Pain For Dummies - Part X

or: The End (?)

Over the past few weeks I've tried to explain a few things about pain, you and your brain - and why science is important and how it helps us to understand ourselves.

I will of course continue to post about these topics - but the Pain for Dummies Series comes to an end with this posting.

To sum up the series:

Pain is incredibly complex - it involves the whole brain, it can (and must) be tackled using different approaches (hence biopsychosocial). And we are far from understanding it completely.

Most important however is the fact that there is such a thing as a "brain in pain" - a brain that has learned that there is pain to be expected regardless of what the person does - and that you can re-learn to be pain free!

That doesn't happen overnight of course - you'll need lots of patience - but there is a basic entry level for everyone. Find it and start (re)training - now!

Here's what I covered over the past few weeks:

Part I: What is Pain?, Pain and the Stress Response

Part II: The Multidimensionality of Pain and the Biopsychosocial Model

Part III: The Psychology of Pain

Part IV: Metacognition - the coolest feature you have and didn't know about

Part V: The social aspects of pain

Part VI: Can you handle the truth?

Part VII: What’s this new approach all about?

Part VIII: Practice what you preach!

Part IX: What’s the economy got to do with pain?

I hope that you can use some of the tips and tricks I put into my postings and that they will make your life easier - or better yet point you towards a pain-free future.

Coming up are a few postings about how we can tackle chronic pain from a therapeutic point of view - by exercising the virtual body and giving non-nociceptive feedback for example.

Stay tuned!