OUR COMMUNITY
Our community connects real patients with policy advocacy.
MEET DAWN
Dawn Gibson
Dawn will head our community efforts and our Community Leadership Council. She founded the acclaimed twitter chat group #SpoonieChat in 2013, growing it into a thriving community of mutual support, friendship, and solidarity for patients as well as students and doctors curious to hear from patients.
Follow #SpoonieChat every Wednesday evening from 8-10PM EST to talk about living with pain.
People living with pain are at the center of everything we do, and in every level of our organization.
OUR COMMUNITY LEADERSHIP COUNCIL
Tinu Abayomi-Paul
Sarah Blahovec
Connie Chen
Brooke Feldman
Chris Freeman
Anne Fuqua
Jed Finley
Ryan Hampton
Frank & Valerie Gawin
Charis Hill
Sonya Huber
Quána Madison
Richard Martin
Ola Ojewumi
Dania Palanker
Amy Partridge
Diane Talbert
Brooke Vittimberga
Jemela Williams
Syreeta Nolan
Sara Ruh
COMMUNITY PAIN STORIES
#RealPainStories | Video: Charis Hill
Charis Hill was a captain of their college's soccer team when pain they had experienced since childhood began affecting daily functioning. They began seeking answers. Five years later, Charis learned they had Axial Spondyloarthritis (also called Ankylosing Spondylitis), a disease their father also had.
Pain Stories: Dr. Frank H Gawin, Pain and Forced Opioid Tapering
Dr. Gawin describes his pain as feeling as if someone were stabbing him repeatedly with a knife. The pain never remits; its intensity varies, but the knife—the stabbing sensation—is ever-present.
Pain Stories: Sonya Huber
Sonya Huber was 38 years old and midway through a divorce when her pain began. As a newly single mom with a four year old son and a demanding tenure track teaching position, it was a terrible time to develop an autoimmune disorder.
Pain Stories: Quána Madison
Quána Madison was a 34-year-old PhD candidate when she noticed that something was wrong: she had lost 30 pounds in under a month and had inexplicable growths and extreme pain in her lower abdomen. Soon after, her doctors recommended preventive surgery for cancer. But after the surgery, Quana never got better. Worse –clinicians dismissed her pain.
Pain Stories: Dania Palanker
45 year old Dania Palanker has lived with pain for most of her life. At 14, her knee swelled so badly that she couldn’t bend her leg. In her early 20’s, she had debilitating pain in both hands and wrists. By her late 20s, Dania began to suspect that these were not isolated incidents.
NPAC WANTS TO HEAR FROM YOU
Do you have an experience with pain?
If you have a personal experience with pain, we want to hear your story. Please fill out the form below, and a Community Council member will reach out to learn more about your lived experience with pain.