''Recovery begins with dealing with pain and what's causing it, not avoiding it.''

In September 2011, Turia Pitt, while taking part in an ultra-marathon

event, found herself caught in a wildfire which quickly

engulfed her whole body. For four long hours she

waited before the rescue team finally found her.

She suffered burns to 65% of her body, she died three times,

lost all her fingers except for three and nobody

expected her to survive.

But she did.

Her recovery includes over 200 skin implants/grafts,

re-learning how to walk, talk, and doing ''simple'' tasks.

And as far as I can ascertain from watching a doco on her life,

her recovery was not easy and none of it was achieved without pain.

But she has recovered and is running again.

There are a number of different kinds of pain we

may experience but for the purpose of this post I am

going to stick with two broad categories: mental(psychological)

 and physical.

If we are experiencing physical pain, usually, but not always,

 the reason for our pain may be fairly easy to diagnose.

Psychological/emotional pain however, can be trickier.

Pain, regardless of whether it is physical or psychological,

 is a signal telling us that there is something going on

in our body and/or mind that needs our attention.

Your back is hurting? See a doctor.

Your ''soul/mind/feelings'' are hurting?

See a psychologist.

Whether we are experiencing physical or psychological

pain, methinks that most of us tend to reach for a

''painkiller'' of some sort as our number one coping strategy.

(Some trivia: Painkiller was originally a brand name before it 

became a generic product category.)

When I came off a skate board and my leg was twice

its size, the doctor looked at me, laughed and said: ''What did

you do? Come off a skate board?''

-Yeah, I did I answered, upon which he shook his

head and said: ''Take two painkillers and don't skate again.''

I have ended up in many a doctors practice with all manner

of injuries through the years and been told to stop

surfing, skating, rollerblading, etc. etc. and take two 

painkillers...alas, to no avail, as life... must be lived.

Ironically, the worst physical injury I've managed to ''achieve''

happened when I was lifting my amplifier and managed

to tare some ligaments and dislocate a disc in my lower back.

Yikes! PAINFUL.

This time the doctor didn't prescribe some generic painkiller.

Bedrest for two weeks, liquid morphine, valium every four

hours, physio, acupuncture, etc. etc.

However, knowing how addictive Morphine and Valium

 can be, I decided to go with normal painkillers.

I persisted with physio and ultra sound therapy for a couple

of weeks, but it did nothing to ease the pain.

So, I decided to start swimming laps.

Long story short: after four absolutely agonizing weeks of

swimming I started to feel some improvement.

So, I kept swimming. Two kilometers five days

a week for almost 15 years.

Wisdom gained from the above experience:

''Recovery begins with dealing with pain and

what's causing it, not avoiding it.''

(Citizen Z)

The problem with pain is that even if we push it

deep down inside of us it has a tendency to surface.

We may find that we snap at people, lose our

temper, feel depressed, listless, angry, restless,

etc. etc.

Whatever way our pain manifests itself, it will

out one way or another.

Often we tell ourselves: toughen up, it's not that bad,

don't be a sissy, ignore it and it will go away, etc. etc.

because somehow to admit to being in pain is to admit to

being ''weak''.

And who wants to be weak?

Thing is, those in the ''know'' say that the only way to

overcome pain is to face it, name it, and deal with it.

Instead of putting on a ''brave face'' and ''just grin and bear

it'', acknowledging to ourselves that we're in pain and

then instead of keeping it to ourselves, sharing what we're

going through with someone we trust, we may find 

the pain a bit easier to deal with.

Whatever the cause of our pain may be,

it seldom just goes away.

This is when coping strategies may come in handy.

''Problem-focused coping'' as in problem solving

and action taking to change the source of

the distress.

''Emotion-focused coping'' as in focusing on managing

and or reducing the emotional distress caused by

an event/situation/etc. etc.

Problem-focused coping strategies are usually used

when constructive actions can be taken, and 

emotion-focused coping is often used when people feel 

that a situation cannot be changed but must be endured.

In short: Is there something I can do to change this?

Let's do it.

Or

Is there something I can do to change this?

Not really.

So how do I best cope with this emotionally?

In other words: How do I best proceed

in order to recover from this?

 My view, by using both coping strategies.

Strategies not to use:

Avoidance/denial

Catastrophizing

Isolating

Making a mountain out of a molehill

Worrying as a means of self-defense

Romanticizing the past

Numbing with the use of

drugs, alcohol, food, gambling, etc.

Misdirection of emotions, as in

letting loose feelings on somebody

or something that has nothing to do

with the root cause of our distress.

I believe that recovery is available for all those

who seek it.

''Recovery begins with dealing with pain and

what's causing it, not avoiding it.''

about the image: charcoal and graphite on paper

some Elements editing