Have you experienced the long-term swelling and inflamed pain in your joints? Have you felt an irresistible pain in your body that would drain your energy throughout the day? Did it affect your mental stability, which led to anxiety and depression?
If these questions made you say yes, what did you do to overcome and manage your pain?
Don’t worry. If you’re trying to release the tension every time you felt body pain, you’re not alone. The American Academy of Pain Medicine reveals that more than 1.5 billion people around the world have chronic pain. In the United States, almost 100 million Americans have suffered from recurring chronic pain.
When left untreated, your physical strength and stamina reduce throughout the time, as the National Institute Suggests. It disturbs your cognitive development, increasing your stress and your risk to death.
In this article, we will build strength in you by helping you identify the causes of chronic pain and how to manage its persistence.
Table of Contents
What is Chronic Pain?
Chronic Pain is any pain that lasts for at least 12 weeks and may persist for more than six months. Healthline suggests that it is a pain that occurs in addition to the original health condition. Meaning, the pain can develop into worst cases and recurs intermittently, prolonging the healing process.
Chronic pain is a nightmare to everyone, including yourself. The American Academy of Pain Medicine suggests that more than 1.5 billion people around the world suffer from chronic pain, affecting about 100 million Americans in long-term disability.
In reality, your treatment expects to stop the underlying cause of pain. However, the chronic pain manifests and persists after the healing for no apparent biological cause.
Being said, there are common types of chronic pain that you may have experienced, including headache, lower back pain, cancer pain, arthritis pain, nerve pain, postsurgical pain, or psychogenic pain.
But when left untreated, chronic pain may result in poor sleep, depression, anxiety, guilt, suicidal thoughts, or loss of interest in sex. In the worst case, chronic pain may cause the expiration of your life.
Thus, chronic pain calls for pain management that will identify the source of pain, prevention, and treatment through regenerative treatment and alternative healing.
Causes of Chronic Pain
There are a variety of medical explanations as to how chronic pain initially starts. Some researchers postulated that chronic pain develops after a nerve pain. And some argued that chronic pain is caused by a sprained muscle or a severe injury.
However, not all cases of chronic pain have started from a prior injury. At some point, the pain can be unfounded, in which the treatment may not heal the pain by directly treating the injury.
Don’t worry. It won’t be as complex as you think. Natural Med Doc helps you by outlining the causes of chronic pain, which includes:
Chronic Fatigue Syndrome
Chronic Fatigue Syndrome (CFS) enables you to experience extreme fatigue or tiredness that can’t be mitigated with bed rest. Because of its uncertain medical condition, there are no tests for CFS; only that your doctor conducts a cross-examination in determining the diagnoses for your fatigue.
Today, the cause of CFS is still unknown. However, recent researches have theorized that a virus, weakened immune system, stress, and hormonal imbalances are the leading factors for CFS.
Hence, symptoms of CFS may severely interfere with your daily activities. Its effects may affect your sleeping pattern, disturb your mental muscles, and ruin your physical sanity.
Fibromyalgia
If you’ve watched how Lady Gaga survived a chronic pain, then that’s how fibromyalgia demonized her life. It is a long-term chronic condition that induces extreme musculoskeletal pain, recurring fatigue, and sleep and cognitive disturbances.
Fibromyalgia is one of the complicated chronic pain conditions. Its symptoms are a combination of other chronic pain, which can be challenging to treat.
PubMed Central identifies that fibromyalgia may stem from the abnormal interpretation of the brain and nerves to react to normal pain signals. Moreso, it may be caused by a chemical imbalance in the brain in the dorsal root ganglion, which affects the pain sensation.
Inflammatory Bowel Disease (IBD)
Your digestive tract can also be vulnerable to chronic pain, which affects the normal breaking down of food, extracting nutrients, and excreting toxins and waste products in your body. Here comes in the inflammatory bowel disease (IBD).
Healthcare providers have identified two main types of IBD — Crohn’s disease and ulcerative colitis. Crohn’s disease is the inflamed part affecting the tail end of the small intestine. On the other hand, ulcerative colitis stems from the inflammation of the large intestine.
In reality, the symptoms of IBD interfere with your daily activities. You will experience diarrhea, bleeding ulcers, stomach pain, weight loss, and anemia. Also, IBD ruins your sanity through eye inflammation, skin disorders, and arthritis.
Temporomandibular Joint Dysfunction (TMJD)
Temporomandibular Joint (TMJ) is a joint that connects to your mandible (lower jaw) to your skull. This particular region of your head allows you to move your jaw in an open-close movement, which helps you to speak and eat.
WebMD reveals that risk factors may contribute to the presence of TMJD, including arthritis, structural jaw problems, poor diet, prolonged stress, lack of sleep, and erosion of the joint.
Similar to Fibromyalgia, TMJ induces recurring painful experiences in a particular region. The pain can be felt in the face or neck, stiffness in the muscles of the jaw, locking of the jaw, or clicking or popping from the TMJ site.
PRO TIP: 3A’s to Avoid Chronic Pain
There are available natural management pain treatments for curing chronic pain. You don’t need to spend thousands of dollars to undergo surgical operations. Hence, here are the practical tips suggested by most pain clinics:
#1 Avoid Stress. And the pain will avoid you. You may carry a light-to-heavy burden from your essential obligations. But always take the chance to relax, breathe, and meditate. Despite your hectic schedule, maintain your balance. Have time for yourself. In this way, you can increase awareness within yourself and your environment.
#2 Avail some alternative medicines. Such as acupuncture, chiropractic medicine, herbal medicine, reiki, and therapeutic touch. The downfall of over-the-counter medicines increases the complications of chronic pain. In other words, alternative medicines will teach you a “mind-over-matter” medication.
#3 Address your anxiety and depression. Don’t think you’re alone in your fight. Remember that pain clinics are your last resort to continue your life journey. If you have anxiety or depression, address it as early as possible. Don’t conceal your problems, or else it worsen your chronic pain.
Key Takeaways
Chronic pain is a nightmare to everyone, including yourself. More than 1.5 billion people around the world suffer from chronic pain, affecting about 100 million Americans in long-term disability.
Headaches and lower back pains are common types. But in the worst cases, it manifests in cancer pain, arthritis pain, nerve pain, postsurgical pain, or psychogenic pain.
Always remember that there are two causes of chronic pain: from physical injuries or unfounded biological sources. Hence, here are the major causes of chronic pain:
- Chronic Fatigue Syndrome;
- Fibromyalgia;
- Inflammatory Bowel Diseases (IBD); and
- Temporomandibular Joint Dysfunction (TMJD).
To avoid chronic pain, follow the 3As:
- Avoid Stress
- Avail some alternative medicines
- Address your anxiety and depression.
