Since completing this website in March 2024 the journey of self-exploration through somatic healing has continued unabated. The reward of that journey has been to understand something very important regarding the relationship between the mind and the body, and how conflicts in the psyche can trigger symptoms of Crohn’s disease, a disease in which the immune system struggles to distinguish self v’s not-self.
The Immune System gone awry?
The classic explanation of Crohn’s disease is that the immune system ‘goes wrong’ and begins attacking the body. From the Crohn’s and Colitis UK website;
“We don’t yet fully understand what causes Crohn’s, but it happens when the body’s immune system goes wrong. Usually, the immune system protects the body against harmful substances and infections. In Crohn’s, the immune system starts attacking the gut. We don’t know yet why this happens. It’s probably caused by a mix of genes, bacteria in the gut and something in the environment.”
Or fighting pathogens?
Alternatively some suggest the immune system attacks pathogens in the bowel causing inflammation. This was my experience when detoxing my bowel from the MAP bacterium. From the NIH Library of Medicine;
“Microbial factors
The hypothesis of a microbial involvement in CD can be supported by the location of the lesions with aphthous ulcers appearing in Peyer’s patches, by the predominance of lesions where the bacterial concentration is the highest and also by the favourable therapeutic effects of temporary transit derivation and antibiotics in moderate flares.
Gut microbiota is the subject of an unprecedented interest in all the fields of gastroenterology. All recent studies confirm the existence of a dysmicrobiosis phenomenon with low levels of Firmicutes, Bifidobacterium, and Lactobacilli, while higher numbers of Escherichia coli and other strains of Enterobacteria.”
Mind/body connection
However, rather than just looking for physical causes alone, could the manifestation of the symptoms of Crohn’s disease be related to a conflict in the psyche, perhaps involving long held trauma from one’s childhood carried forward into adult life? This is explored in the remainder of this post based on my experience of somatic healing.
If a child is raised with violent and/or controlling parents or perhaps in an environment in which the child simply doesn’t feel safe then behaviour patterns can develop to appease the child’s perception of external authority. For example it might develop ‘submissive traits’ to avoid violence at the hands of it’s father, or perhaps a ‘pleasing personality’ to ensure it is not abandoned by it’s mother. But in this process the child can abandon itself, the natural development of it’s own identity, it’s sense of self. This is abandoned due to fears for it’s safety at the hands of external authority and the child can develop behaviours and beliefs that are ‘not me’ but instead imposed upon it and accepted through fear of the consequence of not complying with the demands of the people it perceives as authorities in it’s young world.
The child can then gradually develop into adulthood exhibiting poor personal boundaries, or worse still, none at all due to it’s needs being continually overridden by the imposition of the demands of parents or it’s society generally (such as peers). It is, in a sense, invaded by forces around it that are more powerful than it’s own boundaries. This can also mean the child develops a poor sense of self or perhaps no sense of self at all as it’s own identity is suppressed due to it’s need to comply with the demands of it’s external authorities. As the child is commonly not supported in discovering it’s own values and needs the behaviour patterns it develops are often retained in the sub-conscious mind for years to come.
My experience of Crohn’s included being invaded by the Candida fungus as well as the MAP parasite, followed by a massive immune response resulting in inflammation of the small bowel. This led to surgery twice with the consultant on one occasion saying that when he opened me up I was ‘all twisted up inside’. Although I wasn’t aware of it at the time, the physical symptoms bore a striking resemblance to the experiences stored in the psyche…. multiple fears for my safety resulting in behaviour patterns that were established due to the demands of my ‘authority figures’ when I was young. My sense of self was non-existent, I was comprised of a ‘twisted’ mass of demands of the authority figures of my childhood.
There were no personal boundaries, no sense of an identity and hence nothing to defend and protect. Instead the demands and opinions of others invaded me and I sought to be what I thought others would like – the complete invasion of ‘me’. There simply was no sense of ‘self’, only ‘not self’ – to the point where the views and opinions of others directed my behaviour. Changing my diet, my water, purging the parasitic infections and removing external stressors helped my body to recover. But to calm the immune system such that it recognised self V’s not self, and to ensure those same pathogens did not invade my body again required an intense spell of somatic healing.
The good news is that the conflicts stored in the psyche and reflected in the body as Crohn’s disease can be healed and overcome with the help of an experienced and understanding therapist. With support our consciousness can learn to say ‘No’, to develop healthy boundaries and take back authority for our own lives. We can learn to identify that which is essentially ‘us’, to fiercely protect it and learn to recognise and discard all behaviours and beliefs that are ‘not us’. Correspondingly our bodies will respond by developing strong healthy immune systems that protect our well-being and remove invading pathogens. Just as our minds learn to recognise what our needs are, what defines us and to drop old behaviour patterns based on fear, so our bodies learn to protect ‘self’ and discard all that is ‘not self’.
This is not an easy journey but few rewards are greater than discovering one’s inner being and then fiercely protecting it against invasion by anyone or anything that attempts to impose itself on our sovereignty.