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Chronic Illness Trauma Studies

How Adversity Shapes Health & Why It's Not In Your Head

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  • Adverse Babyhood Experiences (ABEs) Increase Risk for Infant and Maternal Morbidity and Mortality, and Chronic Illness (Veronique Mead, JOPPPAH, 2020, 34 (4):1-33)
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  • FMS: Trauma Is A Risk Factor for Fibromyalgia and It’s Not Psychological (Free ACE Fact Sheets & Talk from The “Conquering Fibromyalgia” Summit)
  • Freedom from Trauma Summit : Healing Chronic Illness by Healing Childhood Trauma (Free ACE Fact Sheets)
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  • Summit: How Adversity Affects Risk for Disease and Why It’s Not in Your Head (Free ebook)
  • Summit: The Chronic Illness and Trauma Connection (Free eBook – Avaiya)
  • Summit: Trauma and Type 2 Diabetes Free Fact Sheet (Avaiya)
  • Top Blog Posts with eBooks & Testimonials (Chronic Illness Trauma Studies by Veronique Mead, MD, MA)
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  • Update 2023
  • Video Intro to Chronic Illness, Trauma, & Why It’s Not Psychological
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  • Welcome to Chronic Illness Trauma Studies (CITS): A Blog

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Recent Posts:

  • Chronic Illness and Trauma Podcast with Guy MacPherson (The Trauma Therapist Project)
  • My Biggest Insight of the Summer (Healing Complex PTSD and Chronic Illness)
  • Chrillog #4: Laila’s Chronic Lyme Story (I Am Happier, Physically Stronger, and More Stable Than Before Getting Sick)
  • Why it’s Important for People with Chronic Illness to Limit Stress and Set Boundaries (Free Healing Fact Sheet to Inform Friends, Family & Your Doctor)
  • Chrillog #3: Avdeep’s Chronic Fatigue Story (“I Feel Better Than I Have in 15 Years”)
  • A Compilation for Healing ABEs (Fact Sheet, eCourses, Exercises, Journal Article and more)
  • Live Webinar: How Trauma Affects Risk for Chronic Illness (Tuesday April 27, 6pm PDT with live Q&A)
  • Mending Chronic Illness: 17 (More) Antidotes from Gardening with Your Soul
  • The Fatigue Super Conference: 40+ Classes on ME/CFS, Long-Covid, Chronic Lyme and more (Free Online Summit)
  • Chrillog #2: Harper’s Chronic Fatigue Syndrome Story (ME/CFS)
  • ACREs III: Chronic Illness Flares, Triggers and Shame (My ME/CFS Story)
  • Chrillog #1: Marit’s Asthma & Parkinson’s Story
  • Introducing #Chrillogs: Our Chronic Illness Stories Through a Trauma Lens
  • Chronic Illness Books for Healing Trauma (That Will Help Your Symptoms) + Free Resources List
  • Type 2 Diabetes and Trauma: 8 Categories of Adversity Increase Risk (+Tips, Fact Sheet and Why It’s Not Your Fault)
  • My PreDiabetes Story: Overweight, “Sugar Crashes,” and Trauma (+ My Type 2 Diabetes Talk at Avaiya’s Free Online Summit)
  • Planting Seeds for Healing 8 Categories of Adversity (and Chronic Illness)
  • Book Recommendation: Are You a WOMI?
  • ACREs II: How I Overcame Years of Severe Food Intolerances in 5 Days (+20 years healing complex PTSD)
  • Trauma and Type 1 Diabetes: Dan’s Onset Story and Symptoms (With Research That Explains It)
  • 22 Encouraging Tips for Healing Chronic Illness from a Trauma Perspective
  • HALE Survey Results 2: Adversity and Decreasing Age at Onset of Chronic Conditions
  • Chronic Illness and Trauma Survey Results: Part 1 of the HALE Pilot Study (Summary & 56 Conditions)
  • Healing Chronic Illness: 11 Tools for Addressing Nervous Systems Perceptions of Threat and Finding YOUR Pathway to Healing (with Covid Updates+)
  • Supporting Resilience and Healing: The Trauma Mind Body Super Conference (Summit)
  • 6 Principles for Healing Trauma and Chronic Illness (Short Videos from The Sensorimotor Psychotherapy Institute)
  • Trauma, Chronic Illness and The Marie Kondo Effect – Insights from the Science of Adversity (Free Summit Healing Digestive Pain)
  • Podcast: Chronic Illness and How Cells Respond to Trauma & More (with Jannine Krause, ND, LAc on “The Health Fix”)
  • 9 Paradigm Shifts in Chronic Illness, PTSD and Complex PTSD That Will Set You Free (Video)
  • Comfort, Chronic Illness and Covid-19 (How Comfort in the Little Things Helps and Heals) Covid – Post 2
  • 9 Tips for Inviting Safety: Calming Fear in the Time of The Coronavirus (Covid-19 Post 1)
  • Transforming Chronic Illness: 20 Metaphors and Tips From Gardening With Your Soul
  • ABEs at APPPAH Conference 2019 – Prenatal and Perinatal Trauma Increases Risk for Disease (& Worldwide Efforts for Prevention and Healing)
  • ABEs and Chronic Illness: Introduction to the 10 Adverse Babyhood Experiences That Increase Risk (Free eBook)
  • Podcast: A Family Doctor and Trauma Therapist on How Trauma Increases Risk for Disease (& Why It’s Not In Your Head)
  • 18 Stealthy Ways to Act Out & Heal Fight, Flight, Freeze and Disease
  • 15 Steps for Healing Through Impulse And Play (More Social Nervous System and Chronic Illness Tips)
  • Healing Childhood Trauma and Chronic Illness (Free Talk and Online Classes with Avaiya University)
  • Chronic Illness Can Be Traumatizing and Doctors Contribute (8 Facts I Didn’t Learn In Medical School)
  • #WEGO Finalist For Best in Show Blog 2019 (Patient Leader Awards)
  • My Adventures in Healing Multigenerational Trauma and Chronic Illness with Systemic Family Constellations
  • Shhhh… Listen! Do You Hear Your Social Nervous System Calling? (7 Tips for Healing Chronic Illness)
  • Comprehensive Guide to Adverse Babyhood Experiences and Chronic Illness (Free eBook and ABE Fact Sheets For Your Doctor)
  • 16 Clues About Trauma,Triggers & Flares in Chronic Illness
  • IIA. ME/CFS and The Cell Danger Response: How Adversity Triggers the Freeze Response and How the CDR Gets Stuck (Includes Surveys)
  • IIB. ME/CFS Surveys (The Cell Danger Response and Hibernation Series)
  • Podcast on Rheumatoid Arthritis and Trauma (with Ameé Quiriconi of One Broken Mom)
  • Adverse Childhood Experiences and Chronic Illness (Calculate Your ACE Score & See Graphs)
  • The Chronic Illness and Trauma Series: 30+ Diseases Increased by Adversity (Introduction)
  • The Cell Danger Response: The New Disease Paradigm (100 Chronic Illnesses such as Diabetes, ME/CFS, Autoimmune Diseases and more )
  • I. ME/CFS and Freeze: A Metabolic State of Hibernation That is Not in Your Head (The Cell Danger Response and Polyvagal Theory)
  • Chronic Illness and Trauma FAQ
  • Essential Guide to Chronic Illness, Trauma and The Nervous System: Keys to Quelling the Volcano
  • Chronic Illness ACE Fact Sheets To Educate Your Doctor (Free Downloads)
  • Create a 1 Page Medical History That Will Empower You and Help Your Doctor Listen (Free Downloads)
  • Making Time for Chronic Illness Resources (Tips for Healing Chronic Illness)
  • Therapies for Chronic Illness: Healing Nervous System Responses to Stress & Trauma (Find a Therapist & List)
  • #6 Trauma Triggers Type 1 Diabetes and Other Diseases (Buffers, ACEs, Delayed Onset after Trauma+)
  • #5 Stress, Trauma and Type 1 Diabetes: 7 Reasons Doctors Dismiss Trauma as a Risk Factor for Disease
  • #4 Stress During Pregnancy, Birth and Infancy Increases Risk for Chronic Illness (Type 1 Diabetes, Asthma, ME/CFS)
  • How Understanding Trauma is Making Sense of My Chronic Fatigue (ME/CFS) and Helping Me Heal (My Chrillog)
  • #SolveChronicIllness (Take the HALE Survey)
  • The 12 Most Helpful & Popular Posts (Get Answers & Find Your Way)
  • Book 3: Why Chronic Illness is Not Psychological (Even if You Have a History of Trauma)
  • Chronic Illness and Trauma (Free Ebooks & Downloads)
  • How to Recognize Symptoms of Trauma in Chronic Illness (Free ebook 2)
  • Video: Multigenerational Trauma and Birth Events are Risk Factors for Chronic Illness (It’s Not Psychological)
  • Video: When You Have a Chronic Illness and A History of Trauma (It’s Not Psychological)
  • Adverse Babyhood Experiences and Rheumatoid Disease / Arthritis (ABEs & RA)
  • #3 Adverse Babyhood Experiences (ABEs) Influence Epigenetics and Risk for Chronic Illness
  • #2 Adverse Babyhood Experiences and Asthma: Separation in Early Life is a Risk Factor for Chronic Illness
  • 6 Chronic Illness Holiday Tips for More Ease, Joy and Connection at Christmas
  • Chronic Illness & Charlie Brown Christmas Trees: Being Loved For Who You Are
  • #1 Trauma and Autoimmune Disease: Adverse Babyhood Experiences Increase Risk for Type 1 Diabetes, RA, SLE, MS (and more)
  • Mind Body Medicine and Chronic Illness (It’s Not All in Your Head)
  • Book 1: Can Trauma Cause Chronic Illness? (7 Types of Trauma that Affect Risk)
  • Healing IBS: Art, Therapy and Unexpected Outcomes
  • My Chronic Fatigue Story 4: The Art of Listening As a Path to Healing?
  • My Chronic Fatigue Story 3: Could Reducing Stress Help Me To Heal?
  • Brain Plasticity and Chronic Illness: Life Experiences Change the Brain via “Pruning”
  • What Causes RA / RD? Trauma, Links, and Stories of Recovery
  • My Chronic Fatigue Story 2: How “No” Made Room For “Yes” And Finding Work Life Balance
  • My Chronic Fatigue Story 1: A Slow and Surprising Onset
  • Chronic Illness and Special Gifts of the Holidays
  • Chronic Illness Holiday Tips and Links Love
  • Treating Irritable Bowel Syndrome And Subtle Trauma By Listening To Your Inner Voice
  • Can Trauma Trigger Flare-Ups in Chronic Illness? (Clues that Help Understand and Nip Flares in the Bud)
  • IBS: When Nothing Else Works For Chronic Symptoms
  • Anniversary Celebrations and Chronic Illness: How We Have Fun in Our Getaways
  • Constipation, Metaphor and Symptoms of Childhood Trauma
  • ACREs I (Adverse Childhood Relationship Experiences): The Most Underestimated Risk Factor for Chronic Illness aka Invisible ACEs
  • Treating Chronic Illness #3: Making Dietary Changes took 10 Years
  • Trauma Therapy for Chronic Illness: Video Example of Working With Fight, Flight, Freeze (Dog Whisperer Cesar Milan and “Kane”)
  • Can Trauma or Stress Trigger Chronic Disease? (Adverse Pre-Onset Experiences)
  • Treating Chronic Illness #9: Intuition, and Why I Left Medicine
  • Chronic Illness Christmas Lite – How Little Moments can Create a Sense of Joy
  • Adverse Childhood Experiences and Rheumatoid Disease / Rheumatoid Arthritis (ACEs & RA)
  • Adverse Multigenerational Experiences (AMEs), Rheumatoid Disease and ME/CFS
  • Epigenetics and Chronic Illness: Why Symptoms May Be More Reversible Than We’ve Thought
  • Trauma and Chronic Illness: 19 Characteristics that Can Make Sense of Symptoms (Summary of the Science)

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About Me

Hello! I'm Veronique Mead. On my blog I look at how chronic illness may be a natural response to one or more overwhelming experiences of threat. While this includes infections and toxins, I specialize in the role of psychological and physical trauma. Because the research - still overlooked and underestimated by medicine - has knocked my socks off.

 

Symptoms, it is turning out, may not be caused by mistakes our bodies are making but because our nervous systems have gotten stuck in states of fight, flight or freeze. Our bodies are our best friends and risk everything to help us survive. We are designed to recover or at least begin to heal from the effects of those survival strategies. I never knew any of this as a family physician or assistant professor. And it’s not in your head.

 

I've been testing these ideas with my own disabling disease for the past 20 years (I am much improved and get a little better every year). I share the research, challenges, why some things that seem so logical do not work for everyone (or make things worse), as well as my favorite 11 tools. This is so you can explore what might help you stabilize, improve or possibly even begin to reverse underlying drivers of your chronic illness too. For an overview with links to my most important posts, start here.

Awarded Top 100 Chronic Illness Blogs

#WEGO Patient Leader 2019 Finalist

#WEGOHealthAwards 2019 Patient Leader Finalist for Best in Show Blog Chronic Illness Trauma Studies Veronique Mead MD, MA

I and we - it feels so much like a WE - were among 6000 nominees for 15 categories of patient leader awards and one of 5 finalists for Best in Show Blog at the #WEGOHealthAwards. Learn more here.

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