Many chronic pain patients tell me how difficult it is to get through the day without treatments that require a therapeutic intervention like physical therapy, massage, and acupuncture. Or space, time, and equipment are needed for options like Tai Chi, yoga, and exercise.
They want techniques that can be done anytime, anywhere. Here’s a quick review of how to get relief, even if you’re in the middle of a large group of people.
1) Just breathe. Breathe in through the diaphragm and out through the nose to the count of five. Or breathe in to the count of five, hold your breath to the count of five, breathe out to the count of five, hold to the count of five. Within minutes you’ll feel reduced stress and muscle tightening.
2) Sitting at your desk, start with your feet. Scrunch up the toes, thighs, hold, then release. Move to your calves, thighs, abdomen. Work your way up to your shoulders, neck, jaw. As you tighten, feel the muscles clench and strain, then release and relax, surging circulation in and taking inflammation away.
3) Concentrate on five things you can see, what they look like, their colors, design, angles. Then four things you can hear, the beat, rhythm, loudness. Then three things you can touch. Are they soft, brittle, rough, cold? Then two things you can taste. The strawberry you ate that morning. Was it sour, sweet? Then one thing you can smell. For me it’s often trying to distinguish the myriad of cleaning solutions surrounding me in the office.
4) Try the 3,3,3 rule. Identify three objects. What is their function, how do they feel when used? Then identify three sounds. How do they differ? Are they pleasant? Calming or irritating? Then focus on three body parts e.g. neck, arm, leg. Move them in all directions. Feel the muscles work to keep the position requested.
5) Take the five minute test. Having a stressful day? Muscle cramping, tension exacerbating every painful site? Take the 5 minute test. Will this issue impact your life, or someone else in a week, month or year? For most issues we deal with daily, the answer is no. Being cut off in traffic, getting to the laundry mat just after it closed, forgetting milk…If the answer is no, let it go.
6) Close the door to your office or to the bathroom and use a stall to jump up and down, pretend to scream at the top of your lungs, stretch, twist, turn, laugh, cry…. . A few minutes away can break the cycle.
7) Assess the pain. Is it a burning, tingling, sharp pain? Then focus on just one aspect. If in your feet, define exactly where the tingling occurs. Is it the entire foot, just the toes? Define how it affects the foot by itself. Sometimes this can help separate the pain from other feelings that are less intrusive.
8) Get outdoors. Even if it’s just for a few minutes. Feel the breeze on your skin. The sun on your face. Hear the birds flapping their wings, chirping in the trees. The cars speeding by. Envision your stress, muscle pain, anxieties hitching a ride and going away.
9) Most of us work in offices where music is played. Tune in to the sound and exclude all else. For just a few minutes, let the beat flow thru your muscles, feeling them move in harmony with your breathing and as they leave taking all your stress and tension away. No music? Create your own inner radio for a few minutes.
10) Think of your pain as a bright, irritating, glaring bulb. As you stare at it see all the aspects of what hurts, your head, neck, arms, low back, legs, feet. Then start to see the bulb slowly diminish. As the light lessens feel your pain go with it until it’s extinguished with the light.
11) Imaging your hand is holding a warm, comforting blanket or ice cold pack. Then use it to cover the area of pain. Imagine the heat or cold enveloping the pain and easing it away.
12) Act as “if.” Think of when you felt better. Cocooned in your bed that morning. Or how much better it will be when you can ease into a warm hot bubble bath after work. Remember a time when the pain was tolerable. Then go to that place and moment and “act as if” you are there.
13) Imagine an injection of numbing agent like Novocain or a powerful pain killer like morphine is being injected into the painful area. Feel the jab as it goes in then the soothing relief as if spreads throughout the area, giving enormous relief.
14) Count. Count the tiles. Count the lights. Count every body part. Just as counting helps to calm and prevent saying something you might regret, so does counting distract and help lessen pain.
15) Go to your happy place. We all have one. Is it languishing on the beach? Feel the hot, grainy sand between your toes. The warm sun on your face and body. Hear the rhythm of the waves. Crashing on the beach then rolling back out to sea. Prefer the mountains? Feel the cool breeze, see and smell the firewood burning brightly. Feel the comfort within the blanket wrapped tightly around you.
16) Take your time to eat lunch. Taste each food. Concentrate on chewing and savoring each bite. What’s the flavor on your tongue? How does it smell? Feel like as you swallow? Is it hard, smooth, cold, sticky, chewy, hot, spicy, sour …? Let the sensations fill your mind.
17) Give yourself a massage. Try using golf balls in a shoe box to relax and soothe achey feet. Or a tennis ball to reach hard to reach muscles like the shoulders, mid back or pectoral muscles. Use a wall to roll it in the needed areas. Have neck pain? Find the tender soot and gently move your fingers in circular motions. Repeat in the opposite direction.
18) Keep self-made hot/ cold packs available for just the right moment when help is needed. Put in the refrigerator or warm in the microwave and you have instant relief. If you have neither, ready-made packs are sold that instantaneously become hot or cold when “popped.”
19) Choose an object in your immediate vicinity. If you can go outside for a few minutes focus on a tree or cloud. Inside? Maybe a phone, computer or pen. Just look at it. Nothing else. Simply relax into watching it for as long as your concentration will allow. Look at it as though it’s the first time you’ve ever see it. Consume every twist, turn, color, design. Think of all it can do- the storms it can bring, the shade it provides or how they connect us to the outside world, the minds it took to create. This is an easy, quick way to release tension and direct attention outside your body.
20) Every time you feel anxious, in pain, worried you can’t continue. Take a breath. Change the negative thoughts from, “ I can’t.“ to “I can.” I can get through this moment by letting go of the tension, getting up and moving, using an ice pack, hydrating, stretching, interacting with a co-worker.. . I have the power to improve my situation.”
Choose whatever techniques give you a chance to clear your head, release tension and feel calmer. They’ll all be a welcome respite to a busy, painful day.
