Meditation and Chronic Pain
Probably one of the most challenging clinical conditions in medicine are those where physical pain plays a role in the chronic disease Although there is always a psychological or emotional component to this pain, it is the physical pain that becomes so daunting This is the case in any chronic disease associated with pain But what makes it so challenging? Is it really the pain? Or is it something else?
Anybody confronted with chronic pain will attest to the fact that it's the continuous physical discomfort that doesn't go away that leads to the challenge But what if the person is given things to do to help with the pain but won't do them because they make the assumption that it won't work This becomes a problem
Case Study
Let's talk about a middle aged woman with high Vata energy who has a 4 year history of sharp burning electrical pelvic symptoms that move up toward her head But over the last 6 months these pelvic symptoms progressed to severe bladder symptoms with burning pain during and after urination to the point of incapacitation so she cannot work or do normal daily activities She's given specific therapies that will indeed help her with the pain but is unable to do even a small part of them because she believes that they are making her symptoms worse In the end her mind is so strung out that she becomes confused with loss of ability to maintain direction in helping herself with healing
I know there will be some who would argue that this is just part of the problem and that is indeed true But what we have here is a mind that is interfering with the person getting better by preventing her from even using the therapies to begin with Physical pain freaks the mind out It produces enormous unsettling so that there is confusion, disarray, loss of ability to maintain direction, and lack of faith in any process
Role of Meditation
Obviously meditation does not eliminate pain but it has one very important attribute It settles the mind so that there is a potential for faith to peek its head in the door and nuture some calmness to the freaked out mind
We see a lot of people in the clinic with chronic disease who have perhaps underlying psychological or emotional pain but not obvious physical pain and so these people can also benefit from meditation
But it's one thing to deal with helping people with chronic disease but quite another to try to help those with chronic disease who have chronic physical pain
Meditation does not eliminate the pain It helps settle the mind so that it is not so anxious and is able to accept suggested therapies without freaking out There are times when pain is so commanding of our attention that a trial of a particular approach freaks us out Everything is uncertain and we just want the pain to go away This is specifically a very bad place for people with chronic disease
