Psychological pain - a misunderstanding
In the past, the tradition was to distinguish between pain with a predominantly physiological cause and pain with a predominantly psychological or social cause. Abdominal pain was attributed to the latter category, as something that was psychological. However, as described earlier, this was due to the lack of knowledge. Today, we know better.
Still, this does not mean that there can never be a mental disorder as the cause of pain symptoms, but the diagnosis of a mental disorder must be made with the same thoroughness as of a physical disorder and on the basis of independent symptoms. The diagnosis cannot be made simply because there is no physical explanation for the pain.
With the knowledge we have so far about the pain mechanisms in the abdomen, it is a serious, risky, and stigmatizing generalization to claim that chronic abdominal pain is generally or often caused by mental illness.
Another misconception that is sometimes seen among healthcare professionals is the idea that the patient is not in real pain but "hurting in the soul". Inherent in this perception is the same misunderstanding of the cause of the pain, namely that it is more about the patient's psychological problems than "real" pain. Again, with current knowledge, this is a false assumption.
Instead of talking about "pain in the soul", it would be relevant to talk about grief. Being affected by chronic pain for many also means going through a grieving process, since living with chronic pain is also about loss. Chronic pain means saying goodbye to many of the things you used to be able to do and saying goodbye to the life you have lived until now. This means that the emotions that come with a loss need to be dealt with and processed.
In addition, it is well known that many chronic pain patients eventually develop depression as a result of chronic pain. It is important that both the pain and the depression are treated and that it is not just assumed that the pain will go away if the depression is treated. Depression often accompanies chronic pain.
