Quiet Lessons from a Loud Body
When I was 24, I was diagnosed with interstitial cystitis—a chronic pain condition of the bladder. The simplest way to describe it is this: it feels like a UTI, but without an infection. No clear cause. No cure. No quick fix.
By the time I received that diagnosis, I had already been living with persistent pain for four years without any real explanation. In some ways, finally having a name for what I was experiencing felt freeing. But at the same time, there was something heavy in what wasn’t being said out loud: this might not go away. I might be living with this for the rest of my life.
That realization sent me to a dark place. And as my emotional world became more overwhelmed, my pain intensified. It felt like my body was working against me.
Over time, I began to notice something important—my pain wasn’t just happening to me. It was connected to my nervous system. So instead of continuing to fight it, I slowly began to listen.
This is what my pain has taught me.
Lesson #1: My nervous system isn’t broken—it’s protective.
I often found myself stuck in a cycle: feeling overwhelmed, then experiencing a pain flare, then turning that frustration inward—telling myself I should have done something sooner to manage my stress. That self-blame only made things worse, and the cycle would continue. Sometimes all I could do was sit in the pain and cry.
What shifted for me was realizing I hadn’t yet learned how to listen to what my body was trying to communicate. My overwhelm wasn’t a failure—it was a signal. In many ways, my system was trying to protect me from pushing too far, from burnout, from ignoring what my body needed.
Over time, I began to see that pain often showed up when something in me needed attention. It was my body’s way of asking me to slow down, to rest, to soften, and to return to the things that actually support my well-being.
Lesson #2: “Just relaxing” wasn’t enough for me.
As a therapist, I understood the importance of mental health days. I was taking them regularly, but I wasn’t weaving mental health support into my everyday life. I was pushing myself hard at work, not prioritizing sleep, and ignoring deeply rooted beliefs that were quietly shaping everything I did. The most significant of these was the belief that my body was broken and that this was simply how life would always be for me.
Rest and mental health days are important, but when you’ve experienced significant medical trauma—like chronic pain—your nervous system operates differently. I realized I needed more than rest; I needed to actively shift those core beliefs into something more adaptive and supportive. This is where Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing (EMDR) became especially helpful for me. I also took a hard look at my life and began making meaningful changes in how I prioritized my time, energy, and well-being.
Lesson #3: I have to choose this perspective every day.
One of the hardest shifts for me was accepting that there wasn’t going to be a single moment where everything clicked and stayed fixed. Instead, I had to learn how to meet myself differently in the small, ordinary moments of my life—and choose to trust that my body knew what it was doing.
This looks like noticing when I am pushing past my limits and choosing to pause instead of overriding my body. It looks like adjusting my expectations for productivity without attaching shame to it. It looks like checking in with myself throughout the day instead of only responding once I’m already in pain or overwhelm.
I am not perfect at this by any means. While they happen less often than they used to, I still have pain flares. And not all of them are emotional in nature. But I can say with certainty that when I’m not in tune with my emotional world, my body is less resourced—and the flares tend to be worse.
Final Thoughts
In some ways, this work was scarier than sitting in the pain itself. It required me to reflect honestly and make changes I didn’t want to make at the time. But I can see now that those changes were not just necessary—they were life-giving. Now that I can see the impact they’ve had on my life, I don’t regret them at all. I feel more connected to myself, more able to listen to my body, and more willing to trust what it’s been trying to tell me all along.
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