Tolerance to Pain

Yes, high pain tolerance is a trait of autism (sensory issues) I also have a very high tolerance to pain & I’m also a high functioning ASD Savant 

If you have facebook look up Affa Sair, which is a chronic pain group, of which I am a member and an admin, as although its based in North east Scotland we cater on line for all chronic pain sufferers, and have a higher than normal number of us proper people in the ranks

Sorry but I am really amused when you quote Deepthought as it comes up as Deepthought said, as if the computer was speaking if you see what I mean.

I was thinking about this today and was wondering if anyone with chronic pain has had any luck with painkillers? I think the strong ones work by changing the way your brain reacts to pain? (I might be wrong in this) anyway, I never had any luck with painkillers. I was thinking maybe this is because ASD brains don't react in the same way to these sorts of painkillers.

Deepthought said:

The thing is though heat is one thing but how do they effect the palate and the mind-body relationship ~ i.e., are they fast or slow burners and all that sort of thing?

An honest description is that they *** you up if you aren't careful.......basically.

I've had a few issues with this. One example, I went to the doctor with something "you can't possibly have *said condition* or you'd be in so much pain you couldn't walk" so I didnt get the medication and then ended up in hospital (where the same thing happened twice more "you'd be screaming in pain if you had *said condition*" ) I've also had injuries which I hadn't really noticed and I've got quite a few tattoos which I would describe being tattooed as similar to tickling - unpleasant but not too bad. But similar to you, I can't stand labels in clothes etc or annoying clothes

Cloudy Mountains said:

I grow Naga Vipers. A stabilised Dorset variety, around 1.4 million Scoville units each. I put about an eighth of one in a tub of Arrabiata, hot, Arrabiata.

You can have this jar if you like.........

You should be perfectly fine.........

So so soooooooo wished I had met you as you are now when I had the stamina to enjoy chilies and had no concept they were in part involved with causing my seizures, as mentioned above. The thing is though heat is one thing but how do they effect the palate and the mind-body relationship ~ i.e., are they fast or slow burners and all that sort of thing?

PINARELLO F8 said:

I also like extreme tasting foods - espresso coffee, vindaloo curry, extra hot chilli sauce, grapefruit juice etc

Yep to all that, also drink vinegar, chili juice, worcestershire sauce etc. - I think it's a form of stimming... I like the sensation I get.

Also, I like a bit of pain - it's soothing, I used to bite my own arms as hard as I could when I was a kid and was fascinated watching the tooth marks gradually fade.

I just got back from a track session with my triathlon club, the set was: 600m @ 5km pace w/ 200m jog recovery + 300m @ 5km pace w/100m walk recovery x 4
But the coach said "Do an extra set if you feel like it..." so I did - previous 4 sets were at 3:45-3:50 min/km pace, last 'extra' set was 3:25 min/km 'because I could' - love the burn in my muscles, love that I did the extra set (no-one else did) and feel so much less anxious after a crappy week at work so far.

I wonder if the atypical response to pain might be part of the reason why self-harm is common in autistics?

I've too hurt myself and carried on and it turned out to be really bad. Fell at work and hurt my back....carried on best I could didnt even log it! Another job I tore the ligaments in my knee and carried on until my knee got stuck in a bent position and hospital asked didnt it hurt you

The short answer is yes, as I am aspergerian and my brain does not always recognise pain properly. At night I will wake up sweating badly and it is because I am in pain, but I do not feel it I just get physical symptoms. If I then work out to take my pain killers everything settles down again.

I think I am the same. I must be hyposensitive. I have a high pain tolerance, I've had multiple injuries throughout my life and I've always just carried on with things regardless of how bad the injury was. I only ever seem to seek help or treatment when a family member or doctor has forced me to. 

Yet something annoying like a label in my clothes, too hot or too cold weather or a hair clip slightly digging in to my scalp would bother me so much more. 

I agree sensory issues are a weird thing for me. 

No problem, I'm glad to hear the knee is OK, but sorry to hear about the issues it's caused. I'm pretty afraid of the same kind of thing. I know that I'll probably be in a similar situation. I've left it years to get my ankle sorted, so I could have more issues. Best to be optimistic though!

NAS36609 said:

Best wishes for your surgery and whilst I agree that a high tolerance to pain isn’t always advantageous, it is very useful post-op! 

Same goes for you! Shame you've got to have surgery too, but yeah, the tolerance thing will be an advantage!

PINARELLO F8 said:

Was it a Phal (pronounced pal) ? 

A Phal is not a traditional Indian dish but is a made up one to satisfy us Western loonys

No not Phal ~ it is a spiritual initiatic dish to get the adherent / disciple to a transcendental state, and to purge the mind-body relationship of any last urges to be elsewhere and get any last toxins out of the body.

Not only is it beautifully hot but the down and up flow of the heat is accompanied by the rich tapestry of the unifying flavours that accentuates the heat and the heat the flavours. It sets ablaze the cerebral, cardial and intestinal brains and renders the body warmly relaxed and the mind coolly alert ~ proving that is the adherent or disciple does not pass out, freak out, or worse. :-/

I found Phals though to be all party with the burn but slightly lacking attendance with the flavour unity, not unlike the difference between digital and analogue music with digital sounding flat and analogue sounding spatial or full and all that.

This is not to put Phals down as a dish though, because they have their own character and they were very well worth appreciating at least for the 'blast' ~ excuse the pun. ;-)

I had though to stop eating super hot curries as I had to give up doing stimulants back in two-thousand and one, as I suffer from having seizures ~ and stimulants just made them worse. I started with dropping caffeine, then, eventually, long slog, sob, grumble, long slog, grumble and sob ~ super hot chillies and super hot curries. :-(

As far as curries go I can only eat mild ones now, as anything hotter caused problems. Fortunately though I always liked Kormas in the sense of being akin to having sweet puddings, so it was not a total loss with the curries ~ as they trigger sentimental memorials of previous curries and related events. :-)

With the hypo-sensitivity to pain thing, it because our physiology is in a consistent state of freeze, flight or fight in terms of the survival reflex, meaning that we only feel pain as secondary requirement after the fact if it has not subsided. So with a new pain it has to get in line to be registered, once the objective is achieved ~ be it the finish line or once we are not so busy and so on so forth.

PINARELLO F8 said:

I got the ladder off the car and a box and climbed up to the swarm. By now there were about 20 people watching from a safe distance. I got the box under the swarm of bees and shook the branch that they were attached to. Suddenly the branch snapped and I lost my balance and fell from the ladder, I landed on my side and my head bounced off the pavement. I got straight back up and pretended I wasn't hurt. I had a massive cut on my head. Someone wanted to phone for an ambulance but I said I was ok. That night I couldn't sleep and felt sick. The following morning I went to work, my collegues said that I was acting strangely and my speech was slurred so I got taken to the hospital. I was ok the next day and yes I did get the bees

I never fell out of a tree, but I used to climb the biggest ones I could find during thunder storms as I was actively suicidal as a teenager on account of seizures and bullying, and the skateboarding and biking meant I could put myself at risk ~ with the moral and ethical that I could attempt death, but the trick came first and foremost.

Anyway, not too unlike what you describe, went skateboarding to a particularly good city for things to do on skateboards, and there was a marble topped wall that was four* foot high that only a few top pros had ollied (jumped) on and ground along on the trucks. So everybody was up for me to pull it off as I was one of the big ollie brigade, and as I cracked the tail down and the board went vertical I swept it up and horizontal with my feet and missed the edge and landed all four wheels on the top of the wall ~ and me leaning back just a little too much, no traction on the wheels and slipped and did a 540 degree rotation five feet high and dropped straight down on my head.

Blood was all over the place so I found what turned out to only be a small cut, applied pressure and it soon stopped. Everybody was amazed I had done a flat board landing on the top of the wall ~ and the 540, and they thought I should of been dead with the head impact.

Anyways, carried on skating in the city for several hours, not noticing anything unusual, and then went to a concrete drainage ditch that most skaters visit like spiritual types visit stone circles. It takes major effort to work the banks there, and I was finding it unusually hard but it did not dawn on me that I had serious concussion ~ until I saw the film footage of the day later that week. My skating style after the slam was sluggish and stubborn ~ rather than before driven and dedicated. 

* Four foot was previously recorded as five foot ~ as I am really bad with numbers (dyscalculia) and have to go for vague near figure approximations.

PINARELLO F8 said:

Last year I was cycling down a long steep hill at about 40 mph. A car pulled out from a side road so I had to brake suddenly. I lost control and slammed into the tarmac and slid about 20 yards ending up under the car. I had a nasty gash over my eye from hitting the cars bumper and a broken rib. The car driver wanted to phone for an ambulance but I refused and decided to cycle the 30 miles home

I had a very similar one, thirty years back which involved steepest hill session, quarter of mile, my friend on a racer and me on a BMX, and down we went.

I left my friend well behind and at the bottom of the hill, slight bend to the left with a junction adjoining from the right ~ and a car pulled out in front of me. I braked on the back wheel three times with heinous bar wrench steering without front wheel on the floor, and got round it and landed the front wheel and thought ~ YAY! Up until I did not miss the chunky Cotswold dry stone walking for about twenty* feet.

One I came to stop, and my mike had stopped bouncing and cartwheeling, I got up and major relief found that my bike did not have a single scratch and thought ~ YAY!

So back to the top of the hill thought I ~ because the run was two and some miles long, and as I started walking back towards the hill ~ I met the driver who was coming to see if I was okay, and he went white, wretched and lost his balance slightly and slumped into a kneeling position.

Odd thought I, but because I was not feeling particularly chuffed about his lack of diligence and due attention whilst driving ~ I carried on, meeting my friend on his racer at the junction where the parked open door car was, and he went white and looked absolute terrified.

So I put my hands to my face and they were all blood covered (I did not bother wearing my helmet that day idiot factor ten). Several other people wretched as I detoured to go home and have a look in the mirror.

Half my face was pulped. I am not sure how long I looked at the mess ~ but it was fascinating, until that is my parents got back from where ever it was and it was all doctors and stuff thereafter.

The worst of it was resisting picking the scab off which was complete and utter hell. But when it came off ~ I had completely gotten away without obvious scar tissue, and only had to learn to smile differently on the left side of my face to compensate.

* Twenty feet was previously recorded as forty feet  ~ as I am really bad with numbers (dyscalculia) and have to go for vague near figure approximations.

BTW how do I chilli?

Ellie, I've been foolish enough to over do it with those probably twice. I can deal with the burn when eating them, but the horrendous attack on my innards was an experience I won't repeat. I find sitting on a toilet seat for about 4 hours in total, a pretty unproductive exercise.

To keep things in a similarly low tone, I had a friend eat one cut in half in my house. He went to the toilet and didn't wash his hands after handling the cut chilli (I warned him!), then handled the parts he urinated through. He was in agony. It was like he had to keep moving to ward off the pain, a weird unchoreographed twitchy dance.

They are very much handle with care!

lol

But can Cloudy have the  as well? :) 

It’s kind of you to ask. My knee itself is doing okay, but I do have other issues caused by my surgery - tendinitis, nerve damage and a very weak hamstring - which are not so great! I need foot surgery now too...

Best wishes for your surgery and whilst I agree that a high tolerance to pain isn’t always advantageous, it is very useful post-op!