January 16, 2012
What is healing, really?
My definition of healing is coming to terms with things as they are, so that you can do whatever you can to optimize your potential, whether you are living with chronic pain or having a baby. You can’t control the universe, so mindfulness involves learning to cultivate wisdom and equanimity— not passive resignation—in the face of what Zorba the Greek called the full catastrophe of the human condition.
Read more at Time Magazine Healthland
Image ©Margi Macdonald
Like this:
November 25, 2010
Do you really need your over-the-counter pain-reliever today?
Exercise
If we simply think of it as ‘getting up and doing something’, we inevitably want to do it more and more often.
It’s free, it can make us laugh out loud, it’s entertaining, and it doesn’t come with a long list of potential medication-induced, life-threatening side-effects.
What are you doing after you read this?
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Cautions & Care: This article and video do not replace medical assessment and care. If you have a health concern, or have persisiting pain, visit an appropriately qualified health professional. The activities shown in this video may not be suitable for everybody. Please use your commonsense, or seek the guidance of a specialist exercise professional.
September 27, 2010
Pain and prescription medication
Tonight the ABC’s Four Corners program is screening this program The Hidden Epidemic of Prescription Drugs.
Without yet seeing the program, my comment is that chronic pain is a multi-factorial condition which requires an holistic approach on the part of a team of health practitioners who specialise in caring for people who are living with chronic pain.
That there are too many people living with poorly managed pain – with or without the added distress and stigma of medication-related concerns – is because the medical paradigm in this country doesn’t “do” chronic pain very well, and essentially leaves thousands of people floundering and struggling with pain, distress and disability.
Adequate pain relief is a basic human right. No one should have to live with chronic, poorly managed pain or medically induced substance abuse.
It’s time to re-visit a recent post here about chronic pain.
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Image: pillz by bobpaclover7 at photobucket{dot}com
July 20, 2010
Pain is the biggest moral issue in Australia today
Professor Michael Cousins, AM, a world authority on pain and its management considers pain is the biggest moral issue in Australia today.
For people living with chronic pain, life becomes so much more than managing pain-relief medication, and ‘getting on with it’, as you can see in the image here.
Ours is not yet a culture which supports people living with persistent pain, a condition which can be severe and disabling, and which affects people physically, personally, and socially.
Last week I was accepted as a member of APMA – Australian Pain Management Association Inc
APMA’s work involves ‘providing practical health information, social, workplace and training support’.
APAM members are people living with pain, their families and friends, and health professionals.
There’s much we can do to help people who are affected by chronic pain.
Why not take a few minutes to explore the APMA
site?
If you know someone who is struggling with pain persisting beyond three months, let them know that pain relief is a basic human right.
![Almost Like Another Planet... Pamukkale Blues (UNESCO World Heritage) [Explore #1, THANK YOU]](http://static.flickr.com/7079/7209710670_f67079c754_t.jpg "Almost Like Another Planet... Pamukkale Blues (UNESCO World Heritage) [Explore #1, THANK YOU]")
