This is Hidden Brain.
I'm Shankar Vedanta.
It happens in an instant.
You move too fast and you feel a wrench in your back.
That first sharp pain is followed by a persistent ache, bothersome enough to send you to the doctor.
A scan reveals a problem.
A specialist recommends surgery.
You go under the knife, trusting that once the damaged tissue is repaired, the pain will disappear.
The story makes intuitive sense.
Diagnose the problem, fix the bone or ligament or tendon that is not working properly, and you'll make the pain go away.
But for many of us, that's not how pain unfolds.
Aches persist even when scans look normal, or they vanish without any medical intervention.
Treatments that promise relief fail to deliver.
We also notice something puzzling.
The pain we feel changes with other things happening in our lives.
When we're feeling calm or absorbed in something else, the pain subsides.
When we feel isolated or sad, the pain gets worse.
Today on the show and in a companion episode on Hidden Brain Plus,
we examine why our culture gets so many things wrong when it comes to understanding the true nature of pain.
What's really happening when we experience pain and how to address it this week on Hidden Brain.