Pain is an unpleasant experience which usually accompanies an injury or a traumatic incident. It is our body and brain response to threat, making us avoid certain movements or change habits for a while to facilitate healing and recovery.

 

Usually, during an acute injury, the pain reaches its climax initially. Then as the healing is taking place, pain levels tend to subside, and as we are starting to become more functional and move more about, the frequency and the severity of the pain decrease as well. 

 

However there is more complexity to pain! 

 

On some occasions, pain levels continue to persist despite healing has taken place and after a reasonable amount of time has passed i.e. 3 months, 6 months, 1 year or more... There is a lot of research suggesting that depending on the context of your injury, your previous experiences, your emotional status at the time of your injury and other factors, your body and brain can maintain a state of sensitisation which then becomes the prime driver of your pain.

 

That means that even small, simple and "innocent" movements tend to be perceived as "threat" by your system causing dis-proportionate amount of pain. An example is that a light stroking movement to the symptomatic area can now trigger a painful response. Learn more about the context of pain by Prof Lorimer Moseley here.

 

De-sensitisation is the key for a successful pain management program and it can be achieved by understanding the different mechanisms that are present and drive your pain. Once things make sense, then we use various hands on techniques like fascia release, joint mobilisations, passive/ assisted movement and Cranio-Sacral Therapy to decrease the sensitivity even further.

 

The next step is to introduce movement, simple to start with and more complex as your system advances and shows more tolerance to it. Then we increase the repetitions, the resistance, we introduce a different context, we increase the difficulty etc...and when this happens in a very structured way, the body/ brain stops perceiving movement as a threat. 

 

Don't forget that we are all made to move!

So exploring the boundaries of movement is paramount!