Managing pain without painkillers
- Jun 26, 2019
- 2 min read
All of us with chronic illness have creaky and achy bits, Oh the joys of chronic illness! Pain, and more pain! The kind of pain that affects your mood, general happiness and quality of life. For many years I have eased my pain with painkillers that come with life altering side effects, however I know I won't be able to continue taking them all of my life, so I have started trying other ways to help the pain ease.
NB: You don’t have cut out painkillers completely. I haven’t, I wanted to challenge myself to see if I can go towards other painkillers with less side effects, so I’m asking you to join me by challenging yourselves?
Apply a heat pack, it improves circulation and blood flow
Try and breathe through the pain, either panting or taking a big breath and slowly exhale, repeat till the pain is more manageable.
Visual imagery and distraction: Visualise your happy place ( mine is either sewing, or Russel, an island in Northland, NZ), visualisation helps shifts your mind from the pain to somewhere positive, releasing endorphins, positive hormone, overriding the negative thoughts and feelings.
Distract your mind by watching a movie, take a bath with music, cuddle your other half, chat about something that you enjoy and are passionate about
Self-hypnosis imagine where you would rather be, again imagine your happy place
Shut yourself in a dark room and breathe deeply
Shut yourself away by listening to music with headphones allows you to escape everything that irritates you
Dissociation, a chronic pain technique. Mentally separate the painful body part, from the rest of the body,
Try a low gluten and sugar diet as both the types of food can relate to inflammation that causes chronic pain.
Get a pet (I got a kitten and she helps my overall mood)
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