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Pain #5: Extreme Abdominal Pain
Sudden, sharp and extreme abdominal pains should be investigated by a doctor right away.
Conditions like gallbladder issues (including gallstones), pancreatitis, a stomach or intestinal ulcer, and an inflamed or burst appendix can manifest as difficult abdominal pain.
These are not issues that can be ignored away, and require treatment—in the form of medication or surgery—in order to correct. Don’t gamble with your health. If you have this symptom, talk to a doctor.
Pain #6: Pain or Swelling in the Calves
An annoying calf cramp happens to everyone once in a while, and I wrote about it in my previous article about nighttime leg cramps. However, when it is accompanied by swelling or remains as a constant ache, calf pain can indicate something far more nefarious than a simple “charley horse” (the common name for a muscle spasm), it could be deep vein thrombosis, or DVT.
DVT is when a clot forms in one of the leg’s deep veins, and the danger arises when the clot breaks away from the leg vein and travels to the lungs, becoming a pulmonary embolism—a condition which can turn deadly at the drop of a hat.
If you have pain or swelling, or both, in your calves, please see a doctor to rule out DVT (especially if you’ve been flying as DVT is one of the 10 harmful things that flying does to your body).
Other warning signs of DVT include:
- Warmth in the skin of the affected leg.
- Red or discolored skin in the affected leg.
- Visible surface veins.
Pain #7: Odd, Vague, Unexplained Pains or Combined Pains
A combination of subtle yet chronic pains or odd pains that can’t be medically accounted for could indicate a problem lying beneath the surface of the skin and bone: depression.
Depression can cause strange pain sensations to arise in the body, and although these pains can’t be explained by other medical phenomena, depression is a common cause of chronic pain.
If you have annoying pains that have no cause or a combination of pains that arise for no apparent reason, you may be suffering from clinical depression. Other symptoms of depression must be present before a diagnosing depression, such as losing interest in activities you used to do, inability to work or think effectively or not wanting to socialize.
Talk to your doctor to learn more about resources you can turn to in case of depression, such as counselors who can point you in the right direction and help you become pain-free. You can also read my article about the best natural treatments for depression.
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