Empowered Relief: Finding Hope in Chronic Pain (Guest: Dr. Leah Flaherty)

A life narrowed by chronic pain can make even simple pleasures feel like a threat. We sit down with Dr. Leah Flaherty, a pain psychologist at Allegheny Health Network and certified Empowered Relief instructor, to explore a FREE and practical, two-hour path that helps you change how your brain responds to pain—without pretending it will vanish. Grounded in pain neuroscience education and cognitive behavioral therapy, Empowered Relief gives clear, usable tools that calm the nervous system and interrupt the brain’s habitual pain loops and is accessible to anyone, regardless of insurance or location.

We unpack why pain is both sensory and emotional, how stress chemistry keeps the alarm stuck on, and why it’s scientifically valid to say pain can exist even without new tissue damage. Dr. Flaherty explains the guided audio with binaural beats that helps many people relax faster, fall asleep more easily, and de-escalate spikes in real time. We talk through expectation management, the role of daily practice, and the power of reframing catastrophic thoughts into compassionate, realistic self-talk. Small wins count—like getting the kids from the bus stop or finishing one chore—and those wins build agency.

You’ll also hear a candid personal story of trigeminal neuralgia, navigating stigma and “it’s all in your head” comments, and finding hope after medical dead ends. If you’ve felt defeated, skeptical, or unsure where to turn next, this is a science-based, accessible option that takes only two hours and costs nothing. Search “AHN Events Empowered Relief” to register and check out AHN’s “Brain Over Pain” videos on YouTube. If this episode resonates, follow the show, share it with someone, and leave a review to help others find these tools. Your story might be the spark someone else needs to try again.

Chapters

• 0:00 A Personal Story Of Unrelenting Pain
• 1:44 Introducing Empowered Relief And Dr. Flaherty
• 5:18 What Empowered Relief Teaches In Two Hours
• 8:20 Binaural Beats And Calming The Nervous System
• 10:40 Realizing Agency with Small Wins
• 13:09 From Defeat To Hope: Lived Experience
• 16:10 Realistic Expectations And Daily Practice
• 19:22 Dismantling Shame And “All In Your Head”
• 24:08 Stigma and Self-Judgment
• 25:52 Severe Pain, Kinesiophobia, And Hope
• 29:28 How To Join The Free Class
• 31:02 Brain Over Pain Videos And Referrals

Transcript

Sherry: 0:00

Before we jump in today, I want to speak directly to anyone living with chronic pain and their caretakers. Please stick around for this episode. Our guest today will be sharing information that just might help. You're probably sick of people telling you that it's just stress, that it's all in your head, or even throw judgments at you for the way you are getting through your pain. Because I've been there. I know how frustrating it is, and I'm still there. I know that living with severe chronic pain can feel hopeless. I live with a form of trigeminal neuralgia, which can take many of life's simplest pleasures and turn them into constant burning pain. Soaking in the sun, a soft breeze, air conditioning, talking, smiling, singing in the car, having ice cream, intimacy, all of that and more increase the intensity of the burning that is there 24 hours a day. Every day of my life since 2017. It creates a cycle of dread, isolation, and hopelessness that's hard to interrupt because even things that are supposed to bring joy become reminders of limitations. So when I first heard about the Empowered Relief Program, I was skeptical, to say the very least. But after exhausting other courses of treatment that either didn't work or weren't options for me, I wasn't buying that this one would help either. But I showed up anyway, and it ended up changing how I live with pain. Notice I didn't say take the pain away. This isn't some miracle, but it is something real. It's something that gave me hope and got me out of the darkness enough to forge a new path forward. It's free and available to anyone, regardless of insurance or location. And so today I want to share this program with our listeners who experience chronic pain as well as their caretakers. Today we're thrilled to be talking with someone who leads the Empowered Relief Program for Pain Management in the Pittsburgh area. Joining us is Dr. Leah Flaherty, a pain psychologist at Allegheny Health Network and certified empowered relief instructor. Today she will talk to us about a unique neuroscience-based experience that uses tools like binaural beats and brain-based techniques that help change how the brain responds to pain. So, Dr. Flaherty, what exactly is empowered relief and what sets it apart from other pain programs?

Dr. Leah Flaherty: 2:18

So I'll start with my story of how I found it, if that's reasonable, and I'll go into what it is. I was working as a pain psychologist at the West Penn Institute for Pain Medicine, and I found myself with this giant wait list, and I wasn't able to see people for as many times as I needed to or wanted to. So oftentimes I found myself saying the same thing over and over again, and I felt like I wasn't doing what I needed to for my patients. And so I was looking, trying to figure out if there was a way that I could cast a wider net and I could say all of the most important parts of cognitive behavioral therapy for chronic pain in a shorter period of time. And that's how I found Empowered Relief. So what Empowered Relief is, is it's an evidence-based two-hour pain education intervention. So it was created at Stanford University by Dr. Beth Darnell and her colleagues. And so, as folks were all trying to answer this question, how do we get the most amount of information to the most amount of people in a short period of time? That's how Dr. Darnell created this program. So taking about 16 hours of cognitive behavioral therapy for chronic pain, all kinds of different skills and tools and teaching about the pathophysiology of chronic pain, what's going on with the brain and why we're continuing to experience pain and boiling it down to the two-hour class. And so I consider it to be like the greatest hits of CBT for chronic pain. I just love teaching it. So at this point, I've taught 1200 people this class and I want to keep doing it. So it's it's been an honor for me to get to teach it.

Sherry: 3:50

So I guess my initial response. So the thing is when you say about a class for pain, I don't know if it's a common response of the one that I had at the time was it's a class. How in the world is a class going to help me? Can you speak to that before we get any further? Because right away, that was like I it was almost a non-starter.

Dr. Leah Flaherty: 4:14

Yep. I love I love that you're asking that. That's really important. And thank you for grounding me in that. I think it happens a lot. I consider this to be a health literacy intervention. So I think there is so much that can be answered by understanding what's happening in our body, right? So something we talk about in empowered relief, how the definition of pain is so much more than just the where, right? So pain, the definition of pain is both a negative sensory and emotional experience. So there's that whole second half of the definition of pain has to do with. So if we think about the sensory part, is the where, right? The where am I experiencing pain? Is it back pain, foot pain, knee pain, fibromyalgia, pain all over my body? And then the emotional aspect of it is the who, what, where, what, right? So it's the what is who am I now? What does this mean for me? What's gonna happen in my life? Am I going to feel this way forever? When is this gonna stop hurting? So there's all of these questions that go along with the experience of pain. And so when when people come in saying this is just a class, how can this possibly make any kind of difference in my life? Everything that I end up saying is, well, if we can teach people about the brain and the body, about what happens in your body when you experience pain, what's going on with the cortisol, the adrenaline, all of these inflammatory chemicals that are rushing through our bloodstream, if we have the power to be able to delay some of that and to pause some of that and to control it, that's how we gain our lives back from the pain. And there's so much beauty and power in that experience. And I I love to be able to see that kind of that light switch go on in people's head when they start to recognize that they have power over something that has taken their lives from them.

Sherry: 6:00

That's exactly it. That's exactly the way my experience played out when I participated in the program. I really was blown blown away. I mean, I had hope again.

Dr. Leah Flaherty: 6:11

I can't tell you how much so when I was a researcher at the at the Veterans Integrated Pain Management Center, or excuse me, at I worked there, but also was at the VA at the Mental Illness Research Education Clinical Center. And as I was wanting to go on to postdoctoral work, all I kept thinking about was I want to be able to give hope to the hopeless. That's the point here. If I can educate, if I can teach someone about what's happening in their body and it can give them the opportunity where they can feel hope, that's it. That's all I want to do. And so that's so you saying that is exactly why I'm doing what I'm doing.

Sherry: 6:48

Yeah. It's I'm I consider myself really grateful to have gone through the program and now to be able to talk about it and hopefully give someone else a chance to give it a try. The other piece to that is the binaural beats.

Jodi: 7:04

Can you explain what that is and how that actually works in the brain?

Dr. Leah Flaherty: 7:10

So, what I can tell you is really what you learned in the class, Sherry. So I can say that what the binaural audio file does, it's a guided relaxation exercise. And then underneath the voice of the guided relaxation exercise, there's alternating tones that go in one ear and then in the next ear. And so what happens is through a lateralization of the brain effect, we're able to create an environment where we can learn quicker and where we can gain that expertise at our parasympathetic nervous system activation quicker. I am not an audiologist, so I can't tell you exactly which wave is happening and how it's functioning on the brain. And I apologize for that. But what I do know is that people are able to gain control over their nervous system and they're able to relax quicker and be able to manage their stress and their pain in a different way. And that has been an incredible opportunity for me to get to see that work for so many people.

Sherry: 8:02

Yeah, and you're you're seeing it in other places now with like the sound baths and the gongs and all the different things. And I can say the first time I experienced those binaural beats, I didn't realize what was happening, but I did feel different. And around the same time as when I discovered the sound baths, and it was a real powerful experience to feel how certain sound frequencies can have that profound impact. And I think you kind of already touched on it, but I was wondering what are the types of shifts, or can you explain like a shift that you saw in participants after they engage with the tools?

Dr. Leah Flaherty: 8:40

So the way that I think about it as a psychologist and not an audiologist is if someone finds something that works, by the time I see people, by the time, and and I know you lived this, Sherry, you've tried so many different things, have been to so many different doctors, and start to feel pretty hopeless, right? Start to feel like, how am I going to get an answer for this? How is my pain ever going to go away? And so what I have found frequently with the binaural audiophile is when people start to listen to it, they start to say, Oh my goodness, I can't believe I was able to fall asleep like that. I can't believe that my insomnia was able to reduce in such an incredible way. I had this email from a woman saying that she listens to it when she feels herself getting activated, right? She was in an ambulance and put it on because she was feeling so activated in the ambulance. She's like, okay, I just need to help myself with this, right? And so when people start to gain a little bit of confidence in their ability to make changes in their pain and in their stress level, that's how it grows, right?

Sherry: 9:35

So once you realize you have you do have a little agency over it.

Dr. Leah Flaherty: 9:39

Exactly, exactly. And once you have that small bit of agency, it starts to grow. And I mean, you see people say, I feel in control of my life in a way that I haven't in years.

Sherry: 9:50

Yep. I want to comment on something Dr. Flaherty said before about people just feeling defeated and you know, am I going to have to live with this forever? Is it ever going to end? And just ruminating on those things. And I was there. It started in 2017 and it went on for about two years. And I finally got to the point that I was exploring surgical options. And it turned out that the day that I was scheduled to have my MRI, they were like, Well, we have to cancel that MRI because you have a bigger problem. And they found a large blood clot in my subclavian artery, which ended up causing strokes a few days later. So I was completely defeated because once all the acute stroke recovery was finished, then I still was like feeling there are no other options. What am I going to do? I couldn't imagine living that way for the rest of my life. And I still had kids, young kids. Um, so what you said really spoke to me, and I can I can relate to when you're feeling that way.

Dr. Leah Flaherty: 10:57

Yeah, I think a lot of what we're talking about too, there's of course the pain, the physical pain, but when you were talking, I was thinking about the exhaustion that you must have been experiencing, that level of fatigue that is like, I cannot believe that I have to do this day. It is so overwhelming, that sense of fatigue and managing both the pain and your life when it feels just too big. And that's what I hear so often from people. I just I can't believe I have to do this. This is too big. And that part is incredibly difficult. So something we talk about a lot is being able to get your brain back, right? Because when you're feeling that exhaustion and that pain constantly, you don't feel like yourself. You're not talking the way you normally talk about it. I wasn't.

Sherry: 11:40

Yeah, no, I'm supposed to be you. I wasn't. And I was teaching at the time, and I would get in the car and I would cry on my way home from school because my face was on fire, and I knew that I I would pull in the driveway and not even be out of the car yet, and the kids are there, you know, wanting me, needing me, and all I wanted to do was get in my room, shut the door, turn off the lights, and it was no way to live, and it was not, it was not what I wanted for my family, you know. So I was at the point where I've tried everything, you know, and then to be finally, finally ready to take the next step and get the MRI for the surgery, and then to have that like come completely unraveled too was just like okay, so I was one of the people that said, you know, I've tried and I'm I don't know what else to do.

Dr. Leah Flaherty: 12:40

It's so beautiful to hear that as the past tense, right? And so saying this is where I was, and now here I am out of it. And that part is just hearing stories like that are just incredible, knowing how possible that is. And I think I'm so glad that you're doing this because there are so many people out there who are dealing with exactly what you're talking about, who are getting out of the car and wanting so badly to be there with their kids and with their family, but their pain is taking over their life. And so to hear you say that's in my rear view is incredible. And it's not in your rear view because you had a magic wand, it's because you put the work in, and that's the part that's that's really important to hear.

Sherry: 13:18

Yeah. Well, and it's not gone, it's still there 24-7. It's still there, but I have had to make adjustments in my life to be able to make it work to get some quality of life back for myself and the people that I love. Yeah.

Jodi: 13:35

What can people realistically expect to get out of one session?

Dr. Leah Flaherty: 13:39

I love that question because what you can expect out of one session is me giving it my all, trying to tell you all of this information. And then so the first hour of the class is education. The first hour of the class is talking about your brain and your body and the physiology and what's happening with our central nervous system and how we have more power than we ever thought possible to be able to manage it. The second hour of the class is working together to create a personalized plan. And that's my favorite part. 90% of the people that I've taught have been on Zoom. The chat is just a really phenomenal place to be. And so just having people saying, Hey, I have that thought too. I I've never heard anybody say that before. I can't believe you also are sitting in your car preparing to go into your family, right? To prepare to get ready to because your life has become so hard. And so being able to hear other people say that and those connections being born just in the Zoom chat has been incredible.

Jodi: 14:39

That's great. T

Sherry: 14:40

 That was it.

Dr. Leah Flaherty: 14:41

Yeah. And so once people have that, what we're doing is I get to watch people help each other, right? So here are some of the negative thoughts that I have about my pain. And they're usually big, ugly words like I can't do anything. I'm never gonna get better, I'm always gonna feel this way. And when you start having those big scary words, it can feel impossible to get out of it. And so what you have is other people saying, Hey, I thought that way once too, and I've been trying this thought. I've been trying the thought, well, maybe this might work. Even planting a little seed of maybe this might work is so much more powerful than nothing's gonna work. I've tried everything. You know, so just being able to play with that thought process.

Jodi: 15:23

Getting rid of the negative self-talk is big no matter what.

Dr. Leah Flaherty: 15:27

It's huge, it's huge. And it's literally grows the brain. So we talk a lot about neural networks. And so pain neuroscience education is really kind of the leading modality in the field right now, teaching people about what's happening in their brain. And so we talk a lot about neural networks. So when when we experience pain every day, what's happening is our brain is trying to help us out. And we create these shortcuts in our brain. If you think about driving to work for the hundredth time and not remembering how you got there, because your brain created a shortcut. Your brain said, I got this, don't worry about it. You think about everything you've got going on, don't worry about this. It does the same thing with pain. So when we experience pain so many times, our brain says, Okay, there's that pain again. I've got this. And so what we're teaching people is how do we stop? How do we interrupt that signal? What can we do to tell our brain, no, we're not going back down that road. I'm not going to work today, right? Like I'm not doing that. And so, how do we tell our brain to get out of it? And that's a lot of what we're doing in the class too. And so I'm taking a long path, but what I'm saying is, what we're learning is how to build some skills, how to gain some tools. But I only get to see people for two hours. So what you can expect to get out of it is what you put into it. So Sherry will tell you you have to live it. You have to practice the binaural audiophile, you have to practice restructuring those negative cognitions, you have to practice the distraction techniques and the self-guided relaxation exercises. All of that together has been incredibly impactful for thousands of people across the country. But I don't have a magic wand, right? So I can't do it. It's it's just about me giving you the skills and then you gotta leave them.

Sherry: 17:11

Right. And it stuck with me too that it was building the understanding that it's not a miracle, you know, it's not a magic wand. You're it's not gonna miraculously eliminate pain. Right. But it helped me to learn to work with it and not against it, you know. Yeah. And it I mean, honestly, it helped lead to doing this podcast because it it taught me how to calm my nervous system and get myself to a calmer space where I could take small steps into figuring out how to make my life work with the condition that I'm living with. And you know, I had to turn away from teaching, I knew I couldn't do that. I'm getting like emotional now. So I have I'm trying to dial things fast, most important thing. Yeah, yes. To have you here to talk to you about this, to just to see how it has like profoundly shifted my life is just ah,

Dr. Leah Flaherty: 18:11

but I think what's so important, Sherry, is I I if everyone could have the same benefit from you, that would I I would be the happiest person on earth, right? But what I see so often is when people feel so defeated and and those negative thoughts feel so big, it can be so hard to allow for the opportunity uh of something positive to happen, right? And so that's on us. And so it sounds like a lot of what you talk about in this podcast is being able to allow yourself the opportunity for growth, right? Allowing yourself the opportunity, the openness to new experiences. And so that was you. You were you were ready, you wanted it, you were open to hearing something that could allow you to make changes in your life and build this momentum that you've built. Yeah. And so that's what I would hope for anyone is if I'm saying anything, it's it's that when you even though you felt like you've uh turned every stone, right? Then the next one might be the answer for you. The next one might be the thing. And it's just about continuing to explore with curiosity what could be the answer in our lives. Sure.

Jodi: 19:14

And trying a program like this, you might as well try it, right? I mean, it it doesn't hurt to take that step.

Dr. Leah Flaherty: 19:20

Exactly. Yeah.

Sherry: 19:21

All right. So we touched upon this a little bit, but I think we need to talk about something that a lot of people carry silently, which is the message that their pain is, you know, it's all in your head, or they should just toughen up. How does this program help dismantle that internalized shame that people sometimes carry or often carry when they are in especially invisible pain?

Dr. Leah Flaherty: 19:51

Yeah, that's such a good question. When you're saying kind of quietly carrying, I think a lot of times it's pretty loud because we'll hear it from people, right? So I I mean I've heard people talk about whether it's medical providers or family members saying that their pain is all in their head and they have that it feels like like when when you don't have an organic cause that can show exactly this is why it should hurt right here, that can be incredibly distressing for people. And I hear so often someone says, Well, my doc says that my scans look good. So what's happening? Why, why is this continuing to happen in my life? Why am I still in pain? And so I think what's so important to remember is that all pain is caused by the brain, right? I mean, our heart beats because of our brain, our lungs work because of our brain. So we can only have pain because our central nervous system is connecting to our brain, right? And so when we hear it's all in our head, I when people say that to me, I think like, well, well, sure. Like, yes, our brain, our brain does everything. And so if if that's the truth, if if our brain is the organ that is responsible for pain, which it is, our brain is the organ that's responsible for all pain. And if that's the case, then that means that we can use our own power to be able to change the way that pain is processed in the brain. And so in Empowered Relief, Dr. Darnell talks about our brain as a pain computer of sorts, right? And so if that's the case, then it's like we can alter the code of the pain computer. And that's what we do with pain neuroscience education, is we're teaching people that those neural networks that we talked about a little bit before, we can alter those. We can change that. And so when we start to have different cognitions about our pain, when we shift the way that we talk to ourselves, when we shift the way that we think about our pain, what we're doing is we're growing neural networks in our brain. And so, in the same way, when we're practicing activating our parasympathetic nervous system, we're making changes in our brain. And so there's so much important information here to carry. Firstly, importantly, is that this is not your fault. No one asked for this, right? You didn't ask to experience pain that it that is that is unrelenting and chronic and constant. Nobody asked for that. And so that my answer always, when someone says your your pain is all in your head, it's like, well, well, yeah, but I I I don't want this. I didn't ask for it. I don't want to live like this. And so if that's the case, then we have the power to to shift away from it and learn some skills to be able to complement what's happening in our brain.

Jodi: 22:17

Right. That makes sense. It does.

Dr. Leah Flaherty: 22:22

I hope that it doesn't feel shameful. All pain is real, right? So that's not to say that your pain is imagined at all. And so there's there's so many different studies that show that pain can exist in the absence of tissue damage. We don't need to have tissue damage in the body for pain to exist. And so oftentimes they do go together, but there are studies that show that people who that 80% of people who have MRIs who are who are asymptomatic will have an MRI of their knee. And it'll show that, yeah, there's some labral tears in there, there's some tissue damage in your knee. Even if you don't have pain, everyone who's over the age of 40, I'd say, is going to have some kind of tearing in their in their knee, right? It's going to have some kind of damage in their back. And so it's really important to recognize that that's in asymptomatic populations. Pain can exist in the absence of tissue damage. So just because you have tissue damage doesn't mean you have pain. Just because you have pain doesn't mean you have tissue damage. This is all our central nervous system is directing it. And so what I hope people hear from that is not that your pain is imagined or not that there's something wrong with you, but rather there's something we can do about it, which is really exciting.

Sherry: 23:38

Right. Right.

Jodi: 23:40

And very hopeful.

Sherry: 23:41

Yeah. It was a huge gift because when you're living with invisible pain, that means that you're carrying something heavy that no one else can see. It's a whole other level of hard. And I feel like people carry judgments and make a whole lot of assumptions. And I've just decided that you know what, that's okay, because it just makes them the first three letters of that word.

Jodi: 24:02

Well, I think that they judge their own selves, right? It's kind of a deep-rooted family thing where there's a a shame associated with even getting sick. You don't even want to say the word, I'm not feeling well. It's like a it's just like a dirty word. Don't be sick, don't say you're in pain. So I'm sure a lot of people feel shame just for being in that condition, and there's a lot to overcome.

Dr. Leah Flaherty: 24:27

Because women are supposed to be able to do it all too, right? Yeah. I definitely received that message in my childhood too, is that women are supposed to be able to do everything. We're all superheroes. So when do we have time to get sick or be in pain or or or care about ourselves or think about ourselves when everyone else in our circle is relying on us?

Jodi: 24:44

Sure. Yep. Or even, you know, the macho thing. I was talking to you off camera a little bit about my dad, and he was a macho guy, pain don't hurt, you know? And eventually it it'll take you over if you let it.

Dr. Leah Flaherty: 24:59

Yeah. Yep.

Sherry: 25:00

Yep. One question that I get sometimes from others with severe and chronic pain is Is there hope if your pain is so severe that it impairs like even walking to the door feels impossible? Like people with mobility issues. People with extreme mobility problems or extreme difficulty, you know, standing up straight or just, you know, just to get up out of the chair is painful.

Dr. Leah Flaherty: 25:32

Yeah. Yes. Short answer. I think so much of this has to do with expectation management, right? I think we are our own harshest critics. We are so hard on ourselves that when we're talking about something like that, if someone has had a major injury event or someone has had a disease process that has been really difficult on them and continues to build, we can see significant pain. And then what happens is we get kinesophobic, which is the fear of movement, right? And so when we start to develop that fear of movement, what ends up happening is it starts to build on itself, which then starts to lead to depression because nothing feels good anymore. Nothing is exciting anymore. I I don't I don't want to get out of bed because that's gonna hurt. So is it worth it to even move? And that's not most of the people that I see because most of the people that I see are able to get up or able to move. I heard someone talk about this like perception of what a chronic pain patient is, and that's someone who lies around all day. I've never met that chronic pain patient. I've never met someone who is wanting to be on the couch all day, right? That's not my experience at all. What I hear so often is people being really difficult on themselves, being really hard on themselves. So I I wanted to do 10 things today and I was only able to get the laundry done, or I was only able to do the dishes.

Sherry: 26:55

Yeah.

Dr. Leah Flaherty: 26:56

Like, why doesn't that count? Why can't you give yourself the benefit of saying I did that today? And I think so often we have this inventory of negativity in our head when we're going to sleep, we get the what are all the things I didn't do today? And we can really use that to beat ourselves up. And so I'm always asking people to shift their cognitions to what did I do today? Right. So knowing the fact that I am living with chronic pain, that I have a chronic condition, that I had this injury, and yet I was still able to get my kids from the bus stop. I was still able to read a book with them. I was still able to have dinner on the table, right? So all of these things that make you you. And so I think as long as we don't lose ourselves in the pain, we are able to have some hope and be able to get some of that quality of life back. Yes.

Jodi: 27:43

Right. That's great. So I am newer to hearing about your program. Tell me a little bit about what is it like? Is there one class, two classes? What's the follow-up and the support afterwards?

Dr. Leah Flaherty: 27:57

It's a one-time class. It's a two-hour intervention and it's just one time. I am working in uh working with creating more programming so that we can have some follow-up sessions after that. So like refresher courses or things like that. But at this point, what we've got is a is a one-time, two-hour intervention. And because we're funded by the West Penn Hospital Foundation, I've been offering this for free for three years. And so there's no cost, yeah. So there's no cost to patients to log in. And so you were talking about in the show notes. I can send a link to register so that anyone who's interested can can join.

Jodi: 28:33

That's beautiful. I love the accessibility of that.

Dr. Leah Flaherty: 28:36

Yeah, me too. Yeah.

Sherry: 28:38

Yeah. So what's the harm to try? And what is the website? Because I I will link it in the show notes.

Dr. Leah Flaherty: 28:44

It's AHN Events. So if you Google AHN Events Empowered Relief, you'll find it.

Sherry: 28:50

Okay. Yeah. And the last time I looked, there were just like different dates that are available, and you just click and sign up, and it was a really simple process.

Dr. Leah Flaherty: 28:58

That's it. It's easy peasy. I also wanted to say, too, in a lot of the conversation that we're having, when I say pain neuroscience education, that sounds really complicated. It sounds like neuroscience. I'm not a neuroscientist. How am I going to be able to understand this? So we made a bunch of uh videos that have kind of this demystification or destigmatization of what that means. And those are available. I'll send you that link too. And so that's on AHN's YouTube channel. It's called Brain Over Pain. And you can find those videos too.

Sherry: 29:29

And you may have already mentioned this. Anyone is eligible because it's free. So it doesn't matter if you're UPMC or HighMark or any of that stuff.

Dr. Leah Flaherty: 29:38

Yeah. I if you're AHN, I would recommend talking to your doc about it, just saying, hey, I heard about this program because they can put in a referral for you. You can self register or get the referral. But it is nice to make those connections with the physicians because we've had a lot of exciting, we've had over 4,000 referrals in network from our physicians because they know it works for their patients.

Sherry: 29:57

That's fantastic. So so glad that it's here. And more and more people are discovering it and giving it a try.

Jodi: 30:07

So definitely. Anything you want people to know to wrap up?

Dr. Leah Flaherty: 30:14

All I want people to know is to continue advocating for themselves. I I know it's I know it's tough. So one of the things that I really like to recommend is that folks bring their support people with them, their loved ones. Because I think oftentimes it can feel like we're fighting this alone. And so if you can have someone in your life take it with you and you can say to them, this is what I'm talking about, right? I told you it's not all in my head. We have some data now from people who've taken our class with a loved one and have said that it's made them feel more connected to their support people, it's made them have conversations with their loved ones that they haven't had before. So that's always my hope is to make sure that people aren't telling themselves they have to do this alone. You don't have to do that.

Jodi: 30:58

Yeah, I do feel it seems to me in my experience, even talking to other people, that when you're going through something really terrible and you're having a lot of pain, even sometimes when you're surrounded by support, you feel isolated and alone, right? So I think looping people in probably makes a big impact.

Dr. Leah Flaherty: 31:18

Yeah, and it can lead to that accountability too. Cause I know it's tough to keep up with your plan, right? To say, have I listened to this every day? Am I doing all these things I'm supposed to be doing every day? And so to have someone help you with that accountability can be really great too.

Jodi: 31:34

Yep. Fantastic. Well, thank you so much. I'm excited to get this word out to more people.

Sherry: 31:40

Yes, we will link everything in the show notes, but as Dr. Flaherty said, you can just uh search AHN events empowered relief. Dr. Flaherty, thank you so much for having this conversation with us today.

Jodi: 31:54

It's my favorite thing to thank you for the wonderful work you're doing.

Dr. Leah Flaherty: 31:58

Thank you. Thanks for talking about it. I appreciate you both so much.

Sherry: 32:03

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