You're Not Crazy For Being Sick - Understanding Psychosomatic Illness 

All I know is a lot of doctors dismiss symptoms because they assume it’s psychosomatic. My friend has a 10 year old daughter who came to the ER multiple times with rib pain and got dismissed as having a pulled muscle & being dramatic, when she actually had a rare cancer all around her lungs. She just survived 7 months of chemotherapy & radiation and is in remissions thankfully

I'm only 20min into the video and my teenage years now make so much more sense. I was so stressed out from being bullied at school that I had several stomuch ulcers, lost weight to dangerous levels and I had no emotional support after my best friend died. My parents are a doctor and a pharmacist, there was an external solution to EVERYTHING while all I needed were hugs and affirmations. They themselves had emotionally unavailable parents since both had lived through WW2 and other brutal things. I have a three year old daughter now and I try SO HARD to learn about myself to heal the trauma that is instilled into me by the two previous generations. It's so hard. I cry, a lot, learning through my own pain how much pain my own mother must have bottled up inside of her. Dr. K, you have no idea how much you're helping our wee little girl by helping her gaming parents to understand themselves better and be there for her, with all our hearts.

I suffered an extreme case of psychosomatic illness, where I basically lost function of my hands for half a year, due to extreme pain. It manifested at first as cubital tunnel syndrome, then carpal tunnel syndrome, then went through all diseases imaginable as each one was ruled out medically. My family and I were terrified that I might never regain full use of my hands (based on a diagnosis of fibromyalga). Finally, a psychologist posited a crackpot theory how my mind was causing all this to escape the stress I was getting from Uni and work. The moment I took this seriously, the extreme, constant pain went away within a week. This experience has changed my entire perspective on the medical system, my mind and life in general. The mind-body connection is so much more powerful than you believe

When Dr. K said that its not mental weakness that causes psychosomatic illnesses, but instead too much mental fortitude I felt so heard. Many nights I find myself super stressed, to the point of almost feeling sick and having chess pain, at the end of the day, and I thought of it as a mental weakness, that I got worn down too easily. Now I realize that I need to be more mindful of how tired I am, and how stressed during the day to make sure I'm not ignoring these things.

Had GI problems for 6 years doctors were convinced it was cuz of my anxiety. turns out I got bit by a tick and now I am allergic to beef and pork. Worst part is its condition i had asked my doctor about 3 years ago that only required a blood test. I ended paying out of pocket for a immunologist. I did get it recompensated by insurance when i tested positive, but it still sucked that i basically had to go behind my GPs back to get the test.

I had to vomit nearly every morning from 5th grade to 12th grade (BC I was extremely nauseous the first few hours of the school day) nobody was able to diagnose me or help me with anything, somewhere around the 10th grade a doctor told me it was probably psychosomatic, nice I had a name for it, but still no help. These were some bad times which led to depression and much more, i'm happy that I got through it alive :)

A new term I've heard that I really like is "Psychobiological Illness." The term psychosomatic has unfortunately been tremendously misunderstood as being "all in your head," when in fact, it's very much not! Sometimes I just term it as "stress related" to my massage clients, although even that can feel blamey to some, like, "oh you're just not managing your stress well enough." And in this vein, let's not forget that alexithymia was a survival adaptation for those of us who have it. It's not that we were born defective or we have been purposely suppressing our emotions. Nobody saw and reflected our emotions and taught us what they were -- and/or our emotions weren't responded to with co-regulation. Maybe we were even threatened, or punished for having them ("I'll give you something to cry about!") So we had to "rip out the dashboard wires" because having these emotions we had no way to regulate, was far worse than the misattunement/abuse/neglect we were already experiencing. We had to do it to survive, because the emotions were overwhelming.

I grew up parentified, and i honestly don't have a memory of my mom where she was not sick. She promised to attend graduations, then few days before them she would say she is sick. That happened in everything when it comes to my life so i was the caretaker, taking her to hospital, reminding her to take medicine, and not getting parental care. While talking to my therapist last year, i mentioned how I don't think my mom's sicknesses were just sicknesses, i said i felt like they were giving her free pass from parenting, and getting her the pity she got from people which she seemed to love especially cause she grew up in a house with many siblings so it was hard to get attention if you were healthy. That was the first time i heard about psychosomatic illnesses, and I'm so glad you made this video as it helped me to understand more about this subject.

I've struggled with IBS and Pots, as well as an immunological condition, kind of like rheumatoid, and mood disorders, for 25 years. This is my whole life in this video.

I’ve had chronic IBS for years. Doctors tried to tell me it was psychosomatic. I paid out of pocket for testing and found I had a gut infection of SIBO and H Pylori, which left untreated can cause Stomach Cancer! I’ve been treating the H Pylori and other parasitic bacteria’s and my symptoms are going away. Doctors failed me by saying it was Psychosomatic. I will repeat one more time: My IBS is not caused by trauma. It is not caused by stress or anxiety. It is not caused by a dysregulated nervous system. It was caused because of multiple rounds of antibiotics that destroyed my gut. It was caused by food poisoning that exposed my damaged gut to parasitic bacteria. Everyone story is different, but I’m living proof that IBS is not just a Psychosomatic illness, but rather a real dysbiosis of the gut that can be fully addressed.

thank you for making this. I was about to ask for some discussion on this topic. I've been suffering from chronic symptoms for 10+yrs and it's destroyed my life. I'm the 3rd generation of this. All that was told to my grandmother and mother was "hysteria". I normalized this my entire life and blamed myself not making progress on my depression. Only when I matured did I realize I didn't just have physical symptoms due to my depression, I was depressed because I felt so fucking helpless and desperate from my symptoms and no professional took me seriously. At 12 y/o, the pediatric explanation was "growing pains" + "kids do anything to laze around and skip school". The solution provided to me was vitamins and "drink espresso at least once a day". At 12 years old. I also realized I did not spend my days playing videogames because I was addicted or lazy, I did it because it was my only distraction from my fucking suffering when I couldn't go out in the world and do everything everyone else my age could do. Stop dumping everything into "it's all psychology/psychiatry's job", "it all gets fixed with therapy", "drink water live laugh love do yoga and pray". ESPECIALLY when there is physical evidence - specific autoimmune antibodies, imaging anomalies, etc. It's no wonder people go to the most bizarre potential non-scientific treatments when modern medicine treats them this way.

As a Psych-RN and spouse of a partner struggling with a laundry list of these disorders, I want to thank you for this deep-dive. It provides a framework for both practitioners and sufferers. This is an invaluable video and needs to be broadly distributed. It is a truly remarkable piece of content. Thank you Dr K.

I have a family member with an extreme chronic psychosomatic illness. It is almost impossible to get people to understand. Thank you so much for helping me and others understand it better. Much love for you doc

Those who think these illnesses are only psychosomatic are ignorant. Trauma causes epigenetic changes that can also be passed down through long rna. There are now studies that show that CFS/ME is a mitochondrial dysfunction that stops energy being utilised by the cell, new fibromyalgia studies are showing that the inter muscular pressure in patients is up to 3 times more than average people. Cortisol levels irritate and eventually destroy the gut lining, as do some medications. We could go on for days with all the ways trauma effects the body. Trauma also causes early death through heart attacks, diabetes etc… yet those get treated as medical issues, when for those without trauma are often victims of their own life style choices. All of theses illness pathways are evidence that trauma is stored in the body. Why can’t physicians just accept this fact? Stop treating what someone else did to us as our lifestyle choices or imaginary suffering! Even the term psychosomatic is stigmatising, it should be traumatic injury. You can go to therapy to learn how to manage you flight, fight, freeze responses and reduce your acute stress but until you deal with the chronic stress in the body you can’t recover. 90% of what improved my health were physical changes, not psychological intervention.

I think also it's a cascade effect: we are sick, therefore we fall behind, therefore we have to do more work, to catch up again, therefore we get stressed... because we are stressed we take less care of ourselves, we eat unhealthy, we don't do fitness exersizes, we don't meet friends, therefore we get more stressed and fall behind more, because we get unhappy... At some point you don't have proper muscles anymore that will support your weak body, which gives you crippling pain. You also overexcert them by working for too long. You wrecked your immuno system and your friendships with this ongoing stress and everything starts falling apart like a house of cards... at least that's my experience. Makes me feel good that my way of diet and exersize ( diet is still lacking, but oh well) is the way to go.

I've had anxiety since my teens, thanks to a really narc father. Got burnout from doing both retail and engineering studies in 2018. Graduated just on the start of the pandemic, and the only job i managed to get was from the same place i burned out. I tried for a year to do my job but the ever increasing demands and even kind of getting isolated from other workmates by doing webstores pickups i started to show signs of fibromyalgia. It felt like you had the flue but with only having your body be really sore and it would flare up even worse as the stress increased. Quit that shit five months ago. I'd rather be poor and healthy than grind the fuck out my mind and body for pennies and disrespect. Fuck retail.

Maybe I'm weird, but dr. K's videos are more exciting to watch than any entertainment show. Love the way you explain those things. Such a blessing for humanity

This has got to be one of the most important videos on the internet. As someone with premenstrual dysphoric disorder (PMDD) this hits home so hard.

this is basically a meme at this point, but i was *just* at the doctor’s office talking about my chronic pain/fatigue, systemic inflammation, IBS, and potential fibromyalgia. this video is helpful for understanding more about this very complex and important subject, thanks!

Thx. I'm coping with some kind of chronic fatigue syndrom (three years at least, but even getting a diagnosis is rather difficult), and are sent from doctor to doctor. Those with a somatic background just claim it's a purely psychatric problem (preferably "it's a depression") and thus they can't help me. My psychatrist meanwhile can only send me back to somatic experts, because the psychological front is not the main culprit and under control. It's so frustrating, and honestly: it's the ignorance by many doctors I encounter is sometimes more depressing than the disease itself.

A few weeks ago, after having slept later at night than usual for several months, a sudden and dreadful thought came into my mind and freaked me for no particular reason. That was the thought that I and everyone I know will eventually die. I found it so suddenly terrifying and began to have a series of severe panic attacks for about 10 days. I could barely eat, was getting diarrhea, sweating, vomiting, and just living in fear. I never realized how much mental health could affect your physical health.

Dr. K, I am late. I studied IBS to advocate for myself when I go to the doctor. You summarized years of pain and denial in a 2 hour video. The 6nonlinear condition is what I had described to my doctors and they did not believe me. Thank you for validating my experience and giving me a way to bring my health back into my hands.

My older sis has IBS, so this was useful for me to listen to. She also has ADD, fibromyalgia, endometriosis, PCOS (which a doctor thought was gallbladder issues and wrongly removed it), and she seems to have less stomach issues when she avoids gluten, though we don't know if it's a gluten allergy or just an intolerance from her other issues. SOMEHOW, she manages to work 4.5 days a week and keeps a tidy home with 4 cats, 1 dog, and she cooks for her bf. Idk how she powers through every day but it's amazing. I can agree with psychosomatic illnesses usually coming from trauma/abuse, as we came from the same messy upbringing and I have had issues with anxiety, panic attacks, and depression for years. I used to have stomach issues before school/work, but it has calmed down in recent years. The body and brain are definitely connected!

Thanks for all of this, Dr. K-I'm a health and CBT coach (clinical med and psych background) and this is so valuable and helps me to make the bridge with my patients. SO many people have crossover/comorbidities-- we gotta keep educating. You're an amazing teacher!

Oh My God. I have IBS. Mindblown. I didn't experience everything on the common childhood/life experiences list, but so many other things are clicking into place. I wish I could have known all this sooner, didn't even know what the term "psychosomatic illness" meant, but I'm glad I know now! In some very real sense, I really did overwork and stress myself into "breaking" or I guess more accurately, into rewiring my system into its current dysfunctional state. That example at 32:30, yeah that definitely makes me feel sick. I also get full body chills, elevated heartrate, and a sense of cold fear, which is maybe due to the adrenaline.

The quality of free information being given out here is incredible. Very thankful for you sharing your knowledge.

I’ve got a complex genetic condition, and still find this so helpful. Even when there is a clear organic pathology, these methods can and do assist greatly in maintaining & gaining the greatest level of wellness & functionality possible. Thank you Dr GG. The fact we can access this sort of knowledge for free is incredible to me.

The more I hear about things like this from reputable people, the more my blood boils and the more I'm able to push through workouts solely fueled by the anger have towards negligent social institutions. I really want to get in to youth rights, because it starts in childhood. Kids are not taught about their situations. Kids are not taught emotional health or proper sexual health and safety. I'm assuming this leads or contributes to Alexithemia (?), because kids repress so they can fit molds in a highly impersonal social institution. Down the line, many of these kids can grow up with vices or cardiovascular issues because of repression. Screw the school system :) they are the biggest bystanders.

I am going through really rough time at the moment and I really appreciate the HealthyGamer content. I am so devistated but I've never seen so much hope in such dark times. Thank you from all of my heart.

Interstitial cystitis, pelvic pain, fibro…all started from injuries/infections but stayed chronic because of psychosomatic issues. At their worst, i DID need meds to keep working. Once i figured out the mind body connection, the thing that helped me most was regular exercise and not catastrophizing or over analyzing.

This genuinely means so much to me as someone who has been struggling with this most of my adult life. This is the first comprehensive video about psychosomatic illness I've seen and God, it is such a breath of fresh air. All the thanks and blessings to Dr K and the team.💗💗💗

I had psychosomatic syncopy in high school for months and internalized it really hard when we finally figured out it was psychosomatic, and not a heart, blood pressure, or iron deficiency problem. Years later, I can have some sympathy for my past self and understand my body's reactions to severe and persistent untreated mental sickness much more.

thank you for this. i struggle with these types of issues and i feel so ignored and dismissed anytime i try to talk to doctors about it. i've been doing what i can, but i think i need to be a bit more focused about it if i want to really get better for good. a big problem being poverty makes it hard to buy healthier food, and illness makes it harder to have the energy to make the food, and then the body doesnt act well when you eat food. i've got such disordered eating habits, and my ability to exercise comes and goes with the gut flareups.

I've been in the process of breaking down the parts of my identity that have held me back and it's so true that the emotions are stored internally. Lots and lots of uncomfortable emotions to work through, but the progress is really starting to come alive

The missing piece here isn't only trauma. People with even mild hypermobolity often manifest all these issues. Trauma at any point in life can make it worse. Doctors seem to miss hypermobility and ehler danlos because they've been taught in medical school that its rare. It's not that rare. Fibromyalgia is often being found in people with hypermobility, and not surprisingly so, their deficient collagen structures don't hold the body together correctly at the cellular level. This research is still not well known by mainstream doctors. I went through everything Dr. K is saying and once I started making adjustments wrt to the underlying hypermobility issues, I was able to get a better handle on things and have a better quality of life. Bottom line alot of this isn't psychosomatic illness, I guarantee lots of these patients have Joint Hypermbolity Syndrome and are more sensitive to their environments and stressors (such as early life abuse). I am one of the. All the diseases he mentions - fibromyalgia, POTS, IBS (and also things like mast cell disorders, PMDD and autism) have extemely higher rates in people with JHS. Btw if the body can't mantain status with blood or someome with histamine issues is obviously going to look like an anxiety disorder when its not necesarily from a mental illness standpoint. Hope this helps someome out there as it took me 15 years fo figure out this complicated issue.

That ending...."Good Luck", ironically perfect, after finally hearing a doctor, a psychiatrist amazingly, being honest about the complexity of some illnesses and that we don't actually know all that much, it was a breath of fresh air to be wished luck, because we certainly will need it. But seriously, it's gonna take me a while to settle down after hearing a psychiatrist talking about yoga, meditation and diet. Maybe there is still hope for the profession. Thank you for this lecture, it has confirmed a few things which I had figured out for myself.

I've had decades of being told by doctors my pain "is all in your head"... But it turned out that a) I have HSD/hEDS. b) my joints are actually nearly all on sideways (and it's not a "dysfunctional gait", it's just the actual, physical shape of my body and when I stop trying to force my body into medically approved "neutral" with unsuitable physiotherapy that assumes a "right" way to move, the pain stops). And c) I have a leg length discrepancy... As soon as I start wearing the right shoes, bracing and lifts, the pain is gone. My pain was never psychosomatic. It was just misdiagnosed and untreated my whole life. Once I understand that my wonky joints are my normal and what support and tools they need to exist in a world built for people who fit into medical "neutral"... The only pain I have is from age related wear and tear. When I dislocate something and it needs to recover. Or, the other thing I was told was psychosomatic until someone actually looked... The tiny benign tumours on my spine causing issues with my nervous system... Doctors who don't want to actually look at their patients cause so much harm by both insisting everything they don't personally understand is purely psychological or stress... Whilst also dismissing trauma as something they don't want to treat either. (And I have significant medical trauma - but it doesn't cause my pain, it causes other issues with my mental health.) Doctors need to understand that their behaviour towards patients is frequently traumatic and until they admit to causing medical trauma by not listening (up to outright abuses of power) patients cannot recieve good medical care. I am fully aware that some of my health issues are trauma related. But it's as a direct result of decades of medical negligence and abuse and ignorance. And none of the things I've been told for years were psychosomatic by doctors truly were when someone finally listened and actually looked properly. And no amount of mediclaly weaponised CBT or mindful meditation or yoga (which, is really bad for hypermobility and makes it worse unless you have a teacher who really understands how to support joint issues, which most don't) was ever going to "fix" it. I never needed to be "fixed". Medicine does. Systematically.

A coworker of mine had to retire because of her husband's medical issues which have been stumping their doctors. And it sounds exactly like how you're describing POTS. I'm going to try showing her this so maybe it'll help her understand what's happening better and figure things out with their physicians. He has partly blocked arteries and has already had one surgery stressing his heart.

Very much pertains to autism. That's what masking is - ignoring the stress signals sent to the body for the sake of social integration. Doing it for 13 years left me a shell due to dissociation.

What helped me most to get rid of reoccuring wrist pain was just a physiotherapist that talked to me and told me that she went through the same struggles but it's completely possible to overcome it. The doctor before that just told me to quit my job and that there is no other solution.

I had pylori and had really bad episodes of vomiting and whatnot. Every doctor I saw told me I had IBS and I was like I used to have that when I was younger and this doesn't feel like that!!! And I finally had an endoscopy and got my antibiotics. A doctor even told me I was bulimic for god's sake. In my experience dr say "psychosomatic" when they have no clue what is wrong with you.

And then there’s people like me who get told everything is psychosomatic and I can’t gain weight because I definitely have an ED with a BMI of under 18 and I’m just suppressing it. Turns out I’m allergic to all stone fruit, only took 15 years to find out and 7 times gastric ulcers nearly every damn cherry season (they said it was stress related while I was on holiday ofc). I tell you NO doctor ever thought of an allergic reaction while neurological symptoms, asthma and “all summer diarrhea and gastritis” are pretty easy to connect to that. I only got the idea because I randomly stumbled upon an article and read that stone fruit allergies are commonly developed in late teenage years and had a test taken and an elimination diet this year (I’m 32). I could never point it to one food because it’s cherries, peaches, plums, apricots and also strawberries and I was eating all of them all summer. I gained 14lbs already… while usually I’d lose 12lbs during summertime. Thank you medical gaslighting.

Awesome video. "Don't give up hope". Might sound silly, but I really needed to hear this rn.

All of my illnesses that are now finally diagnosed as physical illnesses, after id been saying it for years and years, were labelled "psychosomatic" by psychs before and dismissed. difficulty urinating due to a urethral stricture, neck and back pain due to polyradiculopathy on 10 nerve roots, tinnitus tied to an ASD (im a woman..) that i got perpetually gaslit on and only got tested for at 22 after i paid out of pocket and found the testing place myself, headaches due to familial hemiplegic migraine, Digestive issues due to Intestinal methanogen overgrowth (ok that one is complicated, but theres no utility to treating it as psychosomatic, and no treatment is received that way). all of that had been labelled as "psychosomatic", and ignored. 4 of of these could have been diagnosed with a single test, and my diagnosis was delayed by 6 whole years, and i had to pay all of it out of pocket. This long term dismissive treatment has left me with a complex bundle of medical trauma that builds upon my previous trauma that i sought help for from psychs in the first place. Had i never sought help from psychs, id be less traumatised than i am now, they did not help with trauma, but did cause me more trauma. This label is of such a nature (unfalsibiable) that its so damagimg it shouldnt even be used, because it systemically _prompts_ patient dismissal and unserious treatment. It is often used as a euphemism for "hypochondriasis" as well. Just no. In reality there are no real distinction between "psychosomatic" and "physical" because your brain is a physical organ, as is your gut. None of that actually really makes sense. All that remains is that strong dismissal potential

POTS is actually very strongly linked to sideropenia (iron deficiency) and low iron storage. iron deficiency is ofc defined by its fatigue, and is also directlx tied to anxiety and irritability

This has to be the single most comprehensive yet precise, amazing video that I have ever seen explaining my entire experience with the medical system the last 5 years and my traumatic life up until this point. I have said so many times over the years that "doctors don't connect things they just focus on what symptom is in front of them right now." This video is real help, and I'm so grateful that you took the time to put this content out there into the world.

This is incredible, doc, thank you so much. I’ve suffered with chronic pain for decades and always known it was psychosomatic, but nobody could successfully tell me what to do about it. A truly incredible coincidence: a lot of this is stuff, my massage therapist was telling me just a week ago. She was a trained psychologist in Russia, but her degree was not good for practice in the US. It sounds like their style of psychoanalysis is a lot more equipped to help! I mean, I was face down in the massage table talking about how I always feel like I have to change something external! And she was telling me the solution is for me to change my mind! Like, the exact subject of this video. My body/mind connection is severely lacking in interoception- I have intractable bruxism that I don’t notice while it’s happening, despite it causing serious pain and problems. Wild stuff.

Yeah, often i feel like doctors say its all psychosomatic if they don't care to think long enough what the actual problem could be.

Just shared this video with a family member in need, thank you for everything you do!

Thank you, Dr. K. As a patient with Fibromyalgia and mental illness, I understand deeply now that I need to get back into exercising, eating healthier & doing mindfulness practices on a consistent basis. (I've been getting therapy & medications for years.)

This video was so good I watched it a second time, this time with my parents. My situation is mostly a combination of hyperactive nervous system (IBS, circulation issues, vomiting even when I got too excited to the point where my parents would lie to me when they were taking me to the toy shop), and complete lack of emotional modulation (I can listen to a hype song and get all sweaty and heart racing even while I'm sitting). I also exhibit what would otherwise call "anxious" even when I speak (would either raise my voice or talk too fast). Last week I saw a random power cable at the kitchen wall and my kneejerk reaction was "what kind of cockroach flying abomination is this?" before I realize it was the cable. I also think my exagerrated stress response in hypothetical scenarios is also the cause of my procrastination.

Just what I needed to see, after breaking out in stress-hives yet again on this Tuesday afternoon 👌

OMG I’ve been searching for this information for almost 30 years! It all aligns with my experience and makes things so much clearer. Thank you thank you !

While some of the physical symptoms of POTS overlap with the symptoms of anxiety, such as tachycardia and palpitations, POTS is not caused by anxiety. POTS patients are often misdiagnosed as having anxiety or panic disorder. Research has shown that POTS patients are similarly or even less likely to suffer from anxiety or panic disorder than the general public. Research surveys that evaluate mental health show similar results between POTS patients and national norms

As a practising psychologist, many thanks for such a coherent and informative breakdown of this. The aoe healing from your videos extends to other professionals being better able to support clients on topics that we are often not trained on. Sincerely, thank you, Dr. K.

I grew up with chronic nausea and vomiting but not any trauma. Regardless of whether the symptoms came from within me or not the solution was positively within me. Now I’ve not had spasmatic vomiting for 5 years. Also medical cannabis addressed the nausea and magic mushrooms helped me pave the neural pathway to the solution that resided within me as well.

Thank you for sharing this! As someone who works as a PA previously in Hospitalist Medicine and now in Psychiatry and Geriatrics, this is very helpful with understanding pathophysiology of so many illnesses that are so perplexing and it really helps to be able to break this down/be affirming to patients who are struggling so they can recover and know that their experience is real. I really appreciate the work that you do, Dr. K!

Wow this is everything i’ve been trying to explain to my mom who has chronic ibs (intense abuse history) for literally 2 years now all in one place thank you so much

Once again talking about things almost nobody else talks about/knows about. Thank you for this!!! This was excellent and a little bit validating if I may say so.

I got diagnosed with Neurally Mediated Hypotension (which is the same category as Chronic Fatigue Syndrome) a few years ago, but every doctor I went to said it was depression. The problem is, all the "depression symptoms" didnt start until after the fainting spells started wreaking havoc on my life. So I had cardio and pcp sending me to psych for depression, and psych sending me back because they said I wasn't really showing depression just a reaction to the situation. Now I just deal w it, do yoga and holistic med, and dont bother seeing any doctors 😂 I always say I'll go to the doc if I'm bleeding or broken but not for anything they can’t see

Thanks for everything that you put in here, and the work you're doing for all of us!! I love how you meld the two approaches to "health" together ❤️

Thank you for uploading this. So many people with chronic pain and illness have run out of options on treatment with medications and surgery.

Another banger of a video. Dr. K isn't just a national treasure at this point but a WORLD treasure. I love everything you do Dr. K. Much love to you and your family! 😊

I hope this reaches Dr. K. I watched this video right when it came out. It helped me so much, I can't even describe. Realizing that I am not mentally weak, but strong. But the biggest one was realizing I have IBS. I have been struggling with underweight for my whole life. I started eating and gained 12kg in the 6 month. My mood is stable, I have the energy to seriously lift now. I went from barely holding it together as a worker to talking about taking over the firm I work at. Just this one simple change, realizing I starved my whole life. Thank you Dr. K. and everyone involved.

This is incredibly helpful in understanding a lot of my issues. The amount of times I’ve had to cancel plans due to tummy issues is not even funny. I didn’t even realize it’s connected to anxiety. I feel a lot of pressure around family and I haven’t enjoyed participating for a long time for many reasons. I have RA and one of the medications I was on gave me a lot of digestive troubles but besides the tummy issues it gave me it was very effective.

I'd love to hear more about this! A discussion on Gabor Maté's The Myth of Normal would be cool too, he talks about the systemic factors leading to illness.

I've been struggling with burnout and psychosomatic stress symptoms for many years, and have been on sick leave for more than 7 months now (I work as a PhD student in science). And after this video I've FINALLY gotten vital little pieces of information I needed and had been missing! And Dr. K told it all in only 1,5 hours, which is quite remarkable :) So now I actually made a powerpoint with this info so I can show my habilitation doctors and discuss with them. I was diagnosed with autism, so the ability for my mind to work around stress is different... but now I have more understanding to work from! I'am SO grateful to Dr K and the team for this! Thank you so, so much!

ASTROLOGY helped me think systematically and accurately assess my physical health signals! just by becoming aware of all of the different "ruler ships" of the body.

I used to get psychosomatic hives that would grow big enough to cover my entire arm/leg. No doctor could ever tell me what was wrong until I talked to my therapist about it and it turns out these hives would come up when I was really stressed.

Thank you so much for having these long videos on youtube. Playing them in the background really helps when I am trying to study or get school work done,

you’ve been so helpful in my healing journey. more than most doctors. thank you so much for these videos

Finally an explanation! THANK YOU I was looking for so long for content like this. Went to so many doctors for my gut problems, no one could help me. Some told me it's all in my head, some told me to just stop eating carbs and milk and sugar and fodmaps and histamines and red meat and processed food and so on, one told me to Google my problems (WTF), one told my there's nothing I can do I'm just born with a crapy liver without doing any tests to support that. Waisted Thousands of dollars for nothing

My IBS has recently started getting better - even tho I dropped the meds that help a little bit (I did that from time to time to see if anything is changing). I first thought it was just diet changes. But at the same time I've started going to a yoga studio in May. Now it makes sense as this is not the first time I've made a diet change but the first time I've started practicing yoga regularly.

Thank you so much Dr. K for sharing your knowledge with us. I've been suffering from severe depression and anxiety in addition to psychosomatic illness (IBS, fibromyalgia, chronic fatigue). I have to admit that I went back through your lecture because as my depression has become slightly better, I realized that most of it didn't sink in the first time around. But it gives me hope that I may be able to do somethings to start feeling better.

Wow, I love how blunt/ real you are while giving great information. I'm having some serious issues. I'm hoping this information will help me.

You are such an amazing teacher. thanks for everything !

10:00 this is exactly how I described to my therapyst, I fully understand how I do it and why I do it. I found out last year at 35 that I have autism, from very young age I noticed that my body could not handle what the world required me to do in order to function "properly", so I just went full-power mode and forced my own body to do what I wanted to. This led to many health issues. I don't know how to function without doing it this way, that's what I'm trying to figure out. Otherwise I understand I won't live long enough, living on full-stress mode is a terrible way to go through life.

Thank you for sharing the knowledge and the passion you’re putting into this. ❤

This is the best of your videos in a while imo not to talk crap on any others I just love this type of stuff

i had chronic pain in my hands that lasted about a year and a half, made me fall in depression as my main job is being an artist and I just couldnt cope with not being able to not utilize my hands, i ruled out a lot of diseases trough medical work and even got falsily diagnosed with lupus, sarno books on back pain being due to an underlying psychosomatic disorder most of the time opened my mind at the time and taking the knowledge seriously made my pain go away almost completely, even if sometimes it migrates to other areas, its such. Pitty because the information we have on psychosomatic disorders is so overlooked these days..

I'm glad this clip auto played cuz it might've been one I would've skipped not understanding what psychosomatic illness meant, but this is exactly what I've been experiencing and I'm determined that being put on an anti-anxiety med from my GP was not the only answer. Thank you for this other perspective on how to use other methods to heal.

WOW, learnt so much from this, thank you, I'm gonna try fix myself. This is an eye opening for something that's bothering me for years because my stress is chronically high.

You are genius! 🎉And a good teacher. It is so kind and generous of you to share your knowledge in a way that we can all understand. We need to know this stuff for ourselves and our loved ones. I wish all the doctors and counselors knew this too. The mind and body and spirit connection is so intertwined and you explain it so well. I thank you and I will listen to this whole seminar again. It seems that we should all buy very expensive tickets to hear this kind of seminar. Thank you, Professor!

My concern will the notion that illness is psychosomatic is this. Many doctors call it psychosomatic without investigating, especially concerning absominal issues. My brother and sister almost had ruptured appendix because no investigation was done until they had high fever. I went with abdominal problems until I found out peppers were from the nightshade family. I'm allergic to tomatoes which are nightshades. Once I stopped eating peppers, my stomach problems cleared. I'd been told all my life my stomach problems were psychosomatic. Investigate first.

What I struggle with about this rationale is that there are loads of people that block things out, power through, have been abused, in fact that's the default for our society, and the majority of them don't have chronic, debilitating, poorly researched illnesses. There is more of an underlying physical predisposition I think.

0:00: 🧠 Psychosomatic illness is a condition where there is a psychological and physical component, but Western medicine fails to treat it effectively due to the separation of mind and body. 7:44: 💡 Psychosomatic illness is not caused by a weak mind, but by a strong mind that suppresses emotions and ignores physical signals, leading to somatic problems. 16:22: 🧠 Psychosomatic illness, such as irritable bowel syndrome (IBS), is not purely psychological but involves a complex interplay between mind and body. 25:30: 🔬 People with IBS experience a hyperactivation of the sympathetic nervous system, leading to prolonged periods of high stress and symptoms such as diarrhea. 37:02: 🧠 IBS and POTS are physiological conditions that can cause various symptoms, including nausea, diarrhea, fatigue, sleep disturbance, weakness, palpitations, lightheadedness, dizziness, and chest pain. 42:59: 🧠 POTS is a condition characterized by paradoxical vasoconstriction, dysregulation of the sympathetic nervous system, and hypersensitivity to visceral sensory input. 53:40: 🧠 Fibromyalgia involves abnormal nervous input and low-level inflammation, leading to widespread pain throughout the body. 1:02:21: 🧠 The speaker discusses the limitations of Western medicine in treating complex conditions and emphasizes the importance of considering genetic, social, and psychological factors in psychosomatic illness. 1:11:42: 🧠 Psychosomatic illness is a result of the mind and body connection, and can be influenced by stress and trauma. 1:21:07: 💡 Psychosomatic illness involves various factors such as brain, sensory attention, rewiring, and diet. 1:29:18: ⚕ The mind-body connection is crucial in treating psychosomatic illnesses, and various approaches like psychotherapy, neuroplasticity, mind-body practices, and diet can be effective. 1:37:00: 💊 Western medicine is not equipped to address the underlying causes of health problems and doctors often dismiss patients' symptoms. Recap by Tammy AI

Hey, seeing this video really convinced me to buy the guide, thank you, and keep up this amazing flow your on, it rally helps people

"it turns your brain from read only to edit mode" is the best analogy i have ever heard.

This video couldn't have dropped at a better time! Thanks Dr. K! You're the best!!!

Probs to my mum for supporting me and told me that she loves me and that I am a wonderful person and then helped me change school because I had trouble with bullying!

Excellent Dr K. Thank you for sharing your hard-won education to gain this knowledge. I love your accents when you recall information to cite. I learned heaps you bring everything I have been studying in bits and pieces and bought it together. Whole-body medicine makes so much more sense. Blessings from New Zealand.

Holy shit first the visualization and now this?! You could not have timed these better. After catching covid I had lasting symptoms that no specialist could pin point a reason for and it left me in such a terrible state of mind. Even though they weren't that bad, it just felt like I was deteriorating and losing control. I just got covid again and keep reassuring myself it'll be different this time without actually knowing how, but after these videos, I feel like I have a how. Thank you so much!!!

As someone with a Fibro diagnosis, I feel it's often used as an easier explanation for compounding, complex issues. SSRI's and pain meds are a bandaid.

This is exactly what I've been struggling with. Thank you.

Absolute masterpiece once again, I feel more like myself already and have laughed so much it’s amazing. Going to bed early tonight after watching, contemplating, & APPLYING that beautiful vid about how self compassion alone isn’t enough.. fat thank you to you, the team, and the community as a whole 🤝

Ive just starteded my second week in a degree in health science in order to help set up frameworks to treat psychosomatic illnesses! Thank you very much for this, the pathway isnt very clear tet but this really helps!

Thank you thank you thank you for this explanation on IBS. I have had IBS-M for the last 8 years and have been addressing it from a mind body perspective for the last year. This has really validated that I’m on the right track.

Thank you for talking about this. I had/have Long Covid, and it’s a miracle I haven’t beaten the shit out of multiple doctors at this point. I’m only 20 years old, and I had a stroke only 3 months ago. As my entire left side is paralyzed, and I’m being rushed to the ER in an ambulance, I was told repeatedly,”you’re too young to have a stroke”. That reaction is understandable, honestly. The only reason I had a stroke is because of Long COVID’s effects on virtually every system in my body, especially involving blood flow/pressure. But once I had been in the ICU for almost 18 hours, a neurologist who came to talk to me kept writing off everything I was saying about Covid. And he closed our conversation with,”if you take anything out of our conversation, it is that none of this had to do with Covid.” My dad was in the room with me, and we were both stunned. The only reason that neurologist didn’t end up in the next room’s bed is because another neurologist came in to talk to me. Clearly that first guy wasn’t well liked, based on the 2nd’s face when he came in. I understand skepticism of “The Science” with Covid. I had my initial vax, and got the 1st booster. I got Long Covid 1 1/2-2 months after the booster. I don’t think the vaccines caused it in my case, but I know that it has happened in other people. Those vaccines never prevented infection, they only reduced the likelihood of severe symptoms. I read Pfizer’s trials that they submitted to the FDA, it’s publicly available information. Go read the documents, immunity isn’t even mentioned in them. I could go on and on about what people misunderstand about Covid, but it doesn’t matter at this point. Now, the people who are being affected by Covid are like me, and I am one of the lucky ones. I was lucky enough to meet a doctor that has been trying out a treatment for Long Covid for almost 1 1/2-2 years now, and it worked remarkably well. Im back at college, I had to take a leave of absence for a full year. But there are still lasting effects that may never go away. I’m still working with this doctor, and I’ve become a walking case study for his work. There are so many unknowns with Long Covid, and the biggest problem is the fact that medical institutions can’t help. Nothing ever looked abnormal on any diagnostics I have done, including an EEG, MRI, Lumbar Puncture, and more. The breakthroughs that matter have happened with independent doctors, because they can look at the cases that come to them and try to figure out solutions without needing to go through the red tape of a research hospital. If you have Long Covid, don’t give up. I know the hell you’re going through. I had countless times where it seemed like I’d found some solution in a treatment or doctor, only to be let down completely. Find something to do, whatever is within your ability. And if you end up failing, that’s great! The biggest part in my recovery over the past year has been to try even when there’s no point. I conceded to a life of agony for months, and when I started trying again it felt amazing. I had massive setbacks, but simply putting effort into something that was unrelated to my condition felt so good. My motto has been,”Push Through”. I’ve made almost a full recovery, and I know I’m not out of the woods yet. But I’ve had enough of waiting for a solution in agony, so I’ll keep pushing no matter what. You can do that too, the hardest part is just getting started.

Do you realize the significance of what he's saying? By his description, all diseases are to some extent psychosomatic. That's why we have the placebo effect

I love the entertaining way you present this sorta stuff, fascinating material, 10/10 full texan accent