The human brain is a complex network of 100 billion neurons that processes and organizes information from our daily lives. However, if a painful experience or memory is not dealt with properly in the brain, it may transfer that pain to various body parts to create discomfort and disease.
Truthfully, trauma is not "just in your head"; it leaves imprints on the body that changes the brain's chemistry and interrupts normal biological processes.
How Can Trauma Make You Sick?
The common notion that "too much stress makes you sick" is much more relevant than once thought. Because trauma is cellular and is held within the body, the molecular consequences of stress can transform into long-term disabilities like chronic illnesses, anxiety/depression, and PTSD.
In recent years, researchers have found that traumatic experiences change neuronal morphology, neurochemistry, and the ability of the brain to adapt and respond to future stressors. When a person undergoes a traumatic experience, the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal (HPA) axis turns on the body's fight-or-flight response. If a person is unable to calm the body's fight-or-flight response, the heightened stress can manifest into physical pain, increase the risk for cardiovascular issues, and enable bacterial infections, viruses, and toxins to easily invade the body.
What Happens First When a Person Experiences Trauma?
Biologically, the brain structure responsible for emotion and memory, the hippocampus, shrinks. In addition, the amygdala increases its function, while the prefrontal and anterior cortex function decreases. These three processes create spaces where trauma can be stored. When this trauma is stored without being properly processed, it becomes trapped within the body while creating physical manifestations of emotional pain.
The Role of the HPA Axis in Processing Trauma
When the body is in a constant "fight or flight" mode, it is solely focused on survival. This creates an environment where cortisol and adrenaline imbalances can occur and signal the body to slow down bodily functions such as: digestion, metabolism, hormone production, and reproduction.
This stress response is what catalyzes the process of storing trauma. If this response is in constant use, a person may experience "burn-out," total exhaustion, high blood pressure, mitochondrial dysfunction, systemic inflammation, immunosuppression, the formation of debilitating symptoms, and diseases.
How Childhood Trauma can Affect Chronic Illnesses
Childhood traumatic stress or ACEs (adverse childhood events) increases the likelihood of being hospitalized for an autoimmune disease by 80%. These diseases include: Crohn's Disease, Grave's Disease, Sjogren Disease, rheumatoid arthritis, irritable bowel syndrome (IBS), and multiple sclerosis.
What Can Be Done to Address Trauma and Chronic Illness?
Healing from trauma and its effects on the body requires a multi-faceted approach:
- Work with a trauma-informed therapist or psychologist
- Support the nervous system through vagus nerve exercises, breathwork, and somatic practices
- Address nutritional deficiencies that chronic stress depletes
- Address microbial infections and toxicities that suppress the immune system
- Support mitochondrial function to rebuild energy reserves
- Practice limbic system retraining