Rating: 
Summary: no more pain
Review: This book literally saved me thousands and thousands of dollars. Last summer I threw my back out and was in excriciating pain. I was so bad I literally could not walk, and was on painkillers. I bought Sarno out of curiosity and within a week of reading it, and recognizing that my pain was stress related, my back pain was gone. One has to be willing to deal with issues, though, and I'm sure there are many people who would rather take a pill or have surgery than really deal with their lives.
Rating:
Summary: dancing again!
Review: After 20 months of horrible excruciating back pain, and months in bed, at home and very depressed, going to over 20 back specialists and some alternative medicine people, I am now dancing again, (besides being a photographer, I am also a professional dancer for 12 years now) and back to my normal life, lifting, doing photo shoots, traveling and performing.
I first read the book a year before I got cured with its help, but couldn't accept the diagnosis Dr. Sarno suggests in his book, I couln't trust his concept. Unfortunately I wasted a year of misery before I gave it another chance, thanks to the advise of a friend who suggested that I'll try to 'put it on me', not doubt it and give it a chance for a whole month.
I am 100% pain free all thanks to this revolutionary book, 'Healing back pain'.
I could never thank Dr. Sarno enough; he gave me my life back, my happiness and livelihood.
Rating:
Summary: Great Book! Answered all my questions.
Review: I was suffering for many months from chronic pain in my back, legs, knees, feet, neck, arms, and hands, and was almost completely disabled. Healing Back Pain answered the many questions I had about my condition. Combining guidelines provided by Dr. Sarno with techniques used by Olympic athletes, I was able to design a nine-step rapid recovery program that allowed me to improve immediately and recover within four days. My story is detailed in Rapid Recovery from Back and Neck Pain: A Nine-Step Recovery Plan and serves as another testimony to the accuracy of Dr. Sarno's diagnosis.
Rating:
Summary: Just the RIGHT book if you have back pain!
Review: A friend suggested this book to me when I was going through a period of back pain. She and her husband swore by it, but I was more than a little skeptical. However, I was also bedridden and they had it delivered to my door. I have to tell you, that if you are open to the idea, once you read the book, you can easily help your back pain. I have since sent this book out to three other people, and they all now swear by it as well. I suggest you sit down (or just lay there if you're having back pain) and read it cover to cover with an OPEN mind - nothing ventured, nothing gained. You will likely find that you can effect you pain level and possibly learn to control back pain. Good luck!
Rating:
Summary: This booked saved me!
Review: This is an amazing book! I was suffering from severe back pain which I blamed on excessive weightlifting. I was told that I had a herniated disk. I went through months of physical therapy yet was still in excruciating pain. I even missed 6 months of work. I had epidurals done as my doctor advised, still nothing helped. My last resort was getting surgery which I had scheduled. Fortunately I came across Dr. Sornos book, read it, and within 1 month I was pain free. That was 4 months ago and I am very active, working out 5 days a week, and have never felt this back pain again.
This is all true. My pain was horrible. Often bringing me quickly to the floor because of its intensity and it was too painful to stand. Do yourself a favor. If you have back pain, read this book!
Rating: 
Summary: quack, quack ....
Review: Sarno is a Dr., but that is very difficult to believe. Here are some of his 'opinions'. What causes back pain? In every instance it is TMS (Tension Myositis Syndrom)... that is, muscle tension caused by repressed emotions. Let's look at the evidence ... he did a 'survey', and found that, quoting from the book "77% of patients fell between the ages of thirty and sixty ....what I call the years of responsibility". For Sarno responsibility equates to tension, so, TMS causes back pain, QED (the hypothesis is proved). He also argues, I won't look it up, that both tension and backpain have increaed dramatically in the last 30 years, so, again, QED. But here's my favorite .... we all know the body's capability for healing itself of physical injury, correct... so, since back pain is chronic, it must not have a physical cause! I'll quote the good Dr., demonstrating his acute medical knowledge "Even the largest bone in the body, the femur, only takes six weeks to heal. And, during that time, there is pain for only a very short time. It is illogical to think that an injury that occurred two months ago might still be causing pain". Again, QED. The book purports only to 'diagnose' back pain, not to treat it, and the diagnosis is invariably TMS. The Dr. also claims he is very successful treating back pain.... and the treatement ....get ready for this one ...all one must do is buy and listen to two two hour lectures by the good Dr., available on videotape, and follow a few simple guidelines, here's an example, quoting, "think psychological at all times, not physical". If you think your low self-esteem, and/or repressed anger, might be the cause of you back pain, this book is for you. It didn't convice me at all. Sarno, for the most part, offers only anecdotal evidence for his opinions. There are no footnotes, references to published articles, and the like, that one would expect if he were a serious person. Just constant restatment of his 'diagnosis', and many of his own 'case histories'.
Rating: 
Summary: Want Pain Relief? READ this review!
Review: I discovered Dr. Sarno's book 3 years ago and it has transformed my body and my mind. I suffered with chronic pains in my back, hip, buttock, legs, knees and feet for more than 20 years. Sarno's information brought to my attention for the first time that my chronic pains could be caused by
inner tension. My only disappointment was that there were no real techniques explained to help eliminate the pain and that even though I was really excited to be 90% out of pain I still had one nagging "Butt" pain that would not go away. Since I am a competitive long distance runner, I really wanted to be 100%. Finally I discovered how to eliminate all my pain through several mind-body techniques. Dr. Sarno's work inspired so much that I have now written a book on how to eliminate these chronic pains. I have written it from a fitness perspective and include all the techniques that worked and did not work. I believe that
my book, Get Rid Of The Pain In Your Butt NOW!, combined with Sarno's work can help everyone, even you folks that think it is hopeless and you will never be out of pain. All the Best to everyone.
Monte Hueftle
Get Rid Of The Pain In Your Butt NOW!
Pain Relief For Your Back, Legs, Knees, Feet & Sciatica
Rating:
Summary: Very helpful but!
Review: I agree with the reader from Kansas City. Dr. Sarno does an excellent job describing the cause of back pain, but he does not give the reader concrete steps for recovery. That's where Fred Amir's Rapid Recovery from Back and Neck Pain complements the process. It gave me specific things to do to plan my own recovery from back pain and sciatica. It worked very fast and the additional strategies in the book have helped me remain pain free for two years now. Maybe someday they will be made into one book, as the other reader suggested. Thank you Dr. Sano and Mr. Amir.
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Summary: 6 months later, pain-free
Review: I first read this book when suffering from terrible back pain in February 2003. (I reviewed the book shortly after that time.) It hasn't been an overnight cure, but six months later I am pain free. I am profoundly grateful for this book and recommend it to anyone who complains to me about undiagnosable chronic pain.
Rating:
Summary: Nothing Else Worked But This Did
Review: This book has been the most influential health book I have ever read. I sought out a book on back pain being psychological, as I noticed that when I used to go on holidays, my backache would almost disappear and re-appear when I came home. I had spent many years prior to that thinking it was physical and doing various, useless back and stomach exercises and visited physiotherapists, osteopaths, tried yoga, swimming and pilates. Most people would say that their backache improved with exercise. I'm afraid mine got much worse. So much so, that I would have to stop that form of exercise after a few weeks. Only swimming and yoga didn't have an adverse effect, but I could tell they never got to the root of the problem. I'm just disappointed that no-one ever mentioned the emotional factor. I definitely think anyone with back pain, once having checked that it's not a structural problem (although apparently there's no correlation between structural problems of the spine and backache) should give it a go. I found 4 fundamental issues to deal with when confronting the pain in this way: 1. To focus on the pain being due to repressed anger and not a physical reason.
2. Not to have too high expectations of myself.
3. To re-condition my thoughts that bending, lifting, twisting, etc...was NOT harmful for my back. I found the bending one particularly hard to dispel. It took several weeks.
4. Not to pre-occupy myself with the pain (I had to stop thinking, "does it hurt?" every time I leant forward, picked something up, etc...) as this did perpetuate it. Once I addressed these ideas, I made progress. The whole concept does seem corny - I had to keep taking "thinking time" out for about 15 minutes a day / twice a day that it became a joke in the family. I noticed that within a day or so, after this concentration, the edge of the pain would go. This was the amazing thing. Now, I'm going to the gym (I haven't been in years), swimming, picking up my child whilst bending my back, lifting heavy shopping with no pain at all. Wow - anyone with backache will know that that's a treat and I'm not obsessed by my back anymore. I remember questioning the physiotherapist a couple of years ago why you shouldn't bend your back when you need to pick something up, as it's the most natural thing to do. So, I'm glad common sense was part of the solution. I noticed that a some of the readers that gave fewer than 5 stars for this book haven't even tried out the method. There's no point in giving an opinion if you don't KNOW. Another point is that I wondered that if this sort of thing works and is so easy, why isn't it common knowledge. Well, having mentioned it to a few people, I did get some negative responses, as people were insistent that their's was physical (even though not eliminated). Only a small number of people would try this out, probably after exhausting other options.
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