You need to continue to do your hobbies, to exercise, to do things around your home\u00a0to stay active despite your pain.\u00a0Some of you might need to watch out for a tendency to avoid these things for fear of causing pain.\u00a0However, some others of you might instead need to step back from overdoing activities, which prevents your body from getting the rest it needs to heal.<\/p>\n
Here’s a technique to help you stay in control of your pain, and balance activities and rest.<\/p>\n
The $1.00 Technique<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n 1. What<\/em> Activities? 2. Experiment <\/em>with Activities<\/strong> 3. $1.00 Worth<\/em> of Activities 4. Be Creative<\/em> –\u00a0and Careful<\/em> – with Your $1.00 If you garden for 3 hours in the morning, and this spends 75\u00a2, you know you only have 25\u00a2 left for the day. So you can’t garden for another 3 hours in the afternoon. But perhaps you can walk at a slow pace with your family for 30 minutes.<\/p>\n If you have an event you want to go to at night, and you estimate that this event will spend 80\u00a2, you’ll need to take it easy during the day, so you’ll have enough reserve for the evening.<\/p>\n At times you’ll go over your $1.00 on a given day.\u00a0But then recognize that either the day before, or the day after, you’ll have to take it easy.\u00a0Maybe you can save up 50\u00a2 from the day before, and use 50\u00a2 from the following day, so you can do more than usual.\u00a0For example, if you have friends visiting on Saturday and you’ll be doing a lot, plan for this.\u00a0You might take it easy on both Friday and Sunday.\u00a0You might also be in more pain than usual at the end of Saturday during their visit, but you’ll have a plan to manage that.<\/p>\n Sometimes Being in More Pain is Worth It… 5. Earning<\/em>\u00a0Money to Add to Your $1.00 Once again, your goal is to live your life as fully as possible, despite<\/em> having chronic pain. Happy spending!<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" You need to continue to do your hobbies, to exercise, to do things around your home\u00a0to stay active despite your pain.\u00a0Some of you might need to watch out for a tendency to avoid these things for fear of causing pain.\u00a0However, some others of you might instead need to step back from overdoing activities, which prevents […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-13","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-1"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.howtocopewithpain.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.howtocopewithpain.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.howtocopewithpain.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.howtocopewithpain.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.howtocopewithpain.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=13"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/www.howtocopewithpain.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8045,"href":"https:\/\/www.howtocopewithpain.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13\/revisions\/8045"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.howtocopewithpain.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=13"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.howtocopewithpain.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=13"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.howtocopewithpain.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=13"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\n<\/strong>First, discuss with your doctor what types of activities you can do and for how long.<\/p>\n
\nNext, experiment with different types of activities and different lengths of time doing these activities.\u00a0You want to see if, and by how much, your pain increases when you do certain things.\u00a0Your goal is to do as much activity as possible, even if your discomfort increases somewhat, but not to the point of higher and higher pain levels as days go by. For example, let’s say you start Monday morning at a pain level of 5, and by the end of the day, your pain level is 7.\u00a0That’s okay, as long as by Tuesday morning, your level is back to 5 again.<\/p>\n
\n<\/strong>After experimenting, you’ll have a better idea of the amount of activity you can do. Assign that amount of activity $1.00. Now each day you can “spend” $1.00.<\/p>\n
\n<\/strong>So, you have $1.00 each day.\u00a0Let’s look at some examples.<\/p>\n
\nYou’re<\/em> deciding what to do, rather than your pain dictating what you do.\u00a0There are many things that are worth more discomfort\u00a0– you<\/em> decide what they are.\u00a0You’re balancing activities with rest.\u00a0By using the $1.00 technique, you also have a way to keep track of your pain levels across the day and across several days.<\/p>\n
\n<\/strong>You also have ways to add to your $1.00 by using all the pain management skills you know.\u00a0Perhaps some quiet time in the afternoon will bring your pain levels down. Do a relaxation technique. Talk with a friend. Take a bath. Do a guided imagery. Watch a funny movie.\u00a0If your pain levels go down, you’ll have more activity “money” to “spend.”<\/p>\n