Episode 50: Grit, Gratitude and Grace: A positive mindset can improve pain and resilience

This week join your patient co-hosts Tiffany Westrich-Robertson, Deb Constein, and Patrice Johnson as they take us back stage at the American College of Rheumatology Annual Conference. This episode will focus on a session from ACR titled “Grit, Gratitude, and Grace” about the impact that positive psychology can have on disease and pain management for AiArthritis patients. Researchers induced pain in healthy adult military cadets to study the relationship between mindset and pain perception. They found that subjects with more positive attitudes, resilience to adversity, and growth mindsets reported lower pain levels than those who did not share those traits. Scientists have also discovered a link between pain and mental health. Depression and anxiety can even trigger an inflammatory response and the corresponding pain in some people. But patients know that just telling someone to have a positive attitude does not help them, so Tiffany, Deb, and Patrice will dig into the specific ways that you can harness grit, gratitude, and grace to feel happier and experience less pain. The mission of AiArthritis is to elevate and center the patient voice in global conversations with all stakeholders about solving problems facing the autoimmune and autoinflammatory arthritis community. AiArthritis Voices - our online platform designed to deepen these conversations - allows all patients and parents of juvenile patients to attend conferences like ACR through our innovative new Learn and Connect section. So come join us to continue this and other conversations!   Patient Voices and All Other Stakeholders - Join our AiArthritis Voices Program and Connect to Opportunities to Have Your Voice Counted!   If you are a patient, a parent of a juvenile patient, or any other stakeholder (doctor, nurse, researcher, industry representative, or other health services person) - are you ready to join the conversation? It's your turn to pull up a seat. Join our new AiArthritis Voices program, where people living with AiArthritis diseases and other stakeholders who we need 'at the table' to solve problems that impact education, advocacy, and research sign up to have a voice in our initiatives. By signing up, you’ll get notified of opportunities to be more involved with this show - including submitting post-episode comments and gaining insider information on future show topics. Patients and all other stakeholders are encouraged to join so we can match you with opportunities to pull up a seat and TOGETHER - as equals - solve the problems of today and tomorrow. JOIN TODAY!   AiArthritis Voices 360 is produced by the International Foundation for Autoimmune and Autoinflammatory Arthritis. Visit us on the web at www.aiarthritis.org/talkshow. Find us on Twitter, Instagram, TikTok, or Facebook (@ifAiArthritis) or email us ([email protected]).   Show Notes: Episode 50 – “Grit, Gratitude, and Grace”   00:52 - Tiffany welcomes listeners 01:37 - Tiffany is joined today by Deb and Patrice, who attended the virtual American College of Rheumatology Conference with Tiffany 02:49 - Patients are increasingly demanding a “whole body approach” to treating AiArthritis Diseases which may include non-pharmacologic therapies 03:31 - One of the sessions at ACR discussed the effect of positive mindset on disease and pain management 06:38 - The speaker focused heavily on how individuals respond to adversity and why some people are more resilient than others 06:59 - When you experience adversity, what happens inside your body? 07:28 - People who are more resilient (ie have grit) tend to experience less pain 08:23 - People with military training tend to have strong resilience, so researchers studied grit in cadets by inducing pain in healthy subjects 09:13 - The cadets with the most positive attitudes had higher pain thresholds and more resilience to pain 09:40 - Other research has shown that depression and anxiety can trigger inflammatory responses and pain in subjects 11:30 - People with a fixed mindset (as opposed to a growth mindset) are more likely to feel depressed and have higher levels of pain 12:24 - There are two types of gratitude:  worldly (where you are thankful for specific things) and spiritual (where you are thankful to a higher power for all you have) 13:09 - Keeping a 30 Day Gratitude Journal can help people experience less turmoil, less anxiety, and less pain 14:16 - Deb is thankful in some ways for her disease because it has connected her to so many people and experiences that are very rewarding 15:19 - Grace is a feeling beyond simple thankfulness where you identify a direction and purpose in life 16:35 - People who feel like they have a purpose in life reportedly experience less anxiety, less depression, and better sleep 19:00 - Tiffany, Deb, and Patrice share their self-identified character strengths 22:28 - If you are a patient or the parent of a juvenile living with an AiArthritis disease, please join us at aiarthritisvoices.org to attend more conferences like this and continue this conversation with us 23:26 - Tiffany invites listeners to get involved in any of our projects by visiting us on the web at aiarthritis.org 23:40 - Please consider supporting the show by donating at aiarthritis.org/talkshow 23:54 - Tiffany thanks listeners for their support as AiArthritis Voices 360 celebrates our first Anniversary as a talkshow