It’s sometimes thought that emotional distress is entirely separate from physical pain. You might have been told that feelings of sadness, loneliness, and shame are not related to back pain, headaches, or fatigue.

The truth is, often when your body is in pain, it’s because you’re in pain in your mind as well. The mind and the body aren’t strangers to each other; they operate together. If you’re troubled by chronically irritated bowels and doctors can’t seem to find proof or cause, that doesn’t mean your pain isn’t real. It could be that some elements in your life are causing you such distress that your body has come to feel anxious and depressed as well.

So where does my pain come from?

If you’re hurting and can’t seem to identify a physical cause, psychologists might suggest that you’re experiencing somatization. Emotional problems can become physically painful if you’ve pushed difficult emotional pain so far back in your mind that you can no longer recognize it. If you start having headaches, your body begins to absorb all your attention, allowing those dangerous suppressed emotions to stay buried.

If you’re living with an anxiety disorder, the emotional weight of feeling anxious all the time can cause physical symptoms like digestive issues or stomach aches. You might have unconsciously learned over time that admitting to your stomach aches gets you out of the situations making you feel anxious; your body working in tandem with your fears to help you avoid stressful triggers.

Whatever the psychological root of your mystery stomach aches, the pain you feel is just as real as if you had food poisoning. Just like if you had food poisoning, it’s okay to ask for help resolving your mystery pains.

How can therapy help make my pain feel better?

Psychodynamic therapy and other kinds of therapy that teach you to sort through your past and your unconscious thought processes can help dig your pain out by the roots. The likely reason you haven’t been able to do so on your own is that your mind has avoided your emotional pain for a reason—it hurts.

Because your physical pain likely results from emotional distress, turning to painkillers, drugs, or alcohol will only trim the weeds of your pain, allowing it to grow back as soon as the effects of the substance wear off.

In therapy, you can bring your emotional burdens to someone else. In a therapy setting, you’ll work one-on-one with someone who can help you nonjudgmentally, providing you with a safe space to open up and let everything out without fear.

A therapist can do more than identify what might be causing your pain. In order to understand what’s affecting you, your therapist will want to get to know you. Therapists work through relationships and events in your life in order to provide you with emotional tools for managing whatever comes next.

Can my pain go away?

If your sense of security, peace, or trust in others has been shattered, leaving fertile soil for emotional and physical pain, the road to rebuilding your emotional strength could be tough. The good news is that you can feel better. You can have your life back.

Sometimes it can be hard to believe a psychological condition is causing you such real and harmful pain; it might be tempting to focus on what hurts physically rather than turning toward your mind for an explanation. If you’re hurting physically and your pain is keeping you from the life you want, making you feel trapped, looking to a therapist for help is worth it.