Pain is real, but it doesn’t have to define who you are.

Today on A Call for Love, host Linda Orsini is joined once again by psychologist Jacqui Morgan. Jacqui first appeared in Episode 52 to share her insights on embracing change, and now she returns to open up about her personal journey of living with chronic physical pain.

Together, Linda and Jacqui explore:

• How chronic pain impacts sleep, relationships, and identity.
• The balance between medical care, physiotherapy, and holistic approaches.
• Mindfulness, movement, and self-compassion as tools for living with pain.
• How to listen to pain as a messenger rather than letting it take over your life.

You will learn practical strategies and soulful insights for navigating chronic pain or supporting a loved one who is. It’s a reminder that no matter the challenges of the body, there is always more to who you are.

Embracing Change with Jacqui Morgan, Episode 53

Website: lindaorsini.com

Soul Skool: Join From Shadow to Shine Here

Follow Linda on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/lindaorsiniwellness 

Heal with H.E.A.R.T. Transformation Program

About our Guest

Jacqui Morgan is a psychologist with a master’s degree and over six years of experience in private practice and psychiatric care. She has a special interest in couples therapy and the role of attachment in relationships and the workplace.

Originally from Johannesburg, South Africa, Jacqui now lives in Owen Sound, Ontario, Canada where she continues to see South African clients online while preparing to open a local practice. Living with chronic back pain, she shares personal insights from her own journey alongside her professional expertise.

About Linda:

I’m Linda Orsini, host of A Call for Love podcast and founder of Soul Skool, a community where seekers evolve with clarity, compassion, and courage.

After decades as a teacher, I realized the deepest education is that one of the soul. My journey through anxiety and self-doubt led me to meditation, yoga, Reiki, sound healing, and emotional freedom practices. Now I guide others through retreats, trainings, and Soul Skool to return home to themselves and embody their best life.

A Call for Love is your space to pause, reflect, and awaken self-love. Because when we heal ourselves, we help heal the world.

Thank you for listening!

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Speaker: 00:00:00

You're going to learn about how to understand , your

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physical pain, managing this pain,

and communicating with your pain.

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Because when you realize and hold

space for the realization that you're

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not defined by the pain that's going

through your body and that your pain

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is more effective when you tune in.

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Rather than tune out and push it away,

and it doesn't mean that you're damaged.

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And so my guest today is a repeat

guest and she's also a dear friend

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and her name is Jackie Morgan.

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She is a psychologist with a master's

degree and has spent the last six years

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working in a private practice and at.

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Psychiatric care facility.

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She has an interest in couples

therapy and the influence of

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attachment styles on relationships

and functioning within the workplace.

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Jackie and her husband moved

to Owen Sound, Ontario, Canada.

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That's how I met her.

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And she's been there

with us for two years.

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She's come all the way from Johannesburg,

South Africa, and she continues to

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consult with her South African clients

online and looks forward to opening

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an in-person practice in Owen sound as

well, and living with chronic back pain.

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Jackie shares with us what she has

found helpful along her pain journey.

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So welcome Jackie.

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Welcome back to A Call for Love, and

I wanna say you were on episode 52

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when you had newly arrived in Canada

and we discussed embracing change.

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So welcome back.

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: 00:01:38

Thank

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Speaker 2: you.

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Wow.

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Yes.

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That was.

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A long time ago.

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: 00:01:43

Um, what feels like a long time

ago, and you know, what can be so

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similar to that is our experience

and our journeys with pain.

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Because although I've only lived

with chronic pain for the last

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three years, it's a relatively.

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Short history, but it feels

like the longest journey.

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And so yeah, just a voice of encouragement

to all your listeners today, Linda, that

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no matter if you've had pain for the last

few months or years, it feels long because

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it really is testing, it is trying, and

I feel like I can connect with that.

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And I've come a long way in my journey,

but I still have a long way to go.

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So I hope that I can share some

of my insights with you today.

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Speaker: Yeah, I think

it's really important.

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I know that pain can just influence

every area of your life, your sleeping,

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your eating, your, your relationships,

and how you relate to your body

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and your self, and it's relentless.

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Speaker 2: Hmm, absolutely.

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It's all consuming.

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Um, it, and it's complex and, you know,

there's this, uh, favorite saying of

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mine from CS Lewis regarding pain.

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He says, we can ignore even, but

pain insists upon being attended to.

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And, and that for me just describes

so beautifully how pain arrests

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our attention every day, all.

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And so it, it can erode parts

of your life and relationships,

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even your, even your work life.

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I think it would be remiss of us to not

mention identity loss, uh, that one can go

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through when it comes to a pain journey.

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Speaker: Yeah, I think that.

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What you're saying is

pain is all consuming.

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You can't ignore it.

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It's in your face and it's so

this is the journey, right?

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Mm-hmm.

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When you are faced with something that

is here in your life, for better or for

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worse, what are you gonna do about it?

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Speaker 2: Mm mm Exactly that.

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As with all misfortunes, it can bring

out the worst or the best in us.

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And, and so this has really been my

personal experience with Pain two.

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Um, yeah, it really is a deeply

personal journey, so there isn't a

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one size fits all, and, and I'm by

no means an expert on the subject.

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I just hope to be really be sharing

my personal lived experience with you.

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And so I, I just wanted to

mention to everybody that.

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It has been confusing at times along

the way with all the different types

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of interventions that there are

out there, but that not any single

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one of them I would safely say

that I could do, have done without.

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Uh, I, I honestly can see the

benefit of having gone through.

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All the layers and of all the dimensions

because as pain infiltrates our lives

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on many dimensions, so it is with the

interventions that we need to consider.

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So another encouragement just for people

to keep learning about their pain and

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keep trying to understand what there

is available for them out there to do

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to alleviate some of their suffering.

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Speaker: All right.

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Why don't you just give a brief

explanation of what pain you've

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gone through, and then we're going

to discuss how you have begun to

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understand the concept of pain in

your physical body and managing it.

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Speaker 2: Hmm.

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So I have lower back pain.

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It's due to a bulging disc, which

is incredibly common around L four,

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L five, S one, s two, around that

region due to various reasons, whether

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it's the aging process or actual

injury or a combination of, of both.

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Uh, I experience a lot

of pain in my lower back.

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It has confused me at times when I've

looked at images of my MRI and gone.

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Wow, that's not a bad looking MRI,

you know, so it's, it's difficult

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to understand that what you see on

an X-ray is not equal to what you're

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experiencing per se in your body.

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That my experience of pain is different

to somebody else's experiences of pain.

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Mm-hmm.

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My physiotherapists tell me that

some patients have terrible x-rays

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or MRIs and experience no pain.

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But for me, I know that every day,

at several times during the day,

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my pain stops me from doing the

activities that I would like to do.

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And it also inhibits me from doing

some of the sporting activities

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that I used to be able to do and

that I still hope to be able to do.

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Um, and so there is, uh, a real

tendency to want to have to.

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To want to sit back and, and try to

manage pain by not doing anything

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because of that fear response.

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But what I've had to do is

go, wow, no matter what I do.

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Or how little I do, my

pain stays the same.

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Speaker 3: Mm.

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Speaker 2: And so it's caused me to

have it, it's caused me to really

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dig down into what it is that I'm

experiencing and to talk to different

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medical professionals and to reach out

to different resources out there, uh,

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to be able to understand it a whole lot

better and come at it from a new angle.

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So this is some of what

I'll be sharing with you.

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Speaker: I agree.

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The thing about pain is you look fine.

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So people can't see underneath

what you're experiencing, and that

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becomes a challenge because you look

fine, but you're not feeling well.

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Speaker 3: Mm-hmm.

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Speaker 2: A hundred percent.

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And, and also to be a, a younger person

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Speaker 3: mm-hmm.

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Speaker 2: With invisible pain.

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And people say, but you're too

young to be experiencing that.

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It, it also, I think, just throws you into

another category of feeling very isolated.

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Speaker 3: Mm.

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Speaker 2: Um, and, and that people

can't really identify with you.

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And, and that's the danger in the mental

health field is that people will feel

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isolation, that they'll start to feel

hopeless, um, and start to feel like

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they don't know which way to turn.

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I think that's the risk with pain.

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It really does erode your mental health.

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So we, we need to speak about pain

and we need to speak about all its

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different tactics so that we can

claim some of that victory back

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and some of that control back.

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Speaker: That's so fascinating because

I think that it's a double end sword.

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What happens is, is you're experiencing

the pain and you want to, um.

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Not completely identify yourself

as pain, but explaining to others

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that you're experiencing pain,

you're almost reinforcing the pain.

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Yeah.

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Speaker 2: You couldn't

have said it any better.

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Um, I remember that at that

there just was a time when all my

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conversations would lead with how

I was doing in my pain journey.

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Um, and I both needed people to

ask me how I was doing, but I also

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didn't wanna be defined by it.

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So there was that real point of

tension and conflict within me that

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needed to be seen, but that also

wanted to remain invisible so that I

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could continue to live a normal life.

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So it really is, uh, a, a, a tricky

double-edged sword like you say.

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Yes, there's so much more to us

than our pain and, and so much

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more to our bodies than, than the

experience of pain within them.

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And so I would just like us to try and

claim some of that real estate back,

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some of that emotional real estate back.

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Speaker: That's our first point.

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You are not defined by your pain,

but what do you do so that you're

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not defined by it, even though

you're experiencing it acutely?

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Speaker 2: Mm-hmm.

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So I think the first, the first

quiver in your bur should be that

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there is an understanding of pain

that has to be had with, with all.

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Challenges that we meet a, a

firm understanding of something

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is half the battle one.

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And so what I wanna just explain

today is that pain is a result

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of many different factors.

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It is not one plus one equals two per se,

and that pain does not equate to damage.

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But that pain is something that your body.

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Send signals from your pain receptors,

which are your, your nociceptors.

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Whether there is a pressure or a burning

or a chemical threat on your body,

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those chemical signals are sent via your

spinal cord up to your brain for your

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brain to then receive that signal and.

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Anticipate some kind of a threat and

then initiate a protective response.

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So that's

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Speaker: a physiological response to pain.

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Speaker 2: Yes.

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It's physiological and.

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The two other mechanisms that, that

there are is an an emotional component.

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So your emotional part of your brain

then receives those signals that have

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been interpreted and further goes on to

process and say, well, let's think about

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how we process this in our fear centers

of our brain and in our, um, centers of.

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Appraising it.

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Do we like it or don't we, you

know, all those judgment zones.

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So all of that is handled in the Amy,

the, um, emotional centers of our

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brain and, and then cognitively our

frontal lobe comes online and says.

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Speaker 3: Hmm,

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Speaker 2: well, what should we

pay attention to now and how do we

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further interpret this information

and how do we contextualize it

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and, and how do we make decisions

based on this incoming information?

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And so there's, there's the

conversation that's happening

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between all those three points.

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And so this is why I'm so pleased to have

come across that thoughts and emotions.

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It can directly influence

how we perceive pain.

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So pain is a physiological response.

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The pain is real.

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I'm not saying it's not, it definitely is.

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I know it is.

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But there is also a perception Yes.

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Zone that's happening at the same time.

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And that is where we can intercept

this very unhelpful pain cycle.

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And so that's, that's

where we'll go to next.

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Is how to intersect at those points.

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Speaker: Yeah.

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Turning into your pain as

opposed to pushing it away.

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Correct.

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Yes.

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Speaker 2: I think the real temptation

for me was to try and use distraction

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as a technique because I didn't know

what else to do along my journey.

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Um, and distraction can work up

to a certain point and it can

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be helpful in some situations.

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But it doesn't last for very long.

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And so what I needed to do was

find a way of working with my pain

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because distraction inherently had

something quite resentful about

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it, or even repressing about it.

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And it, it introduced

conflict within my own body.

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There was a split in my mind

in how I could be present.

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And so I needed to try something

different, and so I started to tune

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into my pain and exercise certain

pain management techniques that way.

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And that was tremendously helpful

because then what I found was that I

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was intercepting those factors that

involve the immune system and the

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nervous system's response to pain.

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And so.

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Even if you hear something during your day

or smell something, taste something, touch

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it, something that you hear, something

that you do, something that you believe,

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um, people in your life, anything can

set your, your nervous system on edge

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and it can start to create something

of an inflammatory process, which can

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tell your brain that there is a threat.

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Your brain is gonna fire off these pain

signals into various parts of your body.

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You become infused with them.

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So as I started experimenting

with meditative techniques on pain

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management, I found that I could

calm my entire nervous system down.

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Um, another way that I, I got a bit of

distance from my pain was to think of it.

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A voice, so still a voice within me,

but there's still a little bit of

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distance was to ask pain that if it

were to be able to tell me something

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now, what would it be telling me?

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Speaker: Oh, that's interesting.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, it, it, it's helpful

because then, um, you know, at

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times pain would be saying to me,

uh, that I need to have a boundary.

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Somebody, perhaps there's something

that I didn't really want to be doing

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: 00:16:09

or something that I felt I couldn't

really be saying, um, that I would

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then ask this very helpful voice.

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I was starting to use pain as a signal to

me for protection, which is what pain was

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invented for, was there to keep us alive.

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And it still is, but it's been

misinterpreted along the way.

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And sometimes along the way we get so

used to the pain that we've developed,

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habits of feeling our pain, connecting

with our pain, and coping with our pain.

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And so we entrench old neural

systems, neural pathways within us.

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That keeps us going along, what

can sometimes be very unhelpful

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ways of dealing with it.

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You know, for instance,

just turning to medication.

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Uh, and I'm, I'm not advocating for

turning away from medication because we

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know, uh, that medication is medically

appropriate as, uh, a course of treatment

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sometimes for a, for a person's lifetime,

sometimes just for the acute stage.

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But we also have to be

mindful of its effects on us.

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And, and how and when we use it and

it, it, it's got to be prescriptive and

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it's got to be, um, managed responsibly.

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Speaker: Well, I think we're, when

we're in the throes of deep pain,

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certainly that's the time for, you

know, that intervention of medicine.

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I do wanna share though, that, I mean,

I've been fortunate I haven't had a

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lot of pain in my life, but when I do.

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I do seek a doctor's opinion and

possibly medicine if it requires it.

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And then I also go the psychological

and the spiritual route.

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I, I would be amiss not to mention

that Louise Hay has the book.

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You can Hear Your Life.

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So for every part of the body that kind

of breaks down, she says emotionally what

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it's connected to on an energetic sense.

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And so I would, in my circumstances,

um, very simple, very little example.

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I had a style in my eye

and, uh, so I got the drops.

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This is not a huge thing, but it's

just an example and I looked in

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Louise Hayes book and it's like.

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What are you seeing?

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What are you perceiving in your life?

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So then I did both.

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Mm-hmm.

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I did the soulful work, the

energetic work, and then I did the,

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the conventional medical route.

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Speaker 2: Mm-hmm.

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Interesting.

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Yeah, absolutely.

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Um, and, and I think the more that

we can become more melted dimensional

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in our approach to illness and

pain, the better often and the more

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balance we achieve through doing.

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: 00:19:02

So, I don't think there's any one of

those dimensions that, that we should

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minimize or discredit because I think

they're all incredibly valid and helpful.

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: 00:19:12

So this, you know, usually I, I don't know

that I would've turned to a meditative

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source, uh, outside of something as robust

as our biomedical model, which I, I can't

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do without, but it touched, it touched a

nerve that the biomedical model couldn't.

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For instance, it just went somewhere

else in my body that my medication wasn't

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: 00:19:41

doing for me and still isn't doing for me.

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: 00:19:43

And so I'm finding that that balance

between taking, taking pain management

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meds and doing other mindfulness

meditation practices and continuing

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: 00:19:56

with moving my body and exercising,

because I noticed that not moving.

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: 00:20:02

Leads to other problems.

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: 00:20:04

Yes.

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: 00:20:04

Not moving creates it, its own pain.

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: 00:20:08

Um, and, and so I'm trying to do a

little bit of, of everything that's

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: 00:20:13

helpful, including consulting with

a pain coach from South Africa.

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: 00:20:18

And, and so there's a little piece

of advice that comes either from a

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: 00:20:24

family member who's had pain, like

my, my, my cousin in the states.

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: 00:20:29

Who can share some of her gold nuggets

with me, or it's my physiotherapist,

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: 00:20:33

or it's my pain coach, or it's my

neuro, you know, I've got a whole

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: 00:20:38

team of people that are helping

me to manage what I'm experiencing

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: 00:20:42

in my body and it's all helping.

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: 00:20:45

Speaker: Yeah, and I, I think

what you said is very important.

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: 00:20:48

I went to Sri Lanka and some healers,

Ayurvedic practitioners work on my

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: 00:20:54

physical body at frozen shoulder.

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That was like debilitating pain.

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: 00:20:59

But anyways, uh, they said the doctors

had told them to stop moving, like,

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: 00:21:04

stop playing golf, stop playing tennis.

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: 00:21:06

And um, I almost feel like that hurts us.

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: 00:21:11

Of course, we cannot do those same things

to the same degree, but even as a yoga

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: 00:21:17

teacher doing one 20th of it and just

even feeling a little bit into your body.

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: 00:21:25

Is really good for, for your

psychological wellbeing too.

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: 00:21:30

And, and it does bring energy because

if, if you think about our energy

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: 00:21:35

system, we could have stuck dis-ease.

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: 00:21:39

It's, it's the, the energy's not

flowing well and a bulging disc.

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: 00:21:43

'cause you said the energy is not going

up and down your spine really well.

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: 00:21:48

Speaker 2: Yeah, exactly.

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: 00:21:49

And, and what you're saying

there is the, um, the helpful and

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: 00:21:54

beneficial release of brain chemicals

that we get when we exercise.

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: 00:22:00

And so they are really, uh, really

important for our overall wellbeing.

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: 00:22:05

And there's all, there's also

something quite psychologically

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: 00:22:08

positive that happens once we've moved

our bodies and we've survived it.

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: 00:22:14

We bank on a victory.

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: 00:22:16

That goes into a little bit of an

unconscious memory that, oh, we

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: 00:22:20

are not broken and our bodies are

inherently strong, and that there is.

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: 00:22:26

A wisdom about our bodies that

knows what it needs to heal and

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: 00:22:32

moving is part of that healing.

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: 00:22:34

And we come back to ourselves and

we also find enjoyment in our bodies

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: 00:22:39

again, because paint takes so much

away from us and our enjoyment of

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: 00:22:44

our daily lives and our bodies,

and, and so exercising in a graded.

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: 00:22:49

Activity, fashion can really

help you to take those little

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: 00:22:53

steps back to that victory.

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: 00:22:56

Um, and, and my physiotherapist, I

could not have done this without him.

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: 00:23:00

He helped me to see and to look back

and go, Ooh, three months ago we were

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: 00:23:06

only walking for 10 minutes and now

we're up to walking for 45 and this

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: 00:23:13

time in a few weeks time, we'll be here.

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: 00:23:15

And so having those goals

and walking with somebody.

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: 00:23:19

Um, to babysit you, if you like for

a better word, because otherwise, you

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: 00:23:24

know, one might be tempted to do too

much too soon or to not do enough.

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: 00:23:28

So depending on your personality

profile, it's really helpful to,

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: 00:23:33

to be with somebody who knows

what they're talking about.

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: 00:23:37

Speaker: Yes, this is a beautiful

conversation because we've

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: 00:23:40

come to the circle that pain

does not mean we're damaged.

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: 00:23:44

And I, I'd like to add one more thing.

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: 00:23:46

I was.

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: 00:23:48

In Cuba and a barracuda bit through

my foot, sliced through my big toe.

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: 00:23:54

And um, it was a very big mess

and they were stitching my toe

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: 00:24:01

and I placed my hand on my heart.

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: 00:24:03

I said, okay.

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: 00:24:05

My heart, my spirit, the love I have for

the people around me and for life is not

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: 00:24:11

in pain, is not hurt, is not damaged.

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: 00:24:14

It's my body.

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: 00:24:16

I kind of created a little bit of a

separation and I was like nurturing,

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: 00:24:21

and I kind of talked to my body.

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: 00:24:23

I said, you know, you are really hurt.

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: 00:24:25

They're taking care of you.

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: 00:24:26

They're stitching you up,

but you're okay inside.

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: 00:24:30

And I had this conversation and I

could kind of separate the two, and

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: 00:24:33

it really, really helped when I was

in the midst of this fully conscious,

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: 00:24:39

watching all the stitches and the blood.

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: 00:24:41

And so I found that

really, really helpful.

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: 00:24:44

Nice.

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: 00:24:46

Speaker 2: So what you said there

is so good because there's that

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: 00:24:48

self-compassion that we've got

to have when we are experiencing

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: 00:24:52

pain or something frightening.

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: 00:24:54

Um, and then there's the ability to

slightly separate or buffer yourself.

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: 00:25:00

From your feeling self so that we can

still think about our feeling selves and

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: 00:25:05

then we become observers of our pain.

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: 00:25:08

Speaker 3: Yes.

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: 00:25:08

Speaker 2: Not saying that the pain

is not part of us because it's so

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: 00:25:12

intricately part of us, um, but we,

we can then allow this pain in its

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: 00:25:20

own way to talk to us, which helps us

further our acceptance of that pain.

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: 00:25:29

So when we can notice whether it's a

burning or an aching or a stinging,

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: 00:25:35

whether it's um, flittering around

or whether it's stabbing, uh, you

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: 00:25:41

know, when we just allow ourselves

to notice something without judging

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: 00:25:47

the pain and where it's coming

from and blaming ourselves or that

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: 00:25:51

car accident or whatever it was to

cause it, we just kind of go into.

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: 00:25:56

The, the body's process of this

pain, and then we can welcome

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: 00:26:02

it by saying, well, it just is.

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: 00:26:05

Mm-hmm.

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: 00:26:06

And it's interesting to note that it's

in that leg and not the other leg.

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: 00:26:11

And if we take a part of our bodies

that isn't experiencing a pain and

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: 00:26:16

we notice how that's feeling, our

brain starts to interpret not only

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: 00:26:21

just what negative feels like,

but also what positive feels like.

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: 00:26:24

Yes.

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: 00:26:25

Speaker: Which is so healing.

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: 00:26:26

Speaker 2: That's so healing.

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: 00:26:28

And then to mindfully place something

soothing, whether it's cooling or

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: 00:26:33

warming onto that injured area,

sending it a lot of love and care

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: 00:26:39

just like you did in that moment.

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: 00:26:41

You know, you surround it with,

with yourself, um, around reminding

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: 00:26:47

yourself that you don't need to feel

overwhelmed by the pain, but that you

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: 00:26:52

can be with your pain, but that it is.

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: 00:26:55

Not

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: 00:26:56

Speaker: you because

this is a call for love.

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: 00:26:58

I can say the Buddha said that suffering

is caused by pushing away or grasping,

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: 00:27:05

but when we hold space for it, which

is an awareness without judgment,

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: 00:27:11

it's being heard, and so the pain is

being heard and you don't identify

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: 00:27:16

it as your whole self being damaged.

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: 00:27:23

It's just the experience you're

going through in the moment,

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: 00:27:26

Speaker 2: it's part of you and it,

and it doesn't have to overwhelm you.

397

: 00:27:29

Yeah.

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: 00:27:30

And I've noticed that, that when I take

the stance with my pain, that it reduces.

399

: 00:27:37

Speaker: Yes.

400

: 00:27:38

Speaker 2: And you know, other management,

uh, techniques that I still engage in

401

: 00:27:43

are things like grading my level of pain.

402

: 00:27:49

Um, and grading my activities for the day.

403

: 00:27:52

So if doing laundry is, is a five

and I'll run through what the pain

404

: 00:27:58

rating scale is, um, but if I say

that doing laundry is a five, 'cause

405

: 00:28:05

by the end I feel that level of pain.

406

: 00:28:09

I know that I can't combine two or three

level five worth activities Oh, I see.

407

: 00:28:14

On the same day.

408

: 00:28:15

Um, and, and so that helps me to

take some control back and it, it

409

: 00:28:20

also helps me to really work with

myself and not against myself.

410

: 00:28:27

Speaker: It's kind of like a bank

account you don't wanna overspend.

411

: 00:28:30

Yes.

412

: 00:28:31

When you're thinking of how much pain

and how much effort in one day when

413

: 00:28:36

you're saying grading, uh, a 10, you

don't wanna overspend because then

414

: 00:28:41

your body is going to not be happy and

you probably will pay the next day.

415

: 00:28:47

Speaker 2: Yeah.

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: 00:28:48

Yes.

417

: 00:28:49

You can't overspend, you always pay

the price the next day, and so you've

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: 00:28:55

gotta be quite calculated and think

about your activities and wonder

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: 00:28:58

what it is that it's gonna cost you.

420

: 00:29:01

But I wanna balance that again

with what I said earlier on,

421

: 00:29:04

that there is a cost to also.

422

: 00:29:07

Doing and not mobilizing.

423

: 00:29:09

Yes.

424

: 00:29:09

And not building your

confidence back in your body.

425

: 00:29:14

Speaker: Well, you don't wanna

be too stingy in life and you

426

: 00:29:17

don't wanna be too frivolous.

427

: 00:29:19

So it's the same thing with your pain.

428

: 00:29:22

You want to continue to move your body.

429

: 00:29:26

I personally believe we're energy

bodies and I, I know that even, okay.

430

: 00:29:33

Say I'm having pain in.

431

: 00:29:35

My hand, my arm, my shoulder.

432

: 00:29:37

Well, my legs are okay, so I can

move a little bit of my legs.

433

: 00:29:40

I'm still moving my body,

I'm still shifting my energy.

434

: 00:29:44

I'm still relating to it

and getting those successes.

435

: 00:29:48

And that's what makes the difference.

436

: 00:29:50

Yes.

437

: 00:29:51

Yeah.

438

: 00:29:52

Speaker 2: And, and there are so many

helpful resources through medical

439

: 00:29:55

professionals and, and also, uh, available

out there, um, you know, bioness and.

440

: 00:30:02

Sports physiatrists that can help you

to think about how best to mobilize

441

: 00:30:08

and continue to build strength while

still protecting that injured area.

442

: 00:30:13

So, you know, with backs it's always a

good idea to improve your core, um, legs,

443

: 00:30:19

arms, everything around that because

you've still gotta pick up grocery

444

: 00:30:23

parcels and you, you, you know, you

still got to clean your house and, and.

445

: 00:30:28

Drive your car and do all

the things that you wanna do.

446

: 00:30:31

So there's just so much that you

can do, and the stronger you feel

447

: 00:30:36

in general, the better you, your,

your area of vulnerability feels,

448

: 00:30:42

the better you support yourself.

449

: 00:30:44

Um.

450

: 00:30:45

Then I think just lastly, in terms of

communicating one's pain, I found it

451

: 00:30:50

incredibly difficult to help myself

and to help others to understand one

452

: 00:30:56

bad day from one good day, you know,

because it's so fluctuating and we all

453

: 00:31:01

have good days and bad days with pain.

454

: 00:31:03

Um, I would use words like, today is not

a good day, is not a good back day, but.

455

: 00:31:10

More than that, I needed

to give it a number.

456

: 00:31:12

And so the pain rating scale is

quite helpful also when talking

457

: 00:31:15

to medical professionals.

458

: 00:31:17

Yes.

459

: 00:31:17

That if you can say to them that,

no, I'm on zero pain with no pain at

460

: 00:31:22

all, or I am on a 10 that I cannot

think right now, I'm in so much pain.

461

: 00:31:30

So I encourage everyone just to go and

have a look at that pain rating scale

462

: 00:31:33

and then to work out activities for the

day based on that and to work within it.

463

: 00:31:39

In always shapes and forms.

464

: 00:31:42

Speaker: Yeah, that's beautiful.

465

: 00:31:43

When we work within it,

we're honoring our body.

466

: 00:31:47

We're honoring the moment that we're

in, and then we can hold space for it.

467

: 00:31:53

Know that we're not damaged, we're

just, just in the mode of healing.

468

: 00:31:59

Instead of sick, I like to

think that we're healing.

469

: 00:32:02

It's a progression, and then

we can hold space for it.

470

: 00:32:06

So I really thank you for joining a

call for love and sharing about the pain

471

: 00:32:12

body because we're going to have pain in

and out through our life and navigating

472

: 00:32:19

through it and learning those tips

can make that journey a lot smoother.

473

: 00:32:25

Thank you.

474

: 00:32:25

Yes.

475

: 00:32:26

All the best.

476

: 00:32:27

Yeah.

477

: 00:32:27

Thank you, Jackie.

478

: 00:32:28

So thank you for listening, everyone.

479

: 00:32:30

You can reach out to Jackie.

480

: 00:32:32

I have her links in the show notes,

and just wishing everyone peace and

481

: 00:32:38

pain-free living from my heart to yours.

482

: 00:32:41

Namaste.