PODCAST INTRO: Hey, beautiful soul, and welcome to Dear body, I'm Listening, the podcast for women navigating chronic symptoms, invisible illness, and that daily dance between hope and exhaustion. If you've ever been told it's all in your head, well, this podcast is for you, because your body is not lying, and neither are you.
Hi, I'm Donna Piper, movement therapist, Pilates instructor and chronic illness navigator. After years of being dismissed, misdiagnosed and doing everything, quote, unquote, right, but still getting sicker, I created this space to tell our truth. Here, we talk about swelling, brain fog, nervous system crashes, and the kind of symptoms that don't always show up on lab results. We're going to explore lymph breath, movement, self trust, latest research books, relationships, basically everything, all from a place of compassion and honesty. This isn't about fixing your body. It's about finally being heard and getting some answers.
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Donna Piper: Hey, friend, running low? Me too. I'm Donna. This is Dear Body, I'm listening. We're in it together.
Hey, beautiful soul. Welcome back to Dear body, I'm Listening. This is Part 2 of our series on How Trauma Rewrites Pain. Last time in Part 1, we talked about fascia and connective tissue. How trauma literally gets stored in the body? And how those tight braced tissues keep signaling danger to the brain.
Today, we're moving deeper into the autonomic nervous system, the wiring that runs every automatic process in the body from the heartbeat to digestion. Because here's the thing, most of the illnesses I live with, lipedema, hypermobility, EDS, MCAS, POTS, chronic fatigue are either connective tissue disorders or are deeply influenced by connective tissue and the nervous system. So this episode, we'll talk about how trauma rewires the fight or flight system, how connective tissue and fascia feed into it, and why this connection explains so many of my chronic illness symptoms, and maybe yours too.
REAL TALK: NO GLOSS, JUST US. NOW, LET'S DIVE IN.
Let me share something that used to confuse the heck out of me. And by the way, I've been doing Pilates for 25 years. I've recently gone to a Pilates class since I have gotten really ill in the last six years. At the moment, I can do the moves. I'm good at them. I feel good even when I try to pull back. I might challenge myself if the instructor comes over to me and asks me to do more. I've gotten in the habit of saying no. But in the beginning, I would challenge myself even more. Because at the moment, it didn't hurt. And because of my hyper mobile joints, my Pilates background and my dancers background, this did have something in me that I wanted to push. My brain would say, you've got this. This is no problem. But then afterwards, it would be a totally different story. Hours later, or sometimes just in the car ride home, my body would begin to be stiff. My lower back might feel tight. I wasn't getting the same high off of my Pilates. Typically, my pilates workout was pretty intense.
Again, I had been doing it for a long time, and I had gone into the really advanced moves. I knew what I was doing, so I could make even really basic classes intense if I wanted to. But now, even my heart might raise, or I would get these crashes where I had to lay down, and then I would notice that I would feel more bloated, more constipated, and my legs would be more inflamed. And again, with that unbearable fatigue, I felt like my body was going through like a war other than being nourished. Because before, I would feel nourished by it. I'd feel tired right after, and then I would have a lot of energy, and my body would continue to feel good.
I knew something wasn't right, and I knew I wasn't weak. I knew my body had changed, especially with the weight of this lipedema. I know Pilates is beneficial. I felt it, so I just had to get some new education about how to move my body being hyper mobile with this extra weight, because I had been used to moving it and dealing with all of my symptoms, which I didn't even know were hyper mobile symptoms until recently, until I really started to figure out how to move my body where Pilates is going to be good for me, and it's not going to trigger me. And what was really happening with this new batch of symptoms in this active moment of just getting another viral load and another virus last November, until I got the diagnosis of chronic fatigue in January, and the work I've been doing for it, it's a very slow healing process with chronic fatigue, and that is also impacting all of the hypermobile joints.
So this is what's been going on. My connective tissue and my nervous system have been in this trauma loop. My fascia was tightening under the stress of the illnesses. And then the movement, and then my autonomic nervous system was misfiring again. I've been stuck in fight and flight for decades, but with these more chronic, recent flares, and where these conditions have been really setting me back. Especially the chronic fatigue, the lipedema as well, and the hypermobility, the POTS and the MCAS, all live in the same group. They all get, in my opinion, in my life. The two major issues are the chronic fatigue and the weight of the lipedema, and that is flaring and interacting with the hypermobility, the MCAS and the POTS in a way that I just didn't know how amplified these states were.
I've been used to healing my body and moving my body from a compromised, quote, unquote, because I had all these chronic pain, but I never had known until recently that I had these other illnesses. So it wasn't a weakness. It wasn't something going off of what I was doing. It was that I needed to rewire how I view my exercise and what was doing, because it has been rewired having these connective tissues issues in this state that I'm in now is just constantly adding fuel to the fire of the fashion of the connective tissue.
NOW, IT'S TIME FOR THE CONNECTIVE THREAD WHERE THE STORY MEETS THE SCIENCE.
So let's do a quick recap from Part 1. I talked about fascia, and that is a connective tissue web that wraps around every muscle, bone, nerve and organ. I have all these parts of the connective tissue issues that are common through my diagnoses and are also lymphatic issues, right? So everything's connected. And so when trauma tightens the fascia, because fascia is full of nerve endings, it keeps sending dangerous signals to my brain. And so with that, with the chronic fatigue, my brain and my central nervous system haven't been working right. There's studies now showing that it is chronic fatigue. Isn't something that's just lumped together. They can't figure it out, it is a neurological issue. There are some things going on with your brain, which makes sense after knowing what I know, and applying it through my studies as a dance movement psychotherapist who specifically studied post traumatic stress disorder. And those are the clients that I was with. Not on this level, but this was 25 years ago. You don't know what you know. Isn't that a good saying?
So it makes sense why trauma can literally be felt as stiffness, pain or heaviness. So let's get into the Autonomic Nervous System. The ANS, for short. The ANS has two gears. Sympathetic, which is fight, flight or freeze. And parasympathetic, which is rest, digest and heal. So in trauma survivors, this balance gets lost. I've seen it in clients before, and I didn't really see it in myself. When you go to school, if anyone has any sort of psychology degree, and sometimes I think they teach it just like an introduction. There is this diagram. There's four little squares, and one of them is your blind spot. It's hard to be your own healer. You need to be in a relationship so people can point out your blind spot. Because literally, in this diagram, everyone has it. There is a place that you're not going to be able to see, even if you know all the information in the world, you need others to help you. That's where this balance that I thought I had, but I couldn't see my own blind spot was in the sympathetic branch because it was overactive, pumping stress hormones, raising my heart rate, and shutting down my digestion. I had been told by a lot of other doctors before this that it was maybe a parasite or mold. Or they're always trying to go to the root cause. Now, I know my root cause is my connective tissue disorders, and this is where this ties the connective tissue disorders together.
So let's kind of give a very brief overview. This is not in depth, and I'm sure there's other research with other people that are slightly different or maybe contradictory, but this is from my perspective and my research. So with my hypermobility and EDS, the loose connective tissue is like this. What happens is there's constant micro injuries happening, and those are producing pain signals, and then my nervous system gets sensitized, and then trauma on top makes the dial louder. So then, because when you get desensitized, or have a sensitization to something, then it takes more of that stimulant in order to have those receptors aware of it. That's why I have a really high pain tolerance, probably because of all of this. But also because I've had migraines since I was seven years old. So 40 plus years of it has been really adapting my body in a negative way, but in a very healing way. Because when we look at the body, it is always trying to survive and do what it needs to do with what it's given. And the fact that I'm still standing, talking, breathing and doing those things is a huge feat. And so I thank my autonomic nervous system and all my other systems for trying to figure it out.
When we look at POTS, which is another thing that I've had forever, that I didn't really know was a diagnosis is dysautonomia. Which means that the autonomic nervous system can't regulate the heart rate or the blood pressure, and so that's why sitting, standing and doing things, the heart rate is not in a regular rhythm of things. So if you add the trauma to my fascia, which happens with my connective tissue disorders, and the hypermobility, the fight or flight switch gets stuck even harder. So that said, one other layer that's turning on the fight or flight.
Now, let's look at our mast cells. So mast cells live in the connective tissue and are triggered by stress. So there is some research that says that, initially, what happens is when we have any trauma, actually our bone marrow produces the mast cells, which is interesting. So it's kind of drawing out. So again, all these things are related. So trauma, again, and as I define it with my clients when I was a clinician is a significant distressing event. So this mast cell trauma is like my mast cells are out there, like there's danger, there's danger. That's what they are actually designed for. It is the very, very first line of defense. So this trauma of this mast cells thinking like, okay, we're triggered. We're on red alert. It actually is destabilizing these mast cells, which leads to the symptoms of it, whether it's runny nose, gut pain, hives, different skin issues, reactions with just clothing, being touched, and she feels uncomfortable. So all of the many, many symptoms that mast cells that you might have because of your mast cell activation and being destabilized. So this again, increases that bite and flight.
Let's add the chronic fatigue syndrome, so that is a central sensitization of what happens. So the pain, which really just means that the pain dial is stuck so high. And then if you add on your post external malaise, that means that trauma, any significant distressing event, whether it's internal like, oh, my gosh, I'm sick again. Or, oh, my god, I have a migraine again. Or, oh, my gosh, I went to the doctor who's dismissive and kind of a jerk about it. All of that stressful event, and my body's already triple high alert right before I even get to this one. So then trauma lowers the threshold of being able to handle these issues, because my body isn't switching back into rest and digestion. And then coming up with some trauma, ability to do a fight and flight response, it's constantly in that heightened state. So then that is the threshold for some crashes and some other things that I'm going to talk about in a couple episodes, the more complexities of chronic fatigue. But right now, just looking at trauma and any significant event, and how it also impacts the body at the fascial level.
Let's turn to the last one that I have, lipedema. So trauma and chronic stress worsen the swelling, the lymph congestion, and the tissue inflammation. There is a medical trauma of losing weight. It's calories in, calories out. I don't think you have anything. It doesn't look like edema, because you don't pit in the legs. They're more swollen, so they really don't know. So trying to fight through all of this, and I'm trying to change the word fight, but truly respond and persevere through all of this is going to be where it's at, but it also compounds the body's pain response. So all of this also makes the pain of lipedema in your legs even more. So trauma doesn't just quietly sit in the background. It weaves itself through fascia, nerves, immune cells, amplifying the symptoms of every connective tissue that I have, and also heightens the other ones, even if they're not technically a connective tissue condition. And so that's why many of us that have these invisible illnesses carry both trauma and pain. And it's not coincidence, it's biology.
I'm even going to get surgery, which I am going to do for my lipedema. I have three scheduled appointments in January, April and July of 2026. That's also trauma. Your body's going through something. It's trying to protect itself, and living in this state of hyper arousal. Does all sorts of things to your body. For me, personally, it has ramped up my pain threshold. So that's why when I work out, because I'm flexible, because I know the moves, whatever I really can put myself into another flare state, also with chronic fatigue pushing me past because I don't have a big threshold of energy to use, and it will take me out even something as simple as doing dishes.
MYTH BUSTER: LESS HYPE, MORE HEALTH.
Here's the myth. If your tests are normal, the pain must be in your head. But there's no test for pain. Even the pain scale that we have is kind of hilarious. Because 10, we'd be going to the hospital. I have gone to the hospital for my pain, and they can't really figure it out, or they don't know. Do I want to sit in the emergency room in incredible amounts of pain just to be told that they don't really know what it is? Maybe they give me something to put me asleep, but they don't actually address the pain. Because tests do not measure fascia tension. They don't measure my nervous system. They are not measuring mast cell chaos or this central senses citation. I keep on having a hard time pronouncing that because, again, full disclosure, today is a migraine day, but I had a podcast scheduled to do so that's what's going on.
And the last thing I want to say about this myth is, your pain is real.Funny thing that goes on in the community is people with chronic illness, they have a pain scale of like 11, 12, 13, 14, 15. You're conditioned to have a higher pain threshold because your body has all this trauma response because the fascia is tightened. It's signaling that your body's not safe, so it needs to work harder in order to keep you safe. But I again, want you to know that your pain is real. Your nervous system is real. It's having a real response, and your connective tissues are part of the story.
FEEL GOOD FLOW TIME: MICRO MOVES, MACRO RELIEFS. LET'S BREATHE TOGETHER.
So now, let's do a grounding exercise for your ANS. Look around your room or wherever you're at, and gently turn your head. Notice three things you see, a color, a shape and an object. So again, these three things I want you to see are a color, a shape and an object. And then I want you to say each one of them to yourself. Describe the color. It may be blue, the shape might be square, and the object might be your phone or a phone. And now, take a deep breath with your hand on your belly, and a hand on your heart. If that feels comfortable for you, just whisper to yourself, I am here. I am safe. I am here. I am safe. I am here. I am safe. This exercise is called orienting. It tells your nervous system that wherever you currently are, assuming there is no danger around you, that the danger that you might have experienced or are experiencing somewhere, even on a cellular level, that there's no actual physical danger for your bodies to get tense. You're safe at this moment. And over time, these micro practices help you retain the ANS to shift out of fight or flight. So doing these things, telling yourself you're safe does help your central nervous system get new rewiring to help down, shift into, and switch over to rest and digest. So these little things seem kind of like, oh, well, it's not going to totally change my system. I'm constantly in these processes. But actually, by consciously doing this, you can start to change and put in new input to your system that reads like, okay, so maybe I can downshift for even 30 seconds into potentially switching over to a rest and digest.
THIS IS SHARED EDUCATION AND LIVED EXPERIENCE, NOT MEDICAL ADVICE. IT IS NOT MEANT TO BE. CHECK IN WITH YOUR BODY, CHECK IN WITH YOUR CLINICIAN, AND FIND OUT WHAT FITS YOUR LIFE.
Here's the takeaway from this Part 2. Trauma just doesn't live in your fascia. It rewires the autonomic nervous system. And if you live with any connective tissue disorders like hypermobility EDS, hypermobility spectrum, anything where you're hyper mobile, if you have lipedema, which is connective tissue disorder, MCAS comes from the bone marrow, and then comes out through the connective tissue. If you have chronic fatigue syndrome, that is when your system is in a state of arousal. Your brain isn't really working to your central nervous system, and you have something like POTS, where you're in a fight or flight, it really does regulate your heart rate so that could impact it, and you just generally have this state of dysautonomia. There's dysregulation in your system. It's actually amazing that it's working for you, so be grateful.
Well, you don't have to. I'm not telling you to be grateful if you don't want to be. But I know that even though some days I don't feel grateful, the fact that I am overloading my system and I'm still able to figure out ways to potentially rewire it, to get it back into a state where it's naturally going into a more rest, digest state and less in the fight or flight. And that's the goal. And on top of this, you may have a lot of different traumatic incidents. Medical trauma is a real trauma, having people not understand you, not feeling good about yourself. If you were bullied, if someone had said something negative about your body, or about your energy level, all that stuff could stay in your system that's already doing a lot in zone overdrive. Your fascia could just be, again, part of the system that is just really trying to help you out, but is overstimulated.
So if trauma rewrote the wiring one way? That means safety relationships and somatic practices can rewrite it. The other way is the long game. There is no quick fix. I wish there was, but there's really just adopting some new practices to counter this. And then over time, if you can get these new practices to be what your body goes to and not the other is the Holy Grail.
So in the next part, in Part 3, we're going to be connecting the dots even further of how trauma increases the risk for autoimmune disease and chronic illness. There's lots of papers about this and why many of us end up carrying both autoimmune and chronic illness if you've had any trauma. So we'll get all into the actual other part of not just how the body deals with trauma, but also when you actually are actively in the past traumatic events.
If this episode resonated with you, please share it with someone who's been told that their pain doesn't show up on tests, and follow me at the Donna Piper for more ways to move, heal and belong in your body. Until next time, remember, your body isn't broken. It's been working overtime to protect you. And now, if you can put in any way at all, just telling your body it's safe or you are safe, that will help a lot.
You've been listening to Dear Body. I'm Listening. It's time to remember to be gentle with your capacity. Meet yourself where you are. And if this has helped, send it to a friend who also needs a soft reminder and a gentle place to land you. If this episode made you feel even more seen, brought you clarity or reminded you that you're not alone, please take a moment to rate, review, and send it to someone who needs that same reminder. You can find more tools, blog posts and support over at donnapiper.com. And hey, don't forget to subscribe so you never miss an episode.
Got a question for me? Every month, I do a listener coaching episode, and I'd love to hear from you. Send your questions, stories or flare up confessions to donna@donna piper.com, and you just might hear your answer on the show. Until next time, Dear Body, I'm Listening. I am so glad that you are here.
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PODCAST OUTRO: If this episode made you feel even a little more seen, brought you a dose of clarity or pointed you toward your next step, please rate, review and share it with someone who's been quietly carrying the same questions. You can find some more resources, blog posts and healing tools over at donnapiper.com. Don't forget to subscribe so you never miss an episode. Until next time, Dear Body, I'm listening, and I am so glad you're here.
