Question about endorphins

Factual Questions
1

When I’m exposed to soreness/pain/etc. for maybe a half hour, my ‘first endorphins’ will start to kick in, and the pain will start to go away a bit.

Anyway, if I continue doing stuff while I’m sore, and the pain gets worse and worse, at some point, usually after several hours of continuous strain, my body seems to release a ‘second endorphin’… I’ll be in extreme pain, then, rather quickly, it’ll mostly just go away. But, as a side effect, it seems to “zombiefy” me… my brain becomes slow and I have a hard time concentrating, and I even start to slur my speech a little bit… not so much slur as not speak exactly correctly.

In any case, is this all something in my head, or is there really a ‘second endorphin’ that’s released after hours of continued strain, that would have mental side effects?

2

Well, I’ve never heard the term “first endorphins” before, and your description of your experience doesn’t co-incide with what I know of endogenous endorphin behavior.

It generally takes a few hours of moderate to extreme physical activity to cause endogenous endorphin release. So what you refer to as your “second endorphin” may co-incide with the endorphins being released the first time.

Your initial pains, which diminish with continued activity probably represent normal warming up and efficient functioning of muscles and joints, as the body switches from anaerobic to aerobic metabolism.

QtM, MD
Not an endorphin expert, but as a student, I did study endorphins under Sol Snyder, who won the Lasker award for his discovery of the endorphin receptor.