Chronic Pain Awareness Month
Thank you to sunbeam for sponsoring this post!
Did you know that September is pain awareness month? Every September doctors, pain advocates, and patients raise awareness for issues related to living with chronic pain. According to the Cleveland clinic, chronic pain is defined as “pain that is ongoing and usually lasts longer than six months. This type of pain can continue even after the injury or illness that caused it has healed or gone away. Pain signals remain active in the nervous system for weeks, months or years. Some people suffer chronic pain even when there is no past injury or apparent body damage.”
Chronic pain is (unfortunately) a huge part of my life. It’s one of the top two things that limit my ability to function the most. Thankfully, I’m much more medically managed and I have more tools to help my pain now - like heat therapy! - But prior to this I was mostly housebound due to my pain.
Sunbeam is teaming up with the U.S. Pain Foundation for their Pain Awareness Month initiative #PainCounts. The U.S. Pain Foundation is a non-profit organization with a mission to empower, educate, connect, and advocate for individuals living with chronic illness that causes pain, as well as their caregivers and clinicians.
The Foundation advocates that the most effective pain care is multidisciplinary, individualized care combining many different modalities such as physical therapy, different forms of medications, restorative therapies, self-management techniques, and heat therapy.
Personally, my protocol is composed of many different modalities. Heat therapy is one of the most helpful modalities for me. I LIVE with my heating pads, especially the GoHeat™ USB Powered Heating Pad. It’s portable and small enough to fit in my bag for outings and travel, and it’s powered by a universal usb connector which is so helpful when I’m on the go! Heat therapy can also prevent the onset of pain when used prophylactically, and heat therapy can accelerate healing.
There is rarely one single solution to pain treatment. Chronic pain can manifest in many different ways which is why it’s such a challenge to treat effectively. One-size-fits-all approaches often fail for this exact reason. It oversimplifies the beast that is chronic pain.
No person’s pain is the same so it shouldn’t be treated that way. It’s important that healthcare professionals AND patients themselves continue to trial different options until finding the right ones because everyone is unique. This sounds gloomy, and it can be, but there is ALWAYS hope for relief! It can take time, but don’t give up!
If you’re struggling with chronic pain, resources are available at https://mypainplan.org/.
