Encounters in a World of Pain: An Autoethnography

Abstract

Pain, a major health problem in the United States, is a highly complex and subjective experience that is poorly understood by many medical, psychological, and rehabilitation practitioners. In this paper I use a qualitative research methodology, autoethnography, to present a personal narrative about my experience of chronic pain. In this research I am both the research participant and the researcher. I begin with my personal narrative. I then problematize conceptions about chronic pain and discuss them from the point of view of my own narrative and from stories and ethnographies in the literature. Finally I reflect on how occupational therapists can more effectively work with persons with chronic pain.