CRPS, Chronic Pain, and Mental Health: A Conversation on Survival, Healing, and Hope

CRPS and mental health livestream on Facebook Live and YouTube Live

Living with Complex Regional Pain Syndrome (CRPS), chronic illness, or disability can impact every area of life — including mental health, relationships, identity, and the ability to feel safe in your own body.

In this recent livestream conversation, Gabi answers community questions related to CRPS and mental health while also sharing insight from her own 20-year journey living with CRPS. The discussion explores difficult but important topics including grief, fear, jealousy, guilt, relationships, trauma, identity loss, and the emotional reality of navigating life with chronic pain and invisible disability.

What makes this conversation especially meaningful is the combination of both professional training and lived experience. After developing CRPS at just 15 years old and spending years fighting for answers, Gabi understands firsthand the emotional and systemic challenges many people with chronic pain face daily — including isolation, medical trauma, fear, hopelessness, and the pressure to constantly justify their experience to others.

Throughout the livestream, viewers will hear an honest discussion about the neurobiological relationship between pain, fear, trauma, stress, and emotional regulation. The conversation also highlights an important message often missing in chronic pain spaces: recovery is not always about eliminating pain completely, but about rebuilding safety, connection, resilience, meaning, and quality of life alongside it.

The livestream also explores:

  • chronic pain and nervous system dysregulation

  • trauma-informed therapy for chronic illness

  • emotional resilience with disability

  • coping with uncertainty and flare-ups

  • relationships and chronic pain

  • anxiety and fear associated with CRPS

  • learning to live within “good enough”

  • rebuilding identity after loss and illness

One of the core messages shared throughout the discussion is:
“You are not too much — you are navigating too much.”

Free Livestream Worksheet

To support viewers after the livestream, a free downloadable worksheet was created to help individuals reflect on the emotional impact of chronic pain, identify nervous system stress responses, and begin developing grounding and coping strategies discussed during the conversation.

The worksheet is designed for people living with:

  • CRPS

  • chronic pain

  • chronic illness

  • disability

  • trauma-related stress

  • anxiety related to health uncertainty

Viewers are encouraged to watch the livestream first and then use the worksheet to continue processing the topics discussed at their own pace.

Watch the Livestream

https://www.youtube.com/live/A3Gqski6QpQ?si=12121l2QpkiPMQDc


References

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AskJAN. (n.d.). Reflex sympathetic dystrophy (RSD). Job Accommodation Network. https://askjan.org/disabilities/Reflex-Sympathetic-Dystrophy-RSD.cfm

Barrett, L. F., & Simmons, W. K. (2015). Interoceptive predictions in the brain. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 112(15), 4520–4526. https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.1102693108

Brown, B. (2013). Brené Brown on empathy vs sympathy [Video]. YouTube. https://youtu.be/KZBTYViDPlQ

Lumley, M. A., & Schubiner, H. (2019). Emotional awareness and expression therapy for chronic pain: Rationale, principles and techniques, evidence, and critical review. Current Rheumatology Reports, 21(7), 1–12. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11926-019-0829-6

Lumley, M. A., & Schubiner, H. (2019). Psychological therapy for centralized pain: An integrative assessment and treatment model. Psychosomatic Medicine, 81(3), 245–251. https://doi.org/10.1097/PSY.0000000000000675

Lumley, M. A., Yamin, J. B., Pester, B. D., Krohner, S., & Urbanik, C. P. (2022). Trauma matters: Psychological interventions for comorbid psychosocial trauma and chronic pain. Pain, 163(4), 599–603. https://doi.org/10.1097/j.pain.0000000000002425

Pennington, M. (2026, May 5). From CRPS patient to triathlete. Pain News Network. https://www.painnewsnetwork.org/stories/2026/5/5/from-crps-patient-to-triathlete

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