Psychophysical illness. This is a new vocabulary that I learned in AP Psychology recently. Basically, this is an illness to your body caused by stress. Your body reacts to what the mind says, and when it finds that the mind is stressed, it becomes stressed, too. The tension in your body weakens the immune system, making diseases more likely to enter your body.

All because there was some stressful event.

This happened to me, today. I wasn’t feeling particularly well, mood wise. Many things seemed to happen all at once, like a bomb going off unexpectedly. This stressed me out so much to the point where I couldn’t eat breakfast or lunch. With no food in my stomach, I came back home after school feeling dizzy and nauseated. Then I had a momentary blackout, where I knew and felt my eyes wide open but I could not see anything. It was pitch black, and I had to sit down on the floor to prevent running into things. As if a pitch darkness wasn’t enough, I couldn’t breathe like normal. I felt like the air around me was sucked out into a vacuum, as I sat there helplessly gulping for air. After about 15 minutes or so, I began to see my dog sniffing my hands and I was breathing normally.

Why did this happen? Was it a sign from the mind to the body? Was I so stressed to the point where I couldn’t even see what was in front of me? Or was it just a biological effect after skipping two meals?

This got me to wonder about which explanation was right; the science or the psychology? The textbook explains that the mind and the body are so intertwined to the point where it is nearly indistinguishable. In other words, the body thinks, too. It feels emotions, and it is not just a heap of random cells put together to form a lively functioning miracle.

A while later, I was able to get up from the floor. I understood then that my body is telling me to slow down. Slow down to think. To sort out what’s bothering me. To watch the new leaves grow outside. To relax, because my mind was hurting my body.

photos credited to: Mieke Vos ^..^, katiepolvinen, Kiky01

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