Tangelo, you can't tell. That's the whole thing-if they are they come from the unconscious, which is...unconscious-how can you know what you don't know? It's a process of elimination, and you just have to be open to the possibility the symptoms could be either one. You can keep a journal including your symptoms the symptoms to see if you see any patterns, either with stress or related to medical causes (for example diet, lack of sleep and so on), and research the medical possibilities and keep close taps on any treatments you want to try for physical ailments and be your own advocate with the doctors to try these treatments and see if you see improvement.

And if they are somatic, don't think of it as in your head-the symptoms are very bit as real and physiological ones. Is this the medical doctors that are throwing this word around, I am guessing? Do the medical doctors know if you are suffering from any psychological issues like anxiety, depression, ext?

Psychosomatic symptoms are still symptoms. Being the result of processes in your brain doesn't make the symptoms any less valid.

I don't know anything about what symptoms you are having. Its possible you really do have something wrong but they just don't know it yet because its not evident yet. Or it could be stress or anxiety if you have a lot going on in your life right now. I get terrible anxiety and it really affects how I feel a lot. On the other hand one time I was in terrible pain for about a year and finally I went to see another doctor and she did a blood test and found out I was vitamin D deficient. It could be something as simple as that. I thought I was dying! I hurt all over and was so tired I was convinced I had bone cancer or something. You just never know. Depending on your symptoms it could be a lot of things they are maybe overlooking. I hope you find out soon!

Thank you everyone

Cant: The medical doctors and the therapist have brought it up as a possibility. Im 99.9% sure my husband has decided its just depression and therefor my fault.

Walrus: Thank you.

Radrm: Vitamin D can cause serious pain.

Im sure Ill get some kind of diagnosis eventually.

I think depression manifests itself in many ways in our bodies... has anyone mentioned depression and trying an anti depressant?

Has your therapist done any psychosomatic inventories with you? Like the MMPI has a psychosomatic scale, even though there may be inventories with more validity than that one-that's the one I know about.

It's a really tricky thing-my bf was told he had psychosomatic seizures for 2 years because he had PTSD and doctors didn't explore enough tests in a differential diagnosis-just chalked it up to psychological issues. When we switched neurologists-they just went off the previous neurologists diagnosis (I've found doctors have this hang up about changing a diagnosis sometimes-like it's bad doctor etiquette or something).

FINALLY we got a neurologist (the whole while treating it with psychological interventions as if they were psychogenic seizures with no relief) who was willing to do fMRI's and ambulatory EEGs and everything necessary for a comprehensive diagnosis as well as changing medications-and BOOM the medications gave him relief of his seizures, which he was having sometimes 8 a day (they would cluster, one after another and could only be interrupted with a trip to the ER and a shot of ativan). It was horrible, he had two years of almost no functionality because of the severity of his seizure disorder, falls where he broke ribs, pulled muscles, fell down the stairs, broke teeth-all because of the biases in the medical community against mental health issues and because doctors don't like to challenge each other's diagnosis. As you can tell I get pretty ticked off about that. I mean, I'm glad he had all the psychological therapies which made his PTSD ultimately so much better-but we could have done without all the seizures!

So, the moral of the story is-doctors, medical or psych docs are like anyone else-there are good doctors and bad doctors, they are not Gods, they don't know everything. Be your own advocate and think critically about what you're told.

Yep cant74deal is right doctors are not all they seem to be sometimes. They don't know everything and some are good and some aren't. I have had many issues with doctors. they don't like to change another doctors diagnosis. I got paralyzed because of work comp doctors doing that to me. I was only paralyzed for a few hours but I didn't know it could go away. They manipulated my neck ( I had a neck injury at work - hit my head on a 6" steel pipe) they kept saying i was ok and they kept me working and going to therapy and I was dying. Spasms all the time crippled me. Then that day - I guess by God grace the therapist manipulated my neck and it put pressure on my spinal chord and cause me to be paralyzed from the elbows down and the knees down. Luckily a spine specialist was there and he came in and helped me. All he did was hold my arms up and move them and my legs too and in a couple hours i was able to get up again. I cried so bad my hand got contorted it was really scary and weird. For a while I thought that was it like in the movies I was paralyzed for life. That doctor sent instructions to my treating doctor to do a test called a discogram because he knew what was wrong with me. He suspected annular tears. They did the test later and I had two torn discs. They had me at work moving wood piles for light duty (I was a pipefiiter) and I was on darvocet for pain and they also had me go to therapy. It was all killing me pain wise. My son was only 5 years old at the time too. I had to take care of him too. It was so crazy I think with all my stories people must think Im crazy. Sometimes I think I am too. I sometimes ask myself why. Now I have had two neck surgery's. Got some permanent nerve damage but not too bad. I recovered a year and a half after my last surgery in 2003. Not all doctors know what they are doing. I hope you get help. I take depression medicine too. It helps some but I dont feel a huge difference.

It's been my experience that most doctors tend to treat symptoms and don't always look for anything but the physical root cause, which I believe could very well be trauma related.

It's well known and medically accepted that 'stress' accounts for causing or contributing to dis-ease 85% of the time! Yet, main stream medical more often than not don't look at or treat the patient holistically.

In addition, there is a lot of evidence that points to cellular memory. Take, for example, someone receiving an organ transplant all of a sudden craving a certain food and finding out it was the donor's favorite food! I personally believe that there is cellular memory. I've watched people re-enact their trauma with their bodies w/o words.

I believe there is an integral connection not just w/in the physical body (as my PT sings to me...the hip bone's connected to the thigh bone....:-), but also with emotion & spirit.

I believe in the mind body spirit connection 100%. You might be interested in reading Louise Hay's book, You Can Heal Your Life. There are many books about this same subject.

I found talk therapy didn't help my physical issues, where as hypnotherapy and breath work does. I still have physical/medical issues & still see medical doctors. But I have added alternatives to my self-care. And now I look for holistic doctors and nurses who are open to alternative therapies.

As an aside, it really worries me that medical doctors feel so free in handing out anti-depressants. That is scary because antidepressants were originally meant for short term use only just to get on an even keel so the emotional issues can be addressed. Then as they heal, the antidepressants can be stopped, in many cases. Of course, there are cases where there is an actual imbalance in the brain that require appropriate medicine. Sadly many who are on antidepressants aren't getting therapy and so the meds dumb them down which only serves to stuff feelings.

Sadly, many medical doctors do not suggest/require therapy or follow up. And so the patient doesn't heal. Also, grief is often diagnosed as depression. And the meds only dumb down the grief. Feelings need to be released, not buried.

Those suffering trauma, regardless of how long ago it happened or what kind of trauma it was, IMHO, are highly susceptible to dis-ease.

To add to what cant said about neurology, there are neuropsychiatrists who address both the physical and emotional aspects.

I'm not saying what you have is not pyhsical, because it probably is. What I am saying is that its root cause (or major contribution) could very well be psychosomatic, in that it will be harder to heal the physical/medical issues w/o addressing the emotional/spiritual ones.

~hugs~

I agree 100% that the mind body issue is complex, and specialists in particular are from a mindset of looking at things in a very narrow way. We saw neruopsychologists too, we saw ALL KINDS OF PEOPLE. I also have a family friend who does rakki, she's worked on many members of my family or consulted for us. If something is keeping you from living the life you know you can have-you really have to advocate for yourself, research, explore, explain, question, persevere, think of alternatives, be open to possibility. It almost like to part time job just to get answers to some of these complex medical issues-but you can do it. In the end it really doesn't matter what caused it or what you had to do to fix it, as long as your quality of life improves.

I cannot take antidepressants. The side effects for me are extremely severe.

I find that when it comes to ADs there is a lot of experimenting and hoping it works and then head scratching when it destroys my life instead. Then the prescriber goes home to their happy life and Im messed up for months. Id rather be dead. In my experience, it works for some which is great, but not everyone.

I just wish prescribers would be aware of the fact that is works differently for everyone and take responsibility for what they are giving you. They dont.

As an aside, it really worries me that medical doctors feel so free in handing out anti-depressants. That is scary because antidepressants were originally meant for short term use only just to get on an even keel so the emotional issues can be addressed. Then as they heal, the antidepressants can be stopped, in many cases. Of course, there are cases where there is an actual imbalance in the brain that require appropriate medicine. Sadly many who are on antidepressants aren't getting therapy and so the meds dumb them down which only serves to stuff feelings.

-**Well said, I could not agree more.**

Okay, I cannot tell you how many people have told me stories about bad doctors and/or physical problems that took forever to get a proper diagnosis or treatment.

Thanks everyone!

I guess I need to continue to be my own advocate and work on my physical and emotional conditions at the same time.

great ADVICE!
I want to add that being in a sick relationship made me physically sick too. I struggled so hard to improve my health. Now that I am out I hope my health continues to improve. Maybe the stress of the relationship is affecting your health as well.