Psychology for chronic pain in Calgary.
When pain has stayed for months or years, the work isn’t just medical. Therapy that takes pain seriously — along with the depression, role-loss, sleep disruption, relationship strain, and identity work that come with it.
Pain that has stayed.
Persistent pain conditions — fibromyalgia, complex regional pain syndrome, post-injury and post-surgical pain that hasn’t resolved on the expected timeline.
Pain after motor-vehicle accident — including the trauma and litigation context that often comes with it.
Headache and migraine — the psychological dimensions of management, particularly when pain has shaped scheduling, identity, and family roles.
Pelvic pain — including the often-unspoken impact on intimacy, identity, and medical-system frustration.
Pain-mood loop — depression, anxiety, and pain feeding each other. The most common reason a chronic-pain client ends up in a psychologist’s office.
Sleep disruption — pain wrecks sleep, lack of sleep amplifies pain. We work on both ends of the loop.
Identity loss — mourning the person you were before, while also building who you are now. The body changed; the self has to catch up.
Medical-system fatigue — advocacy, communication with your physician and physiotherapy team, the slow erosion of being repeatedly disbelieved or minimized.
Psychological tools for a physical condition.
ACT for chronic pain — acceptance and values-based action. A well-researched psychological approach for chronic pain; meta-analyses show small-to-medium improvements in pain interference, functioning, depression, anxiety, and quality of life (Du et al., 2021).
CBT for pain — identifying the thought patterns that amplify pain experience, building skills to interrupt the catastrophising-pain cycle.
Pacing strategies — the specific skill of operating within a sustainable range rather than the boom-bust cycle most people fall into.
Sleep work — CBT-I-informed approaches adapted for the pain context.
Couples and family inclusion — chronic pain is rarely just an individual’s load. Communication, household-role renegotiation, and intimacy work are often part of the picture.
Collaborative — we work alongside your physician, physiotherapist, or pain clinic, not in competition with them. With your consent, we can communicate directly.
What we don’t do: prescribe (that’s your physician), or do physical interventions (that’s your physio). We work on the parts pain affects that aren’t the tissue itself.
The therapist on the team who does this work.
Browse and click into a bio. The free consult is a call to talk through fit, fees, and insurance.
Chronic-pain psychology, asked and answered.
Does psychological therapy actually help physical pain?
For chronic pain, yes — not by “making the pain go away,” but by reducing pain interference (how much pain disrupts what you want to do), improving mood, restoring sleep, and changing the catastrophising patterns that amplify pain experience. Psychological approaches are part of evidence-based chronic-pain care, with meta-analytic support across multiple modalities (Du et al., 2021).
Does this mean my pain is “in my head”?
No. Pain is always real, and chronic pain has well-documented physiological mechanisms. What therapy works on is the part of the pain experience that is shaped by attention, mood, sleep, meaning, and behaviour — which is significant even when the underlying physical condition isn’t in question.
Will you talk with my doctor or physio?
Yes, with your written consent. Coordinated care across psychology, medicine, and physiotherapy is often more effective than any one of those alone for chronic pain.
How long is the work?
Varies. A focused ACT-for-pain protocol may run 12–16 sessions; clients with co-occurring depression, trauma, or relationship work often stay longer. Chronic conditions also sometimes call for periodic top-ups around flares.
Are sessions covered by insurance?
Most extended health plans cover Registered Psychologists and Registered Provisional Psychologists. Direct billing is available with Blue Cross.
In-person or online?
Both. Sessions at our Calgary office (2640 30 St SW) or by encrypted video for clients across Alberta.
References
Du, S., Dong, J., Zhang, H., Jin, S., Xu, G., Liu, Z., Chen, L., Yin, H., & Sun, Z. (2021). Acceptance and commitment therapy for chronic pain on functioning: A systematic review of randomized controlled trials. Neuroscience & Biobehavioral Reviews, 131, 59–76. doi:10.1016/j.neubiorev.2021.09.022
Twenty minutes. On the phone. Free.
Tell us what’s going on and ask anything — insurance, format, fees, what a first session looks like. You’ll be on the call with one of our therapists, and we’ll go from there together. If we’re not the right practice for you, we’ll say so.