30 Nov Why You Shouldn’t Just Ignore Pain this Holiday Season!
So, picture this, it is early November and I’ve found myself annoyingly having to pop into a busy shopping centre to pick up a few things on one of my days off (for context, I hate shopping centres). I’m thinking to myself, “This will be easy, all I need to do is pop into a couple of shops and get the heck outta here so I can enjoy the rest of my day.” As I park my car and walk through the automatic doors, I am greeted (ney, bombarded!) by an absolute sea of green, red, gold, silver and white as well as numerous mentions of these things called ‘Christmas’, ‘Holidays’ & ‘New Years’ plastered all over the centre. Adding to this, coming out of literally every store in the centre, were the smooth, dulcet tones of Michael Bublé’s Christmas Album (admittedly a guilty pleasure of mine).
It was as if the shopping centre was trying to make me feel guilty that I hadn’t been thinking about Christmas yet, not to mention Christmas Presents…. in the first week of November…
And I tell you what, just between us, they succeeded.
That’s right folks, it’s that time of year again where despite it being the “Holiday Season’, we seem to be as busy as we’ve been for the past year at work. We’re crawling towards the end of year, we’re draining our social batteries going to Christmas party after Christmas party, we’re trying to figure out the logistics of the day when it finally arrives, we’re making sure we get the best turkey, making sure the menu is absolutely stacked and ensuring there’s enough food to feed an entire continent, all while trying to get the best possible gifts for our loved ones to try and express how important they are to us… It’s a lot.
There’s no denying that Christmas can be an absolutely amazing time of the year but it can be stressful and ever-consuming. All of a sudden where there was once time for post or pre-work exercise, there’s not. Where there was once (if you’re lucky) some alone time to practise mindfulness, there’s not. Where there was once a good night’s sleep, there’s not.
It’s no surprise then that this time of the year can be a bit of a hot-spot for pain and injuries to appear, as we know that stress, anxiety, insufficient exercise levels and poor sleep volume and quality, all have major roles to play in the onset of pain or injury. Not to mention all of the drinking and eating (how good is Christmas food though?!).
People who experience pain or injury at this time of year tend to ignore it to some degree and push-on through it with the main reason being that of time; the classic, ”I can’t stop this close to Christmas, there’s way too much to do!”. This, whilst understandable and fair enough, can be very much detrimental to your recovery… Let me explain.
Just as stress, anxiety and all of those aforementioned things can be hugely impactful to the onset of pain or injury, they also play a massive role in prognosis. That is, how long will this take to get better. There is now an absolute abundance of evidence in the wide world of medical research that has consistently shown that those aforementioned psychosocial factors (stress, anxiety etc.) carry enormous weight when it comes to predicting those individuals that are more likely to have prolonged or persistent pain. Most of this research has shown that these factors are way more important than the extent of tissue injury/damage itself. Essentially, the more that these psychosocial factors are present, the greater likelihood of a person developing persistent pain, irrespective of injury ‘severity’.
Now, the mechanisms behind this are unbelievably complex and are best saved for a different blog. But, what I want you to take away from this blog is that you would really be doing yourself a disservice if you just ignored it and pushed on as there may be a greater likelihood of your pain becoming persistent, in the midst of such a stressful time of year.
So, don’t ignore it. Take some time to put yourself and your own health first (for once!) and come see us at SportsFit Physio and Health where we will put a plan in place to get you back on track to feeling back to yourself come Christmas and New Years day. Because after all, nobody wants to spend Christmas day surrounded by hyped up, loud kids AND be in pain at the same time! Being in pain is also no way to start a new year, as it will greatly stifle those resolutions!
On a different note, SportsFit Physio and Health would like to extend our deepest thanks and appreciation to all of our clients, referrers and partners in the community that have made 2023 the year that it was. We would like to wish everyone a Merry Christmas or Happy Holidays, as well as a safe and happy New Year.
Todd Grbac
Physiotherapist