One Woman's Experience of Living with Chronic Pain: The Proclamation of Voice

ABSTRACT Emphasis within chronic pain literature is placed upon lost productivity of patients, escalating health care costs, and denunciation of compensation/disability claims, with exiguous recognition of the personal costs of chronic pain. Sufferers, particularly women, are vulnerable to being pathologized and labeled through the psychologizing of their pain and subsequently silenced in the pursuit of health care services. By means of an illness narrative, this article illustrates the invaluable contribution the chronic pain sufferer can make towards the understanding of her pain. Social work, as a health profession, will be challenged to listen to women's stories and to empower sufferers in the proclamation of their own voices, in an efficient movement towards participatory service delivery.