Comfort, Coping and Call the Midwife

In this month’s guest blog, education researcher Katie Hazel explores how comfort TV helps her – and many others – through difficult days.

Education researcher Katie Hazel

“When I first started researching persistent pain, I never expected that my comfort television series would become part of my academic work. Yet after more than thirteen years of living with persistent wrist pain, I realised there was something worth exploring.

“My name is Katie, and I have lived with De Quervain's Tenosynovitis (DQT) since I was twelve years old. More recently, I was also diagnosed with Carpal Tunnel Syndrome in the same wrist.

“Over the years I've tried almost everything available - physiotherapy, occupational therapy, multiple steroid injections, surgery, MRI scans and countless appointments. While some treatments helped for a while, the pain has never completely disappeared, and I am now awaiting a pain management appointment.

“Like many people living with persistent pain, it has shaped almost every part of my life.

“It shaped my education experience – being the girl at the back with a laptop affected my dream career as a secondary school teacher, and ultimately led me towards this new path of education research. Looking back, that change has been difficult, but it has also opened doors I never expected.

“Persistent pain is usually defined as pain lasting longer than three months, yet for many people it continues for years or even decades. Around 30–50% of people in the UK live with persistent pain, affecting work, education, relationships and everyday life. Despite this, pain is still widely misunderstood. Because it is often invisible, people can find themselves having to explain or justify something that can't easily be seen.

“One of the most important lessons I've learnt is that education matters.

“The more we understand how persistent pain works, the better equipped we are to manage it, support others and challenge common misconceptions. Learning doesn't make the pain disappear, but it can help us feel more confident and more in control. What surprised me, though, was where some of that learning began.

“I've learnt that education doesn't only happen in classrooms. As a former teacher and now an education researcher, I naturally think about where people learn. We often picture learning happening at school, college, university or through healthcare professionals. Those spaces are incredibly important, but they're not the whole story.

“Living with persistent pain means learning every single day. We learn about pacing, flare-ups, adapting activities, accepting identity changes and finding things that help us cope. Sometimes those lessons come from clinicians. Sometimes they come from other people living with pain. And sometimes, they come from places we least expect. For me, one of those places has been television.

“Like many people, I have what I would describe as a ‘comfort programme’. Mine is Call the Midwife.

“It’s a show I have seemed to inadvertently grow up with, watching with my grandma on a Sunday evening or on Christmas Day.

“During pain flare-ups, when I'm struggling to do very much at all, it's often the programme I find myself returning to. Not because it makes the pain disappear - it doesn't. It doesn't replace medical advice or treatment, and I would never suggest that it does.

“Instead, it offers something different. The familiarity of the characters, the predictable rhythm of the stories and the sense of hope that runs throughout the series often help me feel calmer during difficult days. It gives me something to focus on beyond my pain, and for a little while, that can make those moments feel more manageable.

“At first, I simply accepted this as part of my routine. But the more I watched, the more curious I became: Why did returning to the same programme help so many times? Was it simply distraction? Was it the emotional connection to familiar characters? Or could television be doing something more than entertaining us?

“Those questions eventually became research questions.

“As I began reading more widely about media, education and wellbeing, I realised there was surprisingly little research exploring comfort television from an educational perspective for people living with persistent pain. That curiosity led me to present these early ideas at an academic conference in a talk titled, ‘A Comfort Blanket and a Classroom: Television, Chronic Pain and Hope’.

“What struck me most wasn't the presentation itself - it was the conversations afterwards. People immediately began talking about their own comfort programmes. Different shows, different reasons, but remarkably similar experiences. It made me realise this wasn't just my story. It might be something much bigger.

“Those conversations have now inspired what I hope will become my MA dissertation, where I'll be exploring whether comfort television can act as a source of education, comfort and hope for people living with persistent pain, using Call the Midwife as a case study.

“I'm still at the beginning of that journey, so I don't yet have the answers. Research often begins with curiosity rather than certainty, and this project is no different.

“What I do know is that living with persistent pain has taught me that support can come from unexpected places. Healthcare professionals, family, friends and organisations like Flippin' Pain all have an important role to play. But alongside those sources of support, we each find our own ways of getting through difficult days.

“For me, one of those has been a familiar television programme. It doesn't take my pain away. It doesn't replace treatment. But it has encouraged me to ask new questions, inspired new research, and reminded me that learning can happen almost anywhere.

“Sometimes, the things that help us live well with persistent pain are the very things we least expect.”

Written by Katie Hazel

Katie is currently the Research & Administrative Officer at Tooled Up Education and is completing her MA in Education at Edge Hill University. If you have a comfort TV show or film, she would like to use your experience in her MA dissertation – please email her!