Rxpharms - Generic Medications Online

Drug Medical Information

UNDERSTANDING STRESS BREAKDOWN: SYMBOLIC BODY SYMPTOMS IN STAGE ONE -'ORGAN LANGUAGE'

When we come to consider other ways in which symbolism might produce body symptoms, we need to consider organ language. People sometimes express their emotions and feelings by using words appropriate to the function of organs in the body. I saw an adolescent girl in the hospital casualty department when I was a resident medical officer, complaining of painful red areas on the sides of the neck. The girl was very tense and irritable. She said, 'My mother is a pain in the neck! Whatever I do is wrong, I can't win and I'm sick of it!' We might say that this girl was 'hot under the collar'.

Other people complain that someone 'makes me sick in the stomach!', thereby giving some clue to the cause of symptoms of nausea and diarrhea.

Some people adopt a 'stiff-necked' approach to criticism by others, refusing to respond to it, holding their heads up with pride and perhaps suffering from neck pain.

Another common example of organ language, is the development of the feeling of a 'lump in the throat', which doesn't in any way interfere with the person's ability to swallow (we must of course always exclude organic causes first, before diagnosing this symptom as psychosomatic), called globus hystericus. It has been, in my experience anyway, associated with an emotion indicated by 'I'm not going to swallow that!', meaning, of course, 'I'm not going to naively accept what you're trying to ram down my throat!' I remember a patient who developed this symptom when her ex-husband, at the last minute in a property settlement court case following their divorce, suddenly tried to force her to accept terms of settlement that would be humiliating to her. She actually said to me, 'I wasn't going to swallow that rubbish!'

*67/129/5*