Pain Management

Understanding Pain, Causes, Types and Treatments

What is Pain?

Pain is one way our body’s protective systems keep us safe. Danger detectors in the body send information to the brain, which may or may not create pain based on all the other information available, as well as previous experiences.

Pain has a purpose when it relates to a new injury or problem. It gives us the urgency to deal with an issue, relevant to how much of a problem it is.

Pain is an uncomfortable feeling that tells you something may be wrong. It can be steady, throbbing, stabbing, aching, pinching, or described in many other ways. Sometimes, it’s just a nuisance, like a mild headache. Other times it can be debilitating.

Pain can bring about other physical symptoms, like nausea, dizziness, weakness  or drowsiness. It can cause emotional effects like anger, depression, mood swings or irritability. Perhaps most significantly, it can change your lifestyle and impact your job, relationships  and independence.

Because many factors affect pain, there are many things you can do to change pain. Recognising that pain is more than a physical sensation, but is influenced by sleep, exercise, your general health, attitudes, beliefs, mood, your environment  and the people around you, means that all these things can provide new and better ways for you to change your pain, moment to moment and over time.

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What Causes Pain

Pain is one way our body’s protective systems to keep us safe. Danger detectors in the body send information to the brain, which may or may not create pain based on all the other information available, as well as previous experiences.

Danger detectors signal when tissue is approaching its safe limit, so most pain prevents tissue damage. When tissue is damaged, danger detectors become much more sensitive. Psychological and social factors, as well as past experiences, can powerfully influence pain by complex mechanisms in the brain.

Types of Pain

Types of Pain  are classified as either acute or chronic.

Chronic Pain
Can range from mild to severe, is present for long periods of time. Chronic pain (long-lasting pain that goes on for more than three months, or past normal tissue healing time) will usually involve the pain system becoming overprotective. This means that you can have pain even when your tissues are actually safe. This occurs because, like every other nervous system function, the pain system can learn over time to be more effective at protecting a certain body part. The influence of social and psychological factors usually becomes greater with persistent pain.                                                          

Acute Pain
This is usually severe and short-lived and is often a signal that your body has been injured. It normally comes on suddenly and is caused by something specific. It is sharp in quality. Acute pain usually doesn’t last longer than six months. It goes away when there is no longer an underlying cause for the pain. Examples acute pain include a cut, bruise, burn, broken bone, or pulled muscle. It can also be caused by a fever or infection, labor contractions, and menstrual cramps.

Treatments for Pain

The two types of pain are treated with different therapies, techniques and treatments.

Treatment of Chronic Pain

I had the honor to have studied with Mr. Steven Blake, he is the founder of  OldPain2Go® technique which he researched and developed to eliminate his own pain and which ended 40 years of his suffering of severe back problems and Steven has been pain-free ever since. The most common chronic pains are Fibromyalgia, Myalgia Encephalopathy/ Encephalomyelitis or Chronic Fatigue Syndrome (ME/CFS).

Self-healing
Our bodies are miracles of nature and in most cases they heal themselves with no conscious input. OldPain2Go® is about you getting your unconscious and conscious aspects to talk to each other. The Practitioner acts as an intermediary in the process.

OldPain2Go® is a simple methodology based on how the brain processes things, so whilst we all store different information in our head, we do tend to process things in the same way as everyone else.

When we continue in pain, long after the initial warning is unnecessary, we need to challenge whether what seems like an old, useless, out of date pain message is still needed. This can only be done at the level of the unconscious and I will guide you each step of the way.

I don’t ask you to believe it – because most people don’t believe it even after they can no-longer perceive any pain. However, you DO need to WANT to be pain free, and not have more reason to keep the pain than to lose it!

Pain Road Sign – OldPain2Go: Chronic Fatigue & Pain Related Illnesses
This is Steven Blake personal story and thoughts, feelings  and experiences. He is not medically trained or offering medical advice: If you have a chronic fatigue or pain related illness, these are Steven Blake’s personal thoughts on how you are understanding it might help you on the journey to rid yourself of it. Please ensure any action you take, for diagnosis or treatment is conducted under the supervision of a suitably qualified health professional.

People who have Fibromyalgia, M.E. or C.F.S. all share the same attributes that they are the extreme opposite of lazy! In fact, their “driven” personal quality, in my opinion, is at the root of all their conditions.

Steve’s theory, and to remove all doubt he will state straight away that people with chronic fatigue and pain are neither lazy nor is it “all in their heads”. In fact, despite all those affected having different symptoms and levels of incapacity you are united in one thing – your story of how it started and progressed. Every single one of you regularly pushed yourself to your physical or mental capacity – or both. You are the exact opposite of lazy, hence your understandable frustration and sensitivity to people thinking you are, or that you bring it on yourself. It was these matching stories and my experience of dealing with various physical and emotional pain related illnesses through talking therapies that led me to discover the way I think the illness started and therefore my interest as to how someone could be helped to recover. I have now been in touch with many people studying these illnesses who all have very similar theories and now the National Fibromyalgia Association seems to be on the same lines (further details below).

Is this Your Story! You are likely to be a highly driven person and have always pushed yourself to the limit, mentally and physically, often more than your body can cope with, typically with a greater concern for looking after others than yourself. The illness starts with one or more of the following: a viral infection, severe illness (other), vaccination, severe stress or a traumatic accident/incident (the trigger) etc. Several weeks later when you anticipate you should be feeling better, you now have the illness that gives you the chronic fatigue and pain symptoms. This continues for many years, if not for life, whilst you become more and more frustrated by lack of diagnosis, answers or remedies. You may even accumulate more illnesses as your immune system overloads. At some point you will feel so low for so long that your internal voice will keep repeating a phrase that reflects the terrible thought that you are never going to recover. As you rarely look poorly, you also have the issue of not only feeling very ill but having to convince others that you are. Their comments are far from helpful and are in total opposition to the driven person you know you are. This adds to the pressure and continues the downward spiral. At times you may be lucky enough to feel a bit better but whilst playing catch up with life you find it is the fatigue and pain that catches you up!

I have checked this story out on many ME and Fibromyalgia forums and have yet to find anyone this story does not fit. The fact that no two people have the same set of symptoms or degree of debility is why no cure has been found so far and is why pharmaceutical companies will not invest in research. However, it is the lack of the same symptoms and the fact that only the stories match that led me to my conclusion.

Steve’s Train of Thought! – We all have an excellent survival mechanism that is run by the same processing system that controls all your bodily parts and functions. I believe that in order to protect you in a situation of severe overload it shuts you down. Not just a trip switch it actually carefully shuts YOU down in the best way for YOU. This ensures your immobility and even dampens your mental capacity.

This is to conserve energy to recover from whatever initial trigger occurred and to stop you from doing further damage (in the same way doctors put people in a coma to recover from head injuries). It stays like that until it is convinced you won’t carry on in the same “driven” way. Unfortunately, “driven” is your nature and the more you fight the illness the more it thinks you need to be immobilised, hence why this goes on for years or you never recover!

Pain and Fatigue are nature’s way to stop you, as is brain fog and blurred vision (so you can’t even watch TV). Your survival mechanism actually could not have done better for you, thanks to its totally unique blend of symptoms designed especially for stopping you! Whilst that was a great defense at the time, stopping you from possibly fatal consequences, it is now the protective shield you are pinned under!

It is no coincidence that many of your symptoms will be similar to stress related illnesses such as: bowel problems, fatigue, brain fog, changing vision, autoimmune problems and unwarranted pain. This is because you are now constantly in a stressed state, being in a situation you have no control over.

Pain is a message to us to stop what we are doing and concentrate on getting “fixed”. The greater the perceived damage the greater the pain level to ensure you do all that is necessary. It is my conclusion that your pain will continue whilst it is thought necessary by your instinctual processes. The pain will only go when it feels safe that you will NOT keep pushing yourself to the limit. You cannot fight this illness,  it will make it worse!

Update 15/9/2013 “According to the National Fibromyalgia Association, within the last decade perspective has shifted from thinking about it as a rheumatologic or autoimmune disorder to now primarily involving the central nervous system. Essentially, the brain, based on what it knows about a person’s life, makes a conscious decision to defend the person, and to defend them, it calls upon several body systems, especially nerves, to protect. “It’s more of a nervous system sensitivity issue, a hypersensitivity. It can affect multiple systems.” This appears to agree with my findings.

Treatment of Acute Pain

Does hypnotherapy work for pain? The answer is YES, acute pain is very effectively treated with clinical hypnotherapy. Remembering that acute pain is caused by a cut, bruise, burn, broken bone, or pulled muscle thus it is for filling the function of protecting your body from further damage, as such it is s a benefit. However, level of relief, either with intensity level or temporary distraction can often be achieved in a short space of time.

Clinical Hypnosis combined with Neuro Linguistic Programming (NLM) offers the potential to help treat your medical conditions without the need for invasive therapies or additional medications. Therapists consider hypnotherapy a safe treatment option for pain management, pain relief and reduced pain.

According to the University of New Hampshire, hypnotherapy can help a person learn to reduce and/or better control feelings of anxiety, stress, discomfort, etc.

“Hypnosis has been found to be generally more effective than other non-pharmacologic interventions, such as physical therapy and paineducation.24-27. There is growing evidence to suggest that hypnosis has greater influence on the effects  of pain rather than the sensation of pain.28,29. Hypnosis may be able to provide analgesia, reduce stress, relieve anxiety, improve sleep, improve mood, and reduce the need for opioids. Further, hypnosis  can enhance the efficacy of other well-established treatments forpain.25. Hypnosis involves learning how to use your mind to manage anxiety, unpleasant physical symptoms, and certain habits or behaviors. It is another tool that can be used to help patients cope with pain.”-Hypnosis: Tool for Pain Management  By David Cosio, PhD, ABPP and Erica H. Lin, PharmD, BCACP.

Ericksonian hypnotherapy assist in suppressing the brain’s perception of pain. It guides the client’ mind focus on pleasant, rewarding, satisfying and happier thoughts as opposed to discomfort perceptions. The results lend strong support to the clinical use of hypnotic suggestion, deep relaxation and other nonmedical techniques as alternatives to pain-killing drugs  Ericksonian hypnosis as developed by Milton Erickson’s (spanning over 50 years) it sparked a fundamental shift in modern psychotherapy and revolutionised the practice of hypnotherapy. Ericksonian hypnosis recognized as an highly effective type of therapy. It allows the clients to identify or resonate with their own strengths, abilities and resources that can assist in resolving the issues the seek to change. He developed the skillful  communications combined with observation and expectancy. He understood that the client’s resourcefulness is the key to solving their own problem, and the role of the therapist is to help them find the way to it.

Our Lake Macquarie Psychotherapy Treatments

Can Change Therapy offers the following treatments in Lake Macquarie and Newcastle: