Amazing, life changing announcement for many

This announcement actually brought a tear to my eye, well a proper sob if I’m honest… because it got me remembering back to just how dependant and addicted I was to the heavy medications I found myself being offered and quite frankly left me feeling hopeless and like there was no way out.

On 7thApril, NICE, the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence, recommends a range of effective treatments for people with chronic primary pain and calls on healthcare professionals to recognise and treat a person’s pain as valid and unique to them.

The range of treatments to be offered include exercise programmes and the psychological therapies CBT and acceptance and commitment therapy (ACT).  Acupuncture is also recommended as an option.

It goes on to say that people with chronic pain should not be started on commonly used drugs including paracetamol, non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs, benzodiazepines or opiods.  This is because there is little or no evidence that they make any difference to people’s quality of life, pain or psychological distress, but they can cause harm, including possible addiction. 

If I can take you back to before I had children, I was in such a desperate place.  I was working only a handful of hours every week at a desk job and dreaded the suggestion of any training or travelling which would involve me having to sit ‘still’ for any length of time.

I couldn’t go to the cinema unless I really upped the meds to enable me to sit for an hour and a half.  I would dread drives to anywhere, even into town as getting in and out of the car was just excruciating.  

I felt life was passing me by as all my friends and family were seemingly having a great time, just getting on with life and I felt like I was being left behind and I couldn’t see it ever getting any better, only worse.

I desperately wanted to start a family, but I could even entertain the thought when I was ingesting such heavy medication on a daily basis over the last decade?

I hope that gives you a little insight into the soul destroying pain, physically and emotionally that I was experiencing day in and day out.  

Although I hated being so tied to the medication I was on, I was thankful for it and believed that I couldn’t function without it. My body would start to tremble and react terribly when it wasn’t topped up in my system.

But there were side effects, there was the dizziness, the headaches, the drowsiness and agitation.. to name but a few.  

When I went to the GP in absolute desperation, crying that I felt there was no hope and quite honestly I didn’t know how long I could continue in this way, it was only then that I was added to the Pain Management Clinic Programme.

It was within this programme, which looks at both the physical and emotional side of pain that I was offered acupuncture.  

From the very first acupuncture session I noticed a difference.  It’s hard to explain, but I felt lighter, I felt relief emotionally at first and then as the treatments continued the pain itself started to decrease.  I was actually so startled at the difference as I genuinely didn’t think there was anything that would make a difference.

When my sessions ran out I could see such a positive difference that I paid for a private course of treatments and I never looked back – in fact, years later as you all know, I trained in it myself!

But this decrease in pain gave me hope again and I managed to, with the continued acupuncture, brave it enough to go, privately again, and seek out a physiotherapist who specialised in pilates.  She often joked at how scared she was seeing me hobble up her drive and was almost going to say that she didn’t feel comfortable treating me as I was in too vulnerable a state… but thank God she took pity on me, and took me on.  Tiny little exercises and movements at the start and eventually after numerous one-to-one sessions I was able to join her mainstream pilates class and I never looked back.  

Now I do my own yoga and pilates stretches daily at home and I can go for walks again… I could NEVER have imagined being able to ever even dream of doing these things back then, in fact I wouldn’t even have dared hope.

But to me, the crucial factor here is that I BECAME DRUG FREE!  With the effectiveness of the acupuncture at helping to free my body again, flooding it with fresh, oxygenated, nourishing blood releasing the muscles and tendons that held me so tight with fear and pain.  The natural pain relieving, feel good hormones and chemicals it released in my brain, where before I was numbed out with the medication.  I was able to, bit by bit, reduce the meds until eventually I was off them completely.

I then accessed talking therapy, CBT and sessions with a psychologist as I had terrible Post Traumatic Stress and after years of being in severe pain I had a lot of fear and vulnerability there.

The whole point to telling you the ins and outs of my story?  Take a moment and imagine how different it would be if at the very start of my pain journey, I was offered the acupuncture, the talking therapy and the exercise programme INSTEAD of or even ALONGSIDE the medication.  I genuinely believe I would never have had to sink to the depths of despair that I did, if I had been given these alternatives rather than just years and years of heavy medications on repeat prescriptions.

I feel that a hazy, drugged up decade of my life could have been so much brighter and I would have been saved an incredible amount of pain, despair and heartache.  But, I also believe very strongly that our paths are laid out before us and that there was a reason for me to go through and experience all that I did.  For one, I have no doubt that it makes me a better acupuncturist, as I really understand my clients who are in the depths of pain or despair.  I truly appreciate and embrace the ‘sparkly bits’ in life that I see so many other people turn a blind eye to.  So for that I am incredibly grateful.  Some days I just look at my 3 kiddies and could almost burst with gratitude and joy!

I sincerely hope this announcement will pave a new path for those suffering with chronic pain.  It gives me so much renewed hope and belief in our system.  

Please know that if you are currently suffering with chronic pain that there is hope out there.  Our bodies are amazing and they are designed to heal.  It can feel absolutely hopeless and miserable at times, I get that… but please hold on.  Find a therapy and a therapist that you feel comfortable with, talk to your GP, head over to my website www.hopehealthhealing.co.uk and check out the Chronic Pain Page there and let me send you my top tips for shifting pain. 

Just don’t give up, reach out and trust that there’s a better way out there,

Sarah x