Get your heart pumping to reduce pain

One key to reducing pain is to get your heart rate up. Cardiovascular, or aerobic, exercise increases both your breathing and your heart rate, increasing the flow of oxygen and nutrients to painful areas, which aids in the removal of toxins, speeding healing. Your heart works harder and, like any muscle, grows stronger so that, eventually, you will be able to do the same exercise with less effort.

Exercise boosts energy and lowers stress, which are both common problems for people in pain. It releases tension, loosens tight muscles, and makes falling and staying asleep easier, often a difficulty for people in pain. It strengthens muscles, which can then carry some of the burden for an aching back or hips.

Stronger muscles make day-to-day activities like shopping and household tasks easier too. You're also apt to lose weight, a boon to sore joints.

A 200-pound person who stays on the same diet but briskly walks one and a half miles per day, for example, will lose 14 pounds in a year. Giving your heart a workout also raises your spirits and sharpens your mind. It's a rare soul who returns from even 15 minutes of brisk exercise who doesn't feel a little better about herself, who doesn't have a better perspective on the tasks and problems of the day, who isn't in better spirits. In fact, research shows that your mood will lift after just 10 minutes of exercise and continue improving, reaching its high after about 20 minutes.

Other research shows that exercise relieves depression as effectively as antidepressants and psychotherapy. The reason for the lift: exercise releases the mood-boosting brain chemicals serotonin and dopamine, as well as endorphins that act as the body's natural painkillers.

Revved up to give your heart a workout? Below are experts' top aerobic plans for people in pain:

Gently massage your muscles: Some studies indicate this can relieve soreness by 30 percent and also reduce swelling.

Take an Epsom salts bath: Add two cups of Epsom salts to a warm bath and soak for twenty minutes. The magnesium in the salts helps relax muscles and reduces inflammation and swelling.

Apply ice: An ice pack wrapped in a towel placed over the sore spot for twenty minutes reduces swelling. After the pain has peaked, apply a heating pad or warm towel for twenty minutes, which helps by increasing circulation.

Stretch: A few gentle stretches won't necessarily relieve soreness, but they will feel good.

Give it a rest: Go ahead and exercise the next day if you feel like it, but don't try to win any contests.

The temporary tension in your extremities  is encouraging and  worth it if it's  long-term pain relief yo are after.

So get up and get moving.