Chronic pain support groups

Hi Kristi, My name is Cherie, I was a co-leader of our support group before i moved.

You can start by getting a place to hold it, The Library if its not to far from your home will let you hold 12 meetings a yr so you could have one every month,or a church or town hall.

 once you have aquired a place try and set the same date every month ( ie; the first thursday of the month @ 7:00pm) This will help establish a specific date and time for people to put on their calanders.

Next put out flyers u can get a printer to work with you as you dont have much money, I got ours to print 5oo flyers for$ 30 . in grocery stores Pharmacies Dr offices most places will let you put them on there tables or bulletin boards, With Lets say,

Wanted: People who want their own Chronic Pain Support Group , Come and join people that understand what you are going through,Do you suffer from Arthritis, Fibromyalgia,  chronic back pain etc, then this group is for You! The meetings will be the first thursday of the month at the So- so so Library@ 7:oopm  mark your calanders Now  And we look forward to seeing you there! Yada Yada .

Then ask your local newspaper to run the ad they will usually put it in community events or a feature story .

Have meetings when you all just vent about your diseases,

 then a meeting to bring helpful hints or Drs that have worked for someone Etc,

 also have a movie night Some one could rent a movie and you can usually use the librarys vidio machine?  

Finally get guest speakers to come talk to the group, ie (Neurologists ,Chiropractors, Pain Med Specialists,

 usually you can say we cant pay you as we are a non profit group But we can get you exposure in the paper? and we will have finger food, tell them which topic you would like to talk about or let them pick and have a question and answer afterwards .The paper will usually run this as a human interest story etc.

Have a picnic in the summer where you are just having fun for the day ,

And have phone buddy's where members can call or email each other til the next meeting, You will have to take donations in order to print the flyers, and get people in the group to help put them out, once you get the ball rolling you'll be surprised how much it will help you and others and remember deligate you can not do it all!!!!And let them know that at the very first meeting! When you are in Chronic Pain you cant do it all, tell them this is a group meeting it takes group effert to keep it going.

I hope i have helped i think its great you are willing to start a group i really miss mine, Good Luck and anything else you want to ask feel free. Cherie

Kristi

A few months back I had created a share post asking the same question and got some results that were helpful.  Here is the link to that post incase you find anything there to help you too.

http://www.healthcentral.com/chronic-pain/c/25343/15820/pain-group/

I hope your able to get something started.  It's sometimes hard to get things going and also pain patients have a struggle getting out, but some will really be interested in some type of support.

Take Care, I hope it all works out for you

Betty

Hi Kristi,

Let me know how your group set up goes. I just moved to a new community and when I called the number for the chronic pain support group I was told they hadn't met in a few months because no one felt up to it!! lol. Not much help, so I'm interested to see how yours works out. I have toyed with the idea of getting one set up myself.

Best of luck to you!!!!

~Megs