Do you live with chronic pain? We all feel pain every now and then but chronic pain is much different; persisting for weeks, months or even years. For pain to be considered chronic, it is generally present for 3 months or more. Experiencing any painful condition over an extended period can be incredibly difficult to endure. Living with pain can have devastating effects on one’s quality of life; causing a negative impact on one’s emotion state, outlook on life and prevent even the most basic activities.   Unfortunately, many sufferers do not understand why they are in pain. In addition to the physical pain, there is the emotional distress of not knowing if or when life will go back to normal. For most people living with chronic pain, there are very few treatment options available and those that are offered generally fall into 2 different categories; pain-killers or psychiatric medications.

Why you feel pain?

The sensation of pain you experience originates from messages that come from your nervous system. You cannot feel pain unless nerves are involved.  Nerves that carry these pain signals are found throughout your body and ultimately their message reaches your brain; when this happens, you experience pain. Not until these messages reach your brain can you experience pain. In most situations, we know why we are feeling pain; maybe we stub a toe or cut our finger. These events cause tissue damage and your nerves make your brain aware that you have been injured. After a while, the pain goes away and the tissues heal. Chronic pain is different; more often than not, no obvious cause can be identified and the pain-stage of “injury” goes on and on. Taking a functional medicine approach however can often lead to discovering what is causing chronic pain signals to be transmitted to the brain; breaking this constant pain cycle. Breaking this cycle of pain if very important. Due to the way your nervous system works, constantly experiencing pain makes it easier to experience pain! The nervous system becomes very good at anything it does constantly; in this case; the areas of the brain that cause you to perceive pain become very good; too good in fact, at telling you that you hurt! This is one of the most fundamental pieces that must be considered when treating chronic pain.

What Causes Chronic Pain?

Many times, taking an integrative medicine approach provides the best answers and solutions for chronic pain. This is because many who suffer from chronic pain have more than one body system that contributes to their pain. For example; you may have structural instability of joints or muscles that lead to irritation and pain as well as heightened levels of inflammation from a poor diet. Another example would be an individual who has adrenal gland fatigue as well as poor neurotransmitter production (nerve chemicals) which causes one to experience pain when they should not.

Some of the most common health problems we see in our office that lead to chronic pain include:

• Chronic inflammation

• Poor detoxification

• Adrenal fatigue (low adrenal gland function)

• Insomnia

• Hormonal imbalances

• Immune system disorders

• Poor neurotransmitter production

• Structural (muscle / joint) dysfunction

What Can You Do?

If you suffer with chronic pain, a good place to start is seeking the help of a physician who understands the various systems of the body and how they can lead to chronic pain. Many doctors who are managing chronic pain do not have a good understanding of the multiple systems of the body and how they can negatively affect one another. The old saying, “if all you have is a hammer, everything looks like a nail” applies here. Doctors who practice function medicine have hammers, saws, screwdrivers, wrenches, etc. Identifying and effectively treating chronic pain requires the doctor to look beyond the pain itself and isolate underlying causes.

I do not recommend trying to figure this out yourself (unless you are a doctor) because there may be serious health problems occurring that need to be identified through appropriate examination and testing procedures. I am however, encouraging you to think outside the box; to look beyond pain medications or psychiatric drugs. While these may provide relief; they are not the best long-term solution. When I see a patient in my office who is dealing with chronic pain, I often assess structural integrity, inflammation levels, detoxification capacity, various hormones, etc. This is because we are all unique and there is not a single root-cause for most chronic pain disorders. The fundamental principle of functional medicine is to collect data and keep looking for clues that will lead to optimum long-term solutions.

If you suffer with chronic pain, keep looking for answers and seek the help of a doctor who will work with you; not only to control the pain but who can help get you back on the path to wellness and a better quality of life.

Chronic pain can wear you down and cause you to lose hope; don’t give in to it and don’t give up! Partner with a knowledgeable physician and work together. I’m not going to lie to you, it may not be an easy; but neither is living with chronic pain.

If you would like more information about chronic pain and functional medicine or Dr. Sexton go to www.napervilleintegratedwelness.com

Do your own research, inform yourself and ask lots of questions. When collecting information you MUST consider the source. There is no shortage of false, misleading, outdated, profit-driven and utterly biased information in healthcare today; even from the most respected sources and organizations.

This approach to healthcare is not intended to diagnose, treat, cure, mitigate, or prevent any disease. Why is this? The FDA enforces its position that these words can only be used with drugs. This approach does not use drugs.