Hello everyone and welcome to therapy in a nutshell. I'm Emma McAdam, a licensed marriage and family

therapist, and this is the podcast where I condense mental health skills into bite-sized

nuggets of health. Did you know that some people with dissociative identity disorder? That's what used to be called

multiple personality disorder. So when they switch personalities, their different personality states

can have completely different physiology. Studies have shown that alter personalities may have different allergies, different blood

pressure and hormones. They may have different vision. One alter might need glasses when the core

personality doesn't. And they've been able to show through imaging that different personalities

have different blood flow and activity in the brain. Now, they've compared that to actors

pretending to have different personalities, and they can actually see a completely different

physical change in the bodies of these people with dissociative identity disorder than the

actors. So this idea of the mind-body connection, our emotions and our mental state change our body's physiology.

This idea is not just some like woo-woo like hippie idea. Our emotions directly impact our body and our

physiology. And our body and our physical being, these can directly impact

our brain and our emotions. In this video, you're going to learn about the mind-body connection,

the physical impact of emotions. And this is really important because if we want to change how we

think and how we live our lives, we need to learn how to resolve emotions that get trapped in the body.

Now, back when I was in college, I did something that inadvertently really hurt one of my best friends.

She was super upset at me, and she sent me a nasty email.

And I felt terrible about it.

I became physically sick. My stomach hurt. I got diarrhea.

I couldn't sleep. My tear ducts opened up. My hands got cold and sweaty. And after a while,

I was physically exhausted. As part of my emotional response, I had a strong physical reaction.

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