it’s the most researched form of CBT-based pain management, and offers some very helpful features for people with chronic pain.  Yesterday I looked at how a group approach can offer participants a sense of [...]

Pain management in groups using a CBT approach – Why do it?

This week I’m looking a working effectively with groups for pain management using a CBT approach.  Someone said recently ‘why should six clinicians be tied up for three weeks with only six patients? there are other people who need pain management too’ – and over the past ten years I’ve seen numerous attempts to move [...]

Stress: The final frontier (executive functions)

It’s visceral. Stress – hits you in the guts. Some of us cope well, some of us don’t – some of our stress lingers, sometimes it’s just the little things, those ‘daily hassles’ that end up tripping the switch. And I don’t think anyone would disagree that chronic pain is an enormous stressor. [...]

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 [...]

Emotions and self-regulation in chronic pain

I posted about the reciprocal effect of emotions on goal content and today I want to look a little further into this.
A profound statement in the paper by Hamilton, Karoly & Kitzman is this: ‘If emotional well-being influences the selection and the valuation of a particular goal, then it is likely that the relationship between [...]

Chronic pain management is NOT just like ‘any other chronic disease’

The other day someone said to me that managing chronic pain was just the same as managing something like diabetes, hypertension, asthma or any other chronic disease.  It irked me at the time and I couldn’t put my finger on just what it was that bothered me, but after a couple of days thinking about [...]

‘What do I do when I’ve had enough’: The Effect of Emotions on Self-regulation & Chronic Pain

As soon as read the first paragraph of the paper I’ve used as the basis for this post, I knew I was onto something that resonated with my original occupational therapy values. It says this:
‘Living with chronic pain is a balancing act. People with chronic pain are required to make daily decisions [...]

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 [...]