Chronic Illness Trauma Studies

how life events alter genes & why its not in your head

Home » What Caused my Chronic Illness? The Discovery Series on Research I Never Knew as an MD

What Caused my Chronic Illness? The Discovery Series on Research I Never Knew as an MD

The discovery series: my research journey in finding studies that make sense of chronic illness and why it's not in your head

The discovery series presents science-based posts describing research that helped me understand what caused my chronic illness. It helps make sense of chronic illnesses of all kinds. I believe it will help make sense of yours too. It’s introduces solid science I never heard of as a doctor. I’ve written this series in particular for people with chronic illness who have no history of trauma although it provides useful information for those with a history as well as health care professionals and others.

These are detailed posts with references that counteract the prevailing and outdated belief that chronic illness is in any way “psychological.”

When I left medicine and gradually became sicker, I wondered what caused my chronic illness. I retrained in a Master’s degree program that introduced me to new research. And I explored whether my chronic illness could be the result of an intelligent process gone awry.

The studies didn’t say our diseases were psychological. They showed that life experiences shape our health.

The field of epigenetics has since explained this occurs because life events alter our genes.

The research supports what those of us with a chronic illness already know deep down, even when we doubt ourselves. Which is that our chronic illnesses are very real and not linked to being crazy, wimpy, “too negative,” seeking attention, being failures, or being the cause of our symptoms.

It’s not in our heads. It’s in the way our bodies develop in response to life experiences.

What Caused My Chronic Illness?

The research I discovered completely changed my world view. The studies come from evidence in all kinds of different chronic diseases. Along the way I found that the pathways to cause are similar. Each post is therefore relevant to other chronic illnesses.

I tell the story from the beginning of my journey so you can assess what makes sense for yourself. This is especially true if you have a chronic illness and no history of trauma.

These posts are like book chapters rather than short essays. So take your time.

Go at your own pace. Book mark them. Download the pdfs to read offline (you can use the social media icons bar on the left of every post to create a pdf). Sign up to get the latest updates by email.

Join the conversation. Share what you’ve experienced to help me and others in this little community keep learning and refining what we know. What does this research bring up for you? Does this information help make sense of your own story? Of the evolution of your chronic illness? Of your symptoms, flares or triggers?

Know that there are many ways of working with the types of events that affect risk for chronic illness, even when they happened in the distant past.

The Discovery Series

Part 1: The Role of Events in Pregnancy, Birth and Infancy

I was surprised to begin to understand what caused my chronic illness when I discovered research that events in pregnancy, birth and infancy affect risk for chronic diseases of all kinds

1.1 What if Chronic Illness is an Intelligent Process Gone Awry? Insights from Research in Type 1 Diabetes

1.2 Early Life Events Influence Health Through the Mother-Infant Bond: Heal Bonding Disruptions, Heal Asthma

1.3 The Bonding Effect: Nature, Nurture & Perceptions of Threat An Intro to How Life Events Alter Our Genes

Upcoming Posts include a Summary of Risk Factors in Early Life and a Survey

 

Future Posts in the Series

The Role of Events in Childhood

The Role of Events in Adulthood and Before Onset

The Role of Events in Our Parents’ and Grandparents’ Lives

 

You’ll find a summary of the conclusions I reached from 15 years of research in The Chronic Illness Model and in my free downloadable eBook 1: An Overview.

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I love hearing from you. Comments are moderated, which means that I read every one (with relish!) before it becomes visible to everyone. Although your email is required, it is not made public. You can use any name you wish. Share your thoughts and insights. How do you work with your health or that of the ones you love? What have you learned as you've become an expert in your own right? What resonates with you?

A Chronic Illness Path

The search for better health when you have a chronic illness is like a zig zag. There is nothing linear about it. No guarantee of improvement, let alone of success. It’s like peeling an onion that has an infinite number of layers. But seeds get planted along the way, and surreptitiously, they do what they were made to do: they sprout.

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