Mind-Body Connection: How Emotional Health Affects Physical Wellbeing

Have you ever experienced changes in your appetite when you’re stressed about something? This happens when prolonged stress or emotional pain starts manifesting physical symptoms without a clear medical explanation. Usually, it’s hard to put a finger on one specific symptom but people dealing with emotional pain often complain about unexplained headaches, digestive issues, or fatigue. 

Millions of people worldwide suffer from mysterious physical illnesses that seem to stem from an unknown source and you're not alone. The truth is, unresolved emotional trauma and stress can have a strong impact on your physical wellbeing, affecting everything from your appetite to your ability to fight off infections.

In this article, we will breakdown the science behind the mind-body connection, how it affects your physical health. Most importantly, we’ll talk about the holistic healing approaches such as the Compassionate Inquiry Therapy (CIT) and how it can help you eradicate the root cause of the problem.

The Science Behind the Mind-body connection and emotional health

For a long time, mind and body were considered 2 distinct and mutually exclusive systems. But when scientists started looking into it, they discovered that not only our mind and bodies are interconnected but it’s the very connection that forms the basis of our human existence and survival. 

According to research, your mind and body are deeply connected with each other in a way that your emotional and psychological state of mind directly affects your physical well-being. Even your negative emotions such as stress, anxiety, and trauma, may trigger physical responses through your nervous system, more specifically, your autonomic nervous system. 

Another important part of our body that is mostly controlled by our emotions or mental health is our endocrine system. Our endocrine system releases hormones that regulate various bodily functions. Prolonged emotional stress can trigger the release of stress hormones, which may affect metabolism, growth, and your reproductive health. The imbalance of these hormones can lead to various health issues, such as weight gain, hormonal imbalances, and chronic fatigue.

That’s not all, emotional stress can have far-reaching consequence where chronic inflammation, weakened immune systems, and even DNA alterations can result from unresolved emotional turmoil. Contrary to this, positive emotions and thoughts can boost your mood, enhance energy levels, and fortify resilience.

The Fight or Flight Response

The ‘fight or flight’ response is a good example to understand the interconnectedness of your mind and body. Whenever your body receives a stress signal from the environment, it activates a mechanism known as fight or flight response. Upon activation, your body releases stress hormones like adrenaline and cortisol. In shorter spurts, these stress hormones can give you a head start to deal with a problem and boost your immunity. On the other hand, if your body is continuously in fight or flight mode the excess production of the same hormones can lead to chronic health conditions like high blood pressure, a weak immune system, and inflammatory diseases.

Unresolved Emotional Trauma and Its Physical Manifestations

Unresolved emotional trauma can result from a variety of circumstances, such as childhood abuse, neglect, loss, marital violence, or major life transitions. These traumatic occurrences may have a long-term influence on your emotional well-being, influencing how you handle stress and interact with the world around you. When these emotions go ignored, they can cause a variety of physical problems in the body. Unaddressed mental states of mind may make things worse, and there are 3 main causes of emotional pain:

1. Childhood Experiences: Abuse or neglect can leave lasting emotional wounds.

2. Loss and Grief: The death of a loved one or significant life changes can result in deep emotional pain.

3. Chronic Stress: Ongoing stress from work or relationships can accumulate and lead to trauma.

   
   

Physical Symptoms of Prolonged Emotional Stress 

Many people suffer from physical issues daily, including aches, pains, and body difficulties. According to research, up to one in every ten persons may report such concerns without having an identified medical disease to explain them. These manifestations, known as somatic symptoms, represent the physical experience of emotions and the process if known as somatization.

Research shows that somatization is a common experience, such as feeling "butterflies" in the stomach during times of anxiety. Similarly, tension and discomfort in your muscles might occur when you're angry or anxious. People might think that it’s not real, but lack of awareness on mind and body connection may make people think that you’re ‘faking it’.

If trauma or negative emotions are kept closed in the mind, they will start showing up as worsened symptoms of some physical health problem, the symptoms are likely to be:

• Body discomfort, including headaches and joint pain.

• Stomach pain, nausea, or vomiting.

• Fatigue, disorientation, or memory problems.

• Weakness or numbness.

• Breathing issues or shortness of breath.

• Changes in vision and hearing, including abrupt blindness

• A sensation of "stuck-ness" or "lump" in the throat

• Seizures, fainting, or unusual movements

Pathway to Holistic Healing

There is no health without mental health, and if your mind is not at ease, your physical health will likely be affected and get worse. So, it is very important that your emotions are being taken care of and you make positive changes in your life.

There are many interventions that emphasize the importance of treating emotional wounds alongside physical symptoms but most of them are focused on one of the two aspects. For example, mindfulness, meditation, somatic therapy, or cognitive behavioural therapy. It’s the revolutionary therapies like Compassionate Inquiry Therapy (CIT) that focus on uncovering hidden emotional patterns and rooting the core problem out before treating the superficial symptoms. 

How Compassionate Inquiry Therapy Leads to Good Mental Health

Dr. Gabor Mate’s Compassionate Inquiry Therapy (CIT) is a powerful technique that can help you face your emotional traumas from the past. It can help you uncover how these hidden emotional patterns give rise to physical and psychological distress. 

Compassionate Inquiry uses a gentle and exploratory process that will encourage you to go deep into your emotional landscape. The therapist asks you open-ended questions and listens to you attentively. The CI therapist will help you understand your emotions, thoughts and behaviours and also help you uncover your inner trauma and discuss it openly in a compassionate setting. In CIT, the non-judgmental environment and compassionate inquiry will make you feel that you can discuss your inner unresolved traumas openly that you were scared to address. Once you recognize these emotional triggers, you can understand the root causes of your distress and work towards healing.

Benefits of Compassionate Inquiry

CIT has numerous healing effects, such as:

• Processing Emotions: CIT assists you in articulating and exploring suppressed feelings, allowing for emotional release.

• Reducing Physical Symptoms: Addressing emotional issues can help to alleviate physical symptoms such as chronic pain and digestive disorders.

• Cultivating Emotional Resilience: CIT promotes self-awareness, which allows you to develop healthier coping mechanisms for future problems.

Other Approaches for Emotional Healing

Mindfulness and meditation improve awareness and concentrate on the present moment, reducing tension and anxiety. Mindfulness can help you create a deeper feeling of calm and clarity, helping you to regulate your emotions more effectively.

Somatic Therapies, including yoga and breath work, help relieve tension and trauma from the body. These activities promote emotional release and relaxation, reuniting the mind and body and improving general well-being.

Cognitive-Behavioural Therapy (CBT) helps identify and challenge harmful thought patterns. By replacing these with healthier ideas, you can increase your emotional resilience and create effective coping mechanisms, allowing you to better navigate life's challenges.

Conclusion

If you’re stuck in a loop of experiencing unexplained physical symptoms and your doctor ruling everything out. You might want to dig past the superficial symptoms and understand what’s causing them. This is where CIT can help you understand the underlying emotional traumas, and their connection with physical health problems. 

Our certified and well-trained therapists can provide you a safe space to do just that. You can talk about unresolved emotional traumas, let it all out without the fear of being judges by anyone. By using evidence-based CIT approach, we focus on helping you recover as a whole and heal from the inside out.

If you’re ready to take the first step and prioritize your mental and physical health over everything else, now is the time to get in touch with our experts.  Book a consultation now to begin your healing journey!