How Chronic Pain Affects the Family
By achievesolutions.net
January 10
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You see someone you love in pain and it is painful for you. You want to help, to take away the pain forever, but you cannot. That is the worst part of chronic pain.
Chronic pain affects more than just the person who has it—the whole family suffers. And the entire family has to adjust to the many changes that living with chronic pain brings, which can change the whole family dynamic.
Trying to help
While spouses and other family members try to help their loved ones in chronic pain the best they can, they sometimes “over care” for them by trying to do everything, according to Robert N. Jamison, PhD, a Harvard Medical School professor who works with people in chronic pain. The opposite extreme can be just as bad, Jamison points out.
Sometimes it is hard to know just what to do for family members in chronic pain, however, which is why good communication is so vital. But chronic pain sufferers might resist communicating their needs and feelings to their family because they are afraid of worrying them or of becoming a burden. Perhaps they feel the family cannot understand, or they do not want to contribute to the family’s feelings of helplessness about not being able to change things.
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Comments (2 comments)
Add your commentI have learned after years of pain, your family just gets used to it. You just learn to do things for yourselves. It's just like oh Mom is not feeling very well today, and they just go on with what they are doing. I feel it is because your family cannot see the pain, ie, broken wrist, therefore they do not see, the key word is see so they just get used to you being bent over or just a little craby for the day. Thank you
I have to admit that I didn't really learn a whole lot of new information, but it was a really good article. We sometimes do forget that our pain affects more people than just ourselves.