I am very excited to share today’s article written by guest author Jackie Waters, who at a young age was diagnosed with rheumatoid arthritis. In order to manage her own illness, she has made some lifestyle changes to help minimize her symptoms. She understands how scary it is to be diagnosed with a chronic illness, and just wants to help others who are living with chronic pain. She generously shares what she’s learned with people who are newly diagnosed or who are struggling to manage life and their illness. Without further ado, here are some tips and advice on how to rework your home life, and what lifestyle changes to make in order to minimize chronic pain.
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If you have been diagnosed with a chronic pain condition, it’s normal to feel down and confused. Living with chronic pain is never easy, but with the right lifestyle changes and tweaks to your routine, you can still live a fulfilling and happy life. You may even be able to reduce the severity and frequency of your pain symptoms, which can reduce your need for medications. If you are ready to face your newly diagnosed condition, here are some things to keep in mind.
Enhancing Your Home Space Can Reduce Your Pain
Your home is the first place you see in the morning and the last thing you see before bed. So, it makes sense to start managing chronic pain by making appropriate changes. For example, you can add a dehumidifier to the relaxation spaces in your home, as long as you find a dehumidifier that fits your room and your budget. Wondering how a dehumidifier can help with your pain symptoms? Well, pain management experts recommend that those living with chronic pain and conditions that cause chronic pain keep their home environments cool and dry to reduce inflammation in the body. By combining air conditioning with a quality dehumidifier, you may be able to live with fewer symptoms, especially during the warmer summer months.
Stress and chronic pain tend to be related as well, so it can also be beneficial to find ways to reduce stress in your home. Keeping things tidy can be a simple way to accomplish this since living with clutter has been closely linked to chronic stress.
Managing Your Mental Health Can Manage Your Symptoms
Dealing with a chronic pain diagnosis — or any chronic disease diagnosis — can be an emotional experience. If you are having a hard time overcoming feelings of shock or anxiety, consider speaking with a counselor. You can use online resources and reviews to locate and connect with a therapist in your area, and visiting with this professional on a regular basis can help you find relief from any worries or anxieties you are experiencing as a result of your chronic pain diagnosis. Since mental health and pain can be so deeply connected, you may even be able to get recommendations from your primary care physician.
Aside from working with a therapist, you can also find other ways to manage your mental health. Adding a daily meditation or other mindfulness practices to your everyday routine can lead to improved mental health and reduced feelings of chronic pain. So, try to make these practices a habit or work with your care providers to find other solutions.
Caring for Your Physical Health Can Diminish Your Discomfort
The steps you take to care for your body can play a role in how severe and frequent your pain symptoms are as well, so be sure to look for ways to improve your physical health as you look for ways to manage your chronic pain condition. For instance, try an inflammation-reducing diet, such as the Mediterranean diet, to see if that has a positive impact on your feelings of discomfort and pain. Eating a diet rich in vegetables, lean proteins, and healthy fats can also help you maintain a healthy weight, which can improve pain symptoms as well. Pair that new diet with enough exercise and you could find it much easier to reduce and manage discomfort since exercise has been shown to provide chronic pain relief.
Although physical activity may feel like a challenge when you are experiencing physical pain, getting up and getting moving can help your brain produce more endorphins. These feel-good chemicals are responsible for regulating feelings of pain and happiness, so you could very well find relief through exercise. Plus you will be taking a step to improve your overall quality of life.
Learning to live with a condition that causes chronic pain can take some time and effort. If you can make a few tweaks to your health and wellness routines, as well as your home life, you can still live a healthy and happy life.
I would like to thank Jackie Waters for a wonderfully written article, filled with helpful information on dealing with and combating chronic pain. She explained how positive tweaks in your home life, mental and physical health can positively affect chronic pain. Please do visit her site Hyper-Tidy, which embodies her motto of “A Tidy Home is a Happy Home”. She considers herself as a neat freak, and has always been obsessed with a clean home. One of the first things she did was throw out harmful cleaning products and re-organize her home so that it would be easier to manage her “bad” days. She also made diet and lifestyle changes to minimize, as much as possible, her joint inflammation. She is a mother of four beautiful and energetic boys and lives on a 3-acre hobby farm in Oregon. Her goals are to feed her family as much fresh and home-grown food as possible, focus on sustainability while doing so, and practice simplicity.
