Pain is a normal, healthy bodily response. Short-term pain is the body’s alert system. It often appears at the first sign of an injury. However, once acute pain has lasted for more than three months despite treatment, it is considered chronic. Persistent—or chronic—pain doesn’t serve the same biological purpose as acute pain. Chronic pain can be caused by already healed injuries, or even arise from non-painful stimuli. Instead of protecting the body, chronic pain can be debilitating and contribute to the deterioration of your physical and mental health.
While some conditions that lead to chronic pain are caused by neurological or nerve issues, many conditions have no clear causes. It is a common post-surgery complication and can be the result of psychological stress. Up to half of people experience some type of chronic pain as they get older.
Effects of Chronic Pain
Chronic pain has primary and secondary symptoms. Primary symptoms include sensations such as burning, sharp pains, or aches. There are numerous other, secondary issues such as depression, fatigue, and sleeping problems. These may be the cause of chronic pain, the result of chronic pain, or the result of medical treatment for chronic pain.
Unfortunately, many of the pharmacological treatment for chronic pain can also have undesirable side effects. Opioids such as morphine are extremely dangerous and addictive. Acetophenone can contribute to organ failure and increase the risk of overdose. For this reason, pain management specialists recommend lifestyle changes alongside medication to treat chronic pain. For example, a modified exercise plan can mitigate many of the primary and secondary symptoms.
How Exercise Can Benefit People Living with Chronic Pain
While chronic pain can reduce your interest in exercise, following a doctor-recommended exercise routine has the following benefits:
1. Exercise Stops the Cycle of Fear
For many people, certain movements exacerbate their chronic pain. This can trigger a cycle of fear referred to as kinesiophobia. You may start to avoid movement to prevent aggravating your condition. However, limited movement deteriorates your strength and range of motion, making movement of all kinds more painful. This leads to more avoidance, and accelerates your physical decline.
Exercise gives people with chronic pain the confidence to move their bodies. Starting with slow, gentle movements triggers physiological reactions that facilitate blood flow and reduce inflammation. This experience encourages you to engage in even more physical activity.
2. Activity Improves Your Mobility
A sedentary lifestyle is becoming more commonplace, even in people without chronic pain. Over 60 percent of adults do not get enough exercise in a typical day. Many people drive long distances, use elevators, and sit at their workspaces for hours on end. If you are experiencing chronic pain, you may deal with many of these same obstacles in addition to managing your condition.
Engaging in moderate exercise at least two times a week can help you stay mobile despite chronic pain. Exercises can be performed at home with minimal equipment, at the gym under the care of a skilled trainer, or in a rehabilitation facility. Moving your body increases joint flexibility and stability, which promotes good posture and stronger bones. These benefits can reduce pain in areas like the back, neck, and shoulders.
3. Exercise Lowers Your Sensitivity to Pain
Increased pain sensitivity is a common cause of chronic pain. Past injury or surgery can aggravate surrounding pain receptors. As a result, the receptors send out pain signals more readily. Some neurological conditions also cause normally pleasant or neutral sensations be interpreted by the brain as painful.
Exercise can help mitigate increased pain sensitivity by stimulating the release of endorphins. Endorphins improve mood, lower stress, and increase your pain threshold. They act on pain receptors and block pain signals from traveling to the brain. Since endorphins have many of the same pain-relieving effects as morphine, pain specialists recommend exercise as a method for boosting natural analgesics and reducing the chances of opioid addiction.
4. Physical Activity Improves Your Mental Health
Stress can exacerbate chronic pain. First, stress causes the body to release chemicals, such as cortisol, which increase inflammation and your perception of pain. Stress also increases tension in your muscles and joints, which can also cause physical pain. Coping mechanisms or stress reactions such as inactivity, insomnia, and alcohol misuse can exacerbate chronic pain and have their own comorbidities.
A regular exercise routine can help you reduce stress by promoting muscle relaxation and lowering cortisol levels. Less stress can help ameliorate other mental health issues, such as depression and anxiety.
5. Exercise Prevents Muscle Loss
Reduced mobility is both a common cause and a common result of chronic pain. However, prolonged immobility can also cause muscle loss. When the muscles are not used regularly, the body releases cytokines that cause and exacerbate inflammation. This process can destroy muscle cells and lead to a loss of strength.
Challenging exercises stretch the muscle fibers, causing small tears. As the body repairs these tears, the muscle is fortified with proteins that increase muscle mass and strength. Resistance training exercises are the most effective at building and preserving muscle mass. However, gentler activities such as yoga can also prevent muscle loss.