Most Comforting Book about Chronic Pain

The most comforting book I’ve read about chronic pain was, Chronic Pain, by  Rob Prince.

One of the things I really loved about this book is that it was written by a pastor who lived with chronic pain, and one of the first things he said in his book was that pain “sucks.”  Yes, he used that word.  It seemed like the perfect word to me.  It’s not totally politically correct for a pastor or a school teacher to use, but it’s so true.  Pain really does suck.  He also didn’t go over board and into the red zone of swear words.  I’ve been around some counselors who seem to think that they need to swear a lot to seem empathetic.  Swear words can pack a lot of power if you use them rarely, but when used frequently, they just sound crass.  When introducing the topic of chronic pain, it’s totally appropriate to say that it sucks.

Rob Prince’s book was comforting and helpful.  He had good advise like how to deal with the people we meet when we’re in chronic pain and divided them into categories like Mr. Fix-It Guy, Mr. Doubting More than Thomas Guy, Mr. Head in the Sand Guy, etc.  His explanations were so helpful in understanding the hearts of the people who kept giving me advise or who had started to avoid me, and oh so comforting.  Then later it was enlightening when I realized how many of his categories I fit into when I was the friend of someone who was hurting.  Ouch.

Finally, his book is practical and easy to read.  It’s not full of lots of high intellectual concepts or scientific facts.  Since my pain is migraines, there are times when I just can’t read some of the more complicated books.  Normally I love books that make me think deeply on a topic, but not when I’m buried in a migraine.  Pain can take up a lot of concentration.  This book was easy to read while I was in pain and gave me practical suggestions for dealing with the emotions that came with my pain.

If you deal with ongoing physical pain, I highly recommend this book, or if you know someone who does, it would make a great gift.

The book that I might read again is Walking with God Through Pain and Suffering, by Timothy Keller.  The reason I don’t list this book as the most comforting, is because if you really need this book, and you are at all type A, or a perfectionist, or read many books, this is going to be a tough book because you need to skip part one.  People who recommended the book to me told me that.  Timothy Keller even tells you that in the book!  But did I listen?  No way.  I am a type A, first born, perfectionist school teacher who reads lots of books, and I can’t just skip part of a book.  Part one is all about pail philosophies throughout history and in different cultures.  Interesting, sort of, but so not helpful when trying to figure out how to live with pain, and definitely not easy to read with a headache.

The rest of the book was amazing and super helpful.  It was so insightful that I could only read a few pages a day because there was a big idea for me to absorb and think about every few pages.  It’s a great book, but don’t get it if you think you’ll have a hard time skipping a chunk of the book.

The other thing that’s really good about this book is that it applied to physical or emotional pain, and often when you have one kind of pain, it stirs up the other kind of pain.  It was really helpful to me after I finally got through part one… hours of my life that I will never get back.  Yes, I need to learn to ease up and not be such a perfectionist.  I’m working on that.

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