By Paddy Kamen, publisher, BetterBrainBetterLife.com
My gut is in an uproar. It happens almost everytime I eat. A years-long project of trying to stop burping, farting and bloating escalated last December when my digestive system underwent a state of siege. For two weeks, everything I ate caused terrible pain throughout my abdomen, to the point where bending down to pick up the laundry basket caused me to moan.
Is this simply a physical problem? I doubt it.
When I say, ‘my stomach is in a knot’, it usually means I am dealing with strong, difficult emotions, experienced as tension in the abdomen. After 15 years of consistent meditation practice and many silent retreats, I can now detect even subtle emotions as body sensation: fear has been a companion, and anxiety, its offspring (which I define as amorphous fear), has been hitching a ride every day and night since the beginning of February. It is now mid-June.
Is this simply a physical problem? I doubt it.
When I say, ‘my stomach is in a knot’, it usually means I am dealing with strong, difficult emotions, experienced as tension in the abdomen. After 15 years of consistent meditation practice and many silent retreats, I can now detect even subtle emotions as body sensation: fear has been a companion, and anxiety, its offspring (which I define as amorphous fear), has been hitching a ride every day and night since the beginning of February. It is now mid-June.
The anxiety began last January when my father, at 89 and in terrible health, began to seriously decline, and then died on March 3. This is tough stuff, but of course, expected. To complicate things, dad’s wife (I'll call her Sue) has made our family life challenging for some time now. She has a recent diagnosis of Alzheimer’s, on top of an undiagnosed mood disorder and paranoia, so handling her finances as her POA after my father died was an ordeal I wouldn’t wish on anyone. Sue calls me up regularly to accuse me of stealing from her (her latest accusation was that I had stolen vacuum cleaner parts), and throwing her medication in the garbage. Every time she calls it triggers that terrible anxiety in my gut. It can take hours for the sensation to settle down.