Millions of people live with chronic pain and other stress-related symptoms, such as migraine, fatigue, dizziness, IBS, POTS, and other persistent physical symptoms that don't resolve with medical treatment. Many of them are in therapy. And a growing body of peer-reviewed research suggests that psychotherapists may be among the most important people in helping their clients overcome these symptoms.     

This introductory training presents the neuroscience and psychology of neuroplastic pain and symptoms, and the evidence-based treatments now showing strong results in clinical trials. Designed for mental health clinicians with no prior background in pain science, it offers both a conceptual foundation and a practical framework for identifying when chronic symptoms may be brain-generated rather than structurally driven.       

What You'll Learn

Participants will leave with a working understanding of the distinction between structural and neuroplastic pain or symptoms; the surprising breadth of conditions that fall under the neuroplastic umbrella; and a clinical screening tool, the FIT criteria, for identifying neuroplastic presentations in your current caseload. 

The training also explores the psychological mechanisms through which symptoms develop, including the role of emotional suppression, unmet needs, and early adversity in sensitizing the nervous system. It will also explain why the therapeutic relationship and emotional processing work are not just supportive, but can be curative. The training also addresses the powerful role of language and expectation in shaping treatment outcomes, including how clinician framing can either reinforce chronicity or open a doorway to recovery. 

The final section introduces the two treatments with the strongest evidence base in this field: Pain Reprocessing Therapy (PRT) and Emotional Awareness and Expression Therapy (EAET). Both are psychology-based, both draw on skills clinicians already possess, and both outperform usual care, CBT and ACT for neuroplastic pain in peer-reviewed trials. Many of the principles of these treatments are also effective for comorbid anxiety and depression. 

Why This Matters for Your Practice

Chronic pain and medically unexplained symptoms are among the most undertreated and misunderstood presentations in healthcare. Clients with these conditions often arrive in therapy feeling dismissed, discouraged, traumatized by their medical experiences, and doubtful that anything can help. This training gives clinicians a framework for understanding what is actually happening in the nervous system, and a vocabulary for communicating it to clients in a way that restores hope rather than reinforcing fear.

Case material illustrates the kind of recovery that is possible when clients understand their symptoms as brain-generated rather than structurally driven. Specifically, I will present a case in which a client started out bedbound and left treatment working, exercising, and fully re-engaged in their lives. 

Psychotherapists are uniquely positioned to do this work. This session is your introduction to a rapidly growing field, and to the meaningful role you can play in it.