I once had a client come to me complaining of severe pain all over. She touched her arms as she spoke and said everything hurts to touch. She had been suffering with the pain for a while and had been treating her chronic pain naturally by herself. She had come to a limit in her knowledge of how to help herself, so she came to me to help her control the pain and other symptoms.
She hadn’t been to a doctor for a diagnosis but all her symptoms were consistent with fibromyalgia. She wasn’t too concerned with getting a diagnosis, she just wanted to learn how to treat her chronic pain naturally so we got started. She told me she searched online for answers, but there was too much conflicting information so she didn’t even know where to begin.
These are the simple things we implemented.
How Does Chronic Pain Start?
Chronic pain comes from inflammation. Inflammation that causes chronic pain can start many different ways, including sports injuries, accidents or autoimmune diseases. In the case above with my client, if she did have fibromyalgia, the pain is coming from the autoimmune disease. This is the type of chronic pain that can be treated naturally. Sports injuries and chronic pain from accidents may need more medical attention.
In functional medicine, autoimmune disease is believed to start in the gut. Dysfunction in the gut will lead to breakdown in the rest of the body, including autoimmune diseases like fibromyalgia, or chronic pain.
Is It Possible to Treat Chronic Pain Naturally?
Yes, treating chronic pain naturally is possible. There are several steps to take, and it may be a long, difficult journey, but so is chasing pain with medication. Either way you deal with chronic pain is hard: choose your hard.
Treating chronic pain naturally will include changing lifestyle habits to make sure each area in your life is balanced. The lifestyle habits that lead you to chronic pain, will NOT lead you away from chronic pain. You will need to search for and change the habits that are taking you in the opposite direction you want to go.
Below are three simple places to start looking to treat chronic pain naturally.
Treating Chronic Pain Naturally
Heal and Seal the Gut
Like I said, all diseases, including autoimmune diseases, are believed to begin in the gut. The gut is actually outside the body. Everything eaten has to be broken down into individual molecules to be absorbed into the body to be used as needed. The gut is supposed to be a super-tight barrier that is hard to penetrate. The gut wall can become weak with the Standard American Diet, medications, alcohol, gluten, toxins and pathogens. Once weak, undigested food particles can leak through the wall when not supposed to. This term is called “leaky gut”.
These undigested food particles trigger the immune system to create inflammation and also to create antibodies for attack. The thought with autoimmune disease is that the antibodies created now start attacking human cells because they think the human cells are the foreign cells.
Treating chronic pain naturally starts with healing the holes in the gut. You first remove the food, toxins and medications that are the offenders. Then heal and seal the gut holes with targeted nutrients and supplements. These are my favorite supplements that help heal and seal the gut.
Calm the Nerves
What happens when you’re in pain? You tense up right? Being in chronic pain can create chronic tenseness and the inability to relax. Learning how to calm the nervous system and relax muscles can ease pain and is a great way to treat chronic pain naturally.
Meditation and breathwork can help relax the nervous system by switching out of the fight or flight mode and into the rest and digest mode. Another great tool is gentle movement.
Gentle Movement
Too much pounding and high intensity movement can be jarring and hard on the joints. Also, for someone that remains in the fight or flight part of their nervous system, it can be too overstimulating, leading to worsening pain. Treating chronic pain naturally takes gentle movement. Doing yoga, tai chi, Pilates, walking and stretching are better exercises for those with chronic pain.
Walking and stretching are easily done at home. Most towns have a Pilates and/or yoga studio. My favorite app for yoga is called Down Dog.
Let’s Get in Touch!
Treating chronic pain naturally can be a daunting task and seem impossible if you’re trying to tackle it alone. I’d love to hear your story. Comment below or schedule a quick call with me here so I can help! If you enjoyed this article and know someone who would benefit, please share!!
