How To Work Through Pain

How To Work Through Pain
Hillebrand Steve, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service

Do you have to work despite the fact that you are in pain?  Me too!  So I found some tips for how to work through pain.  I hope one of them helps you.

Introduction

It was my goal to write another article on my website for the past few days.  But new pain has presented itself into my life and I just couldn’t get going.  What did I have to write about?  Why bother?  Nobody seems to care about what I have to say.  Am I even being helpful?  Are pain and work linked?

Then I thought about the fact that there are millions of people that do work through their pain.  Surely if that is the case, I can do the same.  So this article will be about helpful tips that I found while researching this topic.  If it helped me, I hope it will help you also.

Take a look at some of my other articles.  For my buttock pain I have found stretches and acupuncture very helpful.  But I suggest you look at other ones on this site.  Who knows?  One of the articles may be helpful in finding some relief to your suffering.

Albarubescens Wikimedia Commons

Where Is Your Focus?

One of the first things that helped me today was doing a web search of how to work when I am in pain.  That’s how I came up with some suggestions.  But the solution is twofold because just the activity of sitting at the computer and researching is a way to relieve pain.  In other words, having your mind engaged in something else takes your focus off of your pain.  Which is the main idea of the title of this article in the first place.  Working refocuses your mental state and takes away the power of the pain.

I also read about a practice where you STOP your mind in it’s tracks when you are focusing on the pain.  Then you TELL yourself a hopeful thought, like “This will get better”.  Finally, you REFOCUS on your present task.  This would be an easy task to do anywhere, especially at work.  So we see that focus is very important.  Here is a link from SpineHealth that suggests other focusing techniques.  I haven’t tried them all, but maybe one or two of them would be helpful to you.

In summary: 1.  Engage your mind in an activity  2.  Stop your mind focusing on pain and tell it something hopeful.

Check Out These Suggestions

A Couple of Helpful Links

Here is a great post by a woman (Elly Copeland) who suffers from Crohn’s disease and depression and has ADHD.  I found her suggestions extremely helpful.  They also support my research and experiences.  She is honest and well spoken.  She knows her topic because she knows pain.  I highly recommend this post.  Stop right now and check it out.  Here is another post from Health that provides some of the same suggestions and a few more.  I especially recommend the one about moving, or changing positions.  In my former job I could sit at my desk hard at work and never get up.  That is a recipe for pain.  Move and stretch.  And move often.  If you sit in one position for extended periods, you are making the pain worse, and will lose ground on managing your pain.

Find a Compassionate Person

Although you may not be able to talk to someone while at work, if you can, I recommend it.  Find a caring person and spend a few minutes letting them know how you are feeling.  You never know if they might have a suggestion that would be helpful.  And just talking about your pain to an emphatic person is helpful.  Having someone validate your pain is such a relief.  Find that person.

Krisphotwrld Wikimedia Commons

Journaling

When you are off work, try journaling.  I was surprised when I started this activity.  I am not a natural writer, but once I started putting my thoughts on paper, I was astonished how they continued to flow.  I frequently made some profound discoveries from this.  Plus just the activity of writing will refocus your mind and you will not feel as much pain.  Also, journaling can clear your mind of other concerns and worries.  Who knows, you might come up with some very profound insights.  Insights that could change your life!

Support Groups

Look for support groups in your community.  Did you know that there is an organization called American Chronic Pain Association?  Check out their website.  It is extensive.  They have a few videos to watch that are very encouraging.  Also, you can see if there is a group in your area, or if not, start one!  This is a vital part of managing our pain, by finding a community that understands our sufferings because they too suffer.

Relaxation Breathing

Can you take a few minutes for some relaxation breathing?  Find a quiet place away from any interruptions and distractions.  I found a great free app called Breathe.  Type it into your app search.  It will guide you through various exercises depending on your needs.  It will take less than 10 minutes for you to do some relaxation breathing.  This relaxation exercise helps manage the pain.  See also my post regarding Meditation.

Vacation?

Is there a chance that you need to just get away from work for a break?  If your work is stressful, that is only adding to your pain.  More stress = more pain.  A vacation can be refreshing to your mind, body and soul.  Especially if you practice some of the recommended techniques you’ll find through the links here.

Here’s a video that proves the validity of refocus.  I hope that there will soon be an application of this for those of us that are chronic pain sufferers.

(I don’t like that they are throwing snowballs at innocent little penguins though!)

Conclusions

Writing this article took work on my part.  I had to research and concentrate on learning.  Then I had to write it in my own words.  You can see that to find relief from your pain you are going to have to work at it.  But I know that once these practices become habits, it will be less work and you will find more relief.  But do commit to WORK at lessening your pain!

I welcome your comments.  I especially welcome recommendations so I can do further research and posts and hopefully help out another pain sufferer.  I’d love to hear what tips worked for you, or about other ideas that worked.  Thanks for reading.

Disclaimer

I am not a medical professional; merely a fellow pain sufferer.  Please talk with your doctor about any of these recommendations if you are concerned how they might affect you.

There are no affiliate links in this post where products are recommended.  However, I do recommend the platform I am using to build my websites.  It is called Wealthy Affiliate.  If you join I become your mentor and I do receive a referral fee.  Check it out for free here.

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11 thoughts on “How To Work Through Pain”

  1. Yes i believe that working through pain can help in the overall sense of relief but it depends on the level of pain and where the pain is eminating from.

    Indeed if you are in some sort of mental anguish, working or journaling can certainly help, physical pain is another matter though and as i said the level and type of pain would be a big factor in this.

    Refocusing and changing our mindset in the positive is always  good but not always easy. The initial push to get started is always tough, have you any suggestions?

    Reply
    • You are right Danny.  It is hard to get started.  But I look back on my first days of being in so much pain that I could hardly move, and to where I am now.  I believe it is because I wanted to find relief from my suffering.  That took lots of work, hours of researching, and still hours of pain.  My only advice:  Find the program that works for you to refocus.  I’m trying out an app right now that helps with that.  It is free for a week.  I paid for the year which was $79.99 I think.  It’s called Kaia.  They do a knowledge section, an exercise section and a meditation/breathing section.  These are all tools that have been helpful to me.  (I plan to review this app once I have used it for a longer period.)  Keep in touch and we can encourage each other.  

      Reply
  2. Yes i believe that working through pain can help in the overall sense of relief but it depends on the level of pain and where the pain is eminating from.

    Indeed if you are in some sort of mental anguish, working or journaling can certainly help, physical pain is another matter though and as i said the level and type of pain would be a big factor in this.

    Refocusing and changing our mindset in the positive is always  good but not always easy. The initial push to get started is always tough, have you any suggestions?

    Reply
  3. I found your article to be very useful especially since you are writing from experience.  I have chronic pain in my shoulder and no one knows what the cause is.  I have found that when I do Yoga and exercise my arms, it helps.  

    When I am at my desk all day sitting in a chair, my body tends to ache.  Do you know of any good stretches to do or have any recommendations for that?  But, when I am truly focused on my website work, I do tend to forget about everything else including the pain so that is healing in itself. 

    Thank you for your research and for helping others.

    Reply
    • Thanks for your comments Alisha! My recommendations would be to get up and move regularly. Your yoga is one of the best routinues you can do. Otherwise, just move all parts of your body; stretch your neck from side to side, sit forward in your chair and clasp your hands behind your back, massage your hands and fingers and bend the fingers back, lift your legs off the floor, hold that, stretch them. The secret seems to be stretching! Hope that’s helpful!

      Reply
  4. Hi Barbara,

    I am sorry that you have to deal with chronic pain like that. I know that there are many others out there suffering like you mentioned so I know many people want to hear what you have to say on the topic, myself included. I found this post to very helpful. You provide some great options for helping to cope with it. I am going to pass this along to a friend of mine that has chronic pain, who I know will get great value out of reading it. Thank you!!

    Reply
  5. Barbara, Thank you for your site, I am a pain suffer myself, I have had both shoulders opporated on, My back opporated on twice, I suffer from PTSD. I have pain everyday. I will try some of the information.There are some days that I just don’t want to do anything,but I make myself.
    Again Thank you for your insight and information and your hard work you put into this article.

    Reply
    • Thank you for your comments Melody. I hope something on my website helps you. There seem to be plenty of pain sufferers around! I am waiting to hear back from the ACPA. I am anxious to start a support group. No one understands pain better than other pain sufferers and their family. Good for you for making yourself do stuff. It really does help with managing the pain.

      Reply
  6. Proud of you for working through your pain to write this. Keep up the good work! Look at the people that are commenting and that you are helping!

    Reply

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