Do you know when your sensory and pain receptors are talking to you? If you have pain, choose to carefully move your body, by doing so you're likely to lessen the pain, says Corinne Austin.
Do you know when your sensory and pain receptors are talking to you? If you have pain, choose to carefully move your body, by doing so you're likely to lessen the pain, says Corinne Austin.
NO EXCUSES
Pain causes stress. That's a given. Pain is unpleasant so we feel that on a conscious level. And on a subconscious level our body recognises that when we're in pain that our ability to run from a tiger (should we need to) is compromised - so that boosts the stressload we feel too.
Movement restrictions cause us similar stress. When we have joint pain, injury, or have restricted ranges of motion due to 'tightness' or joint degeneration, this can also be uncomfortable and unpleasant on a conscious level, and on a subconscious level our body again recognises that it hasn't got the same ability to run from a tiger as it would if we were free of those movement restrictions.
Pain receptors in our body - those which sense pain, muscle spasm, muscle tightness, or constricted blood vessels - they are called nociceptors.
Sensory receptors in our body - those which sense stretch, movement, compression, vibration or sheer forces - they are called mechanoreceptors.
When we feel pain our ability to run from a tiger (should we need to) is compromised - so that boosts the stress load we feel too. Photo / Getty Images
Bare with me.
Nociception, the experience of pain, inhibits mechanoreception. In other words, when we have pain we want to move less. It makes sense right – when we have pain, we want to minimise the pain sensation so we move less, and we move the body part in question less.
But did you know that mechanoreception also inhibits nociception - if it's done sensibly and in a controlled environment.
What does this mean? It means movement can reduce our sensation or experience of pain. That's right, when we move our bodies more, and in accordance with some sensibility and control, our bodies feel safer. When our bodies feel safer they lessen the pain signals being sent to the periphery.
Further, when we have pain and/or movement restrictions, this greatly increases the stress on our bodies. Thus, when we move, our pain reduces, our bodies become more free, more activated and more mobilised, and this reduces our cortisol production and the associated stress effects on the body, and we feel more calm and free - our parasympathetic system takes over. And when we are in a parasympathetic state, everything in our body works better, and our healing powers are enhanced.
How cool is that?
The cool little happy body tip within there is ... if you have pain, choose to carefully move your body. By doing so you're likely to lessen the pain, free the body up, and reduce your overall stress load.
Not bad consequences hey.
• Corinne Austin is a health and movement coach (corinne@fitfixnz.co.nz) . This is her last column. Austin has been writing health and fitness articles for the Northern Advocate Good Life section for just over 10 years. She says a lot has changed in that time and she's feeling that her writing time and energy needs to be spent elsewhere. "It's been a great ride," she said.
