What happens when huge amounts of energy get stuck in the body as trauma, leading to a freeze response or shutdown? How does this intersect with chronic conditions such as CFS, fibromyalgia, sensory defensiveness or other syndromes and does being autistic make you more prone to this? How can somatic therapies be used to discharge years of trauma? Exploring through my own deep-dive into the territory.
As an adjunct to clearing the body of old emotional memories in order to heal, it's important to start a blank canvas of creating positive NEW body memories that invite the body to take part in choosing what makes it feel good. Here's how I'm using that understanding to move into the later stages of recovery from chronic illness, shifting me into a new place when it comes to how resilient and good my body feels (yes, we all still have our off days)...
The legacy of childhood stress can be far longer-lasting for some personality types than others; thus getting to know your type can be like a key to the door ready to unlock the gift of that stress. It may even help launch you into a whole other paradigm…
When we think of emotion as e-motion...electricity in motion, within the body...it can have a very huge impact on how we work with health issues we are grappling with, especially those of us who are highly-sensitive or suffering from PTSD, unresolved trauma or other issues going all the way back to earliest childhood (even if we think we have processed those and moved on...) and even more bizarre phenomenon such as paranormal experiences. One particular study has really assisted me in understanding this whole, largely unexplored, area of health and super-sensitivity and I share some of what I have found out in this post.
Abandonment - real or imagined - in childhood, especially very early in life, is considered one of the most serious triggers of deeply ingrained illness and even post traumatic stress, I newly read this morning. How did I not know this, though I have noted many times how my symptoms match those of PTSD. But that’s all about war-zones, being a veteran, seeing many killings, too much destruction and death, isn’t it? Apparently no, not always; and those with it embedded play out some terribly self-destructive themes, many of which are deeply familiar to me. These reactions, the traits, the repeat behaviours…they are like the patchwork of my lifetime's worst experiences and I find the very themes that have triggered the high-adrenalin and sheer nervous exhaustion of my health collapse, over and over again. So, if this is you, have you considered this traumatic root to your unsolved health issues because we are so adept at covering over these earliest traumas, or playing them down as "nothing", that we can forget to give them the attention they crave in order to heal.
Women do this especially well; we tell ourselves we have to keep our unruly emotions in check and are almost too afraid to give them full rein in case we offend anyone or lose people's good opinion but what if the release of those locked away emotions is the very power we seek or holds the key to our transformation; at the very least, our healing?
Being an especially sensitive person is a bit like being a canary in a coal mine - we experience first whatever is the trickle factor into the masses; we are the thin edge of the wedge. Sensitivities that relate to food and lifestyle - we get them emphatically and then make changes, learn about alternatives, … Continue reading Letting that canary sing
Living whole 