Pain that won’t quit isn’t “all in your head.” But new brain-scan studies show that long-term pain rewires your brain in ways that amp up the ache when you feel anxious or stressed-out. You end up in an endless loop of feeling pain, feeling stressed, feeling more pain—and feeling even more stress. Five to ten regions of your brain are involved in processing pain and many also process emotions. On-going stress changes the way these areas interpret pain signals from your body, so that mild pain may start feeling like intense pain and even non-pain sensations (like a blouse brushing against your skin) hurt. Alternative therapies like massage, acupuncture, meditation and yoga can help.

• In one study, learning simple stress-busting techniques eliminated 45% of chronic pain—of the back, hips, shoulders, knees, neck, abdomen and head.
• Stress makes your muscles tense, so they’re ready for action. But chronic stress can lead to muscle spasms and to back, neck and shoulder pain.
• Anxiety, anger, and a tendency to see the worst in situations (catastrophizing) have all been linked with higher risk for lower back pain.
• Stress can make pain conditions like fibromyalgia, inflammatory bowel disease, irritable bowel syndrome and migraine worse.
• Progressive muscle relaxation, slow breathing, and visualization have all been shown to ease anxiety and reduce pain.

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