Why does my throat ache: psychosomatic illness

The human body is a system in which physiology and the psyche are closely interrelated. Pain in the body always affects our mood, and, conversely, a strong fear can trigger an attack of nausea or diarrhea. Knowing what psychosomatic diseases are, the causes and treatment of them, what can be significantly improved the quality of their lives.

Physicians confirm that emotions can be the cause of somatic (bodily) ailments. And in this there is no mysticism. To see a chain of interrelated processes, which lead to illness from a psychological state, can be easily done in almost any instance.

From this rule, it is difficult to find exceptions: regardless of whether the rhinitis is troubled, the stomach is rubbed or the throat hurts, psychosomatics can be detected in any case. And take care of your health is necessary, always remembering the role of a good psychological state.

What is psychosomatics?

The term "psychosomatic" is sometimes treated one-sidedly, when a direct relationship between emotion and disease is built. So, suppressed anger can be called the main cause of stomach diseases, envy - liver pathologies, and so on. In this regard, it seems that such an approach is unscientific, has no significant evidence, and therefore does not deserve attention.

In fact, psychosomatics exists and has long been proven. But the path of the body from emotion to illness extends somewhat longer.

Body reaction to emotions

Any emotion evokes in us a physical reaction: when we get angry, the muscles of the mostly shoulder torso stiffen. In order to supply tense muscles with blood, the heart starts to work faster, blood pressure rises. This entails changes in the depth and rhythm of breathing.

And if we experience fear, then our muscles, especially the legs, also strain. It is because of this at the moment of fear, we can feel the "vitality" of the legs - this is the result of muscle overstrain. The work includes the autonomic nervous system, so a person can suddenly feel a desire to empty the bladder or intestine (the so-called "bear disease").

A single instance of anger or fear is not able to deal a serious blow to a healthy body. But if a person experiences a negative emotion often, this causes his nervous system to rearrange, along with it the digestive, endocrine, immune system starts to work differently. As a result, negative experiences lead to the disease.

How to recognize a psychosomatic disease?

In most cases, psychosomatics does not immediately lead to organic damage. First, it becomes the cause of functional disorders, that is, the organ or system is healthy, but their activity is disrupted. This can be compared to an unconfigured piano.

If a person experiences certain symptoms of a disease, and the doctor can not find it through laboratory and functional diagnostics, or the form, the stage of the disease can not give such a vivid picture - there are all reasons to suspect the psychological aspect in the formation of the disease.

Psychosomatics and sore throat

If a person regularly hurts Throat, psychosomatics will help to understand what's wrong. The throat is a multifunctional part of our body, it participates in the process of eating, in speech, in breathing.

Therefore, the pain can have a different character: a person can feel the pain when swallowing, the feeling that it suffocates, lumps in the throat. Based on these symptoms, you should look for the reasons.

Pain when swallowing

Pain in the throat, as with angina, may be a sign of inflammation in the nasopharynx. And this, too, will be directly related to psychosomatics.

As already mentioned above, the nervous system plays the main role in the formation of diseases provoked by the psychological state. If we consider the entire human body in a complex, we can see that only three systems control all organs simultaneously: nervous, endocrine and immune. Their activities are closely related to each other, pathology in one system will certainly affect the work of the other two.

If as a result of nervous experiences a person's immune system is disturbed, he may begin to ache in any case: the slightest draft, the path from the car to the entrance to wet shoes or a sip of milk from the refrigerator will instantly cause sore throat.

Others will advise a person to strengthen immunity, but this will bring minimal benefits: the nervous system will "pull" the immunity back, and until a person learns how to cope with their emotions, experiencing them correctly, colds will chase him.

Lump in the throat

When the pain in the throat resembles a sensation of a lump in the throat, the cause may lurk in the diseases of the endocrine system, or more precisely - in the pathologies of the thyroid gland.

In other cases, the reason is that the human muscular system is so tense that the muscles literally squeeze the throat. In this case, the symptom will be closely associated with negative emotions: after being nervous, a person will experience an "exacerbation" and, having calmed down, "go into remission".

Formulation of sensation

In order to understand whether there is a relationship between disease and the psyche, it is very important to try to correctly formulate the sensations experienced. Sometimes this is the key to the clue.

For example, instead of saying "I have pain in the throat", it should be expressed differently: "I do not get a piece in my throat", "they took me by the throat" and so on.

Then it remains only to imagine the sensations in the described situation. A piece in the throat does not climb in a situation of intense fear, so a person should be poreflexed to see if he has chronic phobias, whether his anxiety accompanies him.

Feeling as if you are being held by the throat, talk about the limitations that prevent a person. For example, if he does not do what he would like. If a person has to work as an economist, and he dreams to paint with watercolor. Blocking the creative process is not such an innocuous thing that it may seem, it is quite capable of causing psychosomatic pathologies. Therefore, it is important to ask yourself the most straightforward questions and with the same frankness to give answers to them.

Who to contact?

If a person has a sore throat, psychosomatics can be the cause. But first of all you need to turn to a specialist in bodily ailments. In this case - to the otolaryngologist.

If the doctor confirms that the emotional aspect takes place in this case, then you need to consult a therapist. It is important to note that it is he who is treating psychosomatic illnesses, and not a psychologist or psychiatrist.

The psychotherapist will help to find out which emotion has become the catalyst of the process, will tell how to cope with the disease. Sometimes this process takes just a couple of sessions, and sometimes a person needs to go to the reception for months. In any case, life without psychological diseases and the ills that result from them, of course, is worth it.

Whether there is a medicamental treatment?

For the treatment of psychosomatic disorders, as for somatic disorders, drug therapy is divided into two parts: the main and symptomatic.

Symptomatic therapy is necessary in order to remove the pain itself. For this, any sprays, anti-inflammatory lozenges, folk remedies can be used. If a psychosomatic disease has led to disturbances in the functioning of the immune system, antibiotics and antiviral drugs may be required.

The main therapy includes drugs that regulate the work of the nervous system. This can include both sedative drugs, and funds for improving sleep, and even antidepressants. The psychotherapist, unlike the psychologist, has a higher medical education, so he will be able to distinguish situations in which the reception of medications is necessary, from those when it is possible to manage directly with sessions of psychotherapy.

Psychosomatics in children

If there is psychosomatic in adults, therefore, it may well be in children. Fortunately, this happens much less often, because the child is less constrained by the framework of morality, which does not allow him to express emotions and causes him to accumulate nervous tension.

If the child could not get a toy from the mother in the store, he would probably cry, thus expressing all his indignation. This at first sight glaring behavior allowed the child to instantly minimize the risk of psychosomatic development.

An adult can not afford to burst into tears because of the financial inability to buy, for example, a beautiful and expensive mobile phone. Moreover, grieving, he will hardly go to splash off his grudge against his acquaintances, so as not to look unseemly. And there is nothing surprising if after a while he finds out that he has a sore throat - psychosomatics has found ways of getting negative through the disease.

If the child is still faced with a bodily illness caused by nervous experiences, this requires the most serious attitude. The flexible psyche of children should not succumb to such situations.

For treatment it is necessary to turn to a good child psychotherapist who will teach a child to express and live negative emotions correctly, without hiding them inside himself, but without pouring on others. Be healthy!