Smerten forsvinder ikke, hvis jeg arbejder hele dagen.

Smerten means the pain. The ending -en is the Danish definite article for many common-gender nouns.

• en smerte = a pain
• smerten = the pain

So the sentence is talking about a specific pain, not pain in general.

Forsvinder means disappears or goes away.

The basic verb is at forsvinde = to disappear / to go away.
In the present tense, Danish verbs often take -r:

• at forsvinde = to disappear
• forsvinder = disappears / is disappearing

So Smerten forsvinder ikke literally means The pain does not disappear.

In a normal main clause in Danish, ikke usually comes after the finite verb.

So:

• Smerten forsvinder ikke = The pain does not go away

This is different from English, where we use do/does not before the main verb. Danish does not need do here.

Compare:

• English: The pain does not disappear
• Danish: Smerten forsvinder ikke

Hvis means if.

It introduces a condition:

• hvis jeg arbejder hele dagen = if I work all day

So the sentence means that the pain will not go away under that condition.

A learner may confuse hvis with other words like:

• når = when
• om = whether / in / about, depending on context

Here if is clearly needed, so hvis is the correct choice.

Danish often uses the present tense for general truths, habits, and even future-related situations when the meaning is clear from context.

So:

• hvis jeg arbejder hele dagen literally = if I work all day

This does not have to mean only right now. It can mean:

• whenever I work all day
• if I end up working all day
• if I work all day today / tomorrow

English does something similar in many if clauses:

• If I work all day, the pain won’t go away

So this use is very natural in both languages.

Hele dagen directly means the whole day or all day.

Breakdown:

• hele = whole / entire
• dagen = the day

Together:

• hele dagen = all day / the whole day

Danish often uses this structure without a preposition:

• jeg arbejder hele dagen = I work all day

Because hvis jeg arbejder hele dagen is a subordinate clause, and subordinate clauses in Danish do not use the normal main-clause inversion pattern.

Main clause:

• Jeg arbejder hele dagen = I work all day

Subordinate clause after hvis:

• hvis jeg arbejder hele dagen = if I work all day

So after hvis, the subject jeg comes before the verb arbejder.

Then the main clause follows the normal Danish verb-second pattern.

So you can say:

• Hvis jeg arbejder hele dagen, forsvinder smerten ikke.

Notice what happened in the main clause:

• not smerten forsvinder ikke
• but forsvinder smerten ikke

That is because when the subordinate clause comes first, it takes the first position, and the finite verb of the main clause must come next.

It can match both, depending on context.

• forsvinde literally means disappear
• but with things like pain, symptoms, problems, or spots, English often prefers go away

So in natural English, The pain won’t go away if I work all day is often the best translation, even though the Danish verb is literally disappear.

Yes. Danish present tense is flexible.

It can mean:

• a general pattern: if I work all day
• a specific current/future situation: if I work all day today

Context tells you which meaning is intended.

If you wanted to be more specific, Danish could add a time word such as:

• i dag = today
• i morgen = tomorrow

But without that, the sentence is still perfectly natural.

A rough guide for an English speaker is:

• Smerten ≈ SMEHR-dn
• forsvinder ≈ for-SVIN-er
• ikke ≈ IG-uh
• hvis ≈ vis
• jeg ≈ yai or a softened yigh, depending on accent
• arbejder ≈ AR-bye-der
• hele ≈ HEE-luh
• dagen ≈ DAY-un

This is only approximate, because Danish pronunciation is less phonetic than spelling suggests. A few important points:

• final syllables are often weak
• d can be very soft
• jeg is often pronounced much less clearly than learners expect

If you are aiming for natural speech, it is especially useful to listen carefully to native pronunciation of ikke, jeg, and arbejder.