Pain, especially unresolving chronic pain, is a problem that I see many, if not most, of my patients for. The National Institute of Health defines chronic pain as any pain lasting more than 12 weeks.
Few would argue that “pain” is a message from our brains meant to alert us that there’s a potential injury.
Within that statement are some very important points that are quite often lost on individuals suffering from chronically painful experiences.
-You send the message of pain to yourself. Under that assumption, then you also control the amount or volume of that message.
Yes, it’s very easy to get caught in the trap, that our pain is separate from ourselves. Or that the area of our body that seems to hurt is separate from us.
But it isn’t.
It’s not uncommon to hear a patient say something like- “It throbs, whenever I move it.”
Which is much different than...
“I’m hurting, whenever I move.
In the second statement, there’s ownership of the pain.
...Or control of pain. I’m hurting me. My head is opting to interpret this as strong pain.
From there it’s a small step to realize that “I” am in control of “myself”. So when I’m hurting, I am sending a signal to myself to hurt, specifically my brain receives messages from my arm somethings going on. Then my brain says that whatever’s going on should be recognized as pain.
But it’s a self-choice nonetheless.
Do you remember when you experienced your a tickle. Have you ever tried to resist it? It’s difficult at first, but with focus and concentration you can just become able to change your response to the sensations you’ve attached to each. We can learn to turn down the volume on the incoming signal with practice. Again it’s our message to ourselves, so we control this message and how/how much the message is delivered.
A good way to decrease the volume of the message is to attach a different meaning or emotion to each.
Let’s say that your brother is tickling you. Have you ever tried to not laugh. You probably thought about relaxing and settling into it more. You are effectively down-regulating or dampening your nervous systems response to the tickle. And- it works!
Here’s another instance- let’s say you were injured when you fell off a bike. The fall injured your shoulder. Initially the first few days, you didn’t move the shoulder because it was hurting. After a few days it hurts less. In fact, it really doesn’t hurt nearly as much unless you raise it. So maybe your therapist starts helping you raise it during therapy. It hurts as he does this too.
Now you could have your inner voice telling you possibly one of two things.
Same pain. Two different stories attached to the pain.
The first story is a story of fear. The second story is a story of reassurance, faith and certainty.
Now let me tell you what’s happening with each story.
When your brain receives a message from your shoulder as its moving, it must decide how to interpret each message. As this message is moving up your sensory nerves from your shoulder it receives input from your body before it reaches your brain. This input can be inhibitory (decrease the strength of the message) or excitatory (increase the strength). If it decreases the messages strength it will send hormones and pain-reducing molecules to the nerve to lessen its strength. If it’s excitatory then it will enhance the message through pain-provoking molecules and hormones increasing their input to the nerve before it travels to our brain.
Fear will excite and increase the strength of the pain being interpreted by the brain. If we’re reassured and unconcerned the message will rapidly lose it strength and it may not even be strong enough to be considered pain. Perhaps merely discomfort- like a stubbed toe or a small paper cut. The point is, you control how the message will be felt by you. Are you afraid the injury could require surgery? Are you afraid that the shoulder is permanently injured with a rotator cuff tear? Or are you relieved and encouraged that it continues to slowly get better with time?
The important thing to remember here is that I’m not suggesting that you ignore your pain because you’re “imagining” it. Just be really self-aware of your pain and the emotion or story you attach to it. Because invariably, the story you’ve attached to it, becomes true for you.
Few would argue that “pain” is a message from our brains meant to alert us that there’s a potential injury.
Within that statement are some very important points that are quite often lost on individuals suffering from chronically painful experiences.
-You send the message of pain to yourself. Under that assumption, then you also control the amount or volume of that message.
Yes, it’s very easy to get caught in the trap, that our pain is separate from ourselves. Or that the area of our body that seems to hurt is separate from us.
But it isn’t.
It’s not uncommon to hear a patient say something like- “It throbs, whenever I move it.”
Which is much different than...
“I’m hurting, whenever I move.
In the second statement, there’s ownership of the pain.
...Or control of pain. I’m hurting me. My head is opting to interpret this as strong pain.
From there it’s a small step to realize that “I” am in control of “myself”. So when I’m hurting, I am sending a signal to myself to hurt, specifically my brain receives messages from my arm somethings going on. Then my brain says that whatever’s going on should be recognized as pain.
But it’s a self-choice nonetheless.
Do you remember when you experienced your a tickle. Have you ever tried to resist it? It’s difficult at first, but with focus and concentration you can just become able to change your response to the sensations you’ve attached to each. We can learn to turn down the volume on the incoming signal with practice. Again it’s our message to ourselves, so we control this message and how/how much the message is delivered.
A good way to decrease the volume of the message is to attach a different meaning or emotion to each.
Let’s say that your brother is tickling you. Have you ever tried to not laugh. You probably thought about relaxing and settling into it more. You are effectively down-regulating or dampening your nervous systems response to the tickle. And- it works!
Here’s another instance- let’s say you were injured when you fell off a bike. The fall injured your shoulder. Initially the first few days, you didn’t move the shoulder because it was hurting. After a few days it hurts less. In fact, it really doesn’t hurt nearly as much unless you raise it. So maybe your therapist starts helping you raise it during therapy. It hurts as he does this too.
Now you could have your inner voice telling you possibly one of two things.
- This hurts! And I bet this pain is going to get everything irritated in this shoulder and really start re-injuring it just as it was starting to heal. It’s not uncommon for people to tell themselves this story. And guess what... it will hurt worse (more on why in a second).
- This hurts. But you notice with the therapist’s help, it doesn’t hurt as badly as when you raised it up yourself. And after the arm is raised overhead a few times... it moves better with little less pain! This means that the pain actually leads to it feeling and moving better.
Same pain. Two different stories attached to the pain.
The first story is a story of fear. The second story is a story of reassurance, faith and certainty.
Now let me tell you what’s happening with each story.
When your brain receives a message from your shoulder as its moving, it must decide how to interpret each message. As this message is moving up your sensory nerves from your shoulder it receives input from your body before it reaches your brain. This input can be inhibitory (decrease the strength of the message) or excitatory (increase the strength). If it decreases the messages strength it will send hormones and pain-reducing molecules to the nerve to lessen its strength. If it’s excitatory then it will enhance the message through pain-provoking molecules and hormones increasing their input to the nerve before it travels to our brain.
Fear will excite and increase the strength of the pain being interpreted by the brain. If we’re reassured and unconcerned the message will rapidly lose it strength and it may not even be strong enough to be considered pain. Perhaps merely discomfort- like a stubbed toe or a small paper cut. The point is, you control how the message will be felt by you. Are you afraid the injury could require surgery? Are you afraid that the shoulder is permanently injured with a rotator cuff tear? Or are you relieved and encouraged that it continues to slowly get better with time?
The important thing to remember here is that I’m not suggesting that you ignore your pain because you’re “imagining” it. Just be really self-aware of your pain and the emotion or story you attach to it. Because invariably, the story you’ve attached to it, becomes true for you.
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