Chronic pain not only does not harm the body, but also reconstructs life. Work, sleep, move freely, and fall into the ability to feel like yourself. It changes your thoughts, how you interact with others, how to see the future. And when left for months or years without a clear cause, it is not a symptom of injury, but a constant alarm of the nervous system.
You may have heard that pain is in muscles, joints or nerves. Perhaps you have tried injections, drugs or surgery. But what should I do if the actual source is not structurally? What should I do if your brain learned how to interpret a signal in the body instantly when a pain loop is produced?
A new study suggests what this is happening.1 And more importantly, it shows that you have no power to change it. By aiming at the mental and emotional patterns that strengthen pain, you start to teach something different from the brain.
Treatment reduces the pain of the source of your brain again.
The review published in Lancet investigated how psychological treatment, such as cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT), reduces chronic pain aimed at the processing pattern of the brain, not the body’s body tissue.2 This therapy interferes with how pain is configured by the nervous system instead of managing the symptoms of the surface.
• When pain is chronic, the default setting of the brain begins to work effectively for you. This review explains how chronic pain is strengthened by the Default Mode Network, an activated brain region group when a long thought or emotional overwhelming is overwhelming.3 This network maintains the background fear, worry and self -protection instincts running on the automatic control device.
Maintaining an over -active state makes the pain constant even if there is no persistent injury. Psychological treatment helps to interfere with this background loop.
• Changing your thoughts and feelings about pain interferes with pain loops. Researchers have found that successful treatment is not about coping. It helped to recognize people when they react automatically (to expect pain or afraid of their meanings) and taught them to interfere with the pattern. Over time, these cognitive movements have been significantly reduced in pain strength and led to improvement of daily function. The result is more free and feared.
• There is no psychologist to start progress. Facial therapy was the place where most of the evidence came out, but this review emphasized that other people, such as doctors, nurses and physical therapists, will help to guide these changes. Even self -oriented methods, such as the CBT -based app, can provide real benefits. There are already hundreds of pain -related psychological apps, and many people lack official verification, but CBT -based apps are promising.
• Treatment does not reduce pain, but helps to restore life. Pain relief is just one part of the bigger picture. This treatment helps you to play with your children, go for a walk, and go back to things that are controlled. If you no longer avoid life from the fear of pain, the nervous system begins to settle. Stop the threat scanning. Changes to safety, not fear, are the core of true recovery.
• Personalization and consistency are more important than perfection. If the treatment is customized to an individual, the results are improved. There is no protocol that fits one size. The important thing is to help find your own pattern. Thinking to increase pain and habits of strengthening fear -learning how to interfere with them. There is a place where the change begins. In the way that the mind reacts to a signal that is no longer in the back or joint, but no longer needs to be loud.
Again, two -thirds of the patient’s belief system helped to eliminate chronic back pain.
The randomly clinical trial published in JAMA PSYCHIAATRY tests a therapy called Painting Reconciliation (PRT) to help people change their thoughts on chronic low back pain.4 Unlike conventional treatment, which focuses on physical damage, this approach is to re -educate the brain and see pain as a wrong alarm, not a sign of injury. Researchers wanted to see if the change in pain in pain could provide long -lasting mitigation and whether such changes could be measured in the brain scan.
• This trial focused on people with non -facing back pain in the long run. The researchers studied 151 adults between the 21 and 70 years of age and studied adults suffering from chronic low back pain for an average of 10 years. Most have already attempted existing treatments such as drugs, physical therapy or spinal images without persistent results. Importantly, their pain is not due to a clear injury.
• PRT surpassed placebo and general treatment. After only four weeks of treatment, 66%of the people who received the PRT were painless or almost no pain, only 20%of the placebo group and 10%of the usual treatment.
The PRT group reported the lowest pain level (average 1.18 points in the 0 ~ 10 pain scale), while the placebo group recorded 2.84 points and a general treatment group 3.13. This improvement has been steadily maintained for a year after the treatment.
• Participants went beyond pain relief and reported serious life improvements. People who receive PRT also have a better sleep, depression and anger level and reduced the scores of disability. It is the main difference. Most treatments only reduce the strength of pain, but PRT helps participants restore function, mood and quality of life.
• The brain scan shows that the brain has changed physically during treatment. Functional MRI scans have shown that in the area of pain -related areas of the brain, the PRT reduces the activity that helps the brain determines how dangerous the pain is. After treatment, they suggest that they have learned how to reduce the pain response because they are less activated.
• A stronger brain connection appeared between the senses and the control center. The “pain alarm” area not only calmed down, but also formed a new and healthy connection. Some of the brains associated with emotion and decision -making begin to work closely with the area that detects touch and pain, helping to better understand the place where the brain feels physical senses and methods.
This suggests that the brain is switching to a more accurate and grounded interpretation of a pain signal in a distorted emotional reaction.
Re -educate the brain to break the pain loop
If you live with everyday pain that scans or tests are not fully explained, it is time to stop looking for something broken in your body and start seeing what happens in the brain. Chronic pain often comes from the old fear pattern and the nervous system “wrong alarm”. It is not a real physical damage. The good news is that you didn’t stick. You can train your brain to interpret your pain differently, and the process begins with a way of moving and reacting, thinking about symptoms.
This is not to ignore pain. It is to understand how your beliefs, reactions and habits form your nervous system and how to change it. You must play an active role. It means focusing on building a new brain pattern without trying to paralyze pain. The five steps to help start are:
1. Reconstruct the meaning of pain. When the imaging is clear and the doctor does not find the tissue damage, it is assumed that the pain is damaged. Instead, see symptoms on the brain-start the signal that is no longer accurate. These changes helped 66%of patients in PRT studies so that there was no pain or almost no pain.
Rather than reading or listening to resources that describe pain as a protective brain signal rather than signs of injuries. You didn’t break. You are trapped in a warning loop and you can reset it.
2. Change the reaction to interfere with the cycle of fear. Whenever you get out of the fear of worsening pain, throw away, or avoid something, you strengthen your brain alarm. Instead, admit pain calmly without panic. Tell yourself like a child who is scared. “You are safe. This is sick.
This task re -educes the emotional center of the brain and reacts less urgently. As you can see from the two studies, it is a simple strategy with a strong neurological effect.
3. Use PRT all day. The PRT protocol contains certain technologies that will help you rebuild the pain response. This includes mentally reevaluating symptoms (“This is to send a wrong alarm”), gently exposed to fearful movements and moves the focus on the senses that feel neutral or safe. You don’t have to wait until the expert starts.
Apps that guide CBT or PRT style practice are often effective when used consistently. Before going to bed, try to wake up or use one of these pain flares.
4. At first, even if you are uncomfortable. Movement is not dangerous when pain is produced by the brain. In fact, avoiding movement makes the cycle worse. Your brain begins to associate more and more behaviors with pain and threats. If you were sitting, start with walking or light stretching. Trace progress like a game. Each movement completed without brace or fear will help to rebuild the safety sense.
5. Trace your beliefs and progress every day- Maintaining daily records on your pain strength, emotional induction and automatic accidents can give you insight into the brain’s pain loop. Use it to find out the pattern. What do you think worse? What actions do you provide relief? Handle like experiments. Many patients who participated in the study have improved just by realizing how often their thoughts are causing fire. The more recognition you build, the more control you get.
You do not need perfect discipline. Consistency, self -compassion and willingness to change the brain are needed. are you. because. And once you learn safety again, pain is no longer your standards.
FAQ for psychological treatment for chronic pain
cue: How does psychotherapy help relieve chronic pain?
no way: Psychological therapy, such as CBT and PRT, changes the way the brain interprets pain signals. Such a treatment stops the brain instead of focusing on physical damage and stops responding to suffering as a threat, leading to practical and continuous relief.
cue: Why is PRT different from other treatments?
no way: PRT focuses on changing the belief that pain is the same as injuries. PRTs, which help to understand that chronic pain is often brain -generated, teaches the nervous system. In clinical trials, 66%of the patients were almost or completely pain within 4 weeks.
cue: Does treatment actually change the brain’s pain response?
no way: yes. Brain images have shown that treatment reduces activity in pain -related brain regions. It also improves communication between the brain regions that help you handle your senses and control your emotions, confirming that these treatment causes physical changes in the way pain is processed.
cue: Who is the most beneficial in this kind of therapy?
no way: People with long -term pain, which are not related to ongoing injuries, such as chronic low back pain, migraine or postpartum pain, tend to see the biggest improvement. These individuals often strengthened the fear and avoidance of treatment.
cue: If you have chronic pain, what steps are there in retraining your brain?
no way: Start by changing the belief that pain always means damage. Truly recognized, use an app inspired by practice, CBT -based, or PRT, re -introduces movements without fear, traces the progress every day to build awareness and strengthen new response patterns.