It can be frustrating as hell when you have pain, think it's going away, then it comes back. Like what gives?! Today we are going to talk about some 3 main reasons your pain may keep coming back and what you can do about that.
1. Not getting to the root of the problem
Often when people have pain, they do their best to kind of push through it and do quick fix things to get rid of it (looking at you, Icy Hot). Sometimes things like icy hot, massage, heat, ice, etc. can make things feel better, but it’s not really addressing the root problem and what caused the pain in the first place.
What can you do instead?
Dig a little deeper. When you have pain, make a mental note of what you were doing that brought on the pain in the first place. What were you doing? What position were you in? Were you under more stress? Were you doing more or less than normal? These questions will help you understand what your body may be reacting to that is leading to a pain response.
2. Not training your body for tasks you are doing
This is a common one for “weekend warrior” types or just busy people in general! Sometimes your body just isn’t prepared for what you are asking it to do. For example, if I am going to put up Christmas lights and I’m doing a ton of overhead reaching and my body is not used to that because I don’t do that motion day to day, its likely I am going to be sore. If I tend to just jump into things and go, go go, without my body being prepared, it's likely that my body is going to respond with pain and soreness because it's just not ready for what I’m doing.
What can you do instead?
Prepare your body and “train” for things you plan to be doing rather than jumping into brand new movements and activities that are more challenging without a ramp up period.
3. Stopping what is working
I see this A LOT as a physical therapist. TIme and time again I will have patients who do really well with their exercises and feel like they are ready to go out on their own. I stress the importance of keeping up with their exercises (ya know, because that is what helped them in the first place) and they agree. Well, they start to feel better and they feel like they don’t need the exercises anymore. WRONG! Your pain is gone because you have trained your body and improved your strength, mobility, body awareness, etc. but once you stop, that starts to fade! Then pain starts to come back.
What can you do instead?
Stick to the routines that you used to get you out of pain in the first place. For home exercises in particular, I recommend that my patients keep up with at least 3 exercises daily or aim to do their full program 3 days a week.
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