If you've been dealing with pain for > 1 year, read this
Chronic Wrist pain is really frustrating… especially as a gamer who needs their hands in order to do what you love.
And unfortunately when we experience pain for over a year, sometimes it can complicate the recovery process.
Pain is complex and it is important to realize that it is never a reflection of the state of our tissues. More often it is about protection.
A good example of this is thinking about an ankle sprain. Most people have their pain resolve in 1-2 weeks despite us knowing that it takes ligamentous tissue (ATFL specifically) to heal in around 6-8 weeks.
So tissue isn’t healed, but no pain after 2 weeks.
What gives? When we have an injury our brain rapidly processes all of the contextual factors surrounding the injury (beliefs, how we got injured, what it looks like, what it means for our livelihood, etc.) and creates the experience of pain.
Pain is always about protection, NEVER THE STATE OF THE TISSUES
This means that pain is influenced by not JUST some local signals of physical stress and tissue damage.
It is influenced by the things I mentioned and many more. There is a whole field dedicated to understanding pain but the bottom line is that
Pain doesn’t tell us about how our tissues are doing, but instead tells us whether or not a certain area needs to be protected based on what we believe or understand about the problem.
And when we experience pain for an extended period of time it can affect our beliefs, self-efficacy and we may even be confused as to why it is still happening.
This can make certain areas feel more painful despite the tissue not actually becoming stressed.
Of course this doesn’t occur in all cases as pain can be influenced by many things.
Fortunately when we begin to exercise and move more, it can reduce this overall sensitivity. When we have a better understanding of what is going on it can also reduce the likelihood of your beliefs impacting your pain.
This is why we spend so much time making sure you have a better understanding about wrist pain.
Why it is actually harmful to believe that you have carpal tunnel syndrome and take on passive approaches to wrist pain (rest, bracing, etc.)
It is also why we feel it is so important to give the gamers we work with access directly to us along their recovery process.
When you work with someone who actually understands wrist pain and can help you finally understand what the cause of your wrist pain might be from a biomechanical perspective
This is when you can begin to see progress.
This is why it is so important to work with a provider that actually has the time to help you navigate the ups and downs of recovery, because it is essential to help manage any situations that might arise so you can stay focused on function, instead of pain.
Here is a good example about back pain but is really common with wrist injuries as well
Something that happens really commonly is that when we feel better we often forget our tissues might still be adapting and sometimes jump back into things a bit too aggressively.
The guidance of a good healthcare provider (unfortunately many healthcare systems don't get you to someone that can help you immediately) can be the difference between a 6 week or 3 year recovery (if ever).
If you feel like you aren’t making progress quickly enough with our resources or some of our videos…we might be able to help
Feel free to check us out at 1-hp.org or reach out / comment!
Posted Oct 19, 2024, 11:07 PM UTC