Episode4 Segment 5 - Relaxation techniques and mindfulness

Imagery is all about taking your attention away from what's happening and actually being able to have control over where your going, so it can be like imagining going somewhere you love, like the park for example or the beach.

It's creating, sort of, not just an image specifically in your mind but it includes what smells and, um… sounds and everything that are going on in that environment.

Because the beach was one of my favourite places to go before I was in a wheelchair, obviously you can't take a wheelchair on the sand, so I'd sit in my wheelchair and I used to think it might be hot outside, sunny, I used to sit next to the window feel the sun come through the window on your skin and, um… I use to sit there and say I want to go to the beach right now.

I wanna be at the beach jumping the waves, like surfing the waves, swimming, under water, I want to see fish under water and um… walking along the sand you can feel the sand in between your toes and then the, um… the waves crash, and gently, like come up to your ankles.

And then you look out and you can see dolphins jumping and you can like swim and you can feel like your hair like blowing in the wind and you can feel the sand in between your toes and like everywhere I'm not sitting in a wheelchair right now I'm surfing at the beach with fish around me and dolphins everywhere and it's a good way to get, like get your mind off pain for a while.

Kids that I see find imagery really helpful, they say it takes a bit of practice but it can really help with your pain.

Progressive muscle relaxation is all about tensing the different muscles in the body and then releasing them, the real idea of this is to notice what it feels like when it is tense and actually when it's relaxed, by doing that you can actually start to be able to get some control over those and actually learn to relax some of those muscles that tense up on their own.

But it's really helpful if you can include things like your face, your neck, your shoulders, your back, your stomach, your arms, your hands but there's no particular order that you need to do them in.

Spend a minute just noticing any sensations that you can feel in that area.

For example, warm, cool, painful, tense.

Intentionally tense the muscle group for ten seconds and notice what it feels like Be careful to not over tense areas that are painful.

Let go of any tensions in those muscles and allow those muscles to relax.

Do not rush.

This process should take you about fifteen minutes.

You may want to first learn and practice using the progressive muscle relaxation technique at a time when your pain is not at it's worst.

You should try to make a habit of checking your body for signs of tension a few times a day.

Becoming aware of tension is an important first step in learning to relax.

Try to sit still for a moment.

You can close your eyes if you want to.

Feel your breath go up your nose.

Feel your chest rise as you breathe in, and out.

Now place your hand on your chest or abdomen and notice what it feels like as it rises and falls.

While breathing slowly, check that your breathing using your diaphragm, that's just above your belly and not just your upper chest.

If you have one hand on your chest and one hand just above your belly it should be the lower hand that moves more.

Do this again.

Feel your breath go up your nose and your chest rise as you breathe in.

And fall as you breathe out.

It's really common when your trying to do focus breathing for your mind to kind of wander and get caught up in the different thoughts that are kind of going on.

What's really good then is just to bring your focus back to your breathing.

What you're doing then is actually choosing not to engage in those thoughts, not to kind of fight with them or anything and just to bring your focus back to your breathing.

Mindfulness is about being in the present moment and noticing things from moment to moment.

Even things like smells and things you see and touch and feel, but it's about that present moment.

It's really, it can be really helpful and useful to use with unhelpful thoughts to sort of interrupt those unhelpful thoughts, because if you can be in the moment you don't get pulled away by those thoughts that are coming up, that's the real idea of mindfulness.

When you do mindfulness um, you need to just stay still and kind of pay attention to what's going on, um so just it's kind of about being in the moment so noticing you know what you see hear, um can smell, taste, um touch so what you feel, but it well help you um push through things and relax you a bit.

Um you can get mindfulness apps, um and I've been practising that on the actual apps.