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How emotions are connected to chronic pain

A smiling woman looks out her window.

Sept. 25, 2025—Pain and emotions often go hand in hand. Chronic pain from arthritis, for instance, can take a toll on your mood, and your mood can make your pain better or worse. This is partly because your brain and your pain are connected. Understanding these connections may help you manage your pain.

Pain happens in the brain

When a part of your body is hurt, pain signals are sent to the brain through the nervous system. While the signals can be sent from any part of the body, it's the brain that processes and perceives them as pain. Some areas of the brain where pain is processed are also where emotions are processed, the Arthritis Foundation notes.

This may help explain why pain and emotions can influence each other. For example, having negative feelings about your pain might make it feel worse. So can depression, anxiety and stress. On the other hand, having positive feelings might improve pain by stimulating the brain to make feel-good chemicals, like dopamine.

Emotions can affect pain in other ways too. For example, people with depression or anxiety may find it harder to exercise or spend time with friends—and miss out on pain-relieving endorphins.

While not everyone with chronic pain has depression or anxiety, these conditions are more common in people with chronic pain, reports the National Council on Aging. And about 65% of people with depression also have some type of pain.

What's more, with chronic pain, the relentless processing of pain signals may make the brain more sensitive over time, putting the brain in a constant state of high alert. This may lead to a cycle of pain, the Arthritis Foundation notes.

Just because pain happens in the brain does not mean it's only in your mind. But knowing the close connections between emotion and pain can help you understand what's going on in your body—and help you take control of chronic pain.

Antidepressants or mental health counseling for pain?

Here's another important connection between pain and emotional health: Some mental health treatments can also help relieve chronic pain—even when other approaches haven't worked. That's why your doctor might suggest:

Cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT). CBT is a type of counseling that helps people manage thoughts and behaviors around pain. Changing your thoughts from negative to positive may help you manage pain and feel more in control of your life.

Antidepressants. These medications help ease depression and anxiety by altering brain chemical levels and nerve cell communication. Some types of antidepressants also reduce chronic pain by dampening pain signals through the body's central nervous system.

Lifestyle changes. Some things you can do to improve your mood might also make your pain easier to manage:

Discover more about pain

Do heated pads or ice packs work? What about massage or acupuncture? Learn the basics about pain and how it's often treated.

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