Six days after falling down the stairs, I have zero pain. A client with a nearly identical story is still dealing with symptoms months later. Same mechanism, same type of history, completely different outcome. That gap is what this episode is about.

What Happened

I tripped coming down the stairs and landed hard on my hip and shoulder. I have a known rotator cuff tear, a labral tear on both sides, a spondylolisthesis, and a previous L5-S1 herniation. In other words, my imaging is a mess on paper. When I hit the ground, I felt pain in my low back and my shoulder -- exactly where my history is. That is not a coincidence. That is predictive processing.

What I did in the first few minutes mattered more than anything else that followed.

What This Episode Covers

• Why pain shows up the way it does after an injury, and wh ...