“Our bodies communicate with us clearly and specifically if we are willing to listen.” ~ Shakti Gawain
As a child, I was never taught to regulate my emotions. Instead, I learned to override them—to survive the stress, swallow the tears, and hide the cast even at dinner, afraid that showing what had happened to me would inspire anger instead of care.
As a teenager, I turned to drugs and alcohol to deal with my emotions. It was easier to feel nothing than to be bombarded with emotions I had no idea what to do with.
This turned into a ten-year drug addiction until I finally found sobriety after hitting rock bottom and realizing I needed help. I was cut off from my family, turned to sex work for cash, and spent months in my car and couch surfing when I finally realized I couldn’t live like this anymore and had to face the emotions and trauma in order to move on.
But when I got sober, the emotions grew stronger and deeper, especially when a decade of bad decisions were piled on top of unprocessed childhood trauma. I felt intense anxiety and shame and guilt about what I had done to my body, what I had done for money, and what I had allowed others to do to me.
Along with the emotions came a laundry list of health issues, including severe PMS and bowel problems.
I felt out of control of my body and went from doctor to doctor with no answers – just drugs to relieve my symptoms. I had recently learned to live without substances and didn’t want to add them again, even if this time they came from a doctor.
At first I thought physical and emotional problems were separate. I mean, how can the two be related? But as I went from doctor to doctor with little or no relief from my problems, I began to do my own research and try alternative methods to find recovery and not resort back to living on the streets addicted to heroin.
It didn’t take long for me to realize that my body and my emotions weren’t separate at all. Suppressing or ignoring the feelings sent my nervous system into high alert, my hormones into chaos, and my gut into rebellion. Every mood swing, every tiredness, every indigestion was my body – out loud – because I hadn’t learned to listen.
It wasn’t a supplement, a therapist, or a new diet that finally started to change things—I was actually sitting with the feelings I’d been running from for decades.
The first time I allowed myself to truly feel the anger, grief, and even shame I had buried, my body shook as if it had been holding its breath for years. I still remember doing a hip opening yoga class and bursting into tears halfway through. My body finally felt safe enough to let go of some of the buried things.
I finally faced all my feelings about the abuse I experienced, the decision to work as a sex worker to make money for drugs, and the choices I made and their consequences – including stealing from family and destroying relationships.
As I stayed with these feelings, I finally saw the sexual and emotional abuse that happened as a child and connected the dots from that early abuse to the abuse that I continued to allow into my life.
My hormones didn’t magically settle overnight, and my bowels didn’t suddenly stop protesting, but for the first time, I didn’t fight. against myself. I listened.
I have learned that my physical symptoms are never separate from my emotional symptoms. Every headache, every sleepless night, every PMS mood swing was a message. And every time I tried to “push through” instead of the feeling, the message only got louder.
Over time, I started small: I let myself cry without guilt and eventually said no to things and people that drained me. For example, I realized that I didn’t want to continue the successful marketing business I had built because it forced me to serve people I didn’t even want to sit in the same room with. I was no longer willing to remain silent or tolerate what was not good just to keep the peace.
I also started journaling to process the messy thoughts I had going back to childhood—the thoughts of not being good enough, too weird, too out there, and feeling like I had to hide my true self in order to fit in and get along with people.
It was terrifying at first—I felt untethered, exposed, and completely vulnerable—but slowly my body began to relax. My mood swings eased, my gut started to settle, and I felt like I was finally living my life instead of running away from it.
I realized that the very thing I was afraid of—my emotions—was actually the key to my healing. The feeling was not weakness. This was information. A compass pointing towards balance, alignment and what I now recognize as dharma (soul purpose).
In Ayurveda, we talk about respecting the body’s natural rhythms—the energy cycles, the vata, pitta, and kapha shifts—and paying attention to what your body really needs in each moment. Suppressing your emotions is like trying to swim against the current: it disrupts the flow, creates an imbalance, and can cause your hormones and digestion to rebel.
When I allowed myself to feel, honor my inner changes, and create daily rituals that supported my natural rhythm—warm, nourishing meals, gentle movement, quiet contemplation, and early nights—my nervous system slowly began to settle. My hormones became more stable, my gut became calmer, and I finally felt like I was living in harmony with my life instead of constantly fighting it.
Suppressing your emotions may make you feel safer in the short term, but in the long run your body will make itself heard. Listening, feeling and honoring yourself is where true healing lives. Your body speaks. do you answer
About Rebecca Ryan DeLia
Rebecca Ryan DeLia holds a BS in Alternative Medicine, an MS in Ayurvedic and Integrative Health, and is an RYT500 Yoga Teacher. It helps women rebuild their gut and hormones, regulate their nervous systems, and reconnect with their bodies—all without fear-based restrictions or stacks of supplements. Visit it at hormone-support.com.
