Dr. Susie and I have established quite a fab connection over the past year or so. We teamed up to help people with chronic pain with our own various ways – Dr. Susie providing her professional knowledge (and [...]
In Art and Chronic Pain – A Self Portrait, artist Soula Mantalvanos shares her experience with chronic pain, which has been a debilitating presence in her life for almost seven years. Soula suffers from Pudendal Neuralgia, a painful nerve condition that developed following an accident where a fit ball that she was sitting on burst, causing her to drop violently to the concrete floor beneath. Early on in the book Soula describes that split-second, and the devastating effects that followed. A highly active yoga-loving woman before the accident, throughout the book Soula gives a deeply personal account of the psychological, emotional and physical impacts of living with chronic pain for so many years. These negative effects were compounded by the fact that her condition Pudendal Neuralgia baffled her doctors, and took four and a half years to even diagnose.
Yes, I've found another medium to express my pain and you can own your own copy of it! I didn't see the point of creating a long description of my living with pain, sharing my tips, turning journal entries into a pain story. I am, first and foremost, before the pain life, an artist... so my book had to contain many pictures and few words, just 32 pages in fact, but I believe it's a complete story. It doesn't hold the solution for PN but it'll allow you to explain it to someone else, leave it on the coffee table, and it will be light enough to carry around. Above all I created it to express my experience so far and so that it is a bit of a companion to another PN family member. The idea was for the reader to feel empathy in a world where no one seems to understand, and to ease the pain as you look through it.
Here is my attempt to gather all references I've come across or refer to on my website for Chronic Pelvic Pain. Clearly nowhere near all the references that exist but at least one 'library' location with a bundle of great material (and one organised website!). If you've come across a resource that you think should be included, please contact me and if you are an author and have an update or other information to provide, I'd love to hear from you. I know how frustrating it is to have to sift through pages and pages of the internet, thought this might be of help to pain sufferers who simply don't have the up time. And a huge thanks to everyone who replied and supplied me updated material. Obviously I plan for this page to grow and somehow I will keep it in some kind of legible order. Currently in alpha order by author and title of their publications, perhaps as it grows, we can list by subject.
..The result is this book, a riveting collection of case histories detailing the astonishing progress of people whose conditions had long been dismissed as hopeless. We see a woman born with half a brain that rewired itself to work as a whole, a woman labeled retarded who cured her deficits with brain exercises and now cures those of others, blind people learning to see, learning disorders cured, IQs raised, aging brains rejuvenated, painful phantom limbs erased,
Explain Pain has been a huge stepping stone for patients and clinicians - not only in understanding pain but being able to communicate the concepts to others. Over 5 years on, and the book is still unprecedented in its layout, descriptive illustrations and incredible bank of information. Backed entirely by scientific evidence, Explain Pain is a recommended text at many universities but also read and enjoyed by everyday people in pain.
