Are you suffering from ancestral trauma?

Last Updated on November 29, 2023 by Cathy

Stress plays a huge role in multiple sclerosis (MS). It’s a trigger to MS and it causes flares. But what caused the stress to begin with? Did something traumatic happen in your life? Or are you feeling ancestral trauma?

Researchers don’t know what causes multiple sclerosis (MS). There are many different theories.  Including your body is attacking itself, gut health, or hormone deficiencies (vitamin D). But, there isn’t “one” thing that causes MS.

When I started eating real food and not processed food it stopped the progression of my MS. I wasn’t getting worse but my symptoms weren’t reversing either. It wasn’t until years later, I started looking into why I had MS.

Growing up I ate the standard American diet (SAD). Plus, I had many rounds of antibiotics starting when I was a toddler. That’s when I realized my gut bacteria was off balance and I had a severe yeast overgrowth called Candida. 

I combined the Wahls Protocol with a candida diet. And, I followed the book Healing Multiple Sclerosis by Ann Boroch. That’s when my symptoms started to reverse after three months. However, my symptoms stopped reversing about eight or nine months later due to stress. Stress has always been a huge factor in my life. I was a stressed child, and a stressed adult, I had a stressful job. Both my son and I have an autoimmune disease which causes stress.

We all know how bad stress is, it causes depression, and diseases, and triggers flares. Stress affects our mind and every part of our body. We can’t avoid stress but it’s how we handle the stress that makes a difference.

Stress

Stress plays a major role in MS. It’s a trigger to MS and it causes flares. It’s impossible to avoid stress entirely but it’s very important to learn techniques to manage your stress. When our son was young he was so relaxed, nothing bothered him. We used to say he’d live to be 100 years old because he had no stress. Then he ended up with type 1 diabetes and everything changed. Now, every little thing stresses him out.

What happened? I can understand how a disease can cause stress to a person. But why so drastically? Did the disease trigger something in him that made him react like that? Is it because his body no longer produces the hormone insulin? 

Or was it caused by something traumatic that happened to one of our ancestors at the same age?

I’ve been working hard at reducing my stress through deep breathing and meditation and it’s helping. But, I’ve discovered we also inherit our stress through our ancestors. It’s called inherited trauma. Through epigenetics, the study of heritable gene expression, we inherit our mother’s stress. If she’s stressed while pregnant, you absorb her cortisol (stress hormone). But it doesn’t stop there. We also inherit stress/trauma from our father, aunts, uncles, and grandparents.

It Didn’t Start With You

I’m currently reading a book called “It Didn’t Start With You” by Mark Wolynn. It’s about inheriting trauma from your ancestors. I was a little skeptical at first. But as I was doing each exercise in the book it began to connect the dots between my stress and my fears.

I have two huge stressors, finances, and my son’s health. Not that I’m broke and living in poverty but I’ve always stressed about not having saved enough money. Even when I was a kid I always saved my allowance because I felt better having money than spending it.

I’m the opposite of most Americans – I hate spending money. As far as health goes, I’m more concerned about my son’s health than I am about my own health. Most parents are but both my husband and I are overly protective of our youngest son.

When our son was two years old he contracted necrotizing fasciitis. More commonly known as flesh-eating bacteria. We’re not sure how he got the deadly bacterial infection. But, it entered his body through the open sores he had when he had chickenpox. 

It first appeared in his foot and quickly moved to his upper leg. The surgeon told us if it moved to the bone they would have to amputate his leg. He also said, that if it moved to his abdomen there was nothing they could do and our son would die. Hearing that was the worst moment of my life.

Thanks to all the doctors and the surgeon they acted quickly and saved his life and his leg. Even though that was over twenty years ago, I can still feel the stress from that whole ordeal. When he was 16 years old he ended up back in the hospital. This time with a diagnosis of type 1 diabetes our fears for his health and his life were back.

Ancestral Trauma

So is it true that trauma repeats itself from one generation to the next? I don’t know. But my mother’s mother, my grandmother, had a small child who died in an accident. Then many years later her daughter gave her newborn baby up for adoption. That’s two childhood losses. 

All my grandparents lived through the Great Depression during the 1930s. It was the worst economic downturn in U.S. history. It was a very traumatic time for many families. On my father’s side, there was also trauma due to violence and death over money. 

Cortisol – the Stress Hormone

Cortisol is your “fight or flight” hormone. When you’re stressed your body releases cortisol. Cortisol gives you extra energy and clarity to deal with what’s threatening you. But, when your body is under constant stress your adrenal glands wear.

I went through years of daily stress from my job, it’s what caused my walking to get worse. When I had my cortisol tested I was expecting it to be high instead it was low. Rachel Yehuda is a professor of psychiatry. She discovered children from Holocaust survivors had low cortisol like their parents. This made the children predisposed to relieve post-traumatic stress disorder symptoms. 

Many people don’t like talking about terrible things that happen to them. Adults try to hide things from their kids thinking they are protecting them. But, this unresolved trauma doesn’t disappear it’s passed down to the next generations. Leaving them with feelings of unhappiness or fear without knowing why.

I didn’t know my father’s family and whenever I asked him about them he would tell me “You don’t want to know.” He grew up in a rough life and wanted to leave it behind. It wasn’t until I started getting into genealogy on the internet that he started telling me some stories.

Inherited trauma can seem odd but Mark Wolynn’s research shows positive results for patients dealing with unexplainable trauma. It has taught me why I stress so much over my son’s health and money. It’s the fear of loss that I’m feeling – loss of a child and loss of money which leads to loss of a loved one for my ancestors.

Healing Ancestral Trauma 

If you notice that many people in your family are suffering in the same way. It could be due to ancestral trauma. My grandma was into genealogy and got me hooked on it. It’s interesting to read about their lives and what they went through.

I feel a connection to my ancestors even though I’ve never met them. And, I feel bad for their suffering as if it happened yesterday. So it makes sense that I’m feeling their trauma too. If you read the book It Didn’t Start With You there are exercises Mark Wolynn walks you through to help you. I didn’t want to spend the money (ha, ha) so I borrowed the book from my local library. 

The book helps you to figure out what your worst fear is and what’s the worst thing that could happen to you. Then you gather up some family history and see if there’s a similarity. If there is, he helps you to release your ancestor’s traumas and your fears.

Granted, this book is not for everyone. He recommends fixing strained relationships with your parent or parents by visiting them. But, if you were viciously attacked physically or sexually it probably isn’t a good idea to reconnect with them. You would be better off seeking professional help to overcome your trauma.

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Resources:

https://www.biologicalpsychiatryjournal.com/article/S0006-3223(15)00652-6/abstract

https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2014/04/140413135953.htm

Are you suffering from ancestral trauma?