This should be a show HN.
Why I left my tech job to work on chronic pain
71–80 of 249 posts
Re: Why I left my tech job to work on chronic pain
#72>Pain Reprocessing Therapy I asked chatgpt to explain this to me and it did a poor job. Generally speaking in my friend group. Chronic pain used to be opiods; though long ago medical cannabis came along. I couldnt tell you how many people i know who arent stoners who got into the cbd thing and fully got off opiods. 1 addiction for another, but at least cannabis has far less negatives. >If you don’t have chronic pain…
> The problem, CBD never fixes the pain. ~8 hours later you need more. 100%, medication plays a great role in providing comfort and support but it can be ineffective (and often harmful) if relied on solely for recovery from (neuroplastic) chronic pain. > There's no business case for solving chronic pain It seems some parties may be incentive aligned (e.g. insurers in Australia) - though I'm still navigating this spac…
>It seems some parties may be incentive aligned (e.g. insurers in Australia) - though I'm still navigating this space to find an approach which makes solving the root cause viable. Keen for your thoughts.
Ive been sort of part of this sort of approach before. I was sysadmin, not a suit. These do tend to work out.
This is also the mechanism for how they squash and hide stuff that would cut into tylenol sales. Dont sell it, license it for periods of time is my recommendation.
Or you seem to agree much with my post. Put it together. The chronic pain fixer upper place that takes in patients and explains these things and trains them. You hire the emdr and yoga folks.
>Will check out that vid! Big fan of the body keeps the score.
It helped me for sure. I really need to try EMDR but never have. Id bet it works great. Adrienne is one of my favourites, but the science actual says slow yoga is more effective; whereas she needs to go quicker for video length.
>Related to this, there is an exercise called somatic tracking which has helped many people (including myself) - during it people often notice pain shifting throughout your body. This was a big turning point for me seeing how my mind behaves in real time. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lw1D_UvzIDA
3000 year old religious ritual :)
Its very interesting to me how science when i was young called this all hoo-haa pseudoscience but is now giving it a new name and saying it works.
You know what's interesting, my post is pretty heavily downvoted. I wonder what people disagreed with.
Re: Why I left my tech job to work on chronic pain
#73Earlier quoted context omitted.
Not a physician but how long have you had symptoms for? I've had dental work that took much longer than expected to heal. The pulp in the teeth are quite sensitive and can inflame easily, and that inflamation has nowhere to go (being bound by the hard sides of your teeth and jaw), which can lead to constant pain. I once had a routine filling that took about 3 months to stop aching and I had to take ibuprofen every da…
It has been eight months and there is no tissue damage. Allergic reactions to implant materials are rare and usually stop an implant from fusing with the bone, but mine has integrated perfectly. I would consider removing it, except it is my upper central incisor... I kept waiting for braces to be removed etc but I'm running out of options now.
Painful! Definitely seems long enough to fully heal, plus you've already done the imaging (CT, MRI) which would be a best next step. Maybe you could try another specialist, though it sounds like you've already done everything correctly and in sequence. I hope you can find relief.
Re: Why I left my tech job to work on chronic pain
#74I've dealt with chronic illnesses for the past 10+ years now. It's such a hard path. I recently found out after a violent burn-out that a significant cause was chronic stress and its psychosomatic symptoms. It made me have a hard look at the topic, and I'm gradually adjusting to solve the issue. If I get better, I'm tempted to do as OP and spend more time working on this issue for others. It seems so much more impact…
> I recently found out after a violent burn-out that a significant cause was chronic stress and its psychosomatic symptoms.
Thanks for sharing. I am walking down this path as well. In my experience I can tell I'm deeply out of alignment and it wreaks havoc on the body. My soul says to X but my mind says do Y, it's safer, maintains a stable status quo, income, and relationships, etc., even though it's slowly killing me.
Re: Why I left my tech job to work on chronic pain
#75I’ve been dealing with chronic reflux for about 8 mos now. On PPIs and they don’t seem to do much. But once I get away from my typical routine of work/dadding then all the symptoms vanish, even to the point of being able to eat foods that are not good for reflux: spicy things, tomatoes, a bit of coffee. In my case, this is absolutely a downstream symptom of something mind-body. Already been scoped and got a diagnosis…
Hey, I just wanted to let you know that I have the _exact_ same issue as you since 2 years. It was much worse than what you described 2 years ago. Now it's just very annoying. The diagnosis I got from my therapist is PTSD from my chikdhood due to the strong connection between stress and body. The only thing I found that alleviates my symptoms short term is lots of Buddhist meditation (1-2 hours per day). I wish you a…
How'd you get started?
Re: Why I left my tech job to work on chronic pain
#76Earlier quoted context omitted.
Western medicine “can’t treat stress” but Eastern medicine definitely claims to be able to. But then so do various nebulous “alternative medicines”. Another comment mentioned deep meditation as being effective, and I believe there are a number of studies that have shown it to have actual effect. I’ll add another tried and true stress cure but with a twist. Exercise has consistently been shown to help reduce stress, b…
> Western medicine “can’t treat stress” This is false. Therapy is designed to do just this and it’s readily available in different modalities that have been trialed and studied. You can book an appointment with a therapist today and start working on techniques to build stress resilience and stress handling techniques > but Eastern medicine definitely claims to be able to. But then so do various nebulous “alternative…
I don't think the allure of Eastern medicine has much to do with a feeling that it's ancient or secret. It's pretty normal here in Taiwan to go to a TCM clinic here in Taiwan for various treatments, including stress. The practitioners have degrees and certifications for it.
I can't say how much is placebo, but there isn't really anything mysterious about it.
Re: Why I left my tech job to work on chronic pain
#77“As pain becomes chronic, it is increasingly associated with activity in the affective and motivational systems tied to avoidance and less closely tied to systems encoding nociceptive input” [1] I’ve been on the slippery slope of chronic pain. Minor post surgery issues caused me to change my routine and avoid certain activities which only exacerbated the issues, which led to more avoidance. Eventually I couldn’t walk…
> Minor post surgery issues My wife has had two surgeries and each time she had a minor post surgery issue. One of them was an area that was tender to touch; another was chronic pain. Neither was mentioned as a possible side effect of the surgery by the surgeon. The main takeaway even if a bit extreme here is avoid all surgeries unless absolutely necessary.
Depending on the underlying issue, delaying a surgery could easily lead to needing an even more invasive or extensive procedure, with worse complications or side effects. A blanket avoidance of all surgeries is a great way to be even more miserable.
Anecdotal case: My wife broke her arm some 10 years ago or so. She was really upset about potential recovery time, insurance copayments and such, especially since she was (at the time) a single mother. The doctor suggested setting it and letting it heal on its own, which was absolutely the wrong call. Had she gotten surgery straight away, she would have recovered by the time she actually ended up getting surgery.
I've often wondered if there wasn't a malpractice case that could have been made, but it was before we met so that's lost to time.
Re: Why I left my tech job to work on chronic pain
#78“As pain becomes chronic, it is increasingly associated with activity in the affective and motivational systems tied to avoidance and less closely tied to systems encoding nociceptive input” [1] I’ve been on the slippery slope of chronic pain. Minor post surgery issues caused me to change my routine and avoid certain activities which only exacerbated the issues, which led to more avoidance. Eventually I couldn’t walk…
> Minor post surgery issues My wife has had two surgeries and each time she had a minor post surgery issue. One of them was an area that was tender to touch; another was chronic pain. Neither was mentioned as a possible side effect of the surgery by the surgeon. The main takeaway even if a bit extreme here is avoid all surgeries unless absolutely necessary.
Surgery is a bigger deal than doctors make it seem, but after surgery care can make a huge difference.
I had a surgery asked for more pain meds once on day 5 or 6. Instead the surgeon had me come in to look at the wound, made a tiny incision a blob of pus came out and things felt fine the next day. That’s the kind of thing that could have easily resulted in major problems, but just the right treatment at just the right time fixed it.
Re: Why I left my tech job to work on chronic pain
#79For people on the spectrum here, just want to add to the thread the term Fibromyalgia
It seems to be relatively common and under diagnosed. Also somehow controversial and not fully understood
However, looking into it might shed some light on some issues of chronic pain and potential ways to address it
Re: Why I left my tech job to work on chronic pain
#80I felt like I was dying at 35 years old, my body was completely betraying me, exhausted, constant pain, no life as absolutely no energy on days off and still exhausted starting the next week. Even years in the Army never left me feeling like that I had no idea it was the misery of the IT job that was causing most of my pain and suffering, and it had nothing to do with the job itself, it was the endless insanity of ev…
[flagged]