[splitimage]

Couldn't decide where to post this here, PTSD, or DID, this seemed like the most general so here goes.

I had T tonight for the first time in over a couple of weeks and we got into some pretty heavy stuff. I told T how su I was feeling, and that a part of me was always su.

T and I do alot of ego state work and I have as I like to think of them 7 distinct parts of my personality that each holds different emotions/memories/traits. (I'm not DID - I'm aware of each part, none of them ever take over, and I can communicate with most of them, and they can communicate with each other) hope this made sense. Anyway one of my parts is a much younger me who I call the witch. She's a protector ego state who holds a lot of the bad feelings of despair, sadness, anger, and fear. All of my other ego states are afraid of her, because they think they'll be overwhelmed by her.

Tonight, in bed where I feel really safe, I thought I'd try communicating with her. So I pictured myself holding her, and hugging her really tight and telling her that she wasn't alone and no one was going to hurt her. That it was ok to feel sad / scared / hurt whatever but that we're grown up now and nobody can hurt us the way she was hurt. I told her all about my apartment, my job, my new car, my friends, my passport and credit cards, to try to reassure her that we're safe now.

I got flooded with despair and sadness and cried for awhile, which was ok - she felt calmer. But then I asked her why she was afraid. Big mistake, this was clearly a "we're not going there" question. See I somatize everything emotional. I'm not talking about body memories which I also have, I'm talking painful physical reactions to emotional stuff (happens all the time in T). The minute I asked her why she was afraid I got this huge cramp that felt like I was being stabbed from the inside out, in my but right around the area of the sciatic muscle. Intense pain then radiated from there up my back, over the front of my pelvis, and down my leg. I was in intense physical pain for about 20 min. It's still kind of sore now, hours later.

This is the worst physical reaction I've ever had, and all I did was ask a question. I hate to think what my reaction is going to be when she starts to share her memories and feelings with me.

Sorry this has been so long.

Anyone else get somatic symptoms when they try to get in touch with younger parts of themselves?

I do, splitimage. One of my parts gives me horrible headaches, and another gives me REALLY bad stomach aches. T knows who is there by the physical symptoms I am having.

I also have somatic things that I don't understand, but that feel clearly related to trauma for me, because as far as doctors can tell, there is no physical explanation. Physical symptoms are what brought me to T in the first place, and this past October, which is a bad (trauma) month for me, I became incredibly sick with the strangest collection of infections/symptoms.

SO, you are not alone ((((((((((((splitimage)))))))))))). For me, as I've slowly worked through the trauma stuff, a lot of the physical symptoms have slowly started to disappear...

Lots of to you.

[skyliner]

I often have this. When I feel a negative emotion I feel it in my body as well. For example, if I feel grief, the grief courses through my body and my bones actually ache. I consider it a case of the circuits being crossed. That the emotional pain and the physical pain kinda merge.
Some are of the opinion that fibromyalgia is a manifestation of emotional pain being expressed in physical pain.

[kitten16]

Yeah, I think I have this now that you mention it. I wasn't sure at first!

I've been getting flak recently from people who don't know me well. Basically they're saying, hey, there isn't anything wrong with you. Look alive, show some gratitude, what's wrong, snap out of it, etc. And I've had this automatic reaction where I kind of agree with them (ancient conciliating behavior meant to disarm and charm), and say: "Yeah, I realize I'm not missing an arm, I'm not homeless, I wasn't in Auschwitz, etc. etc." And then I try to explain why I'm still in pain, but it kind of fizzles out at that point.

Anyway, so I kept saying "I'm not missing an arm." I don't know why that image kept coming to me. And about a week ago, my arm started hurting like crazy. Really awful pain from somewhere in my neck that curves around my right shoulder and sometimes shoots down to my elbow. I don't remember spraining anything, sleeping funny, doing anything different. But I'm totally in chronic pain now. It's like my pain got tired of being denied, so it finally showed up in my body! Weird...

[jexa]

Wow that sounds intense, splitimage.

I have somatic anxiety symptoms. Intense nausea, and sometimes vomiting, from memories. I don't try to access younger parts - not a part of my treatment - but telling my T some things made me very sick and I threw up once. I've never had physical pain though. I guess that is lucky.