EP05: Gut-Brain-Chronic Pain Connections

2025-04-01

Chronic pain isn’t just a nuisance. It’s often a gut-driven signal that something deeper is out of balance. In this episode, Tracy Harrison takes a practical look at how gut health shapes our experience of pain. She questions the default approach of reaching for medications and instead encourages practitioners to ask: what’s really driving the discomfort? Pain isn’t random. It often points to deeper issues like inflammation, nutrient deficiencies, and microbial imbalances, all of which are rooted in the gut....

Chronic pain isn’t just a nuisance. It’s often a gut-driven signal that something deeper is out of balance.

In this episode, Tracy Harrison takes a practical look at how gut health shapes our experience of pain. She questions the default approach of reaching for medications and instead encourages practitioners to ask: what’s really driving the discomfort? Pain isn’t random. It often points to deeper issues like inflammation, nutrient deficiencies, and microbial imbalances, all of which are rooted in the gut.

Tracy breaks down how over-the-counter drugs like NSAIDs can quietly erode the gut lining, interfere with nutrient absorption, and set off a chain reaction that worsens the very symptoms they’re meant to relieve. She also shares why it’s worth paying closer attention to factors like sleep apnea, chronic stress, and low-grade infections that keep the body in a state of physiological alarm, and make pain more intense.

The conversation turns toward the gut-brain connection, where neurotransmitters like serotonin and GABA play a powerful role in pain perception. What happens when dysbiosis disrupts their production? How do nutrient shortfalls, especially in B12, magnesium, and tryptophan, shift the nervous system’s response to pain?

For practitioners, this is a clear reminder: if you’re not looking at gut health, you may be missing the source of your patient’s pain. Tracy lays out the case for why functional medicine must go beyond managing symptoms to uncovering the systems at play. It starts in the gut, and it can change everything.

Episode Breakdown:

00:00 The Gut-Brain-Pain Connection

02:30 Why Reframing Pain Matters

03:50 How NSAIDs and Common Medications Affect Gut Health

08:30 The Impact of Physiological Stress on Pain Perception

11:00 Dysbiosis, Inflammation, and Neurotransmitter Imbalance

18:30 The Role of Digestion, Nutrient Absorption, and Deficiencies in Chronic Pain

34:00 Food Sensitivities, Immune Complexes, and Joint Pain

37:00 Serotonin, GABA, and the Gut’s Influence on the Nervous System

40:30 Why Gut Health Is Central to Functional Medicine and Long-Term Pain Relief

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