Pain.

The driving force behind much of what we do as Physical Therapists.

Patients come see us when they’re in pain. We ask about pain and base much of our treatments and interventions behind trying to decrease or get rid of pain completely.

But what is pain and what does it mean?

There is good pain and bad pain.

What do I mean by good pain?

Well, pain is an indicator that there is something wrong in the body. Maybe it’s a tissue that’s injured, maybe it’s tightness within a muscle, or maybe it’s a dysfunctional movement pattern. This pain is the body's way of telling the brain that something isn’t working or functioning like it needs to in order to achieve proper mobility and function.

But what about bad pain?

Bad pain is pain that is not necessarily from an injury or a faulty movement pattern. For example, say you strained a muscle in your low back 5 years ago but you still have pain in your low back now. The muscle has healed since you strained it but the brain still associates that area with pain. This type of pain is dysfunctional and not helpful to the body. It decreases your ability to move because the body doesn’t like to move when it’s in pain. The pain cycle begins - you’re in pain, you move/exercise, it doesn’t help, you’re in pain. The pain cycle is also known as chronic pain - pain that you’ve had for a long time without a tissue being damaged. This can continue for years and can be a reason why just exercise alone hasn’t been helpful.

So what kind of pain do you have?