Especially in recent years, when we go to the doctor, there is a sentence we hear frequently: "You have nothing" he said, "It was psychological." Unless we can express and solve the psychosocial or emotional problems in our life, all this negative load that cannot go out manifests itself with bodily symptoms. Unexpressed negative emotions, uncompensated intense stress can literally displace and manifest themselves as pains, nausea, and tension.
The most common migraine, fibromyalgia, skin conditions (allergies, shingles) are mostly psychosomatic. In such cases, we usually think that we are sick and start seeking medical help. Sometimes medication is prescribed, and sometimes the doctor refers to a psychiatry or psychologist, because not all complaints are based on a physical problem.
The congestion in our inner world manifests itself physically as we suppress it, cannot see it or face it, which is actually good. They are the signals your body gives to save you. When these signals are ignored, research shows us that psychological disturbances such as depression and anxiety are added to physical complaints. In many studies, a history of recurrent major depressive disorder was found in 2/3 of the cases with medically unexplained symptoms such as chronic fatigue, pelvic pain, chest pain, chronic back pain, tinnitus, and irritable bowel syndrome.
When can emotions cause a physical problem?
Let's say you had an unwanted event at work, you got angry with your boss, but at such a moment that you don't say anything. Although not a single word comes out of your mouth, thoughts continue to speak in your mind, you become increasingly angry. As you get angry, you involuntarily clench your jaws, maybe clench your hands or close at your desk where you are. Even the possibility of seeing your boss every time you go to work reminds you of anger and your jaw twitches again, your face hangs, and you spend the whole day working at your desk. The moment you go home and sit, you feel intense pain in your body, and as this situation continues, those pains become chronic and cause health problems.
In some cases, we feel like our hands are tied, and although our inner voice keeps telling us negative things, we try to continue our lives as if there is no problem from the outside. Ignoring and devaluing our own feelings or our real strength has an effect as if we have taken a harmful microbe to our body. When a negative emotion or a thought attacks your internal system over and over again, if you cannot find a way to get rid of the negative, it will make you sick like a microbe and your body will try to remove it through diseases. Of course, it is an inevitable fact that this is more painful.
How can we get rid of negative emotions and thoughts before they turn into illness?
You may have all these pains, or you may have gone to the doctor and referred to a psychiatrist-psychologist. Know that it is not too late for a solution. First of all, what you need to do is to notice what emotions you feel in which situation. You can get help from your body for this. It's like what happens when you feel heaviness, your heart is squeezed, or you have a headache? You feel stuck, overwhelmed or maybe helpless, maybe all of this makes you angry, maybe upsetting you. It is possible to express all these feelings by writing. Write without taking the pencil off the paper and asking yourself whether this is true.
The second step is to identify when and how often all these emotions arise when you have accumulations within you. Maybe it always appears in the same place or always in the same person, now is the time to discover it.
In the third step, we roll up our sleeves to find safe alternative ways for yourself. You can get rid of our accumulated anger by doing sports, you can write what we cannot say or you can find solutions for yourself. Do not forget to seek professional support when you cannot find a solution and need assistance.
