In my last blog post I shared an example of an intolerance to a food due to a past traumatic experience. In this post I will be citing several examples of intolerances to an environmental trigger. Some common environmental triggers are things such as grasses, pollen, dust, and cigarette smoke. It is estimated that annually 24.6 million Americans are affected by asthma (1). The American Academy of Pediatrics has published a book about childhood environmental health problems, which states: “Avoiding environmental allergens and irritants is one of the primary goals of good asthma management” (2).

Even though heat and cold are not generally talked about as much as grasses, pollens, etc….temperature triggers have been seen to affect and exacerbate people with asthma and also autoimmune issues such as psoriasis & multiple sclerosis. (2,3, 4)

The 2 cases I will share today involve the environmental triggers of heat and cold.
Several years ago I had a teenage girl who’s mother brought her in because she had a chronic pattern of feeling ill and vomiting if the temperature got too hot for her. The previous week the temperatures had soared in Southern California. Jaye was at school and the temperature got past 100 degrees and she had to go home ill and she vomited. This had happened many times before to her. Using our mind-body technique of NeuroEmotional Technique (NET) we discovered that she had a traumatic experience where As an 8 year old she was ill and had a high fever (hot) , her dad forced to eat something even when she wasn’t feeling well and didn’t want to eat. She ate it, vomited and made a mess everywhere. Her father yelled at her for making a mess and blamed her and punished her by locking her in the bathroom all night. After ‘clearing’ her subconscious association (conditioned response) of this past trauma, Jaye has not had any more recurrances when she’s exposed to high temperatures.

Another interesting experience I had with a patient involved a 32 year old mother who was suffering from Type 2 diabetes and obesity. I put her on a restricted diet to help her manage her blood sugar and also inflammation. After a few weeks she mentioned that she felt better and she lost a little bit of weight. After asking me if exercise would likely help her lose weight faster…to which I replied ‘yes’, she then told me that she had a peculiar problem with exercising that has been bothering her for several years. She described how after exercising she would feel ‘freezing cold’. I asked if she exercised in a cold environment and Shelly said that she works out at “Curves” and while she was freezing everyone else was hot, red, and sweating. Very unusual I thought to myself. Whenever patients present to me with circumstances that just don’t make much sense I have found in a large percentage of these cases to have some hidden emotional stress pattern.

After some assessment I did determine that there was an underlying past emotional trauma pattern that Shelly had. I found that as a child after playing out in the playground during PE she had to take a shower (remember those communal showers in school?). While she was showering one of her classmates took a Polaroid picture of her naked butt and circulated it to many of her peers at school. At this point in our session Shelly blurted out “that was the most cold-hearted thing any one has ever done in my life”. I thought to myself, “ahh, there’s the ‘cold’ association!”

Several days later I received an email from her…”I also wanted to share with you that you fixed my cold issue. When we spoke on Tuesday, I had mentioned to you that I would get super cold about an hour or so after working out. You established it was an emotional connection and you “did your thing” and I am happy to say that when I tested it yesterday, POOF! It was all gone. :-)”

I’ve seen a plethora of other cases where cold or heat triggered varying physical symptoms such as skin problems, digestion distress, pain, migraines, heart palpitations, depression/anxiety, and fatigue. After addressing the root cause association of the trauma and extinguishing the conditioned response the patient was able to no longer suffer from their symptom.

Please keep an eye out as I will be detailing and discussing some possible helps for people that are experiencing food sensitivities and intolerances that are rooted in past emotional stress trauma. Look forward to me introducing Emotional Allergy Technique™ (EAT™). 

1) https://www.webmd.com/allergies/allergy-statistics
2) https://www.atsdr.cdc.gov/csem/asthma/docs/asthma.pdf
3) https://www.webmd.com/skin-problems-and-treatments/psoriasis/7-psoriasis-triggers
4) https://www.nationalmssociety.org/Living-Well-With-MS/Diet-Exercise-Healthy-Behaviors/Heat-Temperature-Sensitivity