Sometimes when I'm working with a client and they are getting better, the thinking is calming down and the pain is fading away they can suddenly get a pain flare up and it can be very disheartening. I thought I would write about this because if you know what's happening it will be less frightening.
For many of us, the pain has been there a long time, we have become so used to coping with the pain that we have gotten really good at it. In medical terms, it's called the Allostatic Load. Google says; Allostatic load is "the wear and tear on the body" which accumulates as an individual is exposed to repeated or chronic stress. Just the thought of carrying around a 'load' sounds exhausting, right? So as we see that we are always feeling our thinking and start trusting that a Loving Intelligence is running the show we start to relax. But our nervous systems are so over-sensitized that as it's getting used to your new way of being it can say Hey! That little bit of stress is toooooo much and bingo, we get a pain flare up. I had it one time after my pain went away when I was reading some pain research. I was sitting in a comfy chair on vacation and suddenly BAM! My back started to seize up, my pelvis was slanted to the right and sciatica pain was shooting down my leg, ouch!! But I laughed!! I hadn't done anything other than read some scary stuff about bad backs and my nervous system just overreacted to the words I was reading! I laughed because I knew I was ok, I laughed because I knew it would pass. And it did, the next day when I had finished reading I stood up and it was all gone and I haven't had any serious pain since and it's been a few years.
As Syd Banks so brilliantly said; "If only people learned not to be afraid of their own experience, that would change the world." It's changed my world, to know I don't have to be afraid of chronic pain, that I didn't do anything wrong to make it happen, that it was just an innocent misunderstanding, and that if I have nothing on the pain or the thoughts it will pass, is such a relief.
With love Chana
