Monday, December 13, 2010

How to cope with chronic pain

Managing pain is not as difficult as one can imagine. Everything that the body feels and does is being coached by the mind. If one can only learn these compiled tips on how to cope with chronic pain, a lot of problems can be solved and one need not seek the help of a professional in order to be successful in this endeavor.
Reduce stress: As stress is one of the causes of chronic pain, it is better if the person resorts to learning meditation. One can reduce stress and pain that the body is experiencing by means of deep concentration or by focusing on other things. Meditation is a practice where the mind is always placed over matter.
Manage sleep problems: Insomnia can cause chronic body pains as it strains the muscles and leaves the body without rest the whole night through.  As the body bears no comfort, muscles are constricted, thus bearing pains the following day.
Take on a support group: Support groups are a group of people that can be of help. These people meet at a given time and day and talk openly about topics that they are having problems with, how to cope with chronic pain. Support groups are a venue to vent out what one really feels. They tend to exchange notes right after each meeting and help one another to battle the affliction that they are into.
Cutback on alcohol and smoking: Cutting back on these vices can help a person in pain as both can bring about muscle tension that leads to stress, likewise resulting to chronic pain if given a chance to burst inside the system.
Diversion tactics: Strategies like getting a massage and indulging in exercise are considered as the best as they will help the person forget the pain that he has been feeling. Pain can be felt if there is nothing else to do. Have you ever wondered that when you are sick and watching TV, there is a tendency for you to feel uneasy and remember having flu only during commercial breaks? Diverting the attention is a good ploy for a person to teach him how to cope with chronic pain.
There is also a method that involves the use of sensors in order to learn about the body’s inner movements. This process is called biofeedback. The sensors enable the person to see and hear the pulse beats, stomach sounds, body temperature and likewise muscle tension. These graphs and beeps reflect the goings on of the inner body system as the sensors have attached monitors. The body, as guided by the mind, would in turn learn to control the beeps, thus learning to control pain.
Monitor the daily pain levels: Daily monitoring of pain levels can be a necessity in order to know the time of day, duration of the pain, and how many times it occurs in a given period. There are really a hundred ways for a person to learn how to cope with chronic pain and most of it can come from the brain as it controls everything within the body.
Let not pain take over the mind. Always be reminded that pain is just one of these matters.