We know that men don’t suffer menstrual pain, but that’s not the only fun they’re missing. “Research is uncovering very dramatic differences in how the genders experience pain,” says Mark Allen Young, a professor at New York College of Podiatric Medicine and author of Women and Pain: Why It Hurts and What You Can Do.
It all starts with hormones. There is no getting around how profoundly hormones like estrogen and testosterone affect the central nervous system, which is responsible for perceiving and transmitting the sensation of pain.
According to experts, this is one reason why conditions such as osteoarthritis, headaches, and irritable bowel syndrome strike women at much higher rates than men.
Our physical differences really matter, too. “We’ve only recently begun to grasp that women’s body architecture is completely different from men’s,” Young says. Because women walk differently, for instance, they put pressure on joints, muscles, and bones in very different ways than men do. “Starting with the knees and hips and working up to the shoulders, spine, and neck, how a person walks can have a huge impact on how pain develops later in life,” Young says. Just last year, one medical-implant maker finally recognized this fact by creating a knee implant just for women.
Women are also more prone to conditions involving the immune system, says Deborah Metzger, MD, an OB-GYN and specialist in integrative pain management in Los Altos, California. Scientists have long known that women have stronger immune systems than men, she says. That strength can backfire, though, leading women to suffer from far more autoimmune disorders—in which the immune system attacks itself—and the host of mysterious diseases thought to sometimes result from an overreactive immune system, such as celiac disease, irritable bowel syndrome (IBS), fibromyalgia, chronic fatigue syndrome (CFS), and many types of pelvic pain.
“Women tend to have hyperalert immune systems, which is good,” Metzger says. “But once the immune system gets stirred up, it can turn into a feeding frenzy.” The fired-up immune activity produces inflammatory chemicals that fuel all types of muscle and joint pain; it can also activate nerves in vulnerable spots like the lower back (sciatica), the head (migraines), and the pelvis (endometriosis and pelvic pain).
By Melanie Haiken
Comments (6)
With regards to Dr Metzer’s comments, could vulvadynia occur by having a fired-up immune system. Could antibiotics have a ill-effect on that immune system. Also, is it possible/probable for a 48-49 yrs old women in fair health, with grief, stress, sometimes a series of erratic minstrel cycles and a number of medical concerns, enter into menapause?
I have pain soon after having sex. Most recently I went immediately to MD. All visual and UTI test/exams were negative….repeatedly. I do appear to have an irregular output of urine and need to urinate often..
sometimes two to three times every couple of hours.
Could the pain I’am experiencing have anything to do with my bladder? If not why the pain and sometimes bleeding? I’am forty six and otherwies healthy.
my sister has celiac diease which she found out about five month’s ago since been put on a special diet is this diease related to ostrupurosis and is it prone to run in the family.
I myself have had sciatica for many years could the epegural i had when ihad my kids be linked to my sciatica.
Having been recently diagnosed with MS and dealing with all the side effects, such as inflamation in the eyes and chronic back pain, I found this information extremely useful. I can’t help the feeling that I am somehow responsible for my body attacking itself.
I am a 49 year old woman. I have been dealing with pain, and losing my ability to walk for a year now. It started when I was taking care of my mom who was dying from cancer. I see 3 mds on a regular basis. I am told I have fibromalgia, connective tissue disease, osteoarthritis. They are sending me to a md to check for MS. I like deb can’t help feeling its something I am doing to make my body shut down. I would give anything to be able to walk 50% better then I can now.
That’s good. They should be treating women’s bodies differently. I myself have Celiac Disease (like Teresa’s sister) and I feel women living with it probably have vastly different stories than men.
- Jessika : Celiac Speaks – My Personal Notes