The title of this topic is, "I am afraid the pain will never end."

The fear is what needs to stop. It only adds more stress and PMR thrives on stress. When we talk about it, understand what happened, describe it to ourselves and others, then the pain eventually decreases. If the fear of pain takes over, the suffering never ends. I hate the terminology that we are "PMR sufferers."

A therapist helped me to understand the difference between pain and suffering. The expectation that I should be "pain free" wasn't realistic for me.

The biologic I currently take also helped a great deal. I told the therapist I was only in the "eye of the storm" when I first tapered off prednisone while on the biologic. I was afraid to do anything because I thought the storm was still all around me.

Eventually, I decided to aquacise and I still do this. At first I was afraid that I would drown until I discovered I could still swim! Swimming hurt a bit at first but I expected it to hurt.