In this episode of the Pain Free Living Podcast, osteopath Bob Allen and positive psychology coach Clare Elsby explore a question many people notice but rarely understand:

Why does your pain often improve when you go on holiday?

If you live with persistent pain, you might recognise this pattern. Your back, neck, or joints feel worse during busy work periods, yet a few days away from the office and things suddenly start to ease.

In this episode, Bob explains how your nervous system plays a huge role in how pain is experienced. Your body constantly balances between two key systems: the sympathetic nervous system (your “fight-flight-freeze-fawn” response) and the parasympathetic nervous system (your “rest, digest and recover” state).

Modern life keeps many of us stuck in a constant state of alert, whether we are commuting, emailing, dealing with deadlines, phones, or doom-scrolling on social media.

Over time, this can increase nervous system sensitivity, which can make your current pain feel worse.

You’ll find out why stepping away from daily stress, even temporarily, allows your nervous system to settle. When that happens, your body often becomes less sensitive to pain signals, helping symptoms improve.

Clare also explores something many people struggle with: the guilt of resting. For some of us, doing nothing can actually feel uncomfortable. But learning to rest, whether that’s on a beach, walking in nature, or simply switching off your devices, can be an important part of de-stressing and recovery.

So if your pain improves when you take time off, don’t worry, you’re not imagining it.

Understanding how stress, rest, and the nervous system interact is often the first step toward managing your pain more effectively.

Key Takeaways

• Your nervous system plays a major role in how you experience pain

• Chronic stress can increase nervous system sensitivity and amplify your pain

• Holidays reduce stress and activate your body’s rest-and-recover systems

• Many people feel guilty about resting, but recovery requires it

• Finding the right balance between activity and rest helps improve long-term pain management

Helpful Resources

• Your beginner's guide to the nervous system – https://youtu.be/WUesY4Zx6oM

• Ideas to help regulate your nervous system – https://youtu.be/p74SikmjsZs

• The important benefits of breathing well – https://youtu.be/QV3l6HrkCY4

About the Hosts

Bob Allen is an osteopath who has been helping people understand and manage their pain since 2008. Through the Pain Free Living podcast, he shares clear, practical insights to help you move better and live with less pain.

Clare Elsby is a therapist and positive psychology coach who helps people understand how mindset, emotions, and behaviour influence wellbeing and recovery.

Learn More

Bob’s story: https://bit.ly/BobsOsteoStory

Clare Elsby: https://www.clareelsby.com/

Sign up for the Pain Free Living monthly newsletter: https://bit.ly/PFL_newsletter_signup

Podcast & socials: https://linktr.ee/Painfreeliving

Disclaimer

This podcast provides general information for educational purposes only. It is not medical advice and should not replace professional assessment, diagnosis, or treatment. Always seek qualified healthcare advice if you are in pain, have new or worsening symptoms, or any concerns about your health before starting exercise or self-care routines.

Hello and welcome to the Pain Free Living Podcast.

And the podcast that likes to bring you stuff that you wouldn't normally be able to find anywhere else.

So what we're going to talk to you about today is why your pain often improves when you're on holiday.

What we're going to talk about is why that pain goes down.

So if you look at most people's lives these days, we are 24 7, we're on our phones, we are commuting to work, we're commuting from work, we are watching tv, we're using our devices before we go to bed.

And our bodies are not really designed for it.

A little bit of a breakdown of the nervous system.

So we've got the central nervous system, brain and spinal cord.

And then we've got this thing called the autonomic nervous system, which pretty much controls everything else.

Now that autonomic nervous system breaks down into two, two main parts.

You've got the sympathetic nervous system and the parasympathetic nervous system.

These two are constantly trying to balance out.

So the sympathetic nervous system is what you may have heard of as fight, flight, freeze, or fawn.

And that's a relic from the olden days where we had to be aware of predators and we had to be prepared to either run away from them, fight them, freeze.

So we'd hide and not nobody would notice that we were there or would fall, which is similar to freeze.

Well, it's a bit like people pleasing really.

It's just, just, it's a way of getting it to go away.

I'll just agree with it.

A way to get that spread.

It's probably a more modern one, but it's just, just, I just agree with it because to shut it down, that's the quickest way.

Okay, so that, that's, that's for.

So that's part of the sympathetic nervous system.

We've also got the parasympathetic nervous system, which is the rest digest and recover.

So those two systems are constantly in, not, not in balance.

They're constantly trying to, trying to achieve a balance because stress, although it may be surprising, can be a good thing.

If we've got a deadline coming up, we're training for an event.

You know, various reasons why we want to be on alert, ready to take action, whatever that action is, and converse to that.

We've got the rest digest and recover.

So that is more about digestion, it's about sleep, it's about letting your body recover.

And they're constantly, constantly battling against each other.

We tend to be more in the sympathetic arena most of the time for the reasons I outlined.

Because we're in 247 lifestyle, we don't allow ourselves to rest because rest is for wimps.

So we're constantly trying to achieve and to try and push ourselves and do stuff, because that hustle culture, you may have heard of that.

So because of those reasons, when we go on holiday, effectively, you're taking those things away.

Oh, the other thing as well is that sympathetic, if you have a high sympathetic drive, you are also.

It can sensitize your nervous.

It can sensitize you and make you more sensitive to pain.

So if.

So if you have a pain, if you have an injury, then.

And you're on.

Your sympathetic tone is high.

You're more likely to feel more pain than if you were resting.

So that's another thing about having that high sympathetic tone.

When we go on holiday, you're bringing up the parasympathetics and you're more likely to relax and because it's going to make you a little less sensitive to pain.

So that's one of the reasons why holidays are good, beneficial things.

The other thing to be aware of, and I know that there's a couple of people in the room that have had this is, is that if you are, if you have a high sympathetic tone for a long time, because the sympathetics redirect everything you do towards defending yourself.

Like I said, whether it's running away, fighting, or whatever it is, it tends to suppress other activities.

So it tends to suppress things like your immune system, because if you're ready to do something, you don't want to waste energy on, you know, keeping well.

So that's one of the reasons why, when you take yourself out of that 247 environment, you're more likely to become ill because your immune system's been suppressed because your, your sympathetic nervous system has been so high for so long.

And that's about it.

So over to you.

Okay, now I just want to pick up on something you said which I thought was interesting.

Rest is for wimps.

There was very much that.

Actually, it was a long time ago, but that's.

That was always that view.

No.

Well, lunch.

Yes.

Who takes lunch?

Yeah, well, I mean, rest, it's an issue actually, for a lot of people in that it's.

Rest becomes uncomfortable.

Yeah.

You feel guilty because you're not resting.

Exactly.

If we go back to, to, you know, prehistoric days, as you were talking about pre, you know, when we were evolving and trying to escape from saber tooth Tigers and the rest of it.

We were designed to be productive.

We were designed to go out and do things and be alert and that's why we needed.

We were, you know, designed to be the way we are.

And therefore to rest actually means vulnerability.

And our brain interprets that as we're not safe.

So a lot of us human beings find it actually really difficult to just be still and they find it actually surprisingly uncomfortable.

So, you know, I personally find I'm, you know.

And you mentioned the word guilt as well.

That's a really interesting word.

Why do we feel guilty about resting?

And that's because I guess with the modern world we're encouraged to be productive.

Productive all the time.

Productive all the time.

24 7.

Which again leads to these like, constant stressors that are around us.

It leads to stress hormones such as cortisol and adrenaline sweeping our bodies, which mean that we are constantly on alert.

So that when we go on holiday we have this opportunity to rest in a, hopefully a lovely environment and, you know, warm sunshine, all the rest, all the other things that we love.

It means that we almost feel like we've got a withdrawal, symptom, withdrawal from these stress hormones and we literally just drop.

And that can mean that we can feel really.

Well, we can, we take a few days to adjust.

Yes.

Being on holiday and it, it can feel actually quite uncomfortable to some of us because we feel the guilt and we should be doing something.

We're not being productive.

We're not being productive.

And I know people that take laptops away with them and I'm only going to go on it for an hour a day.

Don't go on it at all.

Well, exactly.

I mean, there are different ways we can manage this.

I mean, you can choose the type of holiday suits you.

So if being on holiday and sitting on a sun lounger and doing nothing is not your.

Not your jam, then you know, active holidays is something that you can do.

Yeah, I mean, that's, that's what I tend to prefer.

I'm not, I'm not a lounging in the sun kind of person.

I want to get out there and sample the country that I'm in.

But yeah, it's, it is, the culture is very much.

We have to be productive all the time.

We have to be doing something.

And when you.

And that's one of the reasons why you get why we have stress and why people have digestive issues and why they have insomnia, high blood pressure and all of those sorts of things.

And when you're away, that's that sympathetic side of things calms down and it boosts the parasympathetic, which is really key.

And that's one of the reasons why pain tends to reduce when you're not in that office environment.

Yeah, exactly.

Exactly.

And it is a really good.

We have to get the mind into the mindset that is.

Actually, our bodies need to rest.

You know, we need to.

We need to learn to almost be uncomfortable with our discomfort and learn to be able to sit and do nothing.

Yeah.

Rather than being 24, 7 on our phones and our social media.

Actually, boredom is a good thing for us because it stimulates creativity.

Exactly that.

Exactly that.

So, yeah, so we do need to learn this.

And one of the things we can do is.

Well, one of the big things we can do is mindfulness is being able to just sit there.

And a lot of that is breath work, but being able to sit with our thoughts.

And that is a whole other podcast, actually.

People.

That people can be.

Yeah, yeah.

Because.

Because the world is so switched on because there's so much going on.

People don't get time to think.

And then they kind of crave that.

That gap.

Sorry, they crave that.

That noise, whether it's physical noise or whether it's just voices in their heads that are telling them they should be doing something, they should be working.

They should be.

Exactly.

And the danger of that as well is that we can start.

It gives us more time to think.

But then we can get into rumination, we can get into washing machine thinking.

So I don't know that term.

It's basically where the same thought just keeps going round and round and round in our heads.

Okay.

And they're not necessarily the best thoughts.

It's again, we're getting into negative self talk.

So, you know, with anything, it's all about balance.

It's all about being able to get that balance and to have the kind of holiday that will actually suit you and that you will enjoy but not feel guilty about the holiday because actually your body needs it.

Our bodies and our minds need that.

That rest.

Absolutely.

We shouldn't feel guilty about it.

Yeah.

And that's the clue, isn't it?

It's that if you can go away on holiday and have fun and feel relaxed, it's a good holiday.

If you go on holiday and then you're constantly thinking about what you're not doing at work, you need to have another think.

Yes.

Need to change something.

Yeah.

Talk to us.

Don't help me change it.

And what we're saying is that pain often improves around a holiday.

And now you know why your pain reduces while you're on holiday.

That's the topic for today.

If you have any questions and you've got anything you want to tell us, then drop the note in comments.

We will be back with another episode.

Until then, like subscribe, share with your friends, do all those things I always tell you to do at the end of every podcast and that'll be goodbye for me and goodbye for Andre.

Yeah, goodbye.