Why Is Exercise the Link Between Pain and Performance? How to Overcome the Fear of Injury in Sports

Injury Can Be a Gift — Here’s How

You’ve been injured. You’ve done what the doctor ordered, and the injury has cleared. Kind of. There’s still that niggling doubt in your mind. Those what-ifs:

• “What if I get injured again?”

• “What if I push too hard?”

• “What if I should trip and fall?”

So, you avoid. Because the traditional healthcare approach by your doctor has left you with a fragile mindset. Your return to sport is plagued by negative thoughts and a fear of pain. Your fear of exercise is buried deep by the doctor’s famous first word: “Rest.”

At Reload PT, we take a different approach. We promote activity over avoidance to return you to peak performance without the fear of re-injury.

To learn how to overcome the fear of injury in exercise, read on.

Why exercise is the link between pain and performance

We used to think that chronic pain is tied to tissue damage, but as sports medicine and knowledge have advanced, we understand that tissue damage and pain are not well correlated. This is especially true of long-term chronic pain.

“What we see on an MRI or an image or an X-ray is not the full explanation for the pain. It doesn’t tell the whole story,” says our CEO, Ryan Chow.

There is a myriad of factors that we should be taking into account when designing treatment for chronic pain as time passes. These include stress and misunderstanding. But most harmful is what we call ‘nocebos’.

A nocebo is the worsening of symptoms because a patient believes that activity may lead to injuries or a repeat of an injury that occurred. In sports psychology, we know that this is a very real phenomenon – and it’s down to the mindset fix embedded in the way you think about exercise and injury when you receive misplaced health advice to avoid physical activity. Ryan explains this thus:

“If your back hurts, and a doctor tells you that you shouldn’t pick things up with a rounded back, or if your knees hurt, don’t squat because it’s bad for your knees, then a person becomes hyper-vigilant and scared of movement. They develop a fragile mindset, which can cause more pain – because pain is predictive in nature… if we anticipate pain, it makes the activity more painful.”

How does this pan out?

People end up avoiding exercise that is good for them. They then end up getting weaker, risking further injury and withdrawing from their level of play as their sports performance declines.

This mental game causes a slow decline as they become less active, weaker, less resilient, and, eventually, at elevated risk of disengaging from life activities. Quality of life depreciates, and we see the onset of other mental health issues such as depression and anxiety, and physical health problems like cardiovascular disease and obesity.

It’s crucial to understand that:

• Exercise can help ward off bigger problems such as heart disease, cancer, depression, etc.

• Even though the reason for pain may be the same for different patients (a torn anterior cruciate ligament, for example), the causes will be different (and may include things like bad practices, poor habits, a lack of movement, and so on).

• Because of the traditional approach, people in pain tend to avoid movement or exercise that is, in fact, good for them.

How to overcome the fear of injury in physical activity and realize the gift of injury

When a set way of thinking is embedded in you, it can be challenging to alter your mindset.

We’ve seen people who have had surgeries that have not delivered the promised relief from pain. Sometimes two or more surgeries. This is because the underlying problem that is causing the pain isn’t the injury. 

In fact, surgery can cause trauma to an area that is hurting – without the surgery fixing the actual problem.

When you hire a personal trainer or physical therapist, it’s important to hire a professional that understands sports psychology and the link between exercise, pain, and performance. Here at Reload, we are informed by the very latest research, methodologies, and practices.

Our physical therapists and personal trainers help our clients to understand that it is safe to move, by promoting activity and teaching them to fear avoidance, not exercise. By structuring an individualized approach to pain relief and body conditioning, we access the ‘gift of injury’ – that is creating a better way to lead your life by exercising appropriately and changing your habits. The long-term outcomes include:

• Healing pain

• Overcoming disability

• Developing confidence

• Pursuing new fitness goals

At Reload we adopt a human-centered approach to your health and fitness goals. We start with a full-body evaluation. This 90-minute assessment enables us to learn about your symptoms, your range of movement, and your current ability to exercise. We look at your lifestyles, your job, and your daily life. We talk to you to understand your health goals, and to understand why these goals are important to you. 

Finally, together, we will design a customized and non-conventional program that will move you toward those goals, at a pace that suits you and is appropriate – promoting activity over avoidance and helping you to understand that not every hurt equals harm.

How do you get started on the journey to a life of not worrying about injury?

Sign up for your complimentary performance assessment with Reload PT.