Highly Recommended Article: 'Pain is Weird'

[Remy]

This is by far one of the best articles on pain that I've ever read. It's long but I think it's worth it. Some funny video clips too! I hope everyone suffering with pain will read it.

https://www.painscience.com/articles/pain-is-weird.php

Pain is not just a message from injured tissues to be accepted at face value, but a complex experience that is thoroughly tuned by your brain. The results are often strange and counter-intuitive, like quantum physics, but the science is clear: every painful sensation is 100% Brain Made®, and there is no pain without brain.
Does that mean can we think pain away? Just how much power does the mind have over pain? Can confidence and education cure?

Articles on this topic are now common, but most of them tease readers with the tantalizing idea that pain can be treated with the mind… while failing to explain how. In this article, I get specific about what’s realistic and practical with “mind over pain.” There’s bad news, but there’s also good news — if you understand how pain actually works.mce-anchor1 Many discoveries about the physiology of painmce-anchor2mce-anchor3 have been painfully slow to reach the public, or even health professionals. This is useful stuff, and it needs to be shared.

Mostly we need to stop thinking of pain in terms of single causes or cures: “It’s all coming from the ____, I know it!” It almost never is.mce-anchor4 Pain is not reliable sign of what’s really going on. Chronic pain is a witch’s brew of different factors, complex by nature (not just coincidence or bad luck). At the very least, pain always has a layer of brain-generated complexity. At the worst, the pain system can malfunction in several colorful ways, causing pain that is much more intense and interesting than just a symptom — sometimes the pain is the problem.

 

[Cort]

This is by far one of the best articles on pain that I've ever read. It's long but I think it's worth it. Some funny video clips too! I hope everyone suffering with pain will read it.

https://www.painscience.com/articles/pain-is-weird.php

This is a really important article! I agree that everyone who is pain should read it.

It's weird how even when we are in pain that it sometimes just vanishes completely for periods of time.

Injury and pain are not in lock step with each other. And yet that is exactly what nearly everyone assumed for a long, long time. And many professionals, even though they may “know” better, often seem to forget how powerfully pain is influenced by perception.

It reminds of the remarkable pain story in Norman Doidge's latest book....Incredible what the mind can do at times.

 

[Ladyliegh]

Very interesting, I remember an article a few years ago that said, vocalizing, (complaining) about pain actually helped to relieve some of it.
I know pain is directed from our brain, but too much of this line of thinking could be dangerous. Pain is warning us something is wrong.
I always look away when getting stitches, it seemed to help, however getting staples removed from my leg, hurt like crazy even though I wasn't looking.
Distraction from pain is helpful, but ignoring pain can be dangerous.

 

[Rachellecooper]

Very important and useful post. Must be watched by all those who are suffering from pain and never ever ignore pain as it can lead to incurable diseases.