Pain is a subject we avoid. We find it uncomfortable and difficult to talk about. This silence is to the detriment of both those who are in pain and those who care for them. In this book, Dr. Rachel Aarons brings the subject of pain out of the shadows. She explores it from all angles.

In part one, you will find an in-depth depiction of how being in severe pain alters the person you are and the world you live in. In this detailed phenomenology of the pain experience, Dr. Aarons gives voice to what has been muffled in silence. She is joined by a medley of voices of pain patients with a range of challenging medical issues. They each share their personal experiences of pain and the hard-won messages they are moved to convey about them.

Part two may be seen as a wake-up call from the perspective of the patient directed to those caregivers - including doctors and nurses - who provide medical care to people in pain. It is offered for the purpose of enhancing their understanding and effectiveness in areas of caregiving that relate not to textbook knowledge but to the personal experience of the patient.

In the crescendo of part three, Dr. Aarons tackles the question of how to live with, reduce, relieve, and even rise above pain. She reviews and evaluates a variety of specific pain management approaches for their usefulness and transformative power.

About Pain promises to deepen and expand both your empathy and your understanding of pain. From a professional and at the same time personal perspective, Dr. Aarons sheds a starkly honest light on a taboo subject that inevitably affects every one of us.