Pain is in the Driver's Seat

For anyone living with chronic pain, they are forever challenged by the fact that try as they might - taking medications on time, getting the right amount of sleep and exercise, eating healthy - if pain decides to take over on any given day, they get bumped out of the driver's seat. The dissonance that gets created as a result, lies not in the fact that you are having a pain day, but rather that you had expectations for the day. If we can't get done what we had planned, or get less done than we usually would have, we can be quite hard on ourselves; resulting in feelings of discouragement, and we open the door for the blues to set in. We are much better served to understand that "when I am having a pain day, my tank is full."Waking up uncomfortable and sore lets you know that your body and mind are allowed to focus on what needs to happen in order to best alleviate the pain. That might include cancelling plans, doing less than you would normally do, going about tasks at a slower pace, taking more breaks. It is acknowledging that you have woken up with a full tank, and its not going to take much to spark a tipping point. If we can give pain its space, we can begin to celebrate  the fact that "anything I get done today is a bonus." When we can begin to be kind to ourselves where our expectations are concerned, we begin to feel that we have some control in our pain day. We may have had to let pain take the driver's seat, but we can darn sure still give it directions! :) Photo by Darwin Vegher on Unsplash