Chronic Pain Therapy
What is chronic pain?
Chronic pain is persistent physical pain that has lasted for several months. It can be mild or extreme, continuous or episodic. The intensity of the chronic pain can be experienced as mildly inconvenient but tolerable or debilitating and interferes with your daily functioning.
Chronic pain can present itself in many ways such as episodic migraines or daily headaches, back pain, pelvic pain or musculoskeletal pain. Some physical diseases such as Irritable Bowel Syndrome (IBS), Cancer and Rheumatoid Arthritis can cause chronic pain conditions.
Prolonged pain can affect numerous aspects of a person’s life. For example, pain can limit a person’s physical and emotional functioning. The emotional toll chronic pain can have on a person can lead to stress, anxiety and depression. Unfortunately, stress is a factor that is not only caused by pain but also contributes to causing more pain; creating a vicious cycle that can be difficult to break without intervention and support.
What can I do?
Treating chronic pain can be challenging but research has shown that Cognitive Behavioural Therapy (CBT) can be effective in helping you manage pain. A psychologist or therapist can help you regain control of your life by introducing skills that allow you to manage negative thoughts and behaviors that add and worsen your pain.
To find out how you can effectively cope with chronic pain, you can contact Dr. Chow to schedule an appointment.
How will chronic pain treatment help?
Chronic pain is often associated with feelings of lack of control over your own life. Cognitive Behavioural Therapy (CBT) can be successfully used as chronic pain treatment by helping you to learn coping mechanisms to deal with flare-ups as they occur. For example, learning to replace negative thinking with more constructive thoughts as well as learning stress management and relaxation techniques.
Developing mechanisms for how to control aspects of the pain can have a positive impact on how effectively you cope with your chronic pain condition. The psychologist can also support your emotional well-being by helping you deal with any frustrations, anxiety, depression or other emotions that are associated with your experiences of pain.
Resources
This website offers a number of helpful tools and worksheets that can help facilitate change and promote well-being. You are welcome to download the following PDF document(s) or download ADOBE here 
to download the desired file. These tools are most helpful as an adjunct to therapy.
Video Resource
Learn more (from CBC)
