Is the Problem in Your Head, or in Your Gut?

Actually, for some of us, it may all begin in our guts. I have Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD). My brain doesn’t receive enough serotonin and it causes me to worry and be totally obsessed by fear at times. Serotonin isn’t produced by the brain, however. It’s produced by our digestive systems. So if we suffer from digestive issues, our bodies don’t produce enough serotonin for the brain.

The past two days have been emotional murder for me. After spending a week in New York, I returned with my body out of sync. My sleep and digestion have both been off kilter. This has disrupted my serotonin production and has placed me into a whirlwind of obsessive, fearful thinking that has made an emotional mess out of me.

The good news is that today everything seems better. The bad news is that even though I knew what was happening the past two days would pass, and I understood what was happening, I couldn’t control or make it better. I felt trapped in a very bad space by my own body.

It’s true that we are what we think. But we don’t always have as much control or personal power over our thinking as we like to believe. It’s not as simple sometimes as “I’ll just change my negative thinking to positive.” Sometimes, when my gut and serotonin are in good condition, I can do it— I can replace negative thoughts with  positive thoughts and feel better. But sometimes, when there’s a chemical imbalance going on in my body, I can’t escape the horrors of obsessive negative thoughts and feelings.

If you have trouble with controlling obsessive negative thoughts, then you might want to see a trained professional to learn if there’s something else wrong in your body, like a lack of serotonin production. It makes life easier if we actually know what’s really wrong, because we can work with it and try to get our bodies back into balance.

Thanks to my Higher Power that I am back in balance today!