Life Coaching to Help You Through Physical Problems

In Pain?

Life coaching is not the same as therapy, but I have had clients say that after talking it felt as though they'd had had good therapy.  What they mean is it felt they'd been listened to, refreshed, and sometimes armed with a plan. 

Today I read a report where scientists assigned "talk therapy" to patients with chronic pain (some with fibromyalgia, some with headaches). 

Some either used "talk therapy" alone  OR  "exercise" with "talk therapy".

Each "talk therapy" session was 30 to 45 minutes once a week for seven weeks (similar to what a life coach offers).


* THERAPY BY PHONE VS. THERAPY IN PERSON

Prior to the study evidence had concluded that talk therapy delivered by phone was as effective as face-to-face therapy.


* TALK THERAPY ALONE STUDY

The "talk therapy" was pointed toward helping patients choose specific lifestyle goals and helping them to make changes to unhealthy thinking patters. 

For the purpose of the study, therapists were trained, but actually, working with a suitable  life coach may have had similar results.


* TALK THERAPY PLUS EXERICSE

Those in the exercise group met with a fitness instructor once a month for six months and they exercised 20 minutes to an hour at least twice a week as well as participated in talk therapy weekly.



* STUDY RESULTS

Three months after the study ended, those who had participated in  phone talk therapy with or without exercise showed more improvement than those who’d stayed with their usual care alone.

Those who engaged in both talk therapy and exercise did only slightly better than those who'd received talk therapy alone. 

Chance are the patient in the talk therapy alone study may have also done his own exercise as it would be a logical lifestyle change to include, thus the small difference in results.


The new study is quoted as being the latest addition to clinical trials for the purpose of demonstrating talk therapy’s effectiveness in treating chronic pain and headache.  (Russell Portenoy, MD, chair of the department of pain medicine and palliative care at New York’s Beth Israel Medical Center.)