“Our bodies communicate with us clearly and specifically, if we are willing to listen.” ~Sing the strength
As a child, I was not taught to control my emotions. Rather, I learned to override them—pushing through the stress, swallowing back tears and even hiding a cast at dinner, afraid that showing what had happened to me would generate anger instead of care.
When I was a teenager, I turned to drugs and alcohol to control my emotions. It was easy to feel nothing but bombarded by emotions I had no idea what to do.
This turned into ten years of drug addiction until I finally hit rock bottom and realized I needed help. I was estranged from my family, resorted to sex work for cash, and surfed in my car and couch for months when I finally realized I couldn’t live like this and had to face the emotions and trauma to move forward.
But, when I calmed down, the emotions came back stronger and deeper, especially with a decade of worthless decisions piled on top of unprocessed childhood trauma. I felt shame and guilt as well as intense anxiety about what I had done to my body, what I had done to my money, and what I had allowed others to do to me.
Along with the passion came a laundry list of health problems, including severe PMS and bowel problems.
I felt out of control of my body and saw doctor after doctor with no answers – only medication to ease my symptoms. I had just learned to live without substances, and I didn’t want to add them again, even if they came from a doctor this time.
At first, I thought physical and mental problems were different from each other. I mean, how could the two be related? But, as I bounced from doctor to doctor with little relief from any of my problems, I began to do my own research and examine alternative ways to find a cure for being addicted to heroin and living on the streets.
It didn’t take me long to realize my body and my emotions were no different. Suppressing or ignoring feelings put my nervous system on high alert, my hormones in disarray, and my gut in revolt. Every mood swing, every fatigue, every digestive upset was my body speaking — loudly — because I hadn’t learned to listen.
It wasn’t a supplement, a therapist, or a new diet that finally started to change things—it was actually sitting with feelings I’d been running from for decades.
The first time I found myself truly burying anger, grief, and even shame, my body shuddered like it had been holding its breath for years. I can still remember doing a hip-opening yoga class and breaking down in tears halfway through. My body finally felt safe enough that something was buried.
I finally faced the abuse I experienced, my decision to enter sex work to earn money for drugs, and all my feelings surrounding my choices and their consequences – including stealing from family and destroying relationships.
As I lived with these feelings, I finally looked at the sexual and emotional abuse that happened when I was a child and connected the dots from this initial abuse to the abuse that I allowed into my life.
My hormones didn’t magically stabilize overnight, and my gut didn’t suddenly stop protesting, but for the first time, I wasn’t fighting. against I was listening to myself.
I learned that my physical symptoms were 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” instead of feel, the message got louder.
Over time, I began to grow smaller: allowing myself to cry without guilt and finally not telling the things and people that drained me. For example, I realized that I no longer wanted to continue with the successful marketing business I had built because it forced me to cater to people I didn’t even want to sit in the same room with. I was no longer willing to keep quiet or tolerate what didn’t feel right just to keep the peace.
I started journaling to process negative thoughts that came back from childhood—thoughts around not being good enough, being too weird and too out there, and feeling the need to fit in with people and hide my true self.
It was terrifying at first – I felt disjointed, exposed and completely vulnerable – but slowly, my body began to relax. My mood softened, my gut began to settle, and I felt like I was finally living my own life instead of running away from it.
I realized that the thing I was afraid of – my emotions – was actually the key to my healing. Feelings were not weakness. It was information. A compass points me to balance, alignment and what I now accept as my dharma (soul’s purpose).
In Ayurveda, we talk about honoring the body’s natural rhythms—the cycles of energy, vata, pitta, and kapha—and listening to what your body truly needs in each moment. Suppressing your emotions is like trying to swim against your own current: it disrupts your flow, creates imbalances, and can make your hormones and digestion rebel.
As I allowed myself to feel, honor my inner shifts, and create daily rituals that supported my natural rhythm—warm nourishing meals, gentle movement, quiet reflection, and early nights—my nervous system slowly began to settle. My hormones stabilized, my gut calmed down and I finally felt like I was living in alignment with my own life instead of constantly fighting it.
Suppressing your emotions may feel safe in the short term, but in the long run, your body will hear itself. Listening, feeling and honoring yourself—this is where true healing lives. Your body is talking. answer?
about Rebecca Ryan Delia
Rebecca Ryan Delia has a BS in Alternative Medicine and an MS in Ayurvedic and Integrative Health and is an RYT500 Yoga Teacher. She helps women rebuild their guts and hormones, regulate their nervous systems, and reconnect with their bodies—all without fear-based limitations or supplement stacking. meet him hormone-support.com.
