The Amplifier of Pain is FEAR

September is Pain Awareness Month and I’ve been diving down the rabbit hole of seeking ways of reducing pain naturally.

Diving so far down, I’m popping back up in the 80s with this boombox reference. And you know I’m so not mad at that.

I heard this statement last night on a TEDtalk with Doctor Amy Baxter - she was talking about “how to hack your brain when you are in pain”.

How fear can amplify our pain, and having control can reduce it. She said, “having control over your options decreases pain”

Man that struck a chord with me. 

It is the same idea that strength training gave me emotionally. That I could have say in what my body was experiencing.

I cannot change that my body has #lipedema but I do have some options in how I respond to it.

I’m not trying to belittle the pain, I fully know living with lipedema is an all day every day challenge.

But I also know that I can do things to lower the level of pain. I have options.

And just the opposite, if I get stuck in the pain cave, if I let that fear of what I’d take hold - it can be a quick spiral into deeper more prolonged pain. 

Which takes me out of doing the things I know help my symptoms and reduce my pain.

Such a viscous cycle.

But guess what? Our standard lipedema self care methods that are all things we do to reduce the symptoms of our condition, well every one of them also reduces pain. 

We have some options. We have some control. 

To go a little deeper, we need to recognize that what we are doing is caring for your body, being in the right headspace to be positive while we are doing the treatments, is key.

And furthermore doing things that bring us joy, that we don’t think even have any impact on our bodies, like looking for those #glimmers we talked about recently, can really turn down the volume on our pain. 

And surprise, seeking joy helps our symptoms and our pain way more than you could even imagine. It all counts.

By turning down the focus on the pain we can redirect our attention to the joy, and it builds when we do.

Whatever we focus on grows, so let’s turn up the joy and turn down the pain.

#lipedemafitness #lipoedema #lipolymphedema #healing #emotionalfitness #pain #80skid