When the body resists change, it isn’t failure, it’s wisdom.
My main focus in healing different chronic health issues was for awhile Dynamic Neural Retraining System (DNRS), but as I have written in this blog, it became clear I needed to address trauma. I began to integrate other approaches like Somatic Experiencing . Unlike DNRS, which works from the top down, SE invited me to pay attention to what was happening in my body moment by moment.
Right as I was weaving the two together, I became even sicker and got shingles. The pain and exhaustion were overwhelming, and couldn’t help but think, “why now, when will this end?” I had experienced similar when beginning DNRS, my symptoms from different chronic illnesses had gotten stronger. It was talked about in all of my groups as “resistance” which is the body being overwhelmed with change and “refusing” to move forward. The connotations were negative, but after this experience I began to see it in a more neutral, natural part of healing during the following SE session, it was another protection.
As I sat with the sensations in my body, I saw an image of my younger self, the child who once begged to stay home sick, hidden away from the “bullies in the world” . Tears fell and there was a knowing that sickness had been a form of protection. I had always heard that sickness could be a protection, but now I was experiencing it as a knowing on a body level. It had kept me safe when the world felt too overwhelming. I allowed the images to come and the emotions. My body was too exhausted to do any body movements. The only thing that came was tears, emotions and words. I tracked the grief and stayed with it as I talked to the image in my mind. It is hard to describe SE as being “involuntary” , the words, movements, emotions surface without thought behind it and that is what was occurring here.
I told her it was okay if she needed to hold onto sickness a little longer. That we could stay here if she wasn’t ready to let it go. And then came the softer invitation: whenever you’re ready, maybe we can move forward. Maybe we can live a normal life. Maybe we don’t have to be sick forever.
That moment reframed everything. Resistance wasn’t sabotage. It was my body’s way of protecting me until it felt safe enough to change.
What “Resistance” Really Means
In brain retraining circles like DNRS, people often say you’ll feel worse before you feel better. They call it resistance. And yes — resistance can look like flare-ups, fatigue, or even illness.
But from a trauma-informed perspective, resistance is not failure. It’s communication. It’s the nervous system saying, not yet.
Science supports this view:
- Stress and immune load. Shingles reactivates when the immune system is taxed by stress. Of course, not everyone will get shingles, some will see their chronic illness symptoms get worse. Doing deep emotional work can temporarily raise stress hormones, tipping the balance toward symptoms.
- Allostatic Load. Chronic stress builds up “wear and tear.” Adding too much too quickly, even positive change, can overwhelm the system.
- Neuroplasticity Needs Safety. The brain rewires most effectively in conditions of safety and repetition. Overwhelm shuts learning down.
- Titration Works. Trauma therapies emphasize titration: small, digestible doses of activation that the body can integrate without flooding. Resistance is often the body enforcing titration for us.
How to Work With Resistance
The invitation isn’t to push harder — it’s to listen closer.
- Respect the Pause. Sometimes the most healing act is saying, We can stay here a little longer.
- Shrink the Practice. Go smaller. Two minutes of safe work is better than twenty minutes of overwhelm.
- Offer Comfort. Pair healing work with safety cues: gentle touch, warmth, kind self-talk.
- Negotiate with Compassion. Like I did with my inner child, recognize the protection, then gently suggest the possibility of another way.
- Trust Nervous System Time. Healing is not a race. It unfolds at the pace of readiness, not urgency.
Whenever You’re Ready
That phrase, “whenever you’re ready” , became my compass. It reminded me that resistance is not a wall, but a doorway that opens only when the system feels safe enough to step through.
Getting sicker didn’t mean I was broken. It meant my body was protecting me until I was truly ready.
And readiness, when it comes, will not be forced. It will be chosen.
Could your resistance be less of an obstacle, and more of a boundary of love, keeping you safe until you’re ready to move forward?
