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When The Body Says No
$22.95 CAD |
From an early age many of us develop a coping style that keeps us out of touch with signs of stress, and suppresses so-called negative emotions, particularly anger. This deservedly popular book shows how such “hidden stress” is related to the onset of chronic diseases.
Western medicine, alas, is often helpless in arresting the advance of most of the chronic diseases—breast cancer, rheumatoid arthritis, multiple sclerosis, and many others. When the Body Says No, by Vancouver physician Gabor Maté, shows how in all these chronic conditions, there is a common thread: people afflicted by these diseases have led lives of excessive stress, often invisible to the individuals themselves. Maté explores these connections through life stories and intimate interviews with dozens of people who have lived, died, and sometimes overcome chronic illnesses. The interviewees’ stories are often touching and haunting, and are interspersed with chapters dealing with stress, emotional repression, hormones, the “cancer personality,” the biology of relationships, and the power of negative thinking. The author has worked as a palliative care specialist, a psycho-therapist, and a caregiver for people who are living on the street, so he is up to the task of tackling complex medical issues.
Providing poignant insights into how disease is often the body’s way of saying “no” to what the mind cannot or will not acknowledge, When the Body Says No is an impressive contribution to current literature on the physiological connections among life’s stresses, emotions and the body systems governing nerves, immune apparatus and hormones. With great compassion and erudition, Gabor Maté weaves his findings with the stories of famous people who’ve lived with chronic illness, such as Ronald Reagan, Gilda Radner, and Stephen Hawking. He emphasizes that to decipher the hidden factors in chronic illness, we should not blame the victim, but look to address the unintentional transmission of stress and anxiety through the body and across the generations.
All readers will be grateful for the final chapter, “The Seven A’s of Healing,” which presents an open formula for healing and the prevention of illness resulting from hidden stress. It is a gift to us all.
Also by Gabor Maté is Scattered Minds.