The War On Opioids

There are only going to be more bizarre and unreasonable behaviors if the War on Opioids is not blended/tempered with RESPONSIBLE FACT CHECKING, DEEP COMPASSION, and COMMON SENSE!

https://www.painnewsnetwork.org/stories/2017/7/28/indiana-doctor-killed-in-dispute-over-pain-meds 

It is going to take Chris Christie and/or some of his Opioid Crackdown Cohorts to have to take a (possibly permanent) trip down Chronic Pain Lane, personally, before government folks get a Bird's Eye View of the Truth.  

Most true Chronic Pain Patients are not the problem in the Opioids mess.

https://www.painnewsnetwork.org/stories/2017/7/25/the-myth-of-the-opioid-addicted-chronic-pain-patient 

Yes, there are addicts and abusers.  But, it is way more complex and complicated than folks realize.  

Most of those that are the abusers are NOT the folks in Chronic Pain.

Relegating a Chronic Pain patient to have to "suck it up and deal with it" is going to trigger more and more serious and deadly outbursts of desperate folks, unable to deal with their Chronic Pain.  

It is far more difficult a journey to deal with Chronic Pain or the Chronic Pain of someone you love than anyone that does not experience it can possibly imagine.

Love, Hugs & Blessings,
Barbara

P. S.  Thank you to the Pain News Network for their dedicated work to support people with Chronic Pain!  You can find them at:

https://www.painnewsnetwork.org/ 

© Copyright 2009-2017, Transformation Of A Mystic | Barbara F. Manning. 

All Rights Reserved

      Thank you to ME for my cool photos I have taken!

It's Not Personal, But Our Reaction Is!

Other's actions are not personal, even when they direct them to us, very personally. When we get triggered, it is about something inside of us that bears internal investigation and doing our spiritual work to uncover our hidden places, our unawareness about ourselves.

Other Folks and our Life Circumstances are mirrors for us about what is going on inside of us.

Dang!  It surely is much easier to blame someone or something ELSE!  

It is a grand journey, though, to decode and uncover my defenses!  I never dreamed how complicated I truly am!

Love, Hugs & Blessings,
Barbara

© Copyright 2009-2017, Transformation Of A Mystic | Barbara F. Manning. 

All Rights Reserved

Thank you to ME for the cool photos I took

!  

"The Body Keeps The Score"

I found a book, about which I am very intrigued. The book is:  "The Body Keeps The Score," by Bessel A. van der Kolk.  As a result, I attended a series of talks by trauma specialists, and I discovered a lot of a-ha's as I listened.

The planet is riddled with trauma victims.  It colors many things and challenges most of us in some way--even if indirectly, through our personal experiences with sufferers. Often it is hidden from consciousness in many.  

Healing trauma and becoming resilient over new onslaughts of it are the entire trek for many of us.

If trauma is key, all is not hopeless!  It can go a lot of ways, though, it seems.  It depends on if people get the help and support that they need--if they even recognize that they need help and support.

The "help" that actually helps keeps changing, as more is learned about what happens to us through traumatizing experiences--what gets modified in our brains during the wounding process, and what things assist modification in our brains during the healing process.

I am seeing some old stuff in new light.  This has brought me some feelings of grief.  From past experience, I know that for me to heal this grief, I must honor my Truths, experience and allow the grief, without creating more trauma or drama for myself. Gratefully, I am familiar with the process.  I know this dance.  And I welcome it.  

I find that grief moves at its own speed--sometimes for me, this is slowly!  But things do shift if I am patient and I allow my feelings without recoiling from them, and specifically, without creating more trauma for myself.  Not creating more trauma during healing work is also a learning process.  I have had to get support to learn how not to do this.  

Now I know the process.  It is repeatable.  It works. I am exceedingly grateful, even for the hard stuff. All experiences eventually bring me to a place of joy and gratitude for the gift of this journey of living!

Love, Hugs and Blessings,
Barbara

© Copyright 2009-2016, Transformation Of A Mystic | Barbara F. Manning. 

All Rights Reserved

      Thank you to ME for the cool photos I took of Ireland!  

Stress and Chronic Pain

I sometimes find when I do a body-check, that I am holding my body tightly in places here and there.  It used to happen continually, automatically and unconsciously.  It's part of my having learned, among other things, to be a nice, good-little-girl, rather than inappropriately pummel the living you-know-what out of others when they trigger me.

I unknowingly, unconsciously allowed this body holding / bracing energy into my body, into my joints and into my spirit. 

If I didn't check in with my body, I might never even know I do this.  

Sometimes I find myself holding my breath, and not realizing it for a while.  Sometimes I find myself gritting my teeth while walking around trying to do something.  I go through bouts of night-time teeth grinding that seems to cycle on some schedule I have yet to uncover or decode.

I believe all these things are unconscious means of coping with adversity, of bracing myself through stress.

Stress becomes a habit.  If I don't allow myself to become aware of my reactions to it, I can get into a bunch of seemingly illogical, incomprehensible body pain.

But if I look more closely and honestly, I see that one thing leads to the other--or at the least, it exacerbates it.  There is a correlation and it is often circular, feeding on itself.

For me, stress leads to or contributes to Chronic Pain and Chronic Pain leads to or contributes to stress.

When I can catch myself in these holding actions I can often change them!  

Becoming conscious of the holding actions I do in my body helps me to have the option to make different choices, like taking a deep breath and releasing the holding.

Checking in with my body on a regular basis is crucial.    

Discovering this has led to empowerment in modifying Chronic Pain.

When Chronic Pain is not alterable, though, the only remedy is surrendering to the pain.  In the surrendering there is great releasing and that brings peace and relief.

Gratefully, I am becoming increasingly conscious and more empowered about altering Chronic Pain.

Love, Hugs and Blessings,
Barbara

© Copyright 2009-2016, Transformation Of A Mystic | Barbara F. Manning. 

All Rights Reserved

      Thank you to ME for my cool photos I have taken!  

We Never Get All Our Shame Healed

I have been catching some of the "Neuroscience Training Summit - How to Change Your Brain for Better Relationships, Accelerated Learning, and Increased Happiness."

Here is a "free for a limited-time" link for this online summit, if you are interested:

http://www.soundstrue.com/store/neuroscience-summit/free-access

Today, Louis Cozolino, PhD, (a writer, professor and practicing psychologist in Los Angeles, California,) spoke about information from his book:  "Why Therapy Works - Using Our Minds to Change Our Brains, (Norton Series on Interpersonal Neurobiology.)

As I listened to Dr. Cozolino speak today, I was THRILLED to hear him say that, in all the years he has been doing his own personal psychotherapy and working with clients for their healing, as well, neither he, nor any of his clients have ever been able to completely eradicate Shame from themselves!

This is Good News to me--because I have been working on healing this stuff in me for 35 years, and I was beginning to fear that maybe I was just too maimed to be able to heal all my personal Shame!

Whew!  What a relief to discover that NO one is able to do this!  I would not have believed anyone that said they were completely Shame-healed, anyway!  My own personal experience just doesn't bear that out!

I think we carry Shame in our DNA--in our genetics!  I think we are hard-wired for Shame!  And then, there are so many places and experiences in our lives where we can gather up more Shame to shower upon ourselves!  I do not know how, exactly.  Perhaps it is through, among other things, that issue called "Original Sin," about which I was taught, (and felt scared about,) in Catechism as a child?

Cozolino says evolution sets us up for mental distress.  This comes out of our primitive instincts.  It also comes from our social connections and interactions.  And there's that issue of our survival being very important to us!  Yup--we are wired for Shame, in my opinion!

Hearing about Shame in this light feels much less about a personal issue or downfall than it is a human one, and therefore, some Shame just automatically feels removed from me!!

At any rate, as much healing as I attain, even being a good deal better at personal healing work than I was when I was 25 years old, I seem to be able to lapse back into Shame from time to time.

The best news of all is that I don't stay there as long as I once did; and I feel so much more compassion for myself when I discover I am in that Shame Pile, yet again, that it feels much less earth-shattering and it passes quickly!

This is progress!

What a relief!!  Otherwise I would not know whether to run stark raving mad into the sunset, certain of my complete, unrecoverable brokenness, or, pat myself nicely on the back for having attained healthy integration of all my previous, not-so-positive life experiences with all the good ones!

Thank you, Dr. Cozolino!  I most certainly enjoyed listening to what you had to share, today!

Love, Hugs and Blessings,
Barbara

© Copyright 2009-2016, Transformation Of A Mystic | Barbara F. Manning. 

All Rights Reserved

      Thank you to ME for my cool photos of flowers from my garden!

Life Is Wild, Lately!

With the advent of the government's condemnation of our family's property in September 2015, and the subsequent lawsuit for which we have not yet come through to the other side, I have fallen far behind in blog posting.  I apologize for this!

Thank you for your understanding!

Love, Hugs and Blessings,
Barbara!

© Copyright 2009-2016, Transformation Of A Mystic | Barbara F. Manning. 

All Rights Reserved

      Thank you to ME for my cool photos of flowers from my garden!

The Perception of Others

There is a tendency to be concerned about the perception of others in terms of our chronic pain, (and probably a lot more than chronic pain.)

We are programmed from the time we are born into behaving in ways that yield us certain perceptions from others.  We spend time, mostly unconsciously, trying to stay within the boundaries of what we believe will yield us "Acceptance" by others.

Becoming conscious and true to ourselves about how we really feel is a chunk of our "growing up" work.

Being very empathic, I usually immediately pick up others perceptions of me--even when they, themselves, are not fully aware of it.  I usually get a big electric zap feeling in the pit of my gut when someone's perception of me is the kind that my basic life-programming says could get me drummed out of The Tribe.

What should we do when our experiences of living with chronic pain triggers others fears for themselves?  

Usually, when another is sneering in judgment, there is an underlying fear in them that is the real culprit of their reactions to my experience and it doesn't actually have a personal thing to do with me.

Sometimes others are unable to understand the level of misery that people with chronic pain experience.  This is common--until others experience their own and then they usually make huge transformations in compassion and tolerance.

I have experienced other's dismay, disbelief, anger and judgment about my own chronic pain.  Sometimes this has come from doctors, co-workers, family members and friends.

The one I really have to watch out for about this is my own judgment about myself because of my own chronic pain.  All the others I can deal with effectively.  But, being in my own court, loving and supporting and accepting myself is critical to my own well-being.

So how do we know when we are deserving of support and when we are just floundering in a pile of crap and need to do something to get ourselves out of it?

We are always deserving of support.  No matter what!

In our hearts, we know when we are stuck and need to get help on some level.  

Let it be Okay.  Get what you need.  Ask for what you need.

Do your best to let judgments go--both of yourself and of others perceptions about you.

Love, Hugs and Blessings,
Barbara

© Copyright 2009-2015, Transformation Of A Mystic | Barbara F. Manning. 

All Rights Reserved

      Thank you to ME for my cool photos of flowers from my garden!

Childhood Trauma and Adult Chronic Pain - Part 3

It wasn't until I went to an Ear Nose and Throat doctor, plagued with breathing difficulties, that memories started floating back--more like crashed back into my full consciousness--with a vengeance. 

What we now know to most often be "Trauma Related" disorders are many--Fibromyalgia, Diabetes II, Chronic Fatigue, Low Back Pain, Chronic Migraine Headaches, Arthritis, Irritable Bowel Disorder and Depression, are just a few of them that fall into this category.  

Trauma can be caused by things you are well aware of--like being in a war or a horrific accident.  Trauma can also be much more subtle and even more difficult to identify.  

It can happen years before we develop chronic pain symptoms, before we mysteriously start having funny aches and pains here and there that go away and return again later on, with ever increasing pain intensity and time lines.

Some of us were raised by very strict parents.  That was nothing unusual in my era, being raised in the 1960's and 1970's.  But sometimes our spirits, our psyches, took things harder than we realized.  Or we may have blunted and dimmed the depths of the experiences in our memory.  These memories may even be totally out of our conscious awareness.

I would bet that most of us that experienced abusive or very strict parenting have at least some diminished memories out of our full conscious awareness.  It is just how it is.  It's what many survivors do to get on with being in the land of the living.

I discovered that I discounted all of the split lips and the bloody noses, all the name calling and the brutalizing energy I experienced growing up.  I knew they happened, but they were just below the surface of my everyday conscious awareness.

But, even if it is expected and common occurrence to have been raised this way in childhood, that does not mean it didn't effect us--and possibly even more than we know. 

Most folks that experienced the kinds of things I did as a child find ways to get through such experiences.  I know I did.  As I've said previously, I learned to make lemonade out of the lemons.  It's my long suit and always has been.  But until I was jolted into reality by an Ear Nose and Throat specialist, I had completely discounted the effects and even buried it all to some degree, from my full-on awareness, the full brunt of the experiences.  This stuff went on for all of my childhood, up until I left home as an adult.

Neuroscience now says that these kinds of experiences rewire our brains, making us have more possibilities for developing chronic pain and chronic conditions later in life. 

Here is a link to read up on this information:

http://www.multiplyingconnections.org/science-behind-trauma 

Until my experience with a doctor questioning my scar tissue filled nose and sinuses, I doubt I would have ever begun the journey of putting the pieces together, doing the research that has now opened everything to me.  I am certain there is a direct correlation to my experiences with chronic pain problems in adulthood and my childhood experiences with trauma.

When we are someone that looks for the good and the positive, it is easy to skim past obvious things that may actually be considered bordering on, if not flat-out, abusive parenting.

I can hear myself hollering at myself, "Pull up your socks, quit whining, get over yourself, you big ninny."  

Those are my words, now.  But, they came from another in my life. They didn't even actually use these specific words.  These are my interpretations of their words.  They are my words.  But this was the energy of what I heard repeatedly while growing up.

This is how a child learns to be unbendingly hard on themselves.

Herein breeds the way to trauma going underground and setting oneself up for Chronic Pain problems in adulthood.

It all goes hand in hand.  I observe it regularly in nearly every client I see.  Trauma and Chronic Pain are two ends of the same journey--if the Trauma is not addressed and healed.

Thankfully, there are more and more options for healing Chronic Pain than ever before, and the list is growing longer!

It takes great willingness to do this work, to heal these parts of ourselves.  It is the hardest work I have ever done.  And it is the very most rewarding, too.  

Love, Hugs and Blessings,
Barbara

© Copyright 2009-2015, Transformation Of A Mystic | Barbara F. Manning. 

All Rights Reserved

Thank you to ME for the cool photos of a Pronghorn Antelope in the Great Basin Desert
 and flowers from my garden, too!

Childhood Trauma and Adult Chronic Pain - Part 2

There are many ways to address trauma.  I have found that addressing trauma, past and present, is vital to pain relief and healing.  I work on this, daily.

I have yet to experience complete healing from all pain.  But I have experienced huge reductions in pain.  I have also noticed increases in pain when under stress.  And then there are those times where I cannot put my finger on a single thing that accounts for stress while I am experiencing significant pain.

I am beginning to believe that it is those times that there is some unconscious trigger going on that I must dig at more in order to be 
able to clear it.  And of course, then there are pain causing issues I have going on like arthritis and sciatica from a congenital birth defect.

I am currently using several methods of addressing pain triggered from past and present traumas.  One of them is called "tapping." Specifically, I am using the method of tapping called, "Faster EFT" http://fastereft.com/ to address these things. 

Tapping does seem to reduce stress and pain sensations!  Using this technique does seem to help me become aware of things that have not been in my conscious awareness.

There are practitioners that assist people who need more help than they are able to find by self-tapping. 

But self-tapping is very powerful, all by itself, and it's free.  Learn about how to do it here:   https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UnTwiQY2hcM

I wonder if I have buried other things that I have not, as of yet, uncovered consciously?

Who knows?  But I gladly walk into the darkness to find it, if it will help with healing pain!  

I've had enough pain for a lifetime already.

Seriously.

They say:

I had lots of happiness in my childhood, for sure. But then there are those things I buried out of my consciousness that definitely are still affecting me today.  It is a process, a journey, to eek them out into my conscious memory so that I can release them and Move On.  I am grateful for those releases and I look forward to more of them!

Love, Hugs and Blessings,

Barbara

© Copyright 2009-2015, Transformation Of A Mystic | Barbara F. Manning. 

All Rights Reserved

 Thank you Google Images, for the Commercial Reuse of your Images!
Thank you to ME for my cool photos of the butterflies at the 
Springs Preserve Butterfly Habitat, too!

Childhood Trauma Can Cause Chronic Pain in Adulthood

Warning!  Some parts of this post may be unpleasant to see and read.  But they are vital to consider if you experience Chronic Pain.

The ENT doctor was trying to thread a camera up my nostrils and into my sinus cavity.  He was having difficulty.  In an exasperated tone he said to me, "Good Grief!  Were you in some kind of accident or something?"  

I was sincerely perplexed by his question and I told him, "No, I wasn't."  

He then proceeded to tell me that I had a severely deviated septum and massive scar tissue in my nose and sinuses; and that it was no wonder why I could not breathe through my nose. 

I was dumbfounded.  I could not imagine from where all this damage could possibly have come.

That night after leaving the doctor, I kept waking up from repeated nightmares.
  

The nightmares were of split lips... 

and bloody noses...

  

When I finally dragged myself exhausted out of bed the next morning, I was filled with grief, the likes of which I had never consciously known.

Oh My God!  I was an abused kid--abused enough that I sustained significant physical damage and now it would require surgery to repair it.

How could I reach 51 years of age and have no conscious understanding that I sustained child abuse and more, that it was severe enough to require surgery to correct?  

How does that happen without me consciously knowing it? 

After much soul searching and allowance of these feelings and memories to surface into my conscious awareness, I realized that I simply discounted all the split lips and the bloody noses I experienced growing up.  

It wasn't like I didn't know they happened.  I did.  But they were muffled, somehow muted in my awareness.  I somehow believed they were a normal part of growing up and even expected--No Big Deal.  Lots of kids experienced the same things that I experienced--or so I believed, anyway.  

But even if it is expected and a common occurrence in childhood, that does not mean it didn't affect me.  

Affect me, it most certainly did!

Scientists now know that these kinds of experiences have the potential to somehow rewire brains into "Pain Brains," where the road to pain becomes well honed and becomes easily fired up when under stress--common, everyday, garden variety stress--and heavy duty stress, too. 

The pain is real.  It's not in our head.  But often what triggers the pain is, at least in part, in our brain.  Science knows this for certain. And there is plenty for which they haven't a clue about this, as well. 

Science now also says that these kinds of trauma experiences and even less severe traumas, can set us up for greater possibilities for developing chronic pain later in life--directly as a result of experiencing any type of trauma in childhood--from emotional abuse to sexual abuse to physical abuse.  This also includes losing a parent in childhood to death or divorce, being in a car accident, experiencing violent crimes--literally any kind of trauma experienced in childhood can be a precursor to chronic pain in adulthood.

Do yourself a favor if you experience chronic pain.  Go looking into your history to see if you can uncover any traumas.  If you are reluctant to do so, get some support in helping you to do it.  Don't discount anything.  And don't judge yourself if you believe things you find are not traumatic enough.  Any trauma is enough to trigger chronic pain in adulthood.  And, the more you had traumas, the more likely it is that you will experience chronic pain in your life.  

There are many ways to address and heal trauma.  It is vital to your pain relief.

There is always Hope!  Never forget this!

Love and Hugs,
Barbara

© Copyright 2009-2015, Transformation Of A Mystic | Barbara F. Manning. 

All Rights Reserved

 Thank you Google Images, for the Commercial Reuse of your Images!