Depression And Chronic Pain: How Are They Related?
How are depression and chronic pain related? What can we do if we face it? Discover why they bond and how to deal with it.
The depression and chronic pain They can be related in some cases. The main reason for this is that living with chronic pain, that is, chronic discomfort, is hard in many ways. In fact, everyday life becomes more difficult and this can contribute to experiencing a depressive disorder.
He chronic pain It is a long-lasting pain that usually lasts over time and is caused by a chronic or difficult-to-cure pathology. It is also possible that said pain is not generated by any organic cause.
To consider a chronic pain It has to remain present between 3 and 6 months, even if the causes that caused it have already disappeared.
Normally the causes that generate chronic pain are 3:
The pain begins associated with an injury or illness that persists over time even when the injury has already disappeared.
The pain is caused by a chronic pathology or with an uncertain prognosis.
The pain is not caused by any organic cause and is present irregularly.
When the pain lasts more than 3 months and even when there is no longer an organic cause that maintains it, it stops being a symptom and begins to be a problem, generating other problems.
The most typical characteristics of chronic pain is that it lasts more than 6 months and does not improve with conventional treatments. Therefore, multidisciplinary treatment is usually necessary.
Is there a relationship between chronic pain and depression?
The depression can cause chronic pain and can be caused by pain, there is a bidirectional relationship. Therefore, it is one of the risk factors for chronic pain; since a low or depressed mood can cause pain over time.
Usually, the chronic pain It causes a reduction in their daily activities in the person who suffers from it, for example they stop exercising, their obligations decrease, they stop working, etc. This causes a decrease in reinforcement, in addition to promoting the person’s isolation, which facilitates a depressed mood.
We also know that prolonged pain over time it can produce learned helplessness (if one day it hurt me to go for a walk, I may stop walking because I think it will always hurt me), as well as hopelessness; two facilitators of depression.
On the other hand, there are studies that show that depression worsens the perception of pain, increasing and prolonging it over time. Fields in his neurobiological model pointed out that depression influenced the sensory transmission of pain through somatic targeting that activated pain facilitating neurons. Furthermore, he noted that depression facilitated catastrophic and threatening interpretations of bodily sensations.
In short, it is very common for a person with chronic pain to also be having a depressive episode and the symptoms are confused and intermingled, such as fatigue, sleep difficulties, etc.
What can I do about it?
The most important thing in chronic pain It is observing what behaviors or activities we have stopped doing out of fear and what we do not do because of real pain. Isolating yourself only promotes and favors mood and pain.
Therefore, you have to rate from 0 to 10 how much real pain each activity generates. If the pain is less than 4 and after the activity the pain does not worsen, that activity can be done.
Another strategy to take into account is to look for distraction techniques, since we know that selective attention to the perception of pain worsens it. Some of these techniques could be: meditating, starting a task, listening to music, using relaxation techniques, watching or listening to something, etc.
Finally, it would be useful to pay attention to the distorted thoughts that pain causes, such as: ““No one is going to love me like this”, “I’m getting worse”, “I’m no good for anything”, “If I do that, it’s going to hurt.”“, etc. Since these thoughts reduce self-esteem and make it difficult to overcome pain. They cause you to fall into learned helplessness. It is useful to observe which ones we have and change them to more realistic and positive thoughts.
