7 Things People Don’t Understand About Chronic Pain

Chronic pain is one of the most common health issues in the United States that affects 50.2 million (20.5 percent) Americans. Chronic pain is defined as any pain that lasts for 3 to 6 months or more. Chronic pain stems from a wide range of factors, but the most common ones include untreated injuries, back issues, arthritis, nerve damage, infections, and fibromyalgia. There are some interesting facts about chronic pain that most people don’t know.

1. Stress can not only make pain worse but also cause it

Many people with chronic stress ​develop various physical symptoms, and chronic pain is on the list. Experts suggest that if pain is a message provoked by danger signals, those signals can also come from stressful emotional events.

Human brains process intense emotional situations (abuse, abandonment, grief) in similar ways as physical ones. In some cases, treating the underlying emotional causes of pain can help get rid of chronic pain.

2. Your body creates pain to protect you

When you have an injury, nerve cells in the afflicted area send signals of distress to your brain. These signals are processed in your subconscious, and that’s what creates the feeling of pain. It’s a rapid-fire messaging process that’s designed to protect you from danger. When pain gets chronic, this messaging system is flooding your body with danger signals all the time.

3. Chronic pain can affect anyone

Chronic pain can affect anyone regardless of the age, sex, health level, or family history. The youngest person was 17, and he has been in chronic pain since he was 12 years old. He suffers from leg pain that stems from Complex Regional Pain Syndrome, which occurs for unknown reasons and has no cure.

4. Chronic pain is not all in your head

Every day, people with chronic pain visit doctors who take blood tests and do scans of the body and yet can’t find any physical issue. So many people have been told by one or more of their doctors, “It’s all in your head.” However, people with pain that has no clear physical cause are not imagining their pain. Their pain is real.

5. Many doctors are confused by chronic pain

Despite the shocking number of cases of chronic pain, most medical experts aren’t very well-trained in the problem and our medical system is having a tough time finding the answers. Doctors typically use pain pills, nerve-blocking injections, and surgeries to treat chronic pain.

These treatments generally lower pain but they don’t eliminate it at all. And prescription narcotics have been all over the news lately due to the shockingly high rates of addiction and overdoses that they cause.

6. Having chronic pain doesn’t mean you’ll have it forever

Chronic pain can cause anxiety, depression, and suicide. Many people with chronic pain feel misunderstood and alone. But this condition impacts all of us, whether you are a sufferer, a medical professional, or a family member of someone in pain.

When you’re in chronic pain, it’s difficult to imagine ever being pain-free. But there are lots of people who have resumed normal lives after years of suffering. There is always hope.

7. Meditation can actually reduce chronic pain

Meditation ​has been shown to be more effective than a placebo at lowering chronic pain. It can also help the mind detach from the cycle of fear that accompanies the onset of pain. Being mindful of what was happening around the time of the onset of pain can contribute to a deeper understanding of its emotional culprits. Noticing whether something stressful was happening when the pain started can help you identify whether there’s an emotional connection to the physical symptom