Recovery from an injury or illness needs to incorporate many aspects: physical, mental/emotional and spiritual. As a health care professional, I see that the majority of us fixate on the physical components of heeling. A multi-modal approach to recovery would be more beneficial. The focus of this post is the mental/emotional aspect of recovery.
I had a conversation today with my Brother who is battling stage IV pancreatic cancer (CA) and the importance of a positive attitude in recovery. He is by far one of the most positive people I know, and he continues to beat the odds with his recovery. I don’t think this is a surprise, as a positive psychological outlook can have amazing effects on health and heeling.
I compiled a list of a few things that have been shown to be effective in recovery. This is a program I encourage my patients to engage in daily during their physical rehabilitation program.
educate yourself about injury
knowledge is power and by understanding what to expect during the rehabilitation process, you will have reduced anxiety and a feeling of control.
- What is my diagnosis (what type of injury do I have)
- How long will recovery take?
- What is the purpose of the treatments I am receiving?
- What should I expect during rehab?
- What alternative workouts can I safely do?
- What are the warning signs that I am getting worse?
- What are my treatment options?
Keep perspective
focus on the present and what you can do to recover now. Think of the future, but not so much that you loose focus on the here and now.
Focus on the things you can control
- Sleep schedule: consistent times sleeping and awakening, allowing more sleep for a healing body
- Nutritional health: eat plant based, antioxidant foods (The Game changers/Netflix)
- Maintain fitness during injury; focus on flexibility or strength in a region that is not injured and do a low-level cardiovascular exercise daily to promote blood flow and healing response.
- Practice gratitude, start a daily journal; record three things daily you are thankful for. At my house we always share a high of the day at dinner time.
Stay with your rehabilitation program
Do not stop too soon or skip treatments, there are many phases of recovery and staying engaged in your recovery is helpful in itself.
Visualization and meditation
- Visualization 5 min daily of you performing sport at peak of health, thinking of each component of a skill and visualize yourself doing it over and over again
- Meditate daily 10 min, prior to visualization to clear your mind. The purpose of meditation is to not be thinking and focus on your breath. (calm, headspace )
Set clear and realistic goals
- This can be as simple as getting up to make your bed daily. I like to start small, so that you can accomplish goals each week. Ie: when I broke multiple ribs a couple years ago, my goal was to walk my dog daily, it didn’t matter how far but just to get outside and move.
Do not be afraid or too proud to ask for help
- We all need help at times building our confidence or performing normal tasks. Keep engaged with your network (friends, family, teammates, colleagues, etc…) In the time of social distancing we have technology as a tremendous way to stay connected.