The article addresses in layman's language many of the issues brought up the past week in this board. From the many postings the past few days, it's obvious than only a few of the posters have read the article.

Our worst enemies in dealing with chronic health issues are ignorance, strong negative emotion, inactivity, cynicism and resignation. Knowledge is the first essential step in effectively living with and eventually ameliorating a chronic health problem if amelioration is possible. That's especially true with chronic pain.

The article, without offering solutions, explains what chronic pain is and how it differs dramatically from acute pain. It speaks directly to all of us in this board. Unless you understand the basis of your chronic pain, you're just guessing on what will magically make it better, and are bound to usually be unsuccessful.

Don't expect your doctors to be effective. If they knew what to do with our chronic conditions, the conditions wouldn't be chronic. My experience, duplicated by many on this board, is that our doctors don't have a clue how to diagnose and treat PN, and that includes neurologists. Most of their diagnosis consists of naming our problem, but not diagnosing to heal. Instead, they listen to drug salesmen's pitches and then throw drugs at us. All drugs for PN and chronic pain as yet offer only partial relief at best, no cure, and loads of side effects.

Whether we take drugs or not, we can do a lot to help ourselves. It's up to us. Most of the people on this board who have taken responsibility for their health and healing have either gotten better, or have learned to be at peace with their condition so they could live a good life.