Relationships are often one of the biggest casualties of chronic pain.  A recent news story got me to thinking about the toll any kind of illness, particularly a chronic illness, takes on relationships. 

(Note:  I have no idea whether or not this story is true.  Since the story broke on ESPN a day or so ago, it has gone viral.  Now apparently there is some question of the man's veracity.  Some people think it is a publicity stunt.  So for what it's worth, here is the story.)

Jason Elia, a Nashville TV writer decided to give his girlfriend two extremely nice Christmas gifts – an engagement ring and Super Bowl tickets.  Unfortunately, before he had a chance to give them to her, he got two pieces of bad news.  First, he was diagnosed with bladder cancer.  Second, despite the fact that he was given an 87 percent chance of survival, his girlfriend dumped him, saying she couldn't handle the stress of having a boyfriend with a chronic disease.  To add insult to injury, the ex-girlfriend insisted she should still get the Super Bowl tickets because he bought them with her in mind.  (Elia disagreed and instead offered the tickets to the person who could get him the most Twitter followers). 

Whether or not the story is true, it reminded me that all too often I hear of relationships breaking up when one person develops a serious health problem, especially when that condition causes chronic, debilitating pain.  At the very least, chronic pain puts a strain on even the best relationships – be they marriages or friendships. 

Although we can't control how other people act or react in response to our chronic pain problems, there are positive steps we can take to improve our relationships.  Today I'm focusing on our relationships with friends.  Following are six tips for building, improving and sustaining relationships.

1.  Reassess Your Relationships

Chronic pain tends to impose limits on what you can do.  When you were healthy and active, you could juggle lots of friends, but now you're probably finding that you need to focus your limited time and energy on a few close friends. 

Friendships based on common interests that you can no longer participate in will usually drop by the wayside naturally – for example, job-related friends when you are no longer able to work or sports friends when you can't participate in the sport anymore. 

Toxic friends are another story.  These are friends that in one way or another pull you down and increase your stress levels.  Toxic friends are generally self-centered and take more than they give.  They may be negative, demanding, critical, needy and/or have lives that seem to be constantly full of drama.  If you always seem to feel worse after talking to this person, they are probably a toxic friend.  Real friends should build you up, inspire you and lift your spirits, not drag you down and leave you depressed.