Maybe There’s Nothing Wrong With You After All

I wonder how often we ask ourselves, what is wrong with me? I hear variations of this question regularly. People wonder why they shut down in conflict, why they can't seem to get themselves moving, why they become overwhelmed by things that other people seem to manage, or why they sometimes feel completely disconnected from what is happening around them. There can be a lot of shame attached to these experiences, particularly when we don't understand where they have come from.

But I wonder if sometimes we are asking the wrong question.

If we grew up with chronic stress, trauma, unpredictability or emotional disconnection, our nervous system had to learn how to manage the world we were living in. Our nervous system wasn't making a conscious decision about how it would respond; it was simply doing the best it could with the information and resources available to it at the time.

Think about a small child who is distressed and doesn't get the response they need. They cry, perhaps they cry louder, they become angry, they try to get someone's attention, and eventually there may come a point where their little nervous system realises that none of these things are working. They can't leave, they can't reason with the adult caring for them, and they can’t understand why they aren't being comforted. Sometimes the only thing left for the nervous system to do is to become very still, very quiet and disconnected.

That response is protective when there is no other option.

You know what I find interesting? Our nervous system doesn't necessarily know that the situation has changed simply because we have grown up. We developed patterns to get through difficult experiences and these patterns may continue years later, even when we are living a very different life. I may withdraw when someone is angry with me, become numb when things feel too much, feel overwhelmed, or find myself unable to act when what I really want to do is move forward. Do you know what I mean?

We become frustrated with ourselves and wonder, Why am I like this? Why can't I just get over it?

Perhaps a more compassionate question is, what happened to me that taught my body this was necessary?

The relationship between our body and our emotional experience is fascinating. We often think of ourselves as having a brain that thinks and a body that simply carries us around, but our nervous system is constantly taking in information about what is happening around us and making assessments about safety and threat, often without us consciously realising it.

This is part of what we mean when we talk about neuroception. Our bodies are continually asking, Am I safe here? Do I need to protect myself? And if we have lived for a long time with uncertainty or threat, that system can become very finely tuned to danger.

This is where I think the old expression "trust your gut" becomes interesting. There is a very real two-way communication between our gut and our brain, and our digestive system has an enormous network of nerves of its own. So yes, there is some science behind the idea that our gut is giving us information.

But there is a little catch.

If our nervous system has spent years looking for danger, our gut feeling may sometimes be responding to a familiar pattern of threat rather than what is actually happening in the present. Something can feel unsafe because it reminds our body of something that was unsafe, even though we are now sitting in a completely different situation with a completely different person.

That doesn't mean we should ignore our intuition. It simply means it can be useful to become curious about it.

Is this a genuine sense that something isn't right, or is my nervous system recognising something familiar and sounding the alarm?

Our breathing can give us another little window into what is happening underneath the surface. Chronic stress and trauma can influence the way we breathe, and we may find ourselves holding our breath, breathing more shallowly or feeling as though we can't quite get a satisfying breath, particularly when we are under pressure. Often we don't even notice that we are doing it until someone draws our attention to it.

And then there are those moments when something finally feels safe and we let out a huge sigh, take a deep breath, yawn, or suddenly realise how much tension we've been carrying in our shoulders and jaw.

I think this is one of the reasons I like the idea of becoming curious about our bodies rather than trying to control them. There are certainly breathing practices that can help regulate the nervous system, but I don't think we need to turn regulation into another thing we have to perform correctly. If someone is already anxious, being told to "just relax and take a deep breath" isn't necessarily particularly helpful!

Sometimes it is much gentler than that. We might notice our feet on the floor, look around the room, allow our breathing to settle rather than forcing it, or simply spend time with someone whose presence helps us feel safe.

That last one is particularly important to me. We can do a lot of work on ourselves, but our nervous systems also learn through relationships. Being with someone who is calm, present and accepting can provide an experience that is quite different from what we may have known earlier in life. Over time, those experiences can help us develop a greater sense of safety within ourselves.

And sometimes, as we become safer, we begin to notice things that we couldn't notice before. We might become more aware of our emotions, feel tired after doing difficult emotional work, cry more easily, notice tension leaving our body, or simply find ourselves responding differently to situations that previously would have sent us into overwhelm. There can be physical sensations as well, but I think we need to be a little careful about interpreting every yawn, tear or tremble as evidence that we are "releasing trauma". Our bodies are complicated, and there can be many explanations for what we experience.

What matters to me is that we become more able to listen rather than judge.

Instead of What is wrong with me?, perhaps we can begin to ask, What is happening for me? What is my body responding to? What did I learn to do to keep myself safe? And does that response still serve me now?

Therapy for me is that journey. The journey where we aren't necessarily trying to get rid of parts of ourselves that we don't like; instead we are trying to understand them. Often the things we most dislike about ourselves have a history, and when we understand that history, we can have more compassion for ourselves.

The nervous system is remarkably adaptable. With safety, connection and repeated experiences of being okay in the present, we can learn new ways of responding. We don't have to spend the rest of our lives reacting to yesterday's dangers.

Perhaps there is something else that becomes possible as we become more comfortable being with ourselves rather than constantly trying to fix ourselves.

Sometimes there is a sense of spaciousness, quietness and connection that is difficult to describe. A feeling that we are part of something much bigger than our individual worries and stories. For me, there is something quite lovely about that paradox: we can have a very strong sense of being ourselves while also experiencing a sense of connection to something much greater than ourselves.

And perhaps the funny part is that after all our years of trying so hard to work ourselves out, we sometimes discover that there is nothing particularly wrong with us at all.

You are human being and your nervous system has been doing it’s best to protect you.

And  sometimes healing is simply learning that you don't have to be quite so hard on yourself. You can show up for you. And just maybe There’s Nothing Wrong With You After All