Dr. Wilson's book on Adrenal Fatigue tells the case of a woman who was finding it difficult to recover from it. This woman had "several energy suckers in her life, including her mother" and she felt guilty if she did not have regular contact with them. Sound familiar? His prescription was to eliminate contact with these energy suckers and to absolutely minimise contact with the mother. She was not to speak to her mother for more than three minutes at a time and only twice per week. He then goes on to say: "Although these energy suckers were not the major factors causing her adrenal fatigue, until they were removed, she was not able to recover".
I strongly disagree with his statement. I am convinced that "these energy suckers" WERE the MAJOR factors causing the AF.
A family I know have a son and a daughter in their late twenties, the son is an alcoholic and has been off work for depression for the last couple of years. The daughter is very overweight and is constantly yo-yo dieting, losing the weight and putting three times more on when she re-gains it. As far as the parents are concerned, the son's problems are his doing and the daughter has a weight problem because she has "celiac disease". I know three other people with celiac disease, and lo and behold, they all have emotionally unavailable fathers/husbands. The father in the family mentioned above is also emotionally unavailable. My father also was (and is) emotionally unavailable. My conclusion is that all these issues that are blamed as the problem, i.e. alcohol, obesity, depression, allergies, food intolerances, psoriasis, and constant fatigue, etc. are not the problem but a consequence of the root problem, which is: dealing with pathological people who either make your life misery or constantly withhold what they should be giving naturally. While I am willing to allow for the "correlation isn't always causation" principle and concede that maybe not all cases of those problems mentioned above are caused by difficult family relations, in all the cases I personally know of, I can find this common element. Maybe the issue is cloudy for the professionals because every person's body reacts differently, i.e. as in the case of the family mentioned above, perhaps if both children struggled with alcohol, the source of the problem would be more obvious. It is also a lot more work for a doctor to try to put all the factors together to get the real picture. In all the years since my brother was diagnosed with schizophrenia, not once has any doctor asked to see any of the other family members. I guess it's a lot easier for them to deal with the symptoms that to try to get to the root of the problem...
It is easier to deal with symptoms. That's what doctors are taught. However, we can take our own study to a new level. I am looking for the energy drainers in my life and discovering that I can patch the holes that seem to give them access to me. One is going more and more no contact with some family members. Interesting that we are coming up with similar solutions for adrenal fatigue.
ReplyDeleteI know that limiting contact with members of my FOO has made a very big difference to my energy levels. The book on AF uses an illustration similar to yours : Imagine we're like a barrel full of holes, the more holes the more energy we lose. Makes sense. Identifying and patching up the holes is the way to go. :)
DeleteI agree with you: They are treating symptoms not the problem. I'm realizing this more and more as I struggle with my weight. I lose weight when I feel safe. I don't feel safe often, so I'm trying to work around it. I'm failing miserably but not giving up.
ReplyDeleteI'm not sure is a case of failing miserably, your body is trying to put up a barrier between you and your NM to defend itself, I'm not sure there's much you can do to counteract that, other than finding another way to protect yourself so that your body doesn't feel the need to create this barrier to protect you.
DeleteHi Kara,
ReplyDeleteIt's so hard to get people talking in general about the toxic effects of family dynamics and FOO members that getting the medical profession to recognize it will always be impossible. But chronic emotional stress has catastrophic effects on the body over time. We all know this. Not just self-destructive behaviors, but just the constant gearing up for fight or flight with each contact, event or conversation. That's why 'plugging the holes' is so important. Funny (well maybe not funny) how celiac disease has become a big catch-all, hasn't it? xo CS
Hi CS,
DeleteI did a quick google on the causes of celiac disease and check this out:
(this is an excerpt from a NY Times article)
"Yet the more scientists study celiac disease, the more some crucial component appears in need of identification. Roughly 30 percent of people with European ancestry carry predisposing genes, for example. Yet more than 95 percent of the carriers tolerate gluten just fine. So while these genes (plus gluten) are necessary to produce the disease, they’re evidently insufficient to cause it.
Animal studies have reinforced that impression. In mice engineered to express those H.L.A.’s, tolerance to gluten must be deliberately “broken.” Without an immunological trigger of some kind, the rodents happily tolerate the protein."
Any guesses as to what that "trigger" is?
Kara xxoo
Well my guess is literally as good as yours, and is the same guess. I think that Toxic FOO Syndrome is a critically underdiagnosed disease. TFS. Epigenetics in action.
DeleteTFS is spot on CS. Great term.
DeleteTFS. Love it! I have suspected these "mystery" conditions for a long time. Fibromyalgia, for example, which has no known cause. I think it is a physical manifestation of untreated depression. Celiac probably fits into this category, too, as do many other conditions with "no known causes." When I began recovery, I noticed an unmistakable drain of energy when I was around my FOO. I'd go for a visit with lots of intentions to do other things in my childhood home (visit old friends, go to AA meetings, go shopping, go for walks in the woods) and would end up laying around watching TV and eating. The loss of energy was immediate and obvious. There is no doubt in my mind that this is a real condition, and that it is a cause of fatigue, adrenal or otherwise, as well as aches and pains and, at least in my case, reduced immune capacity
ReplyDeleteToday when I get fatigued, I've learned to look first at emotional causes. The relationship between emotional and physical is so strong for me that I know this is almost always the cause. When I feel fatigued, it's usually because I'm having some recurrence of depression, or some stuck feelings that are trying to make their way to the surface. Sometimes, it's just a plain old virus, but more often than not, the emotions are at the root of the problem--even if it turns out to be a virus.
Few doctors will ever treat this, I think. It requires a general knowledge of medicine, and today's medical world is one of specialization. I've done a lot of body work over the years--kinesiology, rolfing, guided meditation massage, qigong--and all have helped me understand and respect my mind/body connection. Plain old meditation was one of the most powerful: after sitting quietly for a period, I began to notice how my body was naturally tensed, especially my hands, as if to protect myself from attack. Once aware of this, it took months to stop doing it and relax. But it made perfect sense, didn't it? Of COURSE I was braced for attack. I lived my entire childhood in this state. Anyone who thinks this isn't going to cause fatigue and other physical symptoms just isn't seeing the whole picture.
Great post, Kara. I love how you're exploring these issues, XX00, Kitty
Hi Kitty,
DeleteI think you're on to something with your theory on Fibromyalgia, it fits every case I know. What I have seen in people with Celiac disease is that they tend to be "Everything is Just Fine" types, who allegedly never have any problems and are always busy helping other people out. From what I've see the gut is very connected to reality. Just think of what happens when you go on holiday, how does the gut know it's a different toilet? ;) The human body is so much more complex than what the medical profession acknowledges.
What you describe about your plans of doing lots of things when visiting your FOO and ending up not doing any of them is my experience too. It's almost impossible to explain the feeling: an overpowering force who boycotts any possible plan. :P
I had also noticed a lot of tension in my hands: that they are clenched a lot of the time. How interesting that the body reacts to what it picks up and does it without us even realising that's what's going on. In a book I read years ago, it spoke about this muscular tension, and how it tires the body out, because a tense muscle is a muscle that is working. Makes you think about the amount of energy it takes to maintain this "tension" in the body at all times. No wonder we get so exhausted. XXOO
Yup. It's what I meant when I described my mother as a "depressogen." Just dealing with them changes physiology. I think we should do a group post on TSF. I'll start it on CS, but I'll add comments to main text. Let's put it out there, since doctors obviously won't. love CS
Deletelol, yep, the gut knows it's a different toilet, that's for sure. Your theory about celiac makes perfect sense. I bet if we gave it some thought we could come up with all kinds of these conditions. I don't know anyone with celiac, but a friend of mine with fibromyalgia is a stoic woman who is a great person but pretty cut off from her emotions, and who I know had a tough childhood...
DeleteI used to call the TFS I experienced when visiting my FOO "wet cement syndrome." I felt like I weighed a ton. I still get fatigued, but I only have that particular sense of heaviness in those situations.
"How interesting that the body reacts to what it picks up and does it without us even realising that's what's going on." Yes. The body is an absolute wealth of information. We can learn so much from bodywork, from secrets about our past to learning how to stay grounded in the present moment. Hokey as some of it sounds, bodywork has been a huge part of my recovery.
Looking forward to your TFS post, CS.You really have a knack for coming up with great names! If I come up with anything decent to say about it after reading yours, I'll give it a shot. :) XX00, Kitty
Excellente muchacha.xx it will be a work in progress, and we can all add stuff as it occurs. I'm pretty sure my arthritis has been strongly triggered by my FOO; and I know for a fact that my depression was what they call "kindled" by the way my parents, mostly my mother, treated me for many years.
Delete