Our expectation of pain actually affects experienced chronic pain. Because it isn't strictly bodily damage that is responsible for "feeling" pain, it is also how our brain processes that sensory information. This is how acute pain becomes chronic, the brain "overfits" for detecting that sensory input from the nerves to try to bring our attention to it more and more, as this might have been evolutionarily helpful. But when under treatment during this era of modern medicine, dwelling on the pain or feeling helpless about it we allow our brain to prioritize the signals as a stressor and increase the "pain volume" which ends up being counterproductive to our daily lives.
Learning this has allowed me to significantly reduce pain medication intake and increase physical activity. Measured and steady physical activity is often the solution for chronic pain, when convention and intuition dictates that rest is the solution. This leads to a cycle of increased stiffness and lack of mobility. Pain isn't "just in your head" but understanding that the pain experience can be mediated in more ways than solely just medication (thankful as I am for it) is empowering and hope inducing.
So all that is to say that I am not surprised if it turns out our mind can affect our body in the ways stated in this article.
Learning this has allowed me to significantly reduce pain medication intake and increase physical activity. Measured and steady physical activity is often the solution for chronic pain, when convention and intuition dictates that rest is the solution. This leads to a cycle of increased stiffness and lack of mobility. Pain isn't "just in your head" but understanding that the pain experience can be mediated in more ways than solely just medication (thankful as I am for it) is empowering and hope inducing.
So all that is to say that I am not surprised if it turns out our mind can affect our body in the ways stated in this article.