Dissociation, psych drugs and chronic illness

In healing chronic illness with many acute, chronic pains I’ve seen that dissociation is not simply psychological but profoundly physiological too…

The process of getting chronically ill included layers of ever deepening dissociation from the body creating multiple broad spectrum illnesses. A dissociated body/mind cannot meaningfully take care of itself.

Psych drugs allowed for these ever deepening layers of dissociation as they further sickened the body. The drugs masked it so that hearing and responding to the bodys needs became impossible.

(Update 2026: since treating what got labeled “lyme disease,” but is really multiple systemic infections that include the micro-organisms associated with Lyme, I’ve learned that these “critters” literally create layers and barriers via biofilm. The body/mind is wonderfully and fearsomely created.)

When coming off the drugs pain re-emerges in shocking, debilitating, life destroying ways.

The only way to cope is to step up dissociation. This time the body must learn to do it without the drugs. Generally it knows how because those who have been on psych drugs have early trauma where the roots of all this begins.

And then healing…for me…has been the YEARS of untangling the deep embodied dissociative patterns the body was forced to learn in order to first survive a hostile environment in childhood, but then to cope with the poisoning of the body by neurotoxic psych drugs…

A dissociated body/mind cannot meaningfully take care of itself…. healing is the process of becoming, once again, embodied.

Learning to hear the body and the way it communicates is another way of understanding the process of embodiment. This is the path to healing.

• Information and inspiration for the chronically ill
• Healing a brain injury can hurt very badly. Delusion and dissociation. Herbs, herbs, herbs.
• Forms of dissociation are common to all human beings
• Dissociation- On finding the way home – by John Keyes

And:

• Psychiatric drugs are agents of trauma: the above is my body felt sense experience of learning exactly how that happens.
• Trauma and the body 
• More on Trauma, the body, mind and spirit

for contemplation purposes:

• Meditation is the practice of learning to pay attention. That is all.

The biological body:

• Biofilm and such. Chronic illness 101
• systemic infections

***

*it is potentially dangerous to come off medications without careful planning. See: Psychiatric drug withdrawal and protracted withdrawal syndrome round-up

It’s become clear to me that whenever it’s possible that it’s helpful for folks who’ve not begun withdrawal and have the time to consider a carefully thought out plan to attempt to bring greater well-being to your body before starting the withdrawal. That means learning how to profoundly nourish your body/mind and spirit prior to beginning a withdrawal. For suggestions on how to go about doing that check the drop-down menus on this blog for ideas.

Anything that helps you learn how to live well can be part of your plan. That plan will look different for everyone. We learn to follow our hearts and find our own unique paths in the world. Things to begin considering are diet, exercise and movement, meditation/contemplation etc. Paying attention to all these things as you do them helps too. The body will start letting us know what it needs as we learn to pay attention. 

For ideas about how to create a life filled with safe alternatives to psychiatric drugs visit the drop-down menus.

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