Pain experience is idiosyncratic, and very often this process of communication about what pain is “walk it off” and what is “stop and call an ambulance” is assumed to have been learned over decades of youth. In reality, everyone’s learned different subsets of it, and we don’t actually KNOW what’s problematic. All advice of this sort, including most non-specialist physicians, and excluding most physical therapists and professional athletic coaches, is suspect.
Relevant XKCD: https://xkcd.com/883/
Pain experience is idiosyncratic, and very often this process of communication about what pain is “walk it off” and what is “stop and call an ambulance” is assumed to have been learned over decades of youth. In reality, everyone’s learned different subsets of it, and we don’t actually KNOW what’s problematic. All advice of this sort, including most non-specialist physicians, and excluding most physical therapists and professional athletic coaches, is suspect.
A better pain scale: https://i.imgur.com/S2R4pzI.png