Los Angeles Chronic Pain
Support and advocacy information for individuals dealing with chronic pain.
Category: Uncategorized
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The Pain You Can’t See: Living with Invisible Chronic Pain
Introduction Living with chronic pain is hard. Living with invisible chronic pain—pain that can’t be seen, scanned, or measured—adds a whole new layer of challenge. For millions of us, the daily battle isn’t just with our symptoms but with disbelief, misunderstanding, and isolation. I’ve lived with chronic pain for decades. On the outside, I may…
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Celebrating the Small Wins: Why Little Steps Matter in Life with Chronic Pain
Disclaimer: The views, positions, and recommendations expressed in this article are based on my personal experiences and independent research. They are solely my own and do not necessarily reflect the views, policies, or positions of the American Chronic Pain Association (ACPA). Some Days, Just Getting Out of Bed Is a Victory If you live with…
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Handling Brain Fog and Actually Getting Things Done While Living with Chronic Pain
Disclaimer: The views, positions, and recommendations expressed in this article are based on my personal experiences and independent research. They are solely my own and do not necessarily reflect the views, policies, or positions of the American Chronic Pain Association (ACPA). If you live with chronic pain, you likely know what brain fog feels like.That…
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How Do You Handle a Flare-up?
Survival strategies, hard-earned wisdom, and what we wish others knew. There’s nothing quite like a flare-up.It can slam into your day like a thunderclap—or build quietly until the pain, fatigue, and fog are too heavy to carry. Whether you’ve lived with chronic pain for months or decades, one thing becomes clear: no two flare-ups are…
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From Pain to Power: How to Move from Patient to Activist
Disclaimer: The views, positions, and recommendations expressed in this article are based on my personal experiences and independent research. They are solely my own and do not necessarily reflect the views, policies, or positions of the American Chronic Pain Association (ACPA). “I was medically retired from the U.S. Air Force and told, ‘You will never…
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Raise Your Voice: Why Chronic Pain Research Needs Us Now
I’ve lived with chronic pain for nearly 40 years. I’m speaking up today because the progress we’ve made is in danger—and I’m asking you to speak up with me. When I was first diagnosed, the world of pain care looked very different. There were fewer options. Less understanding. A lot more silence. I was told…
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Building Stronger Research Teams: Integrating People With Lived Experience (PWLE)
Too often, including People With Lived Experience (PWLE) in research is treated as an afterthought, a checkbox, a token seat at the table. But if we’re serious about making health research more relevant, equitable, and practical, we need to build research teams that are fundamentally different. Drawing from the Stanford Team Building Field Guide and…
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Why People with Chronic Pain Must Demand to Be Heard
We can no longer be silent or sidelined. It’s time to make our presence felt—in research, policy, and practice. For over 50 million Americans living with chronic pain, silence is not an option. Too often, we are invisible, treated as afterthoughts in national policy, underrepresented in research, and routinely excluded from the decisions that shape…
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Living in a Nation of Pain — And Why It’s Time for Real Change
“One in four adults in the U.S. lives with chronic pain.” That number stopped me in my tracks. A new Medscape article titled “A Nation in Pain: Can New Approaches Turn the Tide?” lays bare what many of us already know: the chronic pain crisis is growing—and our systems aren’t keeping up. We’re not just…
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A Patient Friendly Summary
Name of Study: “Differential treatment response to virtual reality in high-impact chronic pain: secondary analysis of a randomized trial”Published in Scientific Reports (2025)ClinicalTrials.gov Identifier: NCT05263037 How the Study Was Done This study looked at how people with chronic low back pain responded to a virtual reality (VR) program that teaches pain relief skills. Over 1,000…
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“Why Should They Ask Me?” — How People with Chronic Pain Can Shape Research and Care
If you live with chronic pain, chances are you’ve wondered at some point:“Why did they pick that treatment?”“Why isn’t my pain taken seriously?”“Why didn’t they ask someone like me before deciding what works?” The truth is: for a long time, they didn’t ask us. But now they can. And they should.This article is about why…
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Pain Research Can’t Move Forward Without Us: Why Patient Partnership Is Essential
Pain is invisible, yet it impacts every corner of life. Those of us who live with it know its unpredictability, its burden, and its complexity. But for too long, pain research has been done to us, not with us. A recent commentary in The Journal of Pain by Kathryn A. Birnie and Alexandra Neville reminds…
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Using Technology to Better Manage Chronic Pain: Tools for Empowerment, Not Escape
I’ve lived with chronic pain for over 37 years. It began after treatment for testicular cancer at 35 and has since expanded to include back, hip, groin, and abdominal pain, compounded by bladder cancer, arthritis, diabetes, and multiple heart attacks. Chronic pain is part of my every day—and every night. Over the years, I’ve learned…
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Reclaiming Control: Living With Chronic Pain in a Life of Appointments
If you live with chronic pain, you likely know the feeling of your calendar filling up with doctor visits, therapy sessions, lab tests, insurance calls, and follow-up appointments. It can feel like life is scheduled around pain—and worse, around the system meant to “help” you manage it. Many of us wake up already tired, already…
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Supporting Ourselves and Each Other: Living with the Challenges of Chronic Pain
Living with chronic pain is not just a physical experience—it’s a daily emotional, mental, and social challenge. It can isolate us, wear down our resilience, and make even the smallest tasks feel overwhelming. But through mutual support, self-compassion, and community, we can build lives filled with meaning, connection, and strength. In this article, I’ll share…