Why We Hurt and How to Heal The Surprising New Science of Pain and Recovery

Leading pain expert Dr. Rachel Zoffness bridges the gap between medicine and psychology to get to the heart of understanding – and treating – pain.

When Dr. Rachel Zoffness met 17 year old Sam, his pain seemed untreatable. Bedridden with pain for four years, Sam had seen 14 doctors and taken 40 different medications. Nothing seemed to work. But Dr. Zoffness got to know Sam, prioritizing his emotional pain in addition to the physical. They took into consideration his surroundings and his daily activities. Within two months, Sam was working with a tutor again. He caught up with school, graduated, and was asked to prom by two different people.

Sam's neurologist called it a miracle. In reality, Sam's recovery came from a new understanding of pain, one that isn't about simply connecting mind and body. Neuroscience confirms that pain is actually biopsychosocial: produced by what Zoffness calls the five pillars of pain—cognitive, emotional, biological, social, and environmental factors. This book breaks down the science, and is divided into three parts which explain the what, why, and how of pain. The third section consists of a pain protocol which guides the reader through a customized plan to treat their own pain.

People need pain education more than ever: chronic pain is on the rise, affecting more people than cancer, heart disease, and diabetes combined. We need to put an end to this—now. Rooted in research, evidence, and approachable pain neuroscience, Tell Me Where It Hurts approaches pain from a new vantage point, and offers an optimistic way forward. If the brain can change, pain can change--and Dr. Zoffness shows us how.

Dr. Rachel Zoffness MS, PhD is a leading global pain expert, pain psychologist, speaker, author, disruptor and thought-leader in pain medicine. She’s a Lecturer at Stanford, an Assistant Clinical Professor at the UCSF School of Medicine, former pain education faculty at Dartmouth, and winner of the prestigious Mayday Fellowship. Dr. Zoffness is an invited speaker at international conferences and hospital Grand Rounds across the U.S., has completed three visiting professorships at top-tier academic institutions, and consults on the development of integrative pain programs around the world.

She serves on the Board of Directors of the U.S. Association for the Study of Pain, the largest pain organization in America; and the Society of Pediatric Pain Medicine, where she is the first and only pain psychologist to serve on a board of anesthesiologists. Dr. Zoffness is the author of The Pain Management Workbook (New Harbinger, 2020) and The Chronic Pain and Illness Workbook for Teens (InstantHelp 2019), the first pain workbook for youth, and writes the health column “Pain, Explained” for Psychology Today.