Emotional pain is not much different than physical pain imo.

It hits the same neuro pathways signaling something is wrong, and is uncomfortable in the same way, there's just not a spot you can point to and say "it hurts really bad right in this spot on my arm" and emo pain is generalized, not specific to one location.

That you can't 'point' to it causes secondary stress and a negative feedback loop, which creates additional challenges and even more pain alongside anxiety, etc. These things are quite distressing.

I think we can get caught up in thinking mental illness stuff is so different from physical illness. IMO it's not. Mental is physical.

There's pretty decent research done on the subject now, that something like tylenol can actually ease emotional pain (short-term). The pain and medication both hit the same neuro pathways that cause the discord, and relief.

Not suggesting we all take tylenol 3x a day everyday LOL, our liver would not be fond of that, but at times I think it should be part of acute treatment on particularly tough days and the subject needs talked about on a physical level. This helps break down stigma, and secondary stress.

Some or all of this is unconventional to discuss, I understand. But appears to be true and clinical research has been done to confirm these things. Just hasn't been talked about much (yet).

We beat the hell out of ourselves frequently and feel quite misunderstood at times but when attempting to explain things to other people, such as emotional pain/depression pain in general (which is quite debilitating), I think it can help others to understand by using the information I presented above.