Some forms of chronic pain are particularly mysterious

When she was only 14, Catherine Charlwood noticed a swelling in her right forearm. It was accompanied by a heavy muscular ache that made daily activities difficult. As a talented clarinettist at a British school where regular practice was on the timetable, the pain was deeply worrying. She was told it was repetitive strain injury, and would disappear within six weeks. When those weeks had gone and the pain remained, she was diagnosed with tendonitis. She did her best to make do, minimising her music practice and learning to write with her left hand. Eventually, when playing the clarinet was no longer feasible, she had to leave the school.When the pain continued past the six months which is typical of tendonitis, doctors recommended surgery. “Each time they opened me up, what they were looking for wasn’t there,” she says. The second of those procedures, intended to relieve pressure on her radial nerve, actively made things worse. Since then, she occasionally experiences what feels like electricity crackling down the scar left by the procedure. “The volume can turn up, and it can turn up a lot, but it doesn’t turn down,” she says. Further diagnoses have come and gone, but the true origins of her pain remain mysterious.