Acceptance and Commitment Therapy for Chronic Pain by JoAnne Dahl

Author:JoAnne Dahl [JoAnne C. Dahl, Carmen Luciano]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781608826681
Publisher: New Harbinger Publications

Therapist: Why did you come here Elisabeth?

Elisabeth: I don’t really know. I just don’t like my life anymore, it feels meaningless.

Therapist: What is it you want to have in your life that you don’t have today?

Elisabeth: I feel like my pain takes up all my time. If I could just get rid of this terrible pain, maybe I could live again.

Therapist: Is that why you came here Elisabeth, to get rid of your pain?

Elisabeth: Yes, could you help me? If I could just make it more manageable so I could do a little more.

Therapist: If we got rid of your pain, what would you like to do more of that you don’t do today?

Elisabeth: Right now, I would just like to be able to go to the store and carry home a bag of groceries by myself.

Therapist: Why do you want to be able to do that?

Elisabeth: I don’t want to be dependent on people for everything.

Therapist: Why don’t you want to be dependent?

Elisabeth: I’ve always been an active, independent person who helps other people. I don’t want to have to get help just to shop.

Therapist: Is that what you miss Elisabeth? Being an active independent person who helps other people?

Elisabeth: Yes, I loved helping people: my family, my neighbors, and neighborhood kids. They used to come to me because I listened to them and could help them. I was good at helping people. They really appreciated me and life felt meaningful.

Therapist: So you miss that role you played, helping other people and feeling appreciated because you took the time to listen and help.

Elisabeth: Yes, I felt like I meant something then. Now, because of this pain, I’m too tired to do anything like that.

Therapist: I’m really interested in the life you want, Elisabeth. Not just going to the grocery store by yourself, but what you really want your life to mean.

The goal of ACT is to help clients contact their life as a conscious human being and consistently choose to act in alignment with their values, even in the presence of difficult private events such as pain, stress, fatigue, and the client’s verbal fusion with their thoughts about these symptoms. ACT theory specifies a general kind of functional analysis. That is, the theory underlying ACT suggests what it is that we are likely to find in a given case. What justifies this idea, despite the fact that ACT is a behavior analytic approach, is that these processes are thought to flow from human language itself. In other words, there is a likely generic functional analysis specified in ACT, but within that generic model specific analyses need to be conducted to a) see if the generic model fits the case, and b) to provide important details about how these processes are manifest in a given case.

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