Relaxation

Understanding your need for relaxation

When humans feel scared or in danger, our bodies respond through the fight or flight response.

The body gets ready for action – literally, either ready to fight or ready to run to safety.
To prepare, the body sends extra blood flow to the muscles, raises the heartbeat and blood pressure, and tightens your muscles for speed and strength.
The fight or flight response was intended for moments of extreme need to help you survive danger.
But our bodies are not meant to stay in this state all of the time.
Most importantly, while these changes are helpful for our survival from a life or death threat, they have consequences for our physical and emotional well-being if they persist for a long period of time.
This includes making our pain, fatigue, and stress worse.

One of the most effective tools for managing pain, fatigue, and other symptoms is to learn how to stop or calm the fight or flight response.

Chronic pain doesn't need to be met by this alarm-type response.
If we can calm ourselves, we can also calm our nervous system, reduce our stress, and give ourselves a chance to find other ways to cope with our pain, fatigue, and other symptoms.

We calm our system through relaxation strategies.

A state of relaxation is the opposite of the "fight or flight response".
It changes how you deal, emotionally and physically, with stress.
Relaxation is a very effective tool for managing pain and several symptoms that are also experienced by people with chronic pain, including fatigue, problems with sleep, stress, and depressed mood.

What are relaxation benefits?

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Relaxation is a helpful tool for chronic pancreatitis symptoms like fatigue, pain, sleep problems, stress, and depressed or anxious mood. This is because:

Tense muscles make pain worse. Your body naturally protects itself by tensing muscles around an area that hurts or that it needs to protect. When your muscles are tense for too long, your pain may increase. Relaxation helps decrease this muscle tension that occurs when feeling pain.
Relaxation is also a way to counter the well-known negative effects stress has on pain and other physical problems (counteracts the "fight-or-flight" response).
Relaxation also has a beneficial effect on the areas of the brain that are involved in sensing and reducing pain.
It is common to feel tense when you feel depressed or anxious. Relaxation helps decrease physical and mental tension that can make depression and anxiety worse.
Relaxation can help you sleep better. See the Sleep module for more information.
Relaxation is a good way to take a break or "time-out" from stressful situations or emotions. It is a helpful activity you can do to take care of yourself.
People are usually better at planning and problem-solving when they feel relaxed compared to when they feel stressed.

What will I learn in this module?

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I try to relax, but it doesn't seem to help

Do you still feel tense even after trying to relax?
Restful activities such as lying on the couch or watching TV may not trigger the relaxation response.
The relaxation response occurs when you teach your body how to relax more fully and on command by using active relaxation techniques, such as deep breathing.
As you practice these techniques, they will become more natural and help you reach a calming state of relaxation.

In this module you will learn how to:

Achieve the relaxation response.
Overcome barriers and challenges to practicing relaxation exercises.
Utilize relaxation exercises in your daily life and pain management. The following video will teach you how to relax by yourself:

Relaxation exercises

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A good relaxation exercise is one that you enjoy and will do regularly. This module offers you several different relaxation exercises to try:

Autogenic
Deep breathing
Body scan
Guided imagery
Mindfulness meditation
Mini relaxation

You can learn and practice any or all of these relaxation exercises so that you find one or two that you can use regularly in the future to help manage your pain.

Autogenic relaxation

Click here for a guided exercise on autogenic relaxation that will help you decrease bodily tension through deep breathing and awareness.

Duration: 10 minutes
Diminishes physiological arousal
Trains the body to calm physiological processes

Deep Breathing

The following audio is designed to teach you how to breathe deeper and more effectively, which may decrease your anxiety and improve your mood.

Duration: 5 minutes
Improves the quality of your breathing to help you relax.
One of the easiest and most effective relaxation skills

Guided Imagery

The following audio will guide you through a visualization exercise where you remember a place that you feel fondly about and focus all your attention on that setting.

Duration: 6 minutes
Uses mental imagery of calm places to induce relaxation
Uses all your senses to produce a vivid mental image that distracts you from stress

Body Scans – Exercise 1

The following clip will guide you through a floor relaxation exercise aimed at decreasing bodily tension.

Duration: 6 minutes
Mentally scan your body for stress
Decreases tension

Body Scans – Exercise 2

Listen to the audio below for a chair relaxation exercise that will release stress in your body.

Duration: 7 minutes
Mentally scan your body for stress
Decreases tension

Mindfulness Meditation

The audio below is a guided meditation that will help you focus on the present moment.

Duration: 2 minutes
Focuses one's attention on the present moment.
Allows negative thoughts to flow through one's mind without evoking stress
When we do not attach our minds to negative thoughts, they have less energy, and it is easier to let them go.

Mini Progressive Muscle Relaxation

The following audio will guide you through a relaxation exercise in which you learn to tense and release different muscles in your body.

Duration: 4 minutes
A quick technique for achieving the relaxation response
Recommended after you have mastered other techniques that take longer
Can be more easily applied in real-world settings outside the home

How to practice relaxation often

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Practicing relaxation regularly, even when you are feeling well, can have beneficial effects, including reducing the number and severity of painful episodes and building energy. The more you use relaxation, the more benefit from it you'll discover.

This skill, like all the skills described in this module, is most helpful when practiced.
It is best to practice relaxation exercises often. We recommend that you practice a relaxation exercise once a day for 10-30 minutes.
Even practicing for a couple of minutes a day helps you learn this skill, and using it becomes more and more automatic.
It's also best, when you're learning a new skill, to practice it when your symptoms are not at their worst.
Try to find a quiet place to relax. Being in a calm and quiet place makes it easier to relax.
You can practice relaxation with or without the assistance of guided recordings.
The more you practice, the more this tool will benefit you and help you when your symptoms are bothersome.
Use a journal to log when you practice. You may also rate your stress level before and after practicing, using a 0-10 rating (0 = not at all stressed to 10 = worst stress/discomfort imaginable)

Overcoming Barriers to Practice

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It might seem counterproductive to spend time practicing relaxation when life is so busy. However, relaxation may improve your pain, stress, and ability to focus on what you are doing.

Below are some common barriers people face when learning to control their body's relaxation response.

I don't have time to practice

Your ability to relax can improve with regular practice.
Try doing it just a few days or nights for a few minutes each week to start.
With time, it may become easier for you to relax as you learn how to do it.
You may start looking forward to your "relaxation time".

I want to relax, but other people need me

Sometimes, other people need you, leaving you little or no time for yourself.
Explain to them that having time for yourself to relax may help reduce your pain, raise your energy level, and ease your stress.
To protect this time, you may want to talk with them about how much they can ask of you and when.
Making time for yourself may feel selfish at first, but it is important that you make time to take care of you.
The Communication module can help you find ways to talk to others about this concern.

I'm not sure I'm relaxing the right way

If the approaches discussed here aren't working for you, there are other books, tapes, and classes that can help you learn more ways to relax.
A good way to tell if you are being effective is to write down what you are doing. (See the Worksheet for Relaxation).

I don't feel comfortable when I relax

If you are not used to being quiet with yourself, it's possible you may become anxious or more aware of any bodily discomfort at first instead of feeling calm and rested.
This new awareness of your body is normal, especially if you're used to feeling tense.
A small number of people may get very emotional and upset when they try certain relaxation techniques.
If this happens to you, feel free to stop the relaxation technique.
Talk with your healthcare provider about what you are feeling.

I have a hard time sitting still

For some people, it is hard to sit or lie still when they are first practicing relaxation.
If this is true for you, you might try doing a moving relaxation exercise.
This might include doing some gentle stretches and focusing on your breathing or doing deep breathing practice while taking a slow and relaxing walk.
As you get more and more comfortable with your relaxation practice, you can incorporate new things, such as being still.

It's hard making relaxation a priority

For the relaxation response to work, you need to practice regularly.
If you are having problems practicing, think about the benefits of relaxation for you.
But go easy on yourself.
It may take practice to make relaxation a regular part of your life.

A Note for Family and Friends

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How you can help:

When people we care about are struggling with their symptoms, it's normal to want to help them. Helping someone with pain to relax or practice a relaxation technique, even for just a few minutes, may have important health benefits. You may find these techniques helpful for you too! You can support the person with chronic pancreatitis and pain by:

Helping with daily chores and tasks so he or she has more time to take care of herself or himself.

Doing a relaxation exercise together:

Deep breathing
Stretching
Muscle relaxation
Meditation

Encourage the person you care about to take time to enjoy other calming activities such as:

Going for a walk.
Watching a movie.
Playing with a pet.
Calling a friend or family member.
Listening to music or audio stories.
Talk with the person with pain to see if it makes sense to schedule relaxation time on the calendar so that they remember to do it.