When The Mouth Is Silent, The Body Speaks
Sometimes people do not find the words to express our pain and in return our body does. We do not know exactly what happens to us so that the rest can understand us. This inability to match our words with our emotions is known in the field of psychology as alexithyma.
Usually, this disability has its origin in a non-existent or deficient family communication system. Many of the current psychosomatic illnesses give us a clue about the unmet needs of the population: listening, empathy, affection.
Somatizing means transforming an emotional pain into a physical one, perhaps due to the inability to express the first one correctly. An inability that must be understood and treated as the origin of a problem that fulfills a function: communicating with the body what our mind wants to express and our voice is not capable of reproducing.
Psychological origin, real physical symptoms in our body
That psychosomatic disorders have a psychological origin does not mean that they do not manifest themselves in real physical symptoms. There are symptoms that hurt, annoy and that, ultimately, interfere with a person’s life and its satisfactory development.
It is not surprising that in mood disorders, such as depression, vegetative states, a change in the usual sleep pattern and many somatic complaints are observed : sadness is being somatized.
There are many types of depression, some are characterized because the patient adopts an aggressive attitude and others because a passive attitude is adopted. In both, what is felt is not communicated or is not communicated properly and this sensation transforms into psychological and physical discomfort.
The price of being strong at all costs leads to somatizing
When we do not communicate, we implicitly assume that we will not be heard, that we do not have social strategies to make ourselves understood or that we will be directly rejected. In a world where we are told that being strong is the golden quality, no one wants to wear iron bars on their feet.
Many of the people do not express their discomfort because they cannot find the words for it or, simply, they have been taught that doing so “will expose them.” We will not blame this only on parents or guardians, but on society in general. We are taught all kinds of subjects, but the subject of knowing ourselves emotionally remains pending.
The result of this idea is quite evident: we avoid expressing how we feel and when we want to realize it we no longer know why we feel bad. We have retrograde amnesia that prevents us from getting to the true root of the problem, why it hurts so much and where did this come from.
Treatment of patients who somatize by health professionals
The comprehensive care of the person who comes to the office with a somatization disorder is quite deficient at times. These people need medical and psychological attention. Sometimes they are accused of histrionic, simulative or factitious when it has nothing to do with it.
Perhaps it is true that they have an amplifying system of symptoms and a very focused focus on them. For example, a person with high degrees of neuroticism may exhibit this pattern of excessive searching and checking for symptoms.
Therefore, that person may be more focused on their symptoms and therefore their anxious style is making them worse. But the symptoms are there, they are real : headaches, gastrointestinal upset, persistent chronic fatigue, etc.
Treatment of somatic diseases
The patient must be treated in an INTEGRAL way, taking into account the psychological characteristics that may be influencing their physical symptoms and also evaluating how their physical symptoms worsen the psychological picture.
On many occasions, when a somatic disease is not treated correctly, it becomes chronic and a logical and terrible consequence can appear for the person suffering from it.
The disease, already chronic, causes the person to avoid all social activity or to alter their routine, believing that they thus avoid discomfort and that their symptoms will be more controlled in their daily routine. Little by little, the person is putting aside his life for his symptoms.
Psychosomatic illnesses are real and need a specific treatment adjusted to the characteristics of the patient. Once organic pathologies have been ruled out, professionals must be able to understand what the body is trying to say, because the mouth is silent without agreeing to any specific cause .
