Invisible Pain
Did you know that according to brain experts, Alzheimer's starts in the brain 30-50 years before symptoms show up?
It makes sense, if you think about it. I mean, that’s not the kind of thing that just develops overnight. For that matter, where do you think cancer or diabetes comes from? Thin air?
I hate to be critical, but let’s be real, we are vain people. When a blemish shows up on our skin, we take notice. Heck, we go to great lengths to prevent them. Just the thought of other people seeing these imperfections—these symptoms of stress or poor diet—makes us self-conscious enough to run to the nearest drug store for face wash.
The same could be said for excess weight gain or graying hair. Once our pants don’t fit, it’s time to join the gym! Our vanity is a driving force for us to take charge of our health. What we see, we take seriously. Seeing is believing, after all. Or is it?
As a lifelong student of myself and of holistic wellness, I’m always amazed (yet not surprised) how much information we get from our own bodies—a gut feeling, a loss of energy around negative people. Our own thoughts send energy currents, which dictate information to our cells, telling them how to behave. Much of this information can be measured with scientific instruments, and yet almost none of it is visible to the human eye.
Being naturally thin my whole life gave me no incentive to eat healthy or exercise. I hated working out. It just didn’t interest me. And since I was already thin, I considered myself “in shape,” so I didn’t see the point. I’ll say that again, I didn’t SEE the point.
As for my diet, I was known as that “skinny bitch who could eat whatever she wanted and not gain a pound.” My weight was never an issue. But you know what has been an issue? My IBS, my anxiety, and my stress levels. Even as I got sicker, I still didn’t think changing my diet or lifestyle habits was a priority.
It took years, doctor after doctor, nutritionist after nutritionist, healer after healer to drill the importance of healthy living into my head before I finally realized, hey, there might be something to this! And there is!
Stress and poor diet can cause way more than a skin breakout, or hard-to-lose belly fat. Stress and poor diet are at the heart of almost every serious illness. Perhaps it is not only the invisible nature of these diseases that makes them easily overlooked, but the fact that they develop slowly over time. After all, that slice of pizza will likely cause a pimple within two days, but may not show up as a heart attack for 20 years.
“Out of sight, out of mind” can be helpful in some situations, but there is only so long we can pretend not to see the reality of our health. I nitpick on poor diet and stress because they are two of the largest factors that cause inflammation inside the body, which is responsible for almost all disease. But there are many other invisible powerhouses that influence our health. If you’ve ever worked in a toxic work environment, been in a toxic relationship, or suffered with depression, you’d know that these, too, are major players in how we feel. Fuck tangibility and visibility, we need to start paying attention to everything we absorb!
While some of us may be predisposed to certain diseases (“It runs in my family”), thanks to epigenetics, we now know lifestyle, habits, diet, physical activity, environments, smoking, and excess alcohol play a major role in our fate. “Your genetics load the gun. Your lifestyle pulls the trigger.”
With that, I give you a friendly nudge to shine a light on areas of your health that may be hidden, out of sight. Remember, we are exposed to so much every day. So many thoughts, feelings, sensations, and information, and our brain filters all this. It filters stimuli in just milliseconds, to only make us aware of just what we absolutely need to know RIGHT NOW. For example, if you were being chased by a lion, you may not be aware that the sky is cloudy. It’s called priorities. We can’t possibly be aware of every sensation at every moment, or we would explode with overload! So don’t feel bad if you’ve overlooked certain aspects of your health. You’re busy, there’s a lot going on. I get it!
What we can do, is heighten our awareness by even just one degree, to acknowledge that when it comes to disease prevention and chronic illness, we must give credit to the underlying, hard-to-see factors that don’t play by vanity’s rules.
Questions to ponder:
What motivates you to change?
What motivates you to get healthy? Is it how you feel? How you look? A doctor’s advice?
What do you know to be true about your health that isn’t visible on the surface?