Chronic pain is a persistent pain that has been ongoing for over 3 months and doesn’t improve with treatment.
But what is pain? And why does it become chronic?
Well I can answer the first question, the latter involves a lot of inner work!
Pain is a sensation, a label. When our nerves carry a signal to the central nervous system (brain and spinal cord) this gets translated to a feeling of pain.
If the pain is coming from an outside source that we can get away from, these signals and feelings will subside.
Unfortunately, when the signal is coming from within ourselves we end up with chronic pain. The pain signals remain active, causing feelings of severe pain, this is known as hypersensitivity.
Chronic pain can occur after illness, injury, and surgery or alongside diabetes, cancer, arthritis and also for unknown causes, known as fibromyalgia.
However, it is well known that the underlying causes of chronic pain are psychological not just physical.
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Here is where it gets complicated!! If you weren’t confused before…
So, pain can be triggered by signals, illness, injury etc. BUT the reason this turns chronic is due to how our minds deal with, not only the pain, but with depression, stress, trauma, anxiety, fear, perfectionism, self worth etc…
Multiple factors that seem completely unrelated can be triggering these symptoms.
Something to ask yourself “What do I gain from having chronic pain?”
Seems like a really silly question, how can you possibly gain from feeling like this?
Answer this in your journal, give yourself 5 minutes and see what comes up for you.
This could very well be the first step towards healing chronic pain.