The Surprising Connection Between Norepinephrine and PAIN

Most people know that a surge of adrenaline (epinephrine/norepinephrine) is accompanied by a temporary increase in the speed and strength with which skeletal and cardiac muscles can respond to emergency situations, but few laypeople know that norepinephrine, at the level of the spinal cord and in the brain, also modulates the perception of pain. Can the neurotransmitter and hormone that gives us "superhuman" strength also make us impervious?

[@chloejadeable]

Super interesting video! Was nice to see your medical Google fu process too. It's always useful to understand the different interpretations that people might have when you're discussing something together, otherwise you might be talking about totally different things without realising. Thanks for the video!

[@notonanemptymind]

Thank you! I assume you meant no pun ("super" interesting...haha). I appreciate the specific feedback on my process, because I nearly edited out the part about my Googling and all of the things I did _not_ intend to discuss. I thought, "Viewers aren't going to want to know what I'm _not_ talking about," but I wanted to emphasize that "The Superman Effect" is a phrase I'm proposing, and not necessarily what Medicine officially calls the noradrenergic-fueled fight-or-flight (or freeze!) response. I was finally able to get AI to give me what I meant, given enough inputs (not only were "fight-or-flight" and "The Superman Effect" in quotation marks in the final result, but the word "norepinephrine" was also bracketed by quotes, which I removed, letting me know I was forcing the answer, but still impressive).
I had a lot of fun editing this video with all the footage, and I'm especially proud of the soundtrack, which is almost entirely music I selected and mixed. It's probably subliminal for most people who watch, and don't even consciously notice, or else assume that the music belongs to the clips I used, but I think those subtleties are what make videos so watchable. Although my goal is to disseminate interesting and valuable information, video editing is a creative and challenging avocation, and my number-one pastime! I might not be able to monetize this one because of all the copyrighted clips, although I am arguing fair-use, since the video is educational, and I did transform them significantly with the added music and captions...wish me luck!

[@bpggg]

This is related to pain. I had an interesting experience during and after a hypomanic episode (I am diagnosed with bipolar 2). While in the hypomanic state, I literally was running around and jumping off of and onto sidewalk curbs. I usually have significant foot pain but barely felt a thing. When I came back down, not only did my feet hurt as usual (well, a little worse), but I experienced some significant pain in my shins. My question is: Do you think norepinephrine had something to do with this phenomenon, some other kind of signaling (related my state of euphoria), or perhaps some combination of processes? Your videos are very appreciated. It's always welcome to get sound information from RUclips. There are a lot of snake oil salesmen and charlatans out there peddling their opinions as fact. Thank you.

[@notonanemptymind]

Thank you for the positive feedback, and thanks for watching! Yes, it would be my opinion that your hypo/manic condition (inasmuch as we are talking about your brain chemistry at the time) muted mild-to-moderate pain signals traveling from your extremities up the spinothalamic tracts of the spinal cord at the level of the cord, before they could reach the brain, via the actions of noradrenergic efferent neurons. Great question.