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Where Does it Hurt?- How Your Body Responds to Emotions

In Recovery by Tree House Recovery

Our bodies are capable of handling so much stress. We’ve seen human beings endure absolutely unthinkable physical conditions, illnesses, and more. We’ve seen people hold their physical selves resilient throughout unthinkable stresses, injuries, amputations, cancers, and beyond. This “meat suit” we are given to carry us through the experience of life is a fragile and vulnerable one but an incredibly resilient and remarkably self-generating one. Our bones regrow and heal back together. Even our brain can regenerate and regrow and heal. Every part of our body from a cellular level to a muscular level has incredible power and potential.

Though are bodies are capable of handling a tremendous amount of stress, and they do carry stress and they can carry stress, stress is not exactly what the body should be carrying all the time. As men who have lived in active addiction to drugs and alcohol, we’ve put our bodies through unimaginable stress both chemically, physically, and emotionally. Emotions are intangible- we cannot see them or touch them, but when we hold them in, suppress them, and attempt to oppress them, they have an affect on our body. Like any thought, an emotion is an electrical, chemical reaction which has a ripple effect throughout our entire being.

We learn at a young age that holding in our need to go to the bathroom can cause us to feel pain, cause us greater problems, and even cause us to get sick over time. We don’t learn the same about emotions. Holding in our emotions, intentionally or unintentionally, causes us greater problems, can cause us to feel pain in ways that are both detectable and undetectable, and can even cause such deep stress that we do get sick over time. Our body harvests and manifests our emotions like an increasingly clogged drain. Weighed down by stress, our body stops working the way we need it to. As a result, we can experience physical pain, which will only be released when we can release the emotions being held there.

Treatment and recovery offer us the opportunity to connect with our body, as well as our emotions, in a way we never have before.

 

Tree House Recovery of Orange County, California is a premier men’s addiction treatment facility that uses eight different modalities to help our men become the best versions of themselves they can be. We teach our men that every day of their journey is something to celebrate, and that recovery isn’t a sprint– it’s a marathon. By showing our men how to celebrate each day’s victories, we show them that self love isn’t about what we have or haven’t done. It’s about getting a little closer to where we want to be. To get started with Tree House Recovery, call us today at (503) 850-2474