How To Rebuild Trust With Your Body

People living with chronic skin conditions often lose trust with their bodies. We believe that our bodies are broken, and even like they’ve betrayed us. I certainly felt this way in my teens and early 20s.

But this isn’t an irreversible process. Even if you lost trust with your body many years ago, you can rebuild that trust and repair your relationship with your body. This is a crucial part of a healing journey – in fact, it’s foundational. Rebuilding trust with your body is what allows you to determine what your body needs, so you can meet those needs effectively.

So how can you rebuild trust with your body? First, let’s dive into why you might have lost that trust in the first place. Then we can explore ways to create a more trusting relationship with your body.

How we lose trust with our bodies

Our society doesn’t teach us how to listen to our bodies. In fact, it teaches us how not to. 

As soon as we start school, we’re taught that we can only eat at certain times, go to the bathroom at certain times, and exercise at certain times. If our body wants something different from what the school schedule demands, we aren’t allowed to listen to our body’s needs. And so we learn to ignore our body’s signals. Kids who try to meet their bodies’ needs instead of complying with the schedule are often labeled as having “behavioral problems” and are punished, while those who are able to ignore their bodies and follow the schedule are rewarded.

The problem often gets even worse in adulthood. We have to stay productive at work, and we can’t always rest or eat when we need to, because there’s so much to get done. Many of us keep pushing despite toxic levels of stress, just trying to keep up. We get very good at ignoring our body’s needs if meeting them is inconvenient at that moment – which happens often.

The nervous system is very good at learning patterns, and it suppresses any input that you consistently ignore. Each time you’re hungry and you don’t allow yourself to eat, your nervous system learns that hunger is not an important signal. Because that signal doesn’t influence your behavior, it’s apparently not something that really matters. So your nervous system stops paying attention to that signal.

Over time, you may actually lose the ability to detect the signal – you might not even be able to tell that you’re hungry at all. And for many of us, it’s not just hunger. We may not always be sure when we’re tired, stressed, inflamed, dehydrated, or in need of exercise, social time, or a hug.

That’s what losing trust with your body means. You can no longer tell what your body’s needs are, because you’ve gotten so good at ignoring its signals.

Chronic conditions and losing trust with your body

For those of us who have chronic conditions, there’s another layer to consider. Often, we’ve learned to actively distrust our bodies. 

Because of our condition, we may believe that our bodies are broken, and that the signals they’re sending are wrong. We push away whatever we feel from our bodies, or we try to cover it up or numb out so we won’t feel it.

I know I used to distrust my body in this way. I often felt angry and resentful towards my body. Whenever I felt any discomfort at all, I just saw that as further proof that my body was broken. I turned to food to help me numb out and ignore what I was feeling.

My body responded in a way that’s very common – it turned up its signals to try and get my attention. If you consistently ignore what your body is telling you, then instead of whispering, it may start to yell. That’s what happened to me – the more I ignored my body’s signals, the louder those signals got. And I just saw that as even more proof that my body was broken, and tried even harder to ignore it. This damaging cycle continued for years, until I found myself extremely overweight, suffering from prediabetes and high cholesterol, when I was only in my 20s.

I see this a lot in people with chronic conditions. They’re experiencing a health issue (such as inflammation), and their body is sending them signals to let them know. But they don’t listen to those signals, because they believe that their body is broken and that those signals are wrong. As their body’s signals get stronger, they trust their body less and less. Over the course of many years, this damaging cycle can lead to major health issues, as well as destroying a person’s mental health and quality of life.

How to rebuild trust with your body

In order to support your body’s healing, you’ll need to rebuild trust with your body. By learning to read your body’s signals, you’ll be much better able to meet its needs.

1. Realize that your body’s signals are simply information

The first step is to realize that your body is not broken. This is true no matter what conditions you’re dealing with, or what your body looks or feels like. Your body is not broken.

Try to reframe your thoughts about the signals you receive from your body. Those signals aren’t a problem – they’re simply information. Your body is just telling you what it needs. It’s not broken or wrong – it’s just communicating. 

Instead of wishing that your body felt different than it does, try to see any signal your body sends you in a neutral way, as simply a source of information.

2. Become more attuned to your body’s signals

Once you’ve developed this mindset, then it’s time to learn to hear your body’s signals again. 

Begin to pay closer attention to the signals your body is sending. A great way to do this is to do a check-in with your body regularly. For myself, a few times a day, I pause and ask, “What is my body feeling right now?” I take a few minutes to get quiet and give my full attention to my body.

Many of us have spent years desensitizing ourselves to our body’s signals, so you might find that at first, it’s hard to know what you’re feeling. It helps to remove as many distractions as you can. When you’re checking in with your body, don’t look at your phone, talk to other people, or watch TV. Give yourself the gift of a short space of time when you’re not trying to do anything but pay attention to your body.

Try slowly moving your attention to different parts of your body. Feel your belly, your chest, each leg, each arm, your back, your neck, your face, your head. As you shift your attention to each part, notice anything that you feel, no matter how subtle. No sensation is too small to pay attention to. It might even help to say out loud what you’re feeling, to get more attuned to it.

It’s a great idea to do a check-in at least a few times a day. In addition, whenever you notice something happening in your body, pause for at least a moment to pay attention to it. For example, maybe you feel something in your tummy, or maybe you start getting a headache, or maybe your throat gets scratchy. Do a quick check-in to see if you can get more specifics about what you’re feeling, and check in with the other parts of your body as well.

As part of the process of rebuilding trust with your body, some people find it helpful to practice mindfulness meditation, or to include a mindful movement practice like yoga or tai chi. These practices involve taking some time to focus on the subtle signals that your body is sending. If you find that you’re struggling to figure out what your body is telling you, adding a practice like this to your life might help.

3. Respond to your body with compassion

Once you’ve gotten better at detecting your body’s signals, the next step is to respond to those signals.

Remember that the nervous system suppresses any input that you consistently ignore. But when a signal changes your behavior, then your nervous system learns that this is something important. As you respond to your body’s signals, you’re telling your nervous system to get more sensitive to those signals instead of suppressing them.

When you notice a signal from your body, try to respond with compassion. Do your best to give your body what it’s asking for. For example, maybe you notice that you’re feeling exhausted. You might be tempted to reach for caffeine to cover that feeling up. But instead, try to give your body the rest that it’s asking for. Maybe you take a quick 10-minute nap, or simply take a break from work for a few minutes. 

At first, it might be challenging to figure out how to respond to your body’s signals. 

Give yourself grace as you rebuild trust with your body

It will take time to learn to listen to your body’s signals. Be patient with yourself through this process. Don’t try to make it happen all at once – work on changing your mindset first, then work on learning to feel your body’s signals, and finally practice responding to those signals with compassion. This process isn’t always easy, but I can definitely promise that it’s worth the effort.

Now I’d like to invite you to consider whether you’ve lost trust with your body, and what you might need to work on as you rebuild that trust. Grab your journal and a pen, and consider the following prompts. Keep writing until you feel like you’ve thoroughly explored one prompt, and then move on to the next one.

Try to be as honest with yourself as possible as you write. The goal of journaling is simply to explore your own inner landscape, and to discover where you’re at on your journey so that you can move forward. You’re probably far from perfect right now (I know I am), and that’s okay. By exploring the truth of where you’re at right now, you’ll be much better prepared for the transformational work ahead.

• How do I feel about my body in general? What does my internal dialogue about my body sound like?

• What signals from my body do I tend to ignore or suppress?

• How do I respond when I feel signals from my body?

• Do I know what my body needs when it sends me signals? Are there times when it’s difficult for me to know how to respond to certain signals?

• How can I build more sensitivity towards my body’s signals? Would I benefit from adding a mindful movement or another mindfulness practice to help with this?

• What does my body need from me right now?