I haven't used it myself but I've heard great things and it closely matches your request: "Healing Back Pain: The Mind-Body Connection" by Dr. John E. Sarno (http://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/0446557684)

I haven’t had it quite as bad as you, but I’ve struggled for sure. Someone on HN recommended a book called Healing Back Pain[0] - I found it really helpful. Might be worth picking up a copy.

[0]https://www.amazon.com/Healing-Back-Pain-Mind-Body-Connectio...

I would like to recommend something different: Healing Back Pain: The Mind-Body Connection

This book shows that almost 90% of back pain is psychosomatic.

Here is Amazon link, feel free to read customer reviews:
https://www.amazon.com/Healing-Back-Pain-Mind-Body-Connectio...

I'd consider Healing Back Pain: The Mind-Body Connection to be fiction as well. Too long, shouldn't read: if you believe, your back pain will go away. I'm surprised to see the anti-scientific pseudoscience promoted.

'Healing back pain' is an interesting entry to the list. I just recalled my friend lent me this book and a reminder to now read it. Anyone who has read this book can share their thoughts?

From personal experience I would recommend two things:

- a solid core routine. Here's a good example: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4988649

- if it persists, reading the book "Healing back Pain" by John Sarno (Countless people seem to have begun the book highly skeptical and finished it pain free)

This article doesn't have one mention of TMS or the work that John Sarno did? That is borderline irresponsible.

Read "Healing Back Pain: The Mind Body Connection" by Jon Sarno.[1]

I lived with chronic knee pain for over 8 years, and would routinely have "carpal tunnel like symptoms" with my wrists.

Literally within a week of reading that book my knee pain was gone, and my wrists have not had any issues since. My personality type is exactly that described in the book, so it might not work for everyone. But boy howdy it worked for me.

[1] https://www.amazon.com/Healing-Back-Pain-Mind-Body-Connectio...

Edit: As it relates to the article - Dr. Sarno attributes most of the pain to your brain and unconscious emotional rage. It sounds kind of quackish, but he lays out excellent explanations of how your brain works against you to cause this chronic pain. I was a skeptical as well (I won't give away spoilers but the treatment plan is HILARIOUSLY simple) but it has really worked for me.

Found out it was psychosomatic. My belief that my pain was caused by structutal damage reinforced the pain. The cause of the pain seemed to rather be a combination of stress, fear, and supressed emotions. When I started working on these areas the pain resolved. It comes back now and then but now I know it's my mind messing with me so I just resolve what's stressing me at the moment and just keep using my hands and then it goes away. I dealt with this shit for years and it severely restricted my life so it's kind of a miracle to be rid of it.

I recommend reading "healing back pain" by Sarno which talks about this phenomena. The book is mainly about back pain but it applies to all kinds of psychosomatic pain. There's also a free forum with free guides and support from others who have dealt with the same: https://www.tmswiki.org/forum/

In particular the success subforum is very inspirational as it contains posts from peoole who have resolved all kinds of pain syndroms that they originally thought were caused by structural injuries (including rsi).

I feel like a shill writing this and I remember I thought people talking about this theory back in the day were paid shills. But I promised myself after I got rid of this huge burden due to the psychosomatic approach I would let people know about it no matter how many downvotes I get.

That Healing Back Pain book helped a lot of my wrist/back pain as well as my partner's back pain.

Hi, I know this isn't what you're asking for but after reading that it's "seriously reducing my quality of life." I would suggest you read "The Divided Mind" by Dr. John Sarno.

It's just a book and maybe it can help you get better fast ( you can even find the pdf on Google too I'm sure if you aren't ready to spend anything). The best part is reading the book alone can help restore the quality of your life as long as you keep an open mind. I didn't suffer from the same condition as you but I've been in a similar situation and this book changed my life (and another HNer who I recommend it too).

Also if you're suffering from back pain please also lookup "Healing back pain" by the same author.

Sorry for the unsolicited advice but I'm just trying to be helpful having been in a similar situation once. Try it before going for something so radical first. The only thing you have to lose is spending some time reading the book.

Search HN, there have been a number of threads on this topic with lots of discussion.

Also, consider that it may be pycho-somatic. No, that doesn't mean you are crazy or the pain is not real it just means your subc mind has zeroed in on your wrists to express conflict (my take). The best book in this area is by John Sarno, Healing Back Pain: The Mind-Body Connection. You can ignore his Freudian rage theory (he wasn't a psychologist) but learn his techniques and you may have success as many people have using his advice, myself included. I completely cured my "RSI" in about a month and can type for hours now without problems.

I had a severe L4/L5 herniated disc. After several months of agonizing pain I was just about ready to get on the surgery schedule with an orthopedic surgeon (Microdiscectomy). I had tried everything -- PT, prescription pain meds, acupuncture, supplements, bed rest.

The same day I saw the surgeon to schedule my surgery, I figured what the heck, I'll try anything before I get my back cut open. I went to a great, well-reviewed chiropractor, who gave me a thorough assessment and promised improvements in the next 2 months, such that I would not need surgery. I was very skeptical, but went along with it. Her adjustments and analysis did end up helping me a lot, and alleviated a lot of the pain coming from the sciatic nerve. But more than anything this bought me some time.

During this time, I read Healing Back Pain by Dr. John Sarno [0]. Many people recommended his work to me, but again, I was skeptical. I had an MRI scan showing very real structural damage to my spine and I truly didn't believe that thinking my way out of the pain would help. I read the book anyway, and I swear, the pain began dissipating. I began to adopt a new mindset -- my back is fine, the pain is arising out of my stress and awareness of the injury, not the injury itself-- and it truly worked. It's been over a year now since reading the book, and I feel leaps and bounds better. I'm back to doing the things I love (cycling, lifting weights, running), and I'm about 90% pain free. I still have some off days and I listen closely to my body when they happen. I stretch a lot, don't sit for hours at a time, and do basic mobility work every day -- these are things I want to be doing anyway, but my disc issue is even more impetus to do them.

If you're seriously considering surgery, do yourself a favor and read this book first. If you're anything like me, you'll be wildly surprised and completely grateful you did.

[0]https://www.amazon.com/Healing-Back-Pain-Mind-Body-Connectio...

I'm sorry to hear you have constant pain. I deal with constant neck pain, and I can tell you two things that really, really helped (after trying pretty much everything and even considering surgery). The first one is reading "Healing Back Pain" by John Sarno. As an engineer the prospect of reading a book to manage pain sounded quite dumb, but I can assure you it removed 90% of the pain. The other thing that worked was taking 0.5mg Clonazepam whenever the pain got worse. I got the prescription from a doctor saying that it works for some patients with chronic pain.

Please do yourself a favor and read that book, I hope it helps (it did help a very skeptical me one year ago).

I haven't checked out Healing Back Pain: The Mind-Body Connection but if you want another book that I think speaks from a similar angle, and that I know has a scientific grounding, check out A Guide to Better Movement by Todd Hargrove[1].

The crux of some recent research into pain can be summarized in a few points:

* Sometimes you'll hear patients talk about pain and look at their area of pain and find nothing in their bones/muscles/etc that would indicate they should experience pain, and sometimes you'll look at other patients and their bones/muscles/etc and find they should experience pain but they don't.

* If you have three cups of water–two of them warm, the middle one cold–and stick a finger in each cup, your finger that is in the middle, cold cup will actually feel a hot, burning sensation. Try it yourself. Pain can be misleading and not indicative of actual danger.

* Similarly, ever play a sport and not feel an injury until the next day? (I'm not talking about soreness.) This indicates that pain can be silenced, and that underlying physical damage doesn't immediately and directly cause a sensation of pain.

The mind-body connection in essence is this: your body is the territory, and your mind is the map. Your map of the territory can become out of sync with the way the territory actually is. The body is incredibly adaptable, if you teach your body to feel pain, it will, if you teach your body to move freely, it will. This doesn't mean, if you're feeling pain, go and do crazy things and hump the dragon so to speak. It does mean: approach the dragon. Lean into the pain. Allow yourself to feel pain. Recognize the pain and listen to it and learn more about where the flare-up line exists in your body. Constantly strive to elevate where the flare-up line is, mindfully and with good vibes. :)

Increasingly we're moving away from a past where physical pain is stigmatized.

[1] https://www.amazon.com/Guide-Better-Movement-Science-Practic...

I suffered a crushed vertebra last year and experienced horrendous back pain for many months. Sarno's book almost completely cured me of my pain and stiffness. I don't really understand why it works but it does. I would strongly urge anyone suffering chronic pain to read the Healing Back Pain book. Basic calisthenics and stretching has been very helpful too.

I was lying flat on my back for the third straight day. Lower back pain. There was a great amount of pain when I just rolled over, and standing up to go get water or to relieve myself was barely at the edge of possible.

This wasn't the first time I had gone through this, and it seemed to be happening more often. So I remember lying there and wondering if the politest way to commit suicide would be on a plastic tarp in my car in the parking lot of the coroner's office. If I could make it there.

There's a tablet mounted on an arm on my headboard that I can read on my back. I got to an Ask HN item asking what books had most changed your life. The top post at the time was about Dr. John Sarno's book, Healing Back Pain. I've read a lot of books in that genre, but I was desperate and figured, if it helped one guy it might help me. So I surfed over to Amazon.

The book ad pressed all my skeptic buttons. No drugs or exercise. Talk therapy for back pain. This isn't all in my head damn it! But I saw so many hundreds of positive reviews on Amazon and elsewhere, and the book was $6.99 on Kindle, so I bought it and downloaded it immediately.

Maybe an hour later I had finished the intro and chapter one. I slowly and painfully got up out of bed and started waddle/stomping around as best I could. Collapsed into bed a few minutes later. Got up again, rinse, repeat. A few hours later I was basically functional again. A week later I had to pay attention to notice the pain. Now a couple of months later I still get twinges, especially when doing heavy yard work. But the fear has subsided. I've been able to work through it.

That doesn't mean the pain won't come back. And I'm positive that this approach won't work for everyone. But I'm doing great. And my yard looks much better. That one HN post lifted me up and saved me, not quite literally, but almost.

Someone wrote it in a similar thread, I benefited from it so I want to write it again, for future readers.

I heard about someone (and then more people replied) that read "Healing Back Pain" book by John Sarno [1] and finally got rid of back pain. However strange it sounds, it seems to work. I didn't finish it yet but I already see the benefits.

[1] https://www.amazon.com/Healing-Back-Pain-Mind-Body-Connectio...

I dealt with a case of chronic patellar tendonitis for years between ages 23 and 26. Debilitating to the point where I could not go anywhere that would require me to stand in line. The book Healing Back Pain by John Sarno, which is basically the talking therapy you mentioned, was hugely transformative for me. I was able to stop fixating on the pain and focus on strength training knowing that flare up were no big deal. I'm recovered now and regularly skateboarding and standing in line again.

Edit: I should mention I spent upwards of an hour each day for those years doing physical therapy rehab. I turned down recommendations of surgery during that time as well.

I had back pain for three years, which I attributed to sitting for long hours. I had seen a doctor, multiple physical therapists, a chiropractor, and massage therapist ... all of whom provided temporary relief at best.

Upon reading 'Healing Back Pain', I came to understand that it wasn't the sitting but rather built up stress and anxieties causing the pain.

Within 1 week of reading, my back felt 80% better. Within one month, 95%. Several months later, I'm now pain-free.

My girlfriend also experiences anxiety at times and had back pain that would come and go. She read the book and it cured her back, as well.

Admittedly, I found it very strange how effective this book was. I approached it hesitantly, but it has had profound results. Check the reviews on Amazon for further support.

This book has had a great impact on my quality of life and I highly suggest it to anyone experiencing not just back pain, but any physical ailment that might be tied to stress, anxiety, tension, etc.

I don't know about this method, but for me Dr. Sarno's method worked. I was in so much pain that I could barely put my socks on without help. Then I read "Healing back pain" and it convinced me that my pain was psychosomatic. Once convinced, the pain disappeared in a day and never came back.

Dr. Sarno's theory is that the mind can use pain as a way to shift attention away from psychological problems. The subconscious does that by reducing blood flow in the target tissue, which causes pain. Now I don't understand how accepting this as the cause of the pain can make it stop, but that's what happened to me and reportedly for many of Dr. Sarno's patients.

About Dr. Sarno:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_E._Sarno

Healing Back Pain: The Mind-Body Connection by Dr Sarno litreally gave me my life back. Suffered back pain which I thought was from sitting and coding for 11 years. I had no idea emotions can have an impact on physical pain. real excruciating pain that went away almost 3/4th of the way through the book. this sounds so sales pitchy but mind body connection is real I think how now we wonder how doctors in 1950s said smoking tobacco isn't bad for you, we will wonder in future on how doctors denied the mind body connection.

I'm thankful to Dr.Sarno for his book called Healing back pain which gave me my life back from the crippling back pain.

I was in so much pain 2 years ago that all I could think about was pain but reading his book about TMS and applying his teachings has virtually reduced my pain to almost nothing without any pills, surgery, physio or exercise.

So thank you Dr.Sarno. You have changed the life of many people all over the world with your research.

I was thinking of buying that book, but he sounded like a typical wackaloon to me.
I mean, just from reading the first few lines of the Amazon review:

> Dr. John Sarno caused quite a ruckus back in 1990 when he suggested that back pain is all in the head. In his bestselling book, Healing Back Pain: The Mind-Body Connection, he claimed that backaches, slipped discs, headaches, and other chronic pains are due to suppressed anger, and that once the cause of the anger is addressed, the pain will vanish.

Slipped discs are due to suppressed anger? What the fuck?
I've been having back pain for a few years now (it returns whenever I slouch), but it started directly after a gym injury... what has that got to do with suppressed anger?