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Causes of Pain – Western Perspective
As compared with the Eastern perspective on the causes of pain, the Western perspective is much more complex. Here in the West, we’re not satisfied with just knowing that energy depletion, blockages and imbalances cause all pain and all illness. If you are new to Eastern medicine, you’ll probably want “more”. So the rest of this chapter will piece together a holistic, yet Westernized, view of why you’re still in pain. Interestingly enough, the Western perspective has summarized the causes of chronic pain under two major umbrella categories which are separate but interrelated. The categories are stress and inflammation. Since we covered the topic of stress earlier, let’s move on to inflammation.
Acute inflammation is a natural and appropriate immune response to an infection, an irritation, or an injury. Immune cells are called to the site through the blood stream. The blood vessels near the site become permeable and the site becomes warm and red due to the increased blood flow. The inflamed site also becomes swollen which is supposed to protect the area from further injury. Inflammation is the body’s way of repairing itself, but it isn’t meant to be a permanent state.
Chronic inflammation, unlike acute inflammation, is pathological. Soon, modern medicine will link chronic inflammation (as a root cause) of all chronic diseases including heart attacks, diabetes and cancer. Acute inflammation during infection is easy to understand because you can see the swelling and redness, along with feeling the pain. Chronic inflammation, however, is more insidious and harder to appreciate. Chronic inflammation probably underlies all types of chronic pain, but the reasons aren’t so obvious. It’s as if the healing mechanism of the body is hung up and can’t complete its cycle. Many of the physical and non-physical causes of chronic pain induce an inflammatory response in the body. Even nutritional deficiencies of anti-oxidants, for example, can prevent the scavenging of free radicals and promote chronic inflammation.
Free radicals are atoms or groups of atoms with an odd (unpaired) number of electrons and can be formed when oxygen interacts with certain type of molecules. Once formed these highly reactive free radicals can start a negative chain reaction, like dominoes. When they come into contact with important components of the cell like DNA or the cellular membrane, they can cause significant damage. Cells may then function poorly, age or die. To prevent free radical damage, the body has a defense system of antioxidants. Some, we make on our own, like glutathione, and others we get from our food, like Vitamin C. Drugs or toxins that interfere with antioxidant activity can thus contribute to chronic inflammation and that is why we want to be conscious of what we expose our bodies to on a daily basis.
Almost every other physical “cause” of pain I’ve listed below is linked to inflammation. The underlying causes of inflammation are the real story behind why your pain is hanging around. In the Body section, I’ll be sharing strategies to lower your inflammation regardless of the cause.
Trauma
As a family practitioner trained initially in Western medicine, I’m well aware of the tomes written about the causes and conventional treatment of pain conditions. Some of the causes are fairly easy to understand such as physical trauma. When someone sprains an ankle, the ligaments either stretch or tear and microscopic shearing of the blood vessels creates the fluid accumulation. The body begins the healing process by creating an inflammatory response to clean up the area and rebuild the structures that were damaged. Swelling protects the area, but often is a source of pain in addition to the pain caused by torn ligaments. Pain signals travel along nerves to the spine and up to the brain where the brain sends the message to the body to “protect” the joint by discouraging excessive movement.
Western medicine is unable to explain why some people heal completely from trauma and why others don’t. Nothing is more frustrating to a patient than to hear from a doctor that their X-rays are normal and they can’t find the actual source of pain. In today’s hurried medical climate where insurance companies are paying less for medical visits, doctors often rely on laboratory tests, x-rays and scans much more than on their clinical diagnostic skills to evaluate pain. In America, doctors often practice “defensive medicine” which translates into ordering as many diagnostic tests to avoid a malpractice suit for missing something crucial, like a tumor. To make matters worse, patients often request diagnostics because of a belief that these tests will accurately diagnose the cause of their pain. Nothing could be further from the truth.
Obviously trauma will cause pain, stress and inflammation to the body. What isn’t obvious is why some people seem to get better quickly and others don’t. Occasionally the trauma is repetitive and the area never rests enough to heal completely. For example, people who lift heavy things or play tennis with bad form may develop inflammation on a bony prominence on their elbow called the lateral epicondyle. This can become chronic and known as tennis elbow or lateral epicondylitis. These types of injuries are also called repetitive strain injuries.
As I’ll explain in the Body section, people who suffered head injuries, such as concussions, neck injuries, and whiplash are at higher risk of not being able to heal their chronic pain. If you’ve experienced a head injury at any time in your life, even as a child, it could have caused brain imbalance and it may explain why your pain lingers. Car accidents, rough sports like hockey or football, can predispose you to experiencing chronic problems that show up later in life.
Toxins
In order for the body to heal, it must be able to efficiently get nutrients into the cells and get toxins out of the cells. If the toxic load on the body is too heavy, then the toxins will affect the functioning of the cells in the body. Toxins come in two forms, endogenous (coming from within us) and exogenous (coming from outside of us).
Endogenous toxins are normal waste products the body creates during the process of normal cellular function. If the body does not eliminate them adequately, they will remain in the body. Uric acid, a by-product of protein metabolism is a fine example. Exogenous toxins come from outside our bodies and can take the form of many things we are exposed to on a daily basis, including:
Volatile organic chemicals (paint, exhaust, new carpet)
Pesticides/Herbicides
Smog
Heavy metals such as mercury and lead
Synthetic food additives and preservatives
Synthetic chemicals in skin care products
Household cleaners
Cigarette smoke
Viruses, bacteria and parasites
Fluoride and chlorine in tap water
Bromine in baked goods and home furnishings
Plastic containers leaching chemicals into our food
Microwaved food
Low frequency electromagnetic radiation (EMF) from appliances, computers and lights
High frequency electromagnetic radiation (EMF) from wireless devices such as cordless phones, cellular phones and Wi-Fi
Genetically modified food (most commonly corn, soy, cotton, sugar beets and canola)
Processed food (food that comes in boxes, bags, cans or bottles)
Foods you are allergic or intolerant to
Even watching the nightly news on television can be viewed as a potential toxin depending on how your mind and emotions are processing the information. You’ll learn in the Mind section just how powerful your thoughts and beliefs are when it comes to healing chronic pain.
Toxins will gum up the energy flow in your body and stress your detoxifications organs such as the colon, liver, kidneys, lymph, lung and skin. If toxins back up because the detoxification organs are overburdened, then they can leach into your muscle and joints and cause pain. Gluten, a protein component derived primarily from wheat, used to cause stiffness and pain in my muscles and joints whenever I ate it, as did dairy foods. Although I have desensitized myself to many foods that used to cause me pain, I don’t often get the urge to eat wheat or dairy because they don’t taste good to me anymore.
Living in the modern world, you deal with a plethora of toxins in your daily life, even if you eat organic and use only vinegar to wash windows. Since it’s impossible to avoid every single toxin, it is important to be at least aware of the role toxins play in your ability to heal.
In an ideal world, toxins, either exogenous or endogenous, are harmlessly transformed and excreted by healthy organs in the body. The primary organs of detoxification are the colon, liver, gallbladder, kidneys, lungs, lymph and skin. Some detoxification experts will include the nasal passages, blood and reproductive organs as secondary detoxification systems. When these organ systems are functioning optimally, we can theoretically get rid of toxins as fast as we accumulate them. Unfortunately, no matter how healthy your detoxification organs start out, if you are living in North America, your daily toxic burden heavily outweighs your body’s ability to process them. The colon is responsible for ridding our bodies of most of the toxic burden through bowel movements. If the colon can’t function optimally because of stress or inflammation, then toxins are handed over to the liver and kidneys, neither of which was designed to handle large amounts of toxins on a daily basis. Toxins can then literally “back up” so that the lymph, lung, and skin literally overflow. The toxic load can jam up the flow of lymph through the lymph channels. Thus, instead of the toxins dumping efficiently from the lymph channels into the kidneys for excretion through the urine, they can leak out into the muscles, joints, tendons and skin.
Remember the “achy” muscle and joint pain I described in an earlier chapter? I’ve discovered people who suffer from this type of pain often have sluggish lymphatic flow. I was one of them. Over the last year or so, I noticed with constipation or abdominal pain, I also experienced achy muscles or joint pain. Once I’d clear out the constipation, the pain improved considerably. I also noticed that when I ate an intolerant food such as popcorn or raw nuts, the pain would return. I went to see a massage therapist who specialized in lymphatic flow and she confirmed my suspicion that every time my abdomen was upset, my lymph flow would grind to a halt and I’d experience pain.
If the toxin-processing organs cannot rid toxins efficiently, the toxins will be stored away in “safer” places away from the bloodstream. Unfortunately these “safer” places may be safer in the short-term, but not-so-safe in the long term. Toxins often get stored in fat cells. Fat cells are metabolically slow and aren’t very demanding, so storing the toxins there, especially the fat-soluble ones, require enough fat cells to be available. Thus one of the symptoms of chronic toxicity is fat accumulation in the abdomen and the formation of cellulite. I look like a slim person compared with most Americans, but yet after succumbing to fibromyalgia, I developed significant cellulite and gained two inches around my waistline.
Aside from pain, problems in the lungs, nasal passages and skin are indications of toxicity. All skin rashes can be traced to an inefficient or sluggish detoxification system. Thus, when I treat someone for a chronic rash that has stumped other medical professionals, I always start by supporting the health of the detoxification organs, especially the colon. Many strange and severe rashes have been “cured”, not by cortisone creams and pills, but by increasing the health of the bowels and liver. Other symptoms like chronic sinus infections, nasal congestion due to allergies, are other signs that your detoxification system is backed up and not working properly. In the Body section that follows, I’ll show you how you can eliminate these toxins more effectively.
Kerri came to my office with a diagnosis of fibromyalgia. She was extremely negative and complained bitterly about how poorly she was being treated by “the system”. She was on government assistance and every word out of her mouth was about how other people owed her. She had terrible body odor. I didn’t know too much about body detoxification at that point in my career, so I gently asked Kerri if she would mind showering before her next appointment with me. Well! The venom that came from her mouth was sharp and to the point! “I’ve showered twice already today and I still reek like this! I can’t get rid of it! I’m so toxic!” I only saw Kerri in the office for a single visit and she never returned to pay her bill, but I learned something really valuable that day.
When someone is that toxic, the sweat glands will bear some of the burden of detoxifying and it won’t smell very pleasant to be around them! Not only did Kerri have physical toxins burdening her battered body, the emotional toxins were adding fuel to the fire. She was in a downward spiral of “poor me” and was so physically ill that the only true option for her was healing on a spiritual level. In other words, people like Kerri have to hit rock bottom and totally surrender themselves to spirit before change can happen. That degree of surrender happens when you are too sick and tired to fight anymore.
I know rock bottom. I know the feeling of suicidal thoughts because the pain and fatigue are unbearable. In the Spirit section we’ll discuss the empowerment of choice versus victimhood. This change in perspective made all the difference in my healing and in the healing of others I have worked with.
Nutritional Deficiencies
In order for the body to heal, it requires the right nutrients, and not just protein, fats and carbohydrates. Many of our natural sources of minerals have diminished because of food processing and the poor soil conditions in conventional farming. Minerals are essential for almost every job a cell has to do and the lack of minerals may well be one of the major contributors to chronic pain and chronic diseases in North America.
Plants are able to synthesize vitamins from sun and water, but they cannot synthesize minerals. If the soil is mineral deficient, the plant will be too, no matter how big and lovely synthetic fertilizers make them look. I was at a potluck party recently and brought my own food. One couple brought a raw vegetable plate, so I was excited to have something else to eat. Unfortunately, when I took my first bite, I wanted to spit it out. Every single vegetable I tried tasted bland and some even tasted like chemicals. My taste buds, being used to local and organically farmed produce, could no longer tolerate the taste of conventionally grown vegetables! No wonder children these days would rather eat sugar. It tastes better.
Food processing basically strips the nutrition right out of the fruit, vegetable or grain it’s made from. Magnesium is the mineral that is most affected by food processing according to Carolyn Dean, MD, who wrote, The Magnesium Miracle. It never ceases to amaze me how some of my new patients don’t make the connection between what they eat and why their bodies can’t heal. “Garbage in, garbage out” is a term used by computer programmers to describe why computers sometimes don’t work - if you program the software incorrectly. I think that this saying applies to nutrition and health as well.
Intestinal Problems
Many people with persistent low back pain have intestinal issues. Think about it for a minute. Your intestines sit all curled up in your belly cozily next to your other abdominal organs: the liver, kidneys, bladder, gallbladder, pancreas, spleen, uterus (if you’re a woman), major blood vessels etc. Next to your organs, the spine, spinal nerves, and sacrum are all connected together through thin layers of fascia. Everything is touching everything.
When there are problems in the bowel and the bowel walls become inflamed, they end up being overly porous. In medical terms, we call this porosity “permeability”. When the bowel walls become too permeable, then there will be leakage of bowel contents into the pelvis. This relatively “toxic” fluid then leaks through the various fascial tissues and can inflame the nerves of the spine, the pelvic joints and even track down into the hip joints and knee joints. Integrative manual therapists, like my friend Melissa, told me that she has witnessed patients requiring hip and knee replacements due to long term bowel leakage into the joints!
Food Sensitivities
Recently, I’ve been diagnosing more and more people with gluten-sensitivity. Gluten is type of protein found mainly in wheat, rye, spelt and barley. Severe gluten-intolerance, such as found in Celiac disease, can cause serious health problems including malnutrition, chronic severe abdominal pain, weight loss, weight gain, chronic diarrhea or constipation, chronic fatigue, depression, skin problems, arthritis, and even neurologic disease.
You might not have full blown Celiac disease, but you might have gluten intolerance or sensitivity. In other words, the body has an immune response and creates inflammation. The inflammation can manifest as almost anything, but the most common symptoms I see are intestinal symptoms and chronic pain in the muscles or joints.
My partner, James, found out not long ago that he is gluten-intolerant. Having been a “sugar and wheat addict” all his life, it was a sobering realization. It took us a while to diagnose him because I was gluten-intolerant, so we didn’t have a lot of wheat products at home. Over time, I began to notice that James would get annoying little “injuries” when we skated together or would suffer from bouts of recurrent, severe low back pain for no reason. Finally I put two and two together and realized that these bouts of pain only occurred after he had splurge at the deli eating wraps or sandwiches.
James resisted the possibility of being gluten-intolerant because he really craved wheat and needed “proof”. One day, I consulted with a retired certified colon hydrotherapist about what bowel cleanse she recommended. James was so intrigued with her stories of parasites and tape worms that he decided to do the cleanse with me. So we did an eight day cleanse using the supplements the colon hydrotherapist recommended and James did not consume wheat, processed food, sugar or coffee for the entire time. To his amazement, he felt absolutely great! He experienced an increase of energy and not a stitch of pain anywhere in his body. We skated wonderfully that whole week and although we didn’t push ourselves too hard, we were able to do lifts without any injuries. In fact, James was particularly strong.
Within a week after finishing the bowel cleanse, James re-introduced wheat into his diet. His buddies at work offered him a donut and by the next morning, his back was “killing him”. Weeks of experimenting with and without eating wheat continued until, undeniably, he pinpointed wheat ingestion as the cause of his pain. His initial reluctance has now transformed into solid resolve. He’s stronger, happier and pain-free when gluten-free. James still loves his junk food, but at least he opts for organic and gluten-free options. Occasionally he makes an honest mistake, such as eating organic granola, not realizing that oats are not necessarily gluten-free, or French fries, where the fryer oil was used to fry breaded chicken fingers. As for me, I’m happy to have a healthier partner!
Although wheat and gluten are the major culprits in causing food-sensitive pain, other foods like dairy can do the same. In fact, in Chinese Medicine, cheese and other dairy foods, sweets, alcohol and cold raw foods are considered too “damp” for people predisposed to arthritic conditions. No doubt you’ve heard someone with arthritic pain remark that a storm is approaching. I also used to feel pain before a storm even though I don’t have arthritis. Whenever I ate cheese, my muscles and joints would ache, and worsen during rainy or damp weather.
The Elimination Diet is the most cost-effective way to determine whether you have a food sensitivity contributing to the pain. In this diet, you abstain from eating the most common allergens such as egg, dairy, seafood, shellfish, tree nuts, soy, wheat and peanuts for at least two to four weeks and see if your symptoms improve. If they do not, then it is unlikely that you are intolerant to these foods. The longer you do the elimination diet, the better. If your symptoms improve, then reintroduce each allergen one at a time every three to seven days, gradually increasing the “dose” until you are sure you don’t react to it. Alternatively, you can get a blood test called the ALCAT test to check for food intolerance. I’ll share more on this later.
Lifestyle Contributions
Research the causes of chronic pain online and you might read about postural strain, repetitive movements, overuse, and prolonged immobilization. Poor posture and poor body mechanics forces other body parts to compensate for the imbalance. There is no question that how you treat your body daily has an impact on the development and perpetuation of chronic pain.
Several male patients in my practice have physically demanding lifestyles. They cut down trees, lift sheetrock, haul wood, etc. They were invincible in their twenties doing heavy manual work and unfortunately they hold the same expectation in their fifties. Heavy manual work is tough on the body and chances are that at some point in time, injury will occur.
Natural healthy aging doesn’t mean stopping the activities that you truly love just because you are older. My patients don’t understand that they must support the body in other ways that keeps it nurtured and in balance. The harder you are on your body, the more support it needs.
Think of your body as an expensive sports car. If you’re just driving around town showing off your car, there isn’t much wear and tear on it, but if you are competing in the World Rally Championships racing in gravel, snow and ice, the performance of the car depends on its upkeep. At times I’ve joked: some people take better care of their cars than of their bodies!
Many people would acknowledge that exercise is good for the body. Conditioning the body means putting “good” stress on the skeleton, muscles, joints, ligaments, heart, lungs, skin and fascia so that they remain robust and flexible.
With today’s modern lifestyle, we often find ourselves sitting in front of our computers (as I am right now) or television sets, or driving in cars. The lack of regular exercise prevents the flow of energy in the body and can lead to or contribute to chronic pain. Unfortunately, experiencing chronic pain actually prevents people from exercising so it’s a never-ending cycle of pain and de-conditioning.
The elite athletes I work with put huge demands on their bodies. To make matters worse, specific sports often cause muscle imbalances because certain muscles are “recruited” more heavily than others. One of my friends is a former luge athlete. He can still bend forward and flatten himself like a pancake, just as he did years ago while training. The only problem is, his back and hamstring muscles are overly flexible as compared to his hip flexors and abdominal muscles, so when I asked him to try a back bend, he just chuckled because he knew he couldn’t do it.
The quality of sleep every night has a lot to do with how well your body heals itself. Physical rejuvenation is said to occur during deep sleep. Important hormones and neurotransmitters (chemical messengers) are released during sleep. Caffeine and alcohol can negatively impact sleep. Stimulating activities such as being on the computer or watching television can also negatively impact sleep. Chronic pain can exacerbate sleep issues and can cause multiple awakenings if the pain is moderately severe. We’ll discuss in the Body chapter how to get your sleep back on track so that your body can heal.
What you ingest can contribute extensively to your body’s ability to self-heal. Low nutrient, low energy food, like processed conventionally made food can harm rather than heal the body. Hippocrates said, “Let medicine be thy food and thy food be thy medicine” and he was right. Without the energy from proper nutrient dense foods, our body’s cells literally starve and cannot function well. Over time, we can succumb to disease and illness. If you’re not ready to cook all of your own food and go totally organic, that’s okay. Any little bit helps. My goal is to help you feel better faster because inevitably you’ll start making healthier lifestyle choices. How exciting is that?
Lastly, a discussion on lifestyle would not be complete if I didn’t include the mental, emotional and spiritual factors of lifestyle. How often do you have “down” time? And I don’t mean sitting in front of the TV watching movies. Few people in the modern world give themselves the opportunity to be truly conscious of their thoughts and feelings on a daily basis. Spiritual teachers call this being a “witness” to yourself. Most of us are just too busy getting our “to-do” list done, myself included. How often do you just sit still, not doing anything, but witnessing your breath? Unless you have been practicing meditation, probably never.
How often do you read non-fiction books? How many per month? Expanding your awareness is part of growing yourself and an integral part of the self-healing journey. My guess is that if you are reading this book, you are already way ahead of the average American who spends nearly four hours a day watching television shows and slick marketing ads from big corporations.
How connected do you feel to your life’s purpose? Or are you one of many who feel as if they are just surviving day to day, trying to get out of debt and get out of pain? Have you ever thought that maybe your experience of pain is actually part of your life’s purpose? Part of your life journey to share your gifts with others? I can’t say for sure. Only you can answer that. Consciously evolving your spirituality as a part of your healing (which I sometimes consider the fast-track route) will help make your journey a joyous one. It certainly has been joyous for me.
Thankfully, small changes in your lifestyle can dramatically improve your health and wellness. In the upcoming chapters you’ll get to choose what resonates with you most.
Iatrogenic Pain
Iatrogenic pain means that pain is being caused as a complication or by-product of medical treatment. Unfortunately, most people don’t realize that taking medications for other non-pain related conditions can actually cause or perpetuate chronic pain.
For example, drugs for heartburn, or gastroesophageal reflux disease (GERD), diminish or eliminate the ability of the stomach to produce stomach acid. They are categorized as H2 blockers and proton pump inhibitors. Proton pump inhibitors such as omeprazole (brand name Prilosec) and esomeprazole (brand name Nexium) are extremely effective stomach acid reducers and there are millions of people taking them on a daily basis. The supposed cause of GERD is that the stomach acid is back-washing (refluxing) into the esophagus and causing pain. Therefore, GERD is not being caused by excessive amounts of acid in the stomach. Can you see a problem with the long term use of stomach acid reducers?
Think for a moment why our stomachs were designed to produce acid. Could it be that we need it to properly digest our food into smaller components so that the nutrients can be absorbed? Could it be that the acid kills harmful bacteria, parasites and viruses in the food and beverages we invariably ingest? What would happen if we stop producing stomach acid? If you’re following my train of thought, you’ll conclude that we’ll eventually become nutrient deficient and be at higher risk of succumbing to infections.
Studies have reported that acid reducing medications can deplete Vitamin B12, folic acid, Vitamin D, and these minerals: calcium, iron, and zinc. If you become nutrient deficient, then the body’s self-healing processes slow down or stop functioning all together. Pain could be one of the signals that your body is crying for adequate nourishment.
Let’s take another example. Drugs to treat high cholesterol are some of the best-selling drugs worldwide, especially statins. Pravastatin, lovastatin, simvastatin and fluvastatin sales have been greatly dwarfed by the newer more powerful statin, atorvastatin commonly known as Lipitor. Unbeknownst to the majority of patients taking these statins, the muscle pain these drugs can cause is not just inconvenient, it can be downright dangerous. Cerivastatin (also known as Baycol in America) was pulled off the market because of severe muscle disease causing deaths.
As well as lowering your cholesterol, statins lower your ability to make coenzyme Q-10 which is a fat soluble antioxidant that is found in virtually all cell membranes, possibly as much as forty percent. CoQ-10 acts as an antioxidant independently, protecting against DNA damage and other forms of oxidative damage. Coenzyme Q-10 is also an essential component of the mitochondria (the "power-house" of the cell), playing a critical role in the formation of ATP, the body's fundamental energy unit, from carbohydrate and fatty acid metabolism. Without adequate coenzyme Q-10, your cells can’t repair as well nor can they produce the molecules of energy. Thus many people not only feel muscle pain, but also their muscles can’t actually repair themselves after the normal wear and tear of daily living.
Before I became more holistic, I had always wondered why my patients on cholesterol lowering diets and medication still ended up with heart failure. Now I know the heart needed coenzyme Q-10 to stay healthy. So what I was giving them to control their high cholesterol and hopefully prevent heart disease might have actually been causing it! If your doctor has encouraged you to take a statin, please read The Great Cholesterol Myth by Jonny Bowden and Stephen Sinatra, M.D. before you make a decision on whether to take it.
Here is a brief list of common medications that can cause nutrient deficiencies that may be related to the development or the perpetuation of your chronic pain:
Oral contraceptives (birth control pills)
Synthetic estrogen replacement therapy
Anticonvulsants
Anti-diabetics
Anti-hypertensives (blood pressure lowering)
Anti-inflammatories (ibuprofen, aspirin)
Anti-ulcer and heartburn drugs (H2 blockers)
Cholesterol-lowering drugs
Beta-blockers
Phenothiazines
Tricyclic antidepressants
Benzodiazepines
Antibiotics
If you are taking medications right now and are concerned about their causing or contributing to your pain, don’t just stop them suddenly. Stopping certain medications suddenly can cause a rebound effect and can be dangerous to do without consulting a medical professional. Instead, consult with a holistic physician or naturopath who can assess how to gradually replace your medications with natural remedies that work with your body and not against it.
A great resource to have in your library is a book by Dr. Hyla Cass called Supplement Your Prescription. In it, she outlines how psychiatric patients coming to her for depression and anxiety were often nutrient deficient from other medications they were taking. Instead of giving them yet another prescription such as an anti-depressant, she gave them nutritional therapy based on knowing the patterns of drug-induced nutrient deficiency. The results were spectacular – these patients recovered their mental health without drugs. In her book, simply find the medications you are currently taking and which nutritional supplements would be helpful to offset nutritional deficiencies.
In addition to iatrogenic pain caused by drugs, surgical procedures can also contribute to the development of chronic pain. I’ve had many patients who have had back surgery for a herniated disc and who later complain of recurrent, unremitting back and hip pain even though MRI’s do not show a new cause of their pain. In many of these patients, the scar tissue from the original surgery is now impinging on the proper functioning of the soft tissue around the area causing muscle spasm and nerve entrapment. And in Traditional Chinese Medicine or energy medicine terms, the scar tissue has created a significant block to the proper flow of energy, thus creating a cycle of chronic pain.
Brenda suffered from chronic neck pain and dizziness after being in a car accident. No matter how many doctors and therapists she saw, her neck pain and dizziness remained. When she finally saw me, we corrected her brain balance and her pain markedly improved. Her dizziness, however, was more difficult to treat so I sought out the expertise of Marie McMahon, L.M.T., a good friend of mine, who is a craniosacral therapist. After speaking with Brenda for only five minutes, Marie knew exactly why she was still experiencing dizziness.
Marie has discovered that many women who have undergone a hysterectomy often have head and neck issues including dizziness. This was the case with Brenda. Not only did Brenda have a hysterectomy, she also had a C-section earlier with the birth of one of her sons. The scar tissue arising from the surgeries pre-disposed her to having tight fascia internally, and Marie could literally feel Brenda’s sacrum pulling on the structures above whenever she moved her head. I found this fascinating since I never knew how delicate the fascial balance can be between the brain and the sacrum. I certainly didn’t learn this in medical school!
Although seemingly benign, I’ve seen debilitating pain arise in one area of the body after a patient has been given a brace to wear to support another injured area of the body. Walking casts for broken legs tend to elevate one leg higher off the ground compared to the other non-casted leg. The resulting imbalance creates strain on the hips, spine and ligaments and can contribute to the development of chronic pain. Even a thick supportive knee brace can cause an unusual walking pattern that then throws the hips out of alignment. Alas, most doctors who prescribe casts and braces don’t consider their negative effects on body mechanics.
What about Aging?
The one belief that no longer resonates with me is that our bodies fall apart with age. How many times have you heard “Oh, it’s arthritis. I’m getting old, so what should I expect?” You’ll learn in the Mind section that we manifest in our reality what we believe. Thus it is vitally important to question our beliefs. For example, I used to think cancer was incurable until I saw a provoking video called The Science of Miracles by Greg Braden in which a bladder tumor completely disappears (as documented by live ultrasound) with Qi Gong healing within minutes! Then I saw several documentaries and read several books about how cancer is curable and my mind blew wide open. I no longer believe that cancer is incurable. If you’d like to know more, check out the Healing Cancer Summit.
I highly recommend that you remove the belief from your psyche that your body falls apart as you age. It doesn’t have to be true. If you look for more so-called “exceptions to the rule,” you will find that there are many older folks who live vibrant active lives without having to take medications. There are few things as “cool” as witnessing an eighty year old doing a perfect back bend or a head stand. One of my heroes is adult skating legend Barbara Kelly of Lake Placid. She’s over eighty five years old and still skates during our Coffee Club sessions. I plan to still be skating in my nineties. How about you?
There is a big difference between graceful aging and pathological aging. Graceful aging occurs when the body is still strong, healthy and flexible and the mind is sharp. Pathological aging occurs when our bodies seem to “fall apart”. Many anti-aging experts feel that the aging process can be delayed through various natural means including toxin removal, stress and inflammation management, nutritional therapy, stem cells and bio-identical hormone therapy, to name a few.
Getting old is not synonymous with getting sick. There are plenty of ways to reverse your chronic pain and even the aging process if you learn how to take care of your body. It’s never too late to start. By involving all the physical, mental, emotional and spiritual aspects of yourself in your healing plan, you’ll have the opportunity to grow old gracefully.
Unfortunately, most of the skills I use today were never part of my medical school curriculum. They still aren’t part of the curriculum in most schools today. Despite my being in the top ten percent of my medical school graduating class, the most important hands-on skills I have learned are not those I learned in school. In fact, I learned them almost exclusively from non-physicians such as massage therapists, physical therapists, holistic osteopaths, acupuncturists and holistic chiropractors.
In Western medicine, x-ray will show us that someone has an aging degenerative joint whereby the cartilage has eroded away. We never expect anyone to be able to “grow back” his cartilage. But people do!
Modern medicine has made great strides. New diagnostic equipment continues to be developed. Surgical equipment and less invasive surgical techniques are constantly being created. Our ability to save someone’s life after an acute trauma such as a car accident has never been better. Yet, despite the advances in modern medicine, we have a growing number of people experiencing chronic disease, cancer or chronic pain. Something is missing.
Traditional Western medications only affect one chemical reaction among an extremely large network of chemical reactions in the body. In doing so, they can put the rest of the body out of balance. For example, a common medication used for pain is acetaminophen, also called paracetamol. Even the makers of acetaminophen (brand name Tylenol ) can’t explain how Tylenol relieves pain, but we know there is a risk of liver damage even at proper doses.
Other pain medications under the class of NSAIDs (non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs) include common over-the-counter drugs such as ibuprofen (brand names Motrin, Advil, Nuprin), naproxen (brand name Aleve), ketoprofen (brand names Actron, Orudis) and aspirin (brand name Bufferin, Bayer, Exedrin). All carry warnings of an increased risk of gastrointestinal bleeding, i.e. ulcers, and kidney damage. The prescription NSAIDs, although more expensive, are not necessarily safer and have been implicated in increasing the risk of heart attacks and strokes in regular users.
Narcotics are usually the drugs of last resort for most doctors because of their potentially addictive nature. Narcotics such as codeine, hydrocodone, propoxyphene, meperidine, hydromorphone and morphine can also cause vomiting, confusion and shortness of breath. Most commonly, they cause constipation, and you’ll learn in the Body section why you never want to become constipated if you’re trying to heal your chronic pain.
Personally I feel that taking pain relievers for acute pain for short periods of time isn’t necessarily dangerous; however, the growing trend of long term use of these medications is worrisome. There are not adequate studies showing long term safety and there is an ever-increasing incidence of deaths due to adverse reactions documented by the American Food and Drug Administration.
Chapter Summary
The underlying cause of chronic pain from the Western perspective is stress and inflammation
There are a multitude of contributors to stress and inflammation in our daily lives, many of which are not commonly recognized by traditional Western medicine
Medications can contribute to or even cause chronic pain due to their toxicity or nutritionally-depleting nature
Lifestyle is a major contributor to health and wellness
There is a major difference between pathological and graceful aging