😞Pain is a way the body tells us we need to make a change. An easy example is the hot stove♨️. If you touch it and feel pain, you know not to touch it again. You likely learn not to touch hot things at all if you didn’t already know.

🔮Have you ever experienced pain you didn’t know the cause of? Perhaps you were just achy all over and not sure why. Maybe you were like me and woke up one morning with neck pain so severe you couldn’t move.

🤱I was a young mother the first time I woke up unable to turn my head. I remember joking that I must have had a car accident in my sleep. In excruciating pain, I tried multiple things to feel better, including a chiropractor, acupuncture, massage, stretching, and over-the-counter pain medications and creams. Nothing seemed to work, and then suddenly about 3 weeks after it started, the pain was gone as fast as it came. After the first time, the same thing happened at least once a year, if not more frequently, until I started a regular yoga practice.

As a regular yoga practitioner, many of the physical ailments that had plagued me as a stressed mom and athlete became few and far between.

Once I started doing yoga and learning more about the mind-body connection, I began to connect that pesky neck pain to stress and anxiety in my life. Stress 🤯causes the brain to signal the nerves to activate muscles and tighten them to protect the body against further injury, similar to when you touch a stove and feel pain. The tension in muscles can cause pain often in the neck and shoulders. The tension from stress can also cause headaches, including migraines. Additionally, chronic stress causes the hormone cortisol to rise in the body, leading to inflammation and pain. This pain can show up all over the body and may be felt as general achiness.

🧘‍♀️Exercise, including yoga, helps manage stress. Additionally, the longer you practice and the more consistent you are, the less pain you will feel if that pain is the result of stress. Mindfulness and meditation are also powerful ways to manage stress, and just like with exercise, time and consistency make a difference.

The Well Yoga Dubuque teaches yoga and meditation specifically designed to help individuals dealing with stress, trauma, anxiety, and depression. In addition to moving and stretching, we encourage mindfulness practices aligned with scripture, breathwork, and meditation/prayer. Coming to The Well to practice yoga, either during a 1:1 session or a group class consistently will improve your brain and physical health. As a result, you will begin to feel less pain and move more freely.