I have completed a full week and we are at the halfway point in the PRC Program (Pain Rehabilitation Center). I have been learning a lot and have even been working and doing things I haven’t done in months. Some over a year.
The past week I have been able to follow a daily structured schedule of classes, walking, a full body work out, cognitively complex computer work, and lots of learning.
The main goal of PRC is not necessarily getting full relief from my symptoms. There are 11 people who are battling chronic pain alongside me. We had a class period where we listed out everything we have tried, every medication, and every doctor/specialist we saw.
This was done to make two main points:
- We have tried everything
- The regular approach just simply doesn’t work for us and that’s not a bad thing.
Through trying to find relief and working on figuring that out, whether that’s through surgeries and countless doctors appointments and experimental medicines for the group one thing is common the pain just won’t go away.
As we go through the PRC progam, we are shifting our focus on our pain the idea of “I am in control” vs “our pain is in control” the goal is to get our life back to dwarf the symptoms. So we are learning techniques of relaxation, diaphragmatic breathing and what’s coined as “mindfulness” to help us restore our lives as opposed to letting our symptoms run wild. This is different from the new age mindfulness practice though. This is more just being aware and being able to change your focus from pain and behaviors to being able to find things that help distract you better and keep you calmer through the pain.
This graphic above shows that our symptoms aren’t the thing that is changing, but rather our life is growing to make the symptoms become not the full focus of everything in our life.
We walked through lists of how to identify our own “pain behaviors” which is how we respond to our pain. Typically a pain behavior is something that we might do to respond to the pain which is natural and not in itself a bad thing. However, for chronic symptoms those behaviors tend to snowball into more behaviors and intensify our pains.
For me personally I have been working a schedule throughout the days to be working on a computer that involves complex thinking. The goal is to get me to be able to work at least some on a computer. I am starting slow only 10 minutes twice a day but are slowly increasing to hit me working an hour at a time by the end of the program.
I am also working on planning out my weekends and keeping my daily tasks managed in moderation. One key thing is to help eliminate myself just pushing through and crashing for days after. This is done through moderate exposure and limited increasing.
The hardest thing right now for me is during our relaxation times, this involves some cognitive thinking. At least during these times the goal is to imagine peaceful memories and places that help just calm down the whole system. These times are where the pain gets really intense for me as there’s less things to help me ignore pain and the cognitive energy it takes tends to make it feel more intense. I am still working on this, there are other relaxation exercises that help me personally more which focus more on what I feel and hear around me.
Overall, so far the program has really been helping me understand my limits, understanding that I am able to be functional in my family and out and about even if there are different approaches to my days now. There are still a lot of things for me to get stronger at and better but compared to how I was two weeks ago, I feel and look a lot more like my old self with much improvement. I have been upright and out of bed from 7 am – 12:30 am (designed specifically to help combat my poor sleep schedule) every day with no naps or lying down in between. I did lie down two days just for a bit after the program late last week because I was feeling under the weather some.
This past week was a really good week in terms of what I accomplished but as many of you know when you start new habits and do hard things, the third day is often hardest and that day was this past week. There were so many positive steps forward but it was very hard mentally though the Lord was good and things have continued to look up. There are still things that are really difficult to do though.
The weekend was a really good time and Parker got to come see Rochester and the Mayo Clinic. We all got to hangout, talk, and be together. Mom went back to Bartlesville on Sunday to see my Grandma on Mother’s Day and be there with Pop.
Sunday, Rachel, Knox, and I went to a local church here and had a great Lord’s day and then got to celebrate Mother’s Day here! Knox has recovered from whatever virus he had and the suction of his nose helped so much that he is not needing that suction anymore and seems completely back to normal!
–Landon
Prayer Requests:
- Continued good health overall for us
- Avenues for treatment and decreased pain for Landon
- The Lord’s timing on the passing of Landon’s grandma and his graduation from the program
- Continued progress on my sleep schedule even after the program.
- Rachel and Knox will be attending the caregiver/family day on Friday, May 16 so for a cooperative baby and for Rachel to absorb the information and ask all the questions needed.
- Wisdom for helping Landon and his sleep schedule when things like feeling sick happen without causing damage to his new sleep schedule.
Praises:
- Knox is better!
- If Landon ever needs more help, he can come back to the program for a time whenever he needs for life.
- Good progress on Landon’s sleep schedule.