Dancing Through Pain

It’s not much fun living with chronic pain: never knowing whether you’re waking up to a ‘good day’ or a ‘bad day’, managing the persistent fatigue, feeling guilty that you can’t be the mum, dad, friend or employee you’d like to be….the list goes on.

Isolation and accompanying mental health deterioration is a real risk, as are worsening symptoms due to inability to get out and about as much, reducing levels of exercise.

It may seem odd to ask a person exhausted by living with debilitating pain to dance. Mental images of ‘Strictly’ or memories of what was once physically possible in Zumba or Ballet classes, or down the local nightclub, don’t help.

We are helping adults in Gloucestershire living with long-term persistent pain to bring down barriers to the proverbial ‘joy of dance’ through it’s prescribed ‘Dance Translations’ courses. The courses were shaped through NHS Gloucestershire funded research sessions that included people experiencing chronic pain alongside inclusive dance and NHS pain management specialists.

Upbeat music, permission to ‘do things differently’, the positive energy from the facilitators, and being with others who can empathise, has been a cathartic, life-enhancing experience for many. A participant and co-producer who lives with chronic pain fed back:

‘Living in Pain can be quite a joyless experience. You spend a lot of time masking; pandering to other people’s concerns….and there’s something about this course that’s put the joy back!’

Participants are supported to develop their own personalised ‘dance vocabulary’, which can be adapted session-by-session dependent on their level of pain and/or fatigue. For example, one week they may complete an exercise standing, the next seated, or even lying down; they may choose to use their mobility aid to support access to a dance exercise one week, but just use the wall to lean on a following week. Artlift’s Dance Facilitator Annet Richards-Binns primarily uses the ‘Dance Unstuck’[1] toolkit developed by dance and disability experts, which draws on principles of Universal Design of Instruction [2]. It enables participants to ‘translate’ exercises or dance phrases into their own movement possibilities – perhaps, using a different body part to the person next to them, or taking a reach to the side, rather than up due to that nagging shoulder pain.

In these dance sessions, it’s not a case of ‘copying’ but of finding your own way of interpreting the Dance Facilitator’s descriptive language and responding to encouragement to try doing things differently in order to create access to the same function of the exercise (e.g. improving core strength) and/or aesthetic (e.g. capturing the joy of the Bhangra beat).

Prior participants have noted the positive impact both on their mental as well as physical health:

‘My mood was lifted by the session and that has stayed with me. I also feel as if I have had fewer issues with balance/wobbles over the past few days’

‘In this course I was able to find own way of moving…It was something enjoyable and helps mobility. I really missed it when I couldn’t come… sometimes I come in very low but felt great by the time I left’.

Outcomes from wellbeing and pain management surveys indicated an (on average) 12% decrease in levels of pain and 31% improvement in fatigue levels.

Senior Physiotherapist and co-producer of the Dance Translations course, Helen Ryder, said:

‘Keeping active is really important for people with pain. It’s easier to be active when you’re enjoying yourself but, if pain is problem, it’s difficult to know what sort of activity will suit you. You might be scared of trying new things.

‘Dance is a great way to get moving – everyone can join in and it’s fun! Artlift’s dance sessions can really help people to find a way to get dancing that suits them, whatever their movement possibilities’

Dance Translations participants benefit from up to two blocks of 8 x 1.5 hour sessions, which run on Friday afternoons in Barnwood, Gloucester, as well as one-to-one conversations with the Dance Facilitator who works with them on a plan through which to stay active, and thereby well, after the course has finished. All sessions are currently free.

Anyone impacted by chronic pain for 3 or more months who is over 18 and registered with a GP in Gloucestershire can apply to join the course by following a link on the ‘Join In’ page on Artlift’s website. Also, health professionals or social prescribers can refer patients they’re supporting to the course via a link on the ‘Refer to Us’ page

[1] A toolkit enabling access to dance for a wider diversity of disabled dancers, developed by dance artists and educators Jürg Koch and Susie Birchwood and GDance / Art Shape, in partnership with Ballet Cymru, Paradance UK and the Royal Academy of Dance.

[2] https://www.washington.edu/doit/equal-access-universal-design-instruction