How To Tell If Your Pain Is Neuroplastic: Part 2

Welcome back! Could your life experiences and health history offer clues about why your pain has persisted? In Part 2 of this series, we’ll look beyond the characteristics of the pain itself and explore broader factors that may increase the likelihood of neuroplastic pain, including adverse childhood experiences (ACEs), a history of multiple or unexplained symptoms, and other factors that can influence the nervous system. These factors may help us understand why some nervous systems become more vulnerable to persistent pain. Not sure what “neuroplastic pain” means? Check out my other videos for a deeper explanation. Please note: This session discusses childhood trauma and chronic pain for educational purposes, and is not a replacement for professional medical or psychological care.

Transcript

Hello and welcome, Or perhaps welcome back. In this video series, We're exploring the signs of neuroplastic pain. I'm teaching you how to recognize if within your own body you have a likelihood that the symptom you're experiencing could have a neuroplastic origin or root. In the first video, We talked about the qualities and characteristics of the pain, The symptom that you're experiencing. So if you haven't watched that video yet, I encourage you to go back and check that out and then come on back. In this video, We're going to zoom out a little bit from the pain, From the sensation, And look at more global factors that increase the risk or the likelihood that the sensation or pain or symptom you're experiencing has that neuroplastic root. So we talked about in the last video that. . . You may be experiencing multiple symptoms simultaneously. Different locations of pain within the body, Maybe migraines, Maybe GI symptoms, Urinary symptoms. So we know that the more simultaneous symptoms you're having, The more likely the symptom you are experiencing is neuroplastic. We also want to look at what's called your lifetime of symptoms. So not just what you're experiencing now, But going back all the way to childhood to present time to look at all the symptoms that you've had throughout your lifetime, Especially if there have been symptoms that haven't really had a good diagnosis for or a good explanation for. So sometimes in children, That can look like frequent stomach aches that they're being sent home from school frequently for, Or unexplained aches and pains. So looking back all the way to childhood and starting to catalog all the symptoms that you've experienced over time. The more symptoms you've experienced over time, The more likely that the symptom you're experiencing now is neuroplastic. Once the brain has learned this neuroplastic pattern, It is bound to repeat it. So those symptoms that you experienced previously might actually be evidence to support the fact that the symptom you're experiencing now is neuroplastic. And we're looking at wide breadth of symptoms but like starting head-to-toe, Unexplained vision changes, Migraines, TMJ is a really popular one, GI, Abdominal symptoms that are unexplained so people get diagnosed with IBS but IBS in itself can be a neuroplastic symptom, Dizziness or vertigo, Difficulty sleeping, Insomnia, Maybe a fibromyalgia diagnosis, Chronic fatigue syndrome, Pain in any location in the body, Even carpal tunnel, And then unexplained symptoms that don't really, Weren't ever really given a broader diagnosis like burning sensations, Numbness, Tingling in the legs or in the arms or in the hands. So the next thing we look at is childhood trauma. There's a really large study that looked at 85 other studies with over 800, 000 adults and looked at the incidence of adverse childhood events. So adverse childhood events are traumas that happen in childhood, And that can look like divorce, Substance abuse in the family. And what they found is that for those who had experienced two to three ACEs, As we call them, Their incidence of chronic pain increased by 45%. And for those who had experienced four or more ACE events, That risk continued to increase. So there was a 95% increase that those people would develop chronic pain. So we do see a correlation between childhood trauma and going on to develop neuroplastic symptoms later in life. And it's not just designated or isolated to childhood events. We also know that when adults experience trauma, Accidents, Divorce, Death in the family, Moves, Financial stressors. Incidences of violence, That also increases the likelihood that they will go on to develop neuroplastic pain or a neuroplastic symptom. Thank you so much for being here and I look forward to seeing you in our last video of the series.