Pain can be categorized as either chronic or acute.
The "acute" comes from the Latin word "needle", and if you ever had the misfortune to step on a needle, you'll agree that it's a good representation of acute pain.
It usually goes away as the injury heals, but it can return for short periods.
Chronic pain on the other hand is persistent pain.
The word "chronic" comes from the Greek word "time", and in medical terms, pain is considered chronic when it lasts for couple of months or more.
The pain can be caused by an injury, and for unknown reasons, your body's pain signals can be active for weeks, months or years, even though the initial damage may have long since healed.
You can also have multiple cause of chronic pain, most common for older folks.
The main difference between chronic and acute pain is when you have acute pain, you know why it hurts.
But when you have chronic pain, you may have no idea what's causing it.
In some cases, people with chronic pain aren't even aware that an injury ever occurred in the first place, it can appear out of the blue.
Your chronic pain may feel like one of the following feelings:burning, aching, dull pain, crushing sensation, full-like symptoms, mental fogginess, shooting pain, soreness, stiffness, stinging sensations, tightness, tingling etc.
In simple terms, chronic discomfort is a sensation without purpose.
Ironically, while chronic pain has no purpose, it's still difficult to treat.
It can be a solitary and often lonely experience.
Every person feels it differently,even folks who have identical illnesses or injuries.
Because pain can be so subjective, it can be difficult to diagnose and treat.
There's no blood test for chronic pain or pain pule.
It's all up to you to describe your pain to the doctors who work to help you.
The good news is that there are effective ways to deal with this problems.
It's up to you to start spending time researching and educating yourself on this subject.