UFV professor to share her journey living with chronic pain at UFV Science Café event today

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“Most of the time it looks like there’s nothing wrong with me,” she says. “Part of what I’ll be talking about at the Science Café is how small things that people don’t think twice about that can have a large impact on people like me who look ‘normal.’”

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Giles outlines a list of things that exacerbate her issues, like lighting (natural vs artificial), and background noise. There are things that can minimize her pain, but she says there’s a hesitation to advocate for herself because of concerns about how she’ll be perceived. For example, Giles doesn’t have a wheelchair, cast, or cane.

“If I had a broken leg, nobody would make me stand up for three hours. But through no fault of their own, people don’t always recognize what they can’t see,” Giles says. “For me to not feel as much pain, I need this, this, this, and this. But if I ask for this, this, this, and this, I feel like I’m high maintenance, and an inconvenience. And I think people perceive me as that, so I just ask for one thing. What I want is awareness. I want to get people thinking about how we can make the environment accessible to people, beyond physical accessibility.”

Giles will link her presentation with that of Cynthia Thomson, a UFV colleague who is also speaking at the Science Café.

“We collaborated on a clinical trial that talked about not just the medical side of it, but also the psychological and social side, and how your emotions can feed into your pain,” Giles says.

The third presenter is also from the UFV kinesiology department. Brian Justin has expertise in pain management with somatic movement and fitness training. For participants who are willing, Justin asks that you bring a yoga matt.

The Science Café is open to the UFV community and the public. The Chilliwack library is in the A building on the UFV Chilliwack campus at Canada Education Park (45190 Caen Ave).

For more information, contact Dan De Groot at dan.degroot@ufv.ca.