12 Ways Chronic Pain Affects Your Morning Routine

For many of those with chronic pain, mornings can be one of the most challenging times of the day. Maybe you were up all night with painsomnia and barely got any sleep, so you’re completely exhausted when your alarm goes off. Or perhaps your pain and stiffness are worst after lying in bed all night, and it takes several hours to “warm up” and get your day started.

Some folks might struggle through their morning routine due to pain, prioritizing only the tasks that absolutely have to get done before heading off to work or school. Others might not have a morning routine at all, and spend the morning resting, catching up on sleep or managing symptoms. No matter what your mornings look like, it is absolutely OK to spend those hours doing what you need to do for your health.

To shed some light on how mornings are different when you have chronic pain, we asked our Mighty community to share how chronic pain affects their morning routine. Let us know in the comments below what a typical morning looks like for you!

Here’s what our community shared with us:

1. Sleeping In

“I often sleep in late, because my sleep was so disrupted through the night. Or I was up with painsomnia. I sleep through alarms, which means my partner has to battle with me every morning to wake me up and get out of bed.” – Izzy B.

“Morning? My morning routine consists of trying to sleep. I have serious issues with sleep, along with delayed sleep disorder so my brain won’t really let me sleep at the ‘normal’ times. I’m asleep until late afternoon usually, well if I’m lucky to get good sleep anyway. It’s very hard to sleep when your stomach hurts so badly or the nerves in your body all feel completely raw and even the sheet hurts your skin. My morning routine has not happened in the morning for many, many years and I’m only 24.” – Reegan T.

2. Taking Stock of Your Pain Levels

“Laying in bed awake for at least 10-20 minutes registering what my pain level is starting out at for the day. I can’t just get up, shower, eat breakfast and go anymore. My morning consists of a lot of resting after simple tasks. There is no routine. It’s more like ‘what can I physically do next today.’” – Charlene M.

“I don’t get to set the pace, my body dictates how the morning will go. It also doesn’t care what my to-do list is or what appointments I may have. I’m just along for the ride – and active pain management.” – Adele L.

3. Building in Time to Fully Wake Up

“Having to give your body extra time to just lay and exist and wake up before even getting out of bed. Many times I have to push past the pain to get to work at a reasonable hour.” – Stephanie P.

“I used to be very much a morning person who was able to just ‘get up and go,’ but now I wake up very groggy from the pain and it takes me around two hours to properly wake up.” – Lorna M.

4. Waiting for Joints to Loosen Up

“Having to wait for my hands to unstiffen and stop hurting, which can take hours depending on the day. Because of this, some days I’m late for work due to the pain and lack of mobility.” – Patricia G.

“I lay in bed for a minimum of a half hour slowly moving my joints so that they unstiffen enough for me to get up.” – Augie G.

“It takes a good few hours to unstiffen… it’s like waking up with rigor mortis every day. I don’t hit the ground running, I hit it crawling.” – Alice M.

5. Staying in Bed Until Your Meds Kick In

“I have to sit in bed for a good 20 minutes before and after I take my mornings meds. I miss being able to bounce out of bed every morning.” – Tiffany T.

“I have to take my meds at least 45 minutes before I can try to get out of bed. Some days I can make it to my recliner, and some days, I just stay in bed.” – Jennie C.

“Being unable to move out of bed until the morning pain relief has kicked in. This means I have to set alarms for two hours before I think my children will be awake.” – Tara C.

6. Either Being Unable to Shower…

“I miss the joy of a refreshing shower. It’s a struggle to stand and wash off, dry and dress. I miss that feeling of clean energy. It hurts some days to brush my hair.” – Dana K.B.

7. …Or Having to Rest After Taking a Shower

“Even with a shower stool, it’s still necessary to rest after a shower before putting on clothes.” – Jill C.

“I struggle to get out of bed. Showering takes a lot of energy and I usually go back to bed after taking a shower.” – Melize M.

8. Not Eating Breakfast

“My chronic pain from fibromyalgia and past GI surgeries have left it extremely difficult to eat most mornings. Not only is it hard to get out of bed to get food, but then to cook it, and to actually physically eat, oftentimes can be impossible. Then you add on the fact that a lot of times I’m so nauseous and my pain in my abdomen is so bad that I don’t want to eat. Even though I know I have to, there are many mornings I let the pain win and just don’t eat.” – Caitlin N.Y.

9. Taking Breaks While You’re Getting Ready

“It takes longer to get ready in the morning. I frequently have to take breaks. Sometimes I have to nap after a shower because it was so painful and exhausting. It takes much more to even get up sometimes because you’ve tossed and turned all night after being in pain and when you’ve finally gotten comfortable, the alarm goes off and you fear moving because everything will flare back up to a level 10.” – Jae M.

“I have to get up early just to have extra time to sit around and adjust my body to being upright and extra time because the pain makes me move so slow and I have to take breaks while getting ready.” – Jessica B.

10. Not Brushing Your Hair

“It hurts to brush my hair during a pain flare.” – Chelsea V.

“During the winter especially, [on] mornings when it is cold and having a bad trigeminal neuralgia attack, I don’t use a brush on my hair and just my fingers to gently run through it.” – Michelle S.

11. Going Back to Bed After Taking Kids to School

“Laying in bed after getting the kids to school, I have to calculate if I have enough time to recoup energy to go get them from school.” – Kayla R.

“I wake up, get my kids up and ready and off to school and then have to go right back to bed. Showering is harder than ever lately. I really need a shower chair but my tub isn’t wide enough.” – Stephanie B.

12. Moving Slowly Due to Pain

“[Chronic pain] slows me down. Everything takes so much more time and effort. And I can’t always do the things I would like to, like styling hair and doing makeup.” – Laura A.M.

“I’m as slow as molasses dripping during wintertime.” – Steve L.

“Showering is exhausting, so I only do it at night. For the morning, my alarms start going off 30 minutes before I need to get up so I can slowly stretch and make sure I didn’t dislocate anything in the night. I’m extremely dizzy if I get up too fast, so I slowly dangle my legs for a minute then push myself up. I sit up for a moment before standing. Otherwise, I lose balance and fall back onto the bed.” – Lauren R.

If you struggle with mornings because of chronic pain, you’re not alone. Below our community shares how they cope with the challenges morning can bring:

Chronic Pain