The Mind-Body Couple

Can You Combine Physiotherapy with a Neuroplastic Approach? - with Jim Prussack Jr. MPT, MMT

• Tanner Murtagh and Anne Hampson • Episode 133

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What if the most powerful lever for chronic pain isn’t in your muscles or joints, but in your brain’s pain system? We sit down with Jim Prussack a physiotherapist who left a strictly structural model behind after diving deep into pain science, mentorship with John Sarno and Howard Schubiner, and years on the front lines of complex cases. The takeaway is both hopeful and concrete.

We walk through how to tell if symptoms are neuroplastic—looking at timelines, flares tied to stress, inconsistency across activities, and the absence of clear tissue damage. From there, we show why acceptance of the diagnosis is the foundation for every tool that follows, whether it’s graded exposure, cognitive functional therapy, somatic tracking, breathing, or journaling. You’ll hear how reassurance and a trauma-informed approach outperform nocebo-laden scripts like “your core is weak,” and why the best PT sometimes looks like coaching confidence rather than chasing a tight muscle.

We also get specific about mixing psychotherapy and physical therapy without sending mixed signals. For some, active PT restores trust in movement; for others, psychological work on fear, grief, and old patterns unlocks the nervous system. The unifying thread is coherence: consistent, safety-first messaging that teaches the brain to downshift from threat.

If you’re navigating persistent pain, pelvic pain, back pain, or other functional symptoms, this conversation offers a practical roadmap built on pain neuroscience, neuroplasticity, and lived clinical wisdom. Subscribe, share with someone who needs a new lens on healing, and leave a review to help others find the show.

Connect with Jim here:

Website: https://www.thepainpt.com/

YouTube Channel: https://www.youtube.com/@thepainpt

Tanner Murtagh and Anne Hampson are therapists who treat neuroplastic pain and mind-body symptoms. They are also married! In his 20s, Tanner overcame chronic pain and a fibromyalgia diagnosis by learning his symptoms were occurring due to learned brain pathways and nervous system dysregulation. Post-healing, Tanner and Anne have dedicated their lives to developing effective treatment and education for neuroplastic pain and symptoms. Listen and learn how to assess your own chronic pain and symptoms, gain tools to retrain the brain and nervous system, and make gradual changes in your life and health!


The Mind-Body Couple podcast is owned by Pain Psychotherapy Canada Inc. This podcast is produced by Alex Klassen, who is one of the wonderful therapists at our agency in Calgary, Alberta. https://www.painpsychotherapy.ca/


Tanner, Anne, and Alex also run the MBody Community, which is an in-depth online course that provides step-by-step guidance for assessing, treating, and resolving mind-body pain and symptoms. https://www.mbodycommunity.com


Also check out Tanner's YouTube channel for more free education and practices: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC-Fl6WaFHnh4ponuexaMbFQ


And follow us for daily education posts on Instagram: @painpsychotherapy


Discl...

SPEAKER_00:

Welcome to the Mind Body Couple podcast. I'm Tanner Murtaugh and I'm Ann Hampson.

SPEAKER_01:

This podcast is dedicated to helping you unlearn chronic pain and symptoms.

SPEAKER_00:

If you need support with your healing, you can book in for a consultation with one of our therapists at painpsychotherapy.ca.

SPEAKER_01:

Or purchase our online course at embodycommunity.com to access in-depth education, somatic practices, recovery tools, and an interactive community focused on healing. Links in the description of each episode. And Jim is a licensed physiotherapist and has been for over 25 years. And he specializes in treating neuroplastic pain and symptoms. So thanks so much for being on, Jim. Thanks, Tanner, for having me. I really was looking forward to this. So you and I met very briefly, we were saying before hopping on here at the uh ATS conference, which specializes in treating neuroplastic symptoms. And I've I've also seen your stuff on YouTube uh side by side with mine for a long time.

SPEAKER_02:

So like wise, yeah. Whenever, you know, populate your stuff shows up every day. And so I'm always checking out your stuff. And I think we're both uh putting out good content out there to try to help people.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah, no, it's wonderful. And uh so I want to just dive into, you know, what you kind of focus on in your practice and and really have the listeners understand how you approach neuroplastic symptoms. I know some of it'll probably be similar to me, but some of it may be different, which is very welcome. Um, so I know originally you trained in traditional physical therapy. Um and you treated patients more with like the structural mechanical models of pain. So I'm curious to know like what was the turning point that made you realize those methods weren't enough when treating symptoms?

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah, it's a good question. Um, it goes pretty far back. Um let's see. Um I had um been working, I was working in outpatient clinics after graduation for uh a number of years, and I ended up um getting an opportunity to go to Australia to do a postgraduate master's in physiotherapy. Oh wow. Perth, Australia, so west coast of Australia.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02:

There was a guy there uh named Peter O'Sullivan. Some people might know his name in the physical therapy world, and um and so he was teaching there and a few other instructors. So I said, I'm gonna go there. But I was going there for manual therapy for hands-on treatments. What I didn't realize is that we had a whole semester on the biology of pain, science of pain, and we had like a whole segment on chronic pain. And um, so that really opened my eyes. Um, I was already aware, you know, of chronic pain, but not in the same way. So that really set me off on this like, okay, you know, we can treat pain in many ways. Um, there's manual therapy, there's exercise, you know, there's injury pain, and then there's chronic pain. And so I started with that, and that was in 2002. And then after that, I kind of came across Sarno's work because I was looking for some other alternative ideas for for the chronic pain in particular. And so I came across Sarno and picked up his books and said, wow, this is this is incredibly interesting. But as a physical therapist, it was completely the opposite of everything I learned. Yeah. And I was like, How is this gonna fly in the clinic? Like, I'm doing hands-on manipulations and I'm you know talking about structural issues and stuff. So I actually reached out to uh Dr. Sarno when he was alive. I sent him an email.

SPEAKER_01:

Oh, wow.

SPEAKER_02:

Hey, get a hold of Dr. Schechter, who's in Los Angeles, because I was in San Diego. So that's what I did. So that started me down a road of like I went and saw him for a set a day. I saw him see patients, saw him do the assessments, and then I got hold of Dr. Schubiner and spent a week at his in Detroit back when he worked in the hospital. I spent a week there watching him just assess people. And this is interesting. These were kind of the earlier days before all the great classes and courses we have now, and before the the PRT was available and the the EAT and these type of things. It was really based off Sarno back then. Everything was like assessing according to Sarno, looking for trigger points. Um, you know, Dr. Schreebener was sort of expanding his practice in in some new ways of provocative testing and these other things. So I learned so much from those guys. And then I just kind of snowballed. I went and went to the UK. I don't know if you know Georgie Oldfield. Oh, yeah. Yeah, yeah. Georgie, yeah. So she runs a program called SERPA. And so I took that practitioner training. She's a fellow physio. So I said, okay, that seems like that'll be up my alley. So I went there and did that training. And then when I came back, I was still working in outpatient. I was using some of the concepts there, but it was still really, really hard because people were not coming for that. I would get a lot of people looking, get me crazy. I would get doctors who wouldn't believe me. You know how it is. So I decided at some point to say, you know, I'm gonna break off and do some part-time work in this area, just on the side. Yeah, and so I did that for a while until really COVID hit. And COVID is when we couldn't go to work anymore, really allowed me to jump in more and do this work, which I really have come to enjoy. And you know, it's such a an area that's just not, even though we have more people working in this field, it's still in the scheme of things, pretty small. But so many people, and you probably can attest to this too, have these conditions, right? You see these conditions, it's not just pain. Now I treat a whole bunch of various neuroplastic um symptoms besides just pain.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah. Well, first off, it's uh really cool because you worked with some of the the early on names, right? The and and some are still with us, but bigger names in in this space that were starting to do this even as the research was just like first starting to emerge, um, which is really cool. And then and it's interesting because I was I was gonna ask you that around you know, how hard is it like if you're working at more of a traditional physiotherapy clinic to like bring some of these mind-body techniques in? Because as you said, people aren't necessarily coming to you for that, like they're coming for more manual kind of therapies, I would imagine. Hey.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah, it was very, really hard because I was in a workers' comp clinic. So it's all workplace injuries, which again is a high propensity of stress-related uh components as well. And I was doing ergonomics too. So I was actually going into workplaces and looking at desks and seeing how people were working, but I wasn't able to talk about stress and workplace stress. But I would see people, you know, we learn all that, okay, you got to sit a certain way in your chair and make sure you're everything's in the right angles, you know. And but I would see people working in these like ridiculous postures, and I would ask them, and I would say, Hey, you have any pain? Do you have any issues? No, no, I'm good. But they're super chill, super relaxed people, maybe, you know, kind of more mellow people. Then you get these other people you can tell were just very uptight or very stressed people. So I would notice it. I helped some people. I I remember some cases where the doctor said, What did you do? And I said, I I I didn't do anything, doctor. I said, I just reassured the patient that they were they were they were safe. They were okay. This is not a big deal, it's gonna go away. And sure enough, some stuff went away miraculously in people, but I couldn't really do the work, you know, I couldn't do the full assessments. Um but I've had to do a lot of training, you know, coming from the physical side into the psychological side and melding the two together now. And I know you come from the psychological side, so it's yeah, I was I was excited to interview you.

SPEAKER_01:

Well, for a number of reasons, but one of them is that we do come from the two different sides, which is now merging together. Um and similar to yourself, like I I feel that struggle. Like when I was first starting to do some of this work, I was still working at like a public mental health clinic. Um and it was really difficult because people are coming to that public mental health clinic with, you know, um anxiety disorders, depressive disorders, different mood disorders, um, OCD, things of things of that nature. And that's initially what I was more kind of focused in on, even though I had recovered from pain, like that's really what I was trained in in treating. But the the thing is, is that, you know, at least in Canada, one in five Canadians have chronic pain. But it was interesting because as I would try to bring up some of these ideas, and I was still early on in this and trying to explain the idea of neuroplastic symptoms. There was such resistance of I'm here for you to treat anxiety or depression, leave my pain or symptom alone. Like there was, you know, maybe not stated that directly, but there was this resistance of kind of being knocked back into my own lane, I guess is what I would call it. Uh yeah, get back in your silo. Yeah, get back on your side. Like I think that's such a thing. And now, you know, we're both coming out from different angles, but we're trying to merge together. And it is it is interesting work. Um, and as you probably know just from what you explained to the listeners of all the extra trainings you've done and and all of that. Like I really felt that too, because now you need to learn for myself about the physical side, right? Of like the pain science, the the the chronic illness science, um, and how to like help people like self-assess, like, are your symptoms neuroplastic? So it is interesting because like the worlds are are converging slowly, it seems.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah, they're converging. And even, even, you know, it's hard, as you probably know too, certain certain people or certain symptoms are it's hard for some people to believe they're neuroplastic, even if you present with them the evidence. And and sometimes it they're difficult to uh assess. There's gray areas too. You know, there are times where it's like, well, I I I I think it is, you know, I really do believe it is, but you know, maybe need to get a little more testing, or we're not quite sure. And certainly, and I've been wrong on occasion, you know, of thinking it's neuroplasting and it's been, you know, okay, there is a structural cause. So it is a little bit, a little bit of a gray zone, but but mostly I would say it isn't, though. We can we can assess it pretty pretty clearly, you know, through some of the things we look at as as you know. And yeah, um, there's we just try to build evidence to for for a case of it, you know, for the diagnosis of it.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah. Again, I think it's interesting for kind of the general public to know is like, you know, when you're assessing for neuroplastic symptoms, at least I'll speak for myself. I'm partly assessing to ethically know, like, do you fit enough into this category, or at least I believe a portion of your symptoms neuroplastic, that this would be an effective treatment. Can I ethically say this is a good fit? But the other point that you hit on, which I think is so important, is like as you go through the assessment, it's not just for the practitioner, it's for the person to understand, no, this makes a lot of sense. Like there's a lot of evidence supporting that, you know, your body's actually okay. Like there's no damage, disease that's perpetuating all this, right? And and I think it's so, so important.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah, it's vitally important. Um I always start with the diagnosis. Like that's I always say that's the foundation, kind of what Dr. Sarno said too. That's the you know, foundation is is accepting the diagnosis. And and I'm I'm just trying to take what people tell me and reflect it back to them and say, hey, look, this based on everything you told me, this sounds very much like a neuroplastic symptom. Or you know, I've had people think everything is neuroplastic, you know, and I said, Well, I don't think that one is, you know. Yeah, but as long as you get the evidence, and like you said, once it's neuroplastic, it's it is harmless. It's not a physical structural problem, even though it can feel like one, obviously, and be in an area of your body where you have those conditions regularly, yeah, absolutely amazing. And I'm sure you've seen this, what the brain can do in terms of producing various symptoms.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah, it it is wild, and I and I always feel for people because I remember that even with my own symptoms, like struggling to believe it's neuroplastic, or as we used to call it TMS. Um, because similar to you, I read Sardo's books, that was kind of the first introduction. But I felt it was really hard to believe because my my pain and symptoms were so intense, where I was like, like it just there's a hard thing of like connecting that they're like, you know what I mean? Like they're so intense, there must be something wrong. Like, yeah, so like helping people, and I think as you're kind of speaking to like them understanding, hey, there's a lot of evidence to support this is such a valuable piece because I've made the error, especially early on when I was working with people where we did the assessment, but maybe I didn't like I didn't explain it in in grave enough detail. Like they wanted to move on, so I moved on. And then we get to all the techniques and stuff, but it's like almost all the fancy techniques we now have, mind-body techniques, they have little effect if people aren't open enough that this makes sense.

SPEAKER_02:

Yes, 100%. That's why I always say the diagnosis is the foundation, right, for building the house of healing. And yeah, you have to have just enough evidence. And and you know, Dr. Schubiner says with that fit criteria, he says you only need one thing to make it neuroplastic. And usually there's there's there's many pieces of evidence, right? We can point to with not only fit criteria, but you know, their history and what happened. I mean, some simple questioning that that I would never have asked as a physical therapist, but now routinely ask everybody can just unearth some stressors or some life events or traumas, or I remember a case years ago when I started this work and I was the within the first 10 minutes, I was asking a few questions. She said, Oh, I had a surgery on my static nerve. They removed the piriformis muscle. I flew to New York City from Europe, didn't help. And then I said, Hey, well, what was going on at the time? Well, it started at work. Okay, well, I was doing my normal job at the chair. Okay, well, was anything else happening around that time in your life or prior to that? Yeah, yeah. Your father passed away suddenly of a heart attack two months prior. Wow, nobody had even asked her that question. Yeah, yet she had surgery, failed treatments, and it was pretty obvious. Before that, she had zero pain, yeah, full-time job. So sometimes very simple questioning can can give you a lot of information.

SPEAKER_01:

It really can. It's just you're right, it's that timeline that can be so important because I've I've seen it with so many people, as you just described with this case example. Um, you know, it it starts to line up so clearly. Like when did your different physical symptoms start? And then what emotional events, you know, if we date these, like are they lining up? And I think it's it's helpful for evidence, but it's also helpful to know, okay, what what do we need to actually work on? Like what's what's important for us to involve in the treatment to get to this place of reductions or elimination of symptoms.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah, yeah. And that's a that's an interesting point too. And you can go off, we could probably talk about that for a while because there's so many presentations of people, right? And that's something I still try to catalog in my mind, like, okay, because we have lots of tools, lots of treatments now, and lots of places you can go. And everybody might say one thing helped them more than another, right? And so I think it depends on the person, you know, like for that particular example, it was a boom, one-off event, but related to, you know, very important person in their life. Some other people, there's been a long history of on and off symptoms over their whole life, right? Some other people, it it was you go through everything and there was not much there except there was a ton of fear uh around the surgery or fear around something in particular, and then that magnified the whole thing. So the presentation can vary amongst you know different people.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah, and I like that point that you're that you're getting at in the sense of the healing, it it needs to be individualized for each person. That's where I've seen I love success stories, I'm careful saying this, but that's where I've seen success stories go wrong. Is people find someone, a success story of someone who recovered from shoulder pain, let's say, and they listen to the success story, hopefully not too repetitively, but many times they understand okay, they did these three things. They did somatic tracking, they lowered the pressure, and they stopped talking to their mother-in-law. Something like that. And they and they get so locked in of like, okay, well, same symptom, that's what I need to do. And I think that it makes sense, right? It makes sense why we get there because anyone who's had chronic pain and symptoms, we're we're desperate. We're desperate to get out of it. Um, but I think it's so important for people, whether they're working with a practitioner or not, to be exploring different things and trying things out. Because to just assume you know what's going to work for you, or for me, even as a therapist, to assume I know what's going to work for someone, um, it just often isn't accurate. And so there needs to be this exploration as you're doing the work.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah. And that's the thing. I think in terms of the treatments, there's a there's a vast array of things we could do. And people say, some people say, you know, I did a lot of slow breathing, and that really helped. I meditation or somatic tracking or journaling, um, or I just got back to life, I forgot about it. Yeah. I mean, you hear all these stories and you think, okay, but all that's working at the brain level. So every single bit of that's affecting your nervous system. So yeah, explore, explore. Let's see what works, works for you. Absolutely.

SPEAKER_01:

I'm wondering, you know, have you noticed over the years like the physical therapy world becoming more open to the approach that you utilize that you just described a second ago?

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah, I think so. I definitely do notice it. Um, I think it's a little bit more of a uh watered down. It's not going to be as heavy on the psychological side, uh, it just as a physio traditionally trained, because we just Again, just like the psychologist you mentioned, crossing the lines into the physical world, a lot of physical therapists, they don't want to cross into the psychological world. But they will they will go to understand how fear, and I think that's by the one emotion they will most physiologists can say, yeah, that makes sense, you know, that this fear avoidance model, um, central sensitization, things like this that we understand, like the system can get highly amplified and highly reactive. So I think people understand the stress. You know, generally stress can can cause, you know, sensitization or anxiety. So I think with fear, yes, they're taking it on. I think there's the more people do use them PRT, um, graded exposure, giving people confidence, giving them giving that they can move their bodies again, they're not broken. Yeah, that that can go a heck of a long way just to getting somebody better without even diving into some of the deeper emotional issues. Yeah, it can take people a long way for sure. Yeah, it really can. And I and there's a there's a therapy called cognitive functional therapy. Now, this is Peter Sullivan in Western Australia. He was my mentor there, and at the time he was doing all manual therapy and he's moved away from it. And he started again, it's called cognitive functional therapy. And it's kind of a little more on the belief side, but uh he talks about emotions a bit and stress, but it's really about getting confidence back in your body that to move to and teaching people what pain really is. And so some education, pain science education. Um, but I think where as a traditional physio can miss is the deeper psychological stuff that you as a psychologist might address, like the trauma, you know, the adverse childhood experiences, um, some of the deeper emotional patterns and issues that people have that might need to be addressed, right? For for the person to fully recover. Um and those to me personally, they're challenging cases, right? And maybe for you as well. Um, when you when you get somebody's history, you go, it's a you know, everybody's got a different history, but sometimes it's it can be a challenging case just because of the person's been through a lot.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah. No, that's very true. It's it's always so heartbreaking. I I find for myself when you have someone come in and you know, you're going through your assessment and you realize like how much complex trauma there actually is. Like how much adversity they've really gone through long before their their pain or symptoms started. And and it's it's interesting because we've known that for decades. Like we've known, you know, your chances of getting chronic pain, chronic fatigue, IVS, other chronic symptoms, they're more than double as likely to occur if you've faced trauma in the past. So, you know, this this is not new research. We've known that for a long time, but and I want to give that message hope of like, you know, I'm sure you as well has have seen these remarkable recoveries, people with really great deep inner strength and resource where they've been able to work through all this stuff and get into this place of um either you know full recovery or well on their way. Like I think that's that's possible, but it it does get a bit more complicated and complex as you're as you're working with it.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah, and I think you're making a good point too. I want to highlight too the fact that just because you maybe you've had that, if there's any people listening, that doesn't mean you're doomed. Doesn't mean you can't change because the brain is neuroplastic, the brain can change. It might need to you might need to work at things maybe a little bit longer, or maybe not. You know, there is no timeline, but there might be more deeper patterns to work through or or address.

SPEAKER_01:

Absolutely. So I wanted to ask a question just in regards to people that want to mix the two sides of physical and psychological. And let's take the example of a case that's maybe more complex. Like you have someone coming in that has maybe a lot of emotionally strained relationships, they have complex trauma, and they're fairly immobilized. Like that fear of their pain or symptom has really shrunk their world. They're barely moving, um, they're barely doing any activities that they once loved. Because, you know, I work with a lot of complex cases like this. What I'll see is people are rightfully so desperately seeking out all these different treatments, some on the physical side, some on the psychological side. And for some of my clients, I've seen it go really well mixing the two. And for others, I've seen it can create a lot of challenges. So I'm wondering like, what would you recommend? Like when people are maybe seeing a psychological therapist, psychotherapist such as myself, but do want to be using some of the physical modalities.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah, I think again, I think um the reasoning, the understanding back to back to the diagnosis again. Like you can have the diagnosis of neuroplastic symptoms and be working with the psychologist, which is great. And you could still be working with a physiotherapist if the physiotherapist is informed. And it depends on the approach, right? So a lot of physioists will will just try to get somebody moving, getting them back to feeling like they can use their body again. So I think that's the key. If they're if they're targeting a certain tissue, saying, hey, you got a weak core, or you know, we've got to get this muscle stronger, or you're structurally imbalanced, and and you got a foot in both worlds, um, think like you alluded to, it sometimes can really hold a person back because you're straddling two different areas. So you're so you're not committed to the diagnosis. Um, I'll give you an example. I saw a woman, she fully recovered from she had some pelvic pain. But at the time she was done physical therapy, it never helped her. And she was thinking, I want to go maybe try physical therapy again. And I and I questioned her on it. I said, Well, did it help you at all the first time? No. Well, why would you try it again? I don't know. I thought maybe it just might help in the process.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02:

And I said, Well, really give it a think because you could be sending mixed messages to the brain. And in her case, what she decided not to go for the physical therapy, and that was really helped her to move forward.

unknown:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02:

I've seen other people where the physical therapy has helped, especially for people I think who are very much in a um a low activity state. They're not, they're not doing much at all physically, yeah, or they have a tremendous amount of fear to move. Um, I think a physical therapist can be quite helpful to get a person moving, um, get them using their body again. So you but you do want to find the right therapist who can just really promote movement and activity over, you know, passive treatments. I don't think passive treatments are going to be quite as good, like you know, ultrasound and electrical stimulation and um, you know, manual therapy massage again. It's okay, but you have to have the right idea, like okay, maybe it's helping me to calm my nervous system or just relax me a little bit more. Okay. Sure, go for that. Um, versus treating a particular tissue.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah. Yeah, it's interesting because I as you were talking it, it almost depends on, you know, if if someone's you know doing some psychotherapy, they're they're working through emotions and trauma, and they want to try, you know, a physical treatment, whether this is physical therapy or osteo or massage. As you were talking, I was thinking it it really depends on is the physical treatment gonna send more safety to your nervous system, or is it gonna send more danger essentially? Because, you know, I've seen that where people come to see me and they've been told something terrifying by some physical practitioner. And again, I don't think maliciously, like I just think that person, they were told, like, you know, this muscle's out or something like that. And it just, because they were so on alert about their symptoms already, it just put them over the top. Where, you know, and clearly in that example, it's creating more danger. But then I've also seen people where they view it as you're kind of sane, Jim. They view it as like this strengthening. Um, I'm gonna condition and get back to activities. Like they almost view it as like, I just want the activities and exercises to strengthen my body so I can do the things I want. They're almost not viewing it as trying to fix some type of major damage inside.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah, that's like you just put it a great way. It's not about fixing anything, it's about creating safety. Yeah, you're right. And and again, sometimes if that's going in that direction, fantastic. If it's it's creating danger, meaning more fear, more, more, I don't know, more worry. And again, like you said, a lot of healthcare practitioners, well-meaning people, they're not trying to say anything bad, but man, have I heard some nocebo type stuff coming from a lot of different practitioners?

SPEAKER_01:

Well, and I think it comes back to, you know, when we're treating physical pain, no matter what side, physical, psychologically, like it needs to be, in my opinion, trauma informed. Like this is like, you know, a pretty popular word in terms of the the any psychological uh professional out there, like uh I'm a social worker, but like a uh physio, or sorry, physio, uh psychological. Oh man, I can't talk. Psychotherapist or like a psychotherapist, psychologist, social worker, like if any of those people, like it trauma-informed is like the buzzword. Like we're that's what we're doing. Um, but I think when it comes to physical pain, that's that's what happens is like people are deeply traumatized maybe before their symptoms, or if the symptoms themselves are traumatic for them. And so like our words really matter when we're talking to someone. I'm sure you notice. Like they really are gonna make the difference between is that person gonna feel safe when meeting me, or are they gonna feel like I'm gonna make them feel more in danger in their body? And I think that's such an important thing for people to be aware of when treating physical pain or symptoms. 100%.

SPEAKER_02:

I feel like, you know, when I was working years ago, my first job, I'll never forget this. I worked with this uh uh guy who ran the clinic. And at the time I was like, oh, it's all about techniques and learning all these little things I gotta do and how you treat people. And I was like, Yeah, my this guy, he doesn't do barely anything, but he was always voted the number one physical therapist in the area, you know. And I was like, what is he doing? And it turned out I didn't know it, figured out years later. He was just a master at reassuring people. He was a master at making people feel good in their bodies and just saying, hey, you could do this exercise and like making it fun and enjoyable. And I had never considered that component. I'm not sure he even knew what he was doing either, but it it that was the psychological side of the reassurance and the safety coming in really strongly.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah. Yeah, it's so interesting. I I have a similar story to that where when I was first starting to do more of a mind-body approach full-time, I worked at uh a friend of mine, he's a chiropractor, and I worked at out of his clinic and and worked with some of the the clients there, which was great. But I remember he said something really interesting to me, and he was fairly informed mind body, like maybe not to the level you are, but new enough, like, you know, well, well read on some of this. And uh, and he said, like, he was like, my job after like six times meeting with someone is just creating safety. That's all I'm doing. And and he was like that. So I like I think as a result, he probably picked his words very carefully. He gave a lot of reassurance. Um, because he knew himself, like after six, seven times of meeting with someone, the vast majority of the time, like I'm not I'm not correcting anything anymore. Like my job is to like make the person feel as safe as possible in their body. So it's it is reassuring that there are you know people out there that are going forth with treating pain and symptoms in this way, because I think it can be so helpful for people.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah, I think the reassurance goes such a long way. And I think that's where in the medical community there could be some work done to really reduce the nocebo because I I feel like I hear a lot of negative stuff and well-meaning therapists just saying things for people and they don't realize how much it penetrates them and sticks in their mind. And if that person's an anxious person, boom, that could just set off a whole bunch of worry now. Absolutely. Like, oh, you need to be really careful about this, and you know, don't do too much of that. And these things that could just be well-meaning end up hurting the person, or the physician says a couple of things. And I've had to correct people and I've seen people come back to me after seeing their doctor or therapist and their worse. And I go, What's going on? Oh, the doctor told me this. And I'm always like, Yeah, that's just information, right? Like, let's let's look at the truth of that. That's just information that you took in. Yeah, nothing's changed between last time I saw you now.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah, absolutely.

SPEAKER_02:

It's just like kind of highlighting the brain again and the role of that brain and how it can just really amplify symptoms. Absolutely.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah. Well, I know we need to wrap up shortly here because you have to go off and and meet with someone. Um, but I wanted to give you the listeners just an understanding of like the services you're providing right now. Um, and you know, all your links and everything I'll put in the description of this episode so people can connect with you. Um, but could you just tell us a bit about what services or products you're providing right now?

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah, thanks, Tanner. Um, yeah, so I have a website called the Pain PT and a YouTube channel as well called the Pain PT, and there's a lot of resources there. Um, in terms of what I provide, I do I do provide individual assessments um for you know neuroplastic symptoms and treatment as well. Um, I have a group, some group coaching as well that I do once a week. So I offer both those services for people who are potentially interested. Um, but just a lot of free resources as well that you can find on the YouTube channel and on my website.

SPEAKER_01:

Awesome. Well, again, thank you so much, Jim, for coming on and and sharing about your practice. And I think there's just been this episode is just packed full of a lot of wisdom and a lot of learning that people can take away and start to apply for themselves. Um, and thank you everyone for listening to this episode. And I'll talk to you next week. Thanks, Tanner. Bye-bye.

SPEAKER_00:

Thanks for listening. For more free content, check out the links for our YouTube channel, Instagram, and Facebook accounts in the episode description.

SPEAKER_01:

We wish you all healing.