glasscannon

agumonkey I love this - maybe it's about time a wellness/health "HN" was started. We're living in a time of chronic health dysfunction and lack of clarity. DM (and/or anyone else) if you'd like to jam

For my recovery my reading/listening was focused on people like Dr Schubiner, Alan Gordon and some folks in Aus like Lorimer Moseley.

I'm engaging more in linking research studies in now as I experienced a lot of people (often not practitioners) making claims without links to evidence (likely to keep things simple), which made my logical brain skeptical orignally and slowed my entry to this field

Hey algo_lover, OP here.

Just woke up and this post's traction has surpassed my wildest imagination.

Similar to what pedalpete has said, I'm looking to release this in parts to ensure:

1. I am not overwhelming people and losing their interest

2. Quality remains as high as possible (I invested only a few hours into this last week as an experiment). I want this blog to be the most easily accessible, engaging + factual source for chronic pain sufferers. That requires sufficient time to nail (and it seems like I've struck a chord so far).

3. Get signals from readers week by week and tailor to the audience which is forming.

This will help me helpfully reach the most pain sufferers.

RE feel like you're being sold something. This series will cover what is needed to recover from chronic pain and be offered for free. I am looking to build a product eventually (why wouldn't I want help as many people as posssible while building a career which does good - I don't believe they're exclusive), but the information in this blog will remain free.

RE not calling out Pain reprocessing theory/therapy - I'll go through the post today and see if it makes sense to add this into #1 (or if it's better for #4). It's not something I consciously omitted when writting this post last week.

Thanks for the comment!

> used me to change my routine and avoid certain activities which only exacerbated the issues, which led to more avoidance. Eventually I couldn’t walk.

Anecdotally, I had a phase where pretty much the same thing happened to me with the Achilles (+ calf/ankle) flare-ups I was having (during this part of my chronic journey). Eventually got through it by doing small walks around my home, then outside but keeping the frequency high each day (i.e. instead of 1 "long" walk, doing 3-4 short ones). I.e. Desensitisation / daily movement

Would love to connect/chat. Will read over these in the meantime.

> and making comments implying that they know better than doctors about chronic pain (while putting an obligatory “not a doctor” disclaimer juxtaposed to their comments complaining that doctors don’t know what they know).

I am not claiming to know better than doctors whom are proficient in pain science/medicine.

Rather, that most doctors are not adequately educated on this topic. If you ask the average doctor they will tell you how little it is taught in most medical education programs. Case in point, most pain sufferers will tell you how many doctors they had to bounce between before they finally got some answers/direction (if they were lucky).

FWIW I was preparing for two months this year after I left my job to sit the Australian med school entry exam. Ultimately, I decided I would be able to help more people today, with tools readily available (including a computer and substack) than spending the next decade of my life preparing for a medical career.

I would consider amending that part of my post to say something more narrow like "Not a pain doctor", but it seems more straightforward as it is now.

Feel free to get in touch if you'd like to chat Adrig (my contact is in my profile), wishing you the best of luck.

The link between the gut and brain (especially in the case of dietary intolerances) is an interesting one! Keen to see if others have come across good research in the space

Awesome study - thanks for the link!

On your first point, the moving of symptoms is not uncommon in patients with chronic pain - and yes definitely a sign something not normal is going on!

On the second, I've mentioned it elsewhere in this thread (on a different comment) that it's critical to determine if a structural cause is at play (i.e. tissue/nerve damage or something else causing inflammation). It is unfortunate however that many doctors are not familiar with modern pain science so I'm hoping spreading awareness via patients (and some practitioners) will change this.

In the next few blog posts this very thing will be discussed (i.e. exploring when it's likely something is mind related vs the body [though I will focus primarily on the former in this series] - as you're 100% correct sometimes it's the body and sometimes it's the mind, and sometimes it's both!).

Thanks for sharing this.

Very much agree it's critical to get an accurate assessment, ideally from a doctor who understands pain science to rule out a structural cause. In saying this, I recognise many practitioners are not fully across this so I'm hoping this series will help increase awareness.

This first blog is meant as a quick intro to the series - blog post #2 will break down the different categories of chronic pain (i.e. broadly including tissue, nerve damage and pain due to brain plasticity - what the series is primarily focused on).

Amazing, I'll take a look at it.

Thanks!

Heavily agree much destruction has come from overprescription. With this note I'm just seeking to cover my bases and be transparent with readers who don't know me.