Mindfulness for pain management

I am fortunate to not have chronic pain (I hope!) - but right now I am in a lot of pain with my back after falling down the stairs on my backside and my doctod thinks I may have fractured my coccyx and has told me to expect pain for several weeks.

The day I did it coincided with a session with my T and it was very hard for me to sit and move.

So T started to get me to explore the pain - to imagine it as a shape, a colour, what size it was, to go to the edge of it and see what lay the other side - I have heard that mindfulness can be used in pain clinics and I wondered if anyone here has used it successfully to manage their pain.

(btw can I winge and say how awful the pain is now, it has creeped up the whole of my back and even my neck is painful - guess it is muscle spasms and I can also feel my low mood creeping back, it is hard to do the things that T said ) - Soup

Soupdragon, I got bucked off one of my horses and broke my coccyx last fall. It hurt like the bejeebers! Spent a lot of time sitting on ice packs! Winge away hon!

I never heard of using mindfulness to manage pain. To me mindfulness means being in the moment with whatever is happening. I wonder how that works in managing pain?

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Soupdragon, I did some poking around the web and found all sorts of information about mindfulness for pain management. I'll be headed off to the bookstore this week to see what books I can find. Thanks so much for mentioning this!

Great that you have tracked down some stuff on it - hope it is useful. Wonder how is your coccyx pain now - I have read that is is often long term, but hoping it isn't.

Soup

All the info I found about bruised/broken coccyx was that it takes 8-12 weeks to heal. That's about how long mine hurt. The pain lessened with time, doesn't hurt at all now.

Thanks lizardlady - it is good to read something more positive about the pain, glad yours cleared up. Soup

I'm thankful I've never broken my coccyx, but I am experienced with chronic pain. The key is getting your mind off it and onto something else. That's what is really helping me the most. Mindfulness would be a way of doing that.....Best wishes. Hope you'll be well in record time.

I have and it did wonders on me you have to want it to work. also did Reiki and loved that also. Never give up

I am really glad someone brought this up.

I am doing DBT work and did ask about this. I did not find a lot of help yet.

So this is good.

I will try to do the exercise in the original post.

Having terrible dental pain. (extraction on lower wisdom tooth and 2 more root canals that are not settling)

I will explore pain management. My dentists are having trouble pinpointing the problem.

So I need to learn to wait thru it until I get properly diagnosed and treated.

Billi

Hi all,

I've found mindfulness to be really helpful in dealing with chronic pain. If you want to know what 'mindfulness' is about I would really recommend googling Jon Kabat-Zinn and watching his - it's amazing. A very smart guy!

Also - if you're looking for a great book on mindfulness (well actually it's on Acceptance and Commitment Therapy - but it uses mindfulness techniques) I would highly recommend a book by Russ Harris called The Happiness Trap. It's fantastic! Not only useful with chronic pain, but in many areas of life. It teaches you about the benefits of accepting what you cannot control (using mindfulness) and of acting in a committed way towards living life according to the values that are important to you. A really good read! It's certainly changed the way I think about life.

And another couple of chronic pain resources I've bumped into along the way that deserve a mention. First, this is a great 5min youtube clip on - great for showing people who don't understand anything about what it's like living with pain.
Second - there's a whole series of podcasts produced by 'pain concern' that explore issues associated with and the treatment of chronic pain. It's a UK production, and seems pretty good. There are episodes on mindfulness etc.

Hope this helps.