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Why Fighting Pain Makes It Worse: ACT’s Alternative Approach
When pain becomes a daily part of life, it’s natural to want it gone. We try everything to fight it—medications, rigid routines, endless treatments, and second or third opinions. Our days can become centered around appointments, prescriptions, and symptoms. We put our energy into “fixing” the pain in hopes of returning to a life we used to recognize.
But what if the constant battle with pain is actually making things worse?
Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) offers a radically different approach: instead of fighting pain at every turn, it teaches you how to stop struggling and start living. At Bydand Therapy, we specialize in helping clients make that shift—not by minimizing their pain, but by helping them change their relationship with it.
The Pain-Fight Trap
When you’re hurting, fighting pain seems like the logical thing to do. But many people with chronic pain find that the more they resist their experience, the worse it feels—not just physically, but emotionally and spiritually too.
Fighting pain often leads to:
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Increased stress and emotional exhaustion.
Pain becomes the enemy, and life becomes a battlefield. Constant tension takes a toll on your nervous system, draining your energy. -
Avoidance of activities you once enjoyed.
You might stop hiking, playing with your kids, cooking, socializing, or even laughing freely—not because you can’t, but because you’re afraid of making the pain worse or feel defeated before you begin. -
Fixation on symptoms that amplifies suffering.
Monitoring every twinge or flare-up trains your brain to stay on high alert. This hypervigilance actually increases your sensitivity to pain. -
Disconnection from meaningful parts of life.
When pain dominates your focus, relationships, hobbies, and goals begin to fade into the background.
This doesn’t mean you’re “failing” at pain management—it means you’re human. Most of us haven’t been taught any other way to respond. But there is an alternative.
How ACT Offers a Different Path
ACT (Acceptance and Commitment Therapy) invites a gentle but powerful shift in how you relate to your pain. Rather than declaring war on your body, it asks:
What if the pain is here—and life is still worth living?
Here’s how ACT reshapes the experience of chronic pain:
1. Acceptance Over Resistance
Acceptance in ACT doesn’t mean passivity or surrender. It means making room for pain instead of pushing it away.
Think of it like this: if you’re caught in quicksand, thrashing makes you sink faster. Similarly, constantly fighting pain tends to pull you in deeper. Acceptance is about softening your struggle—acknowledging the reality of pain without letting it consume your identity or values.
At Bydand Therapy, we guide clients to explore what it’s like to stop fighting for just a moment—to create space for their experience and notice what opens up.
2. Defusion from Pain-Centered Thoughts
Pain doesn’t only hurt physically—it can also dominate your thoughts. You may find yourself thinking:
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“I can’t live like this.”
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“This will never end.”
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“No one understands.”
These thoughts can feel true, but ACT teaches us to see them for what they are: mental events, not facts. This process is called defusion—creating distance from painful thoughts so you can choose how much power they have.
You don’t have to “think positively” or pretend the pain isn’t there. You just learn to relate to your thoughts with more flexibility and freedom.
3. Present-Moment Awareness
Pain often pulls us into the past—what we’ve lost, what we used to do—or the future—what might worsen or never heal. Both directions can increase suffering.
ACT helps you return to the present moment, again and again. Why? Because the present is where life is happening. It’s where laughter, connection, beauty, and choice still exist—even with pain.
Mindfulness practices in ACT help train attention back to the here and now—not as a distraction, but as a way of being more alive and less consumed.
4. Values-Based Action
One of the most empowering aspects of ACT is that it doesn’t ask you to wait until you’re “pain-free” to live your life.
It asks instead: What matters most to you?
And then: What would it look like to take a step in that direction—even with pain in the passenger seat?
Whether it’s being a present parent, expressing creativity, helping others, or deepening your spiritual life, your values are a compass. ACT teaches you how to move toward those values, even when conditions aren’t ideal.
At Bydand Therapy, we help clients reconnect with what matters so that pain no longer makes every decision for them.
5. Committed Action
Living by your values doesn’t always mean making huge, sweeping changes. It often starts small:
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Sending a text to a friend
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Sitting outside with your morning coffee
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Stretching for five minutes
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Writing a few lines in a journal
These tiny acts of engagement reconnect you to life. Over time, they build momentum. You begin to rediscover meaning—not because the pain went away, but because it stopped being in charge of your story.
Living, Not Just Surviving
It’s easy to fall into the belief that you’ll start living “once the pain is gone.” But if the pain doesn’t go away—what then?
ACT offers the radical idea that you can live a rich, full, and meaningful life even with chronic pain. Not by ignoring it, not by loving it, but by learning to carry it differently.
You are more than your symptoms. You are more than your medical chart or treatment history. You are a whole person with hopes, humor, courage, and choices.
ACT doesn’t promise a cure. It promises something better: a return to yourself. A chance to stop living in reaction to pain and start living in alignment with what really matters.
Why Bydand Therapy?
At Bydand Therapy, we understand how complex and exhausting chronic pain can be—physically, emotionally, and relationally. Our approach is grounded in Acceptance and Commitment Therapy, a method backed by research and compassion.
We work with clients across California and Wyoming through telehealth, offering accessible, individualized support from the comfort of your home. Whether your pain stems from a medical condition, trauma, or something less defined, we can help you explore a different path forward—one rooted in resilience, clarity, and meaning.
You don’t have to do this alone. And you don’t have to keep fighting to prove how strong you are. We see you.
Are you tired of fighting pain every day?
Let’s explore how ACT can help you live more freely—even with pain.
Reach out today to schedule your free 15-minute consultation with Bydand Therapy. We offer telehealth psychotherapy in California and Wyoming—and international coaching for those outside those states who are interested in exploring their relationship with pain through the lens of Bowen Family Systems and ACT.
