Gabor Maté

But what happens in families where either because of trauma or because of stressed parenting or because of the stupid advice of parenting experts...

Children face this dilemma.

I can be myself, have my anger, have my emotions, or I can be attached and be accepted, but I can't have both.

What gets sacrificed is authenticity.

And then we get disconnected from our gut feelings.

And then we suffer all kinds of problems, both physical and mental.

And by the way, when I use the word trauma,

I don't necessarily just mean terrible things happening to kids, which they do.

I also mean the good things not happening, of being accepted, of being validated, of being celebrated, of having emotions heard, listened to, and understood.

That can also shut kids down.

And that separation from ourselves then is the essence of trauma.

Well, I mean, it's not that I spread this information uninvited.

When I was working as a physician, my first job was to help them with their symptoms, to help to write support, you know.

But then I'd say, there's all this information connecting emotions and physiology.

Are you willing to talk about that?

Now, I can tell you multiple examples of people who've been told that you've got this autoimmune disease, we don't know what causes it, we have no cure for it, you'll be on medication for the rest of your life, and it's probably going to get worse.

All kinds of people with autoimmune conditions who actually get better when they start dealing with the emotions.

So it's liberating for people.

And sometimes I don't recommend anybody getting sick, but you wouldn't be surprised to hear that a lot of people, when they do get sick,

They say, oh, this is a lesson for me.