When Your Body Won’t Let You Avoid It

What happens when you don’t process an emotion?

Sometimes… your body does it for you.

In this episode, I share a real and raw experience of waking up in a loop of nausea and intrusive thoughts, only to realize I was avoiding something deeper: rejection.

We talk about:

•  The connection between emotional avoidance and physical symptoms 
•  How rejection can turn into self-rejection 
•  Why emotions only take about 90 seconds to process (if we allow them) 
•  And what it looks like to feel something… without becoming it 

If you’ve ever felt stuck in a cycle you couldn’t think your way out of, this episode will help you understand what your body might be trying to tell you.

Transcript

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Welcome to the Freedom Camp Podcast, rooted in truth, growing in freedom, and built on the belief that you weren't meant to grow alone. Each week I'll share honest stories, insights, and simple questions to help you explore the unseen things that keep you from living in the freedom that's already yours. And take brave intentional steps toward the life you were made for. This is your space to reconnect with your authentic self and grow in freedom on purpose. I was nauseous and unsettled, and I fell asleep quickly, but I kept waking up with this intense loop of thoughts about being sick. Like the kind where you feel like you'll never get relief, even after you are sick. And it kept coming back over and over and over. And what I didn't realize at the time was that I was actually living out the exact questions that I gave in Freedom Camp earlier that day. What came out of that night changed how I understand rejection, processing emotion, and what our body is actually trying to do for us. Eventually I got up, thinking maybe I needed to be sick. But once I was up, I realized I didn't. So I went to Mark and I asked him to pray. And he prayed for healing and over my heart and my mind, something he's done many times before. But this time it stood out to me. And after we prayed, we talked about it. And he shared something that stuck with me. He said, sometimes we can be so stirred up in our mind and our heart that it actually blocks or delays us from receiving healing. That the healing is there, but we're too activated or too dysregulated to let our body feel it. So since I wasn't feeling it, I started sharing about the looping thoughts and about a prayer that I prayed way back in October to be free from this fear I've had for decades around throwing up. And I realized, well, I am free from that fear. But that night I felt tormented by it. So we kept talking, and somehow it led right back to the questions that I didn't journal on from Freedom Camp earlier that day. Where am I not being honest with myself? And what emotion do I avoid? And then it became very clear. Rejection. More specifically, self-rejection. And then something even deeper clicked. We were talking about how the body processes things, and Mark said something so simple but so powerful. P and poop are already processed. Throwing up is usually unprocessed. Something our body is trying to get out because it's not good for us. And I realized I don't let rejection process. But I've spent decades avoiding and not allowing those 90 seconds. And my body has been carrying it. So I did something different. I broke the agreement with self-rejection, with shame, with grief, and all the others that tag along. Right there in that moment. I agreed with God about who I am, that I am loved, I am precious, I am honored, I am wanted. I forgave myself for turning that rejection inward. And I asked for forgiveness where my own self-rejection has spilled out onto others. And I asked for courage to feel rejection without becoming rejection. And that's the shift. Not that rejection will never happen again, because for many of us it will, but that we can feel it without turning it into our identity, without turning it in on ourselves, and without storing it in our body. So I went to bed after that and I slept through the night. No loops, no nausea, no waking up, just rest. And it's not because rejection disappeared, it's because I finally moved it through. So I'm sharing this with you because this is the work of growing in freedom. It's not perfectly journaling every time, it's not always getting it right or avoiding messing up. It's being willing to notice what's coming up and meet it honestly when it does. So if you've been avoiding something, maybe an emotion, a pattern or a feeling that keeps showing up, maybe the work isn't to get rid of it. Maybe it's to let it move through you. So where are you not being honest with yourself? What emotion do you avoid most? And what would it look like to feel that safely? You don't have to force it. Just don't run from it when it shows up. And remember, I'm right here with you in it. Thanks for listening to the Freedom Camp Podcast, where we believe freedom is nurtured from within and grows when you tend to it. If this stirred something in you, let it take root this week and see what grows. And if you enjoyed this or found it meaningful, please give the gift of a review, share it with a friend, and leave a comment below. It helps us build this podcast community because we weren't meant to grow alone.