Working with the Digestive System

My personal journey with the digestive system

For many years, every few years, I would be hit by severe digestive pain—so intense that I could barely function. It came in waves throughout my life. Although I tried many kinds of treatment for digestive problems, each time I would end up bedridden for months, sometimes as long as half a year, with strong pain and burning digestive symptoms, without ever receiving a clear diagnosis.

From frustration to self-healing and new growth

I underwent every test I could—everything from colonoscopies to private food sensitivity testing and more—yet nothing conclusive was found. Meanwhile, my system was in real distress.

Because there was no diagnosis, there was no clear conventional treatment path to follow. The approaches of German New Medicine and Recall Healing, which also informed my process, typically work with a defined diagnosis, so even there I had no obvious place to begin.

Over the years, whenever the pain appeared and did not stop—sometimes for months—I tried everything I could: fasting and cleansing, doctors and specialists, energetic support, and emotional treatments. None of these brought real relief. What did help was inner work, and creating distance from—or releasing—the conflict that was active in my life.

Over time I did deep self-healing work, and I want to share that path here, along with the conflicts described by my teachers, Dr. Hamer and Dr. Gilbert Renaud, whose work sought to understand the language of the body, including illness, as part of a process that can lead to new growth and healing.

First, a brief introduction.

What is the digestive system?

The digestive system is a complete network of organs whose role is to receive food and turn it into available energy and building materials for the body. The food we eat enters the body and goes through many stages of breakdown and absorption so that as much as possible can be used well.

What is the digestive system made of?

The digestive system includes both hollow organs and solid organs that work together as one system.

The hollow organs of the digestive tract include the mouth, esophagus, stomach, duodenum, small intestine, appendix, sigmoid colon, rectum, and anus.

The accessory organs include the salivary glands, gastric secretions, liver, and pancreas, all connected through ducts and channels. In addition, the abdominal portion of the system is wrapped in the peritoneum.

The digestive system as the second brain

The brain is the central organ responsible for thought and emotion, and it is also involved in the function of other bodily systems, including digestion. The digestive system receives signals from the brain that affect how it functions and how much blood flow is directed toward digestion.

But the influence moves in both directions: the digestive system also affects the brain. This is one reason it is sometimes called the “second brain.” Research has shown that the digestive system can influence the pace of aging, mental state, mental health, brain-related illness, and our emotional tone and inner sensations.

About 90% of the body’s serotonin is produced and stored in the intestines. Serotonin is a neurotransmitter that plays an important role in healthy mental functioning.

The digestive system and mental functioning

The communication between the gut and the brain is known as the gut-brain axis. It operates through gut bacteria, the hormonal system, and the nervous system. To understand how developed the nervous system of the gut is, it is estimated to include roughly 500 million nerve cells lining the organs of the digestive tract.

How gut bacteria affect calm and well-being

Our ability to feel calm and settled is also connected to the digestive system and the composition of the gut microbiome. In studies examining the gut flora of monks practicing deep meditation, researchers found bacterial populations associated with lower levels of stress and depression. People living in the same area who did not practice meditation did not show those same bacterial populations.

Digestive problems as an invitation to look within

When digestive problems appear in our lives, they can be an invitation to ask:

What am I unable to digest in my life? Is there something I cannot take in, accept, or process?

My personal healing story

Returning to the beginning of this article: for many years I lived with recurring digestive distress. Looking back, I can see that it began a few years before I turned 30, and that each time I was in a relationship that was not truly right for me, my digestive system reacted.

The end of my twenties brought a lot of pressure. I wanted partnership and family, and neither had happened yet or seemed close. That created restlessness and searching inside me.

My personal conflict was a deep desire to build a family. But as the years passed, I began compromising and entering relationships that were less right for me in the hope of creating a family soon.

Consciously, I felt at peace with that decision. But in a deeper place, it was indigestible.

At a very deep level, I could not digest the idea of building a family with a partner who was not truly right for me. Again and again, whenever I found myself in that situation, severe stomach problems would appear and I would be forced to stop everything.

Just before turning 40, I was in a serious relationship that led to six months of terrible pain. It did not resolve until the relationship itself ended.

The body may express what we cannot resolve consciously

When something in our lives disturbs us deeply and we do not know how to resolve it, it can become an emotional conflict that weighs on the body.

Emotion matters greatly. How we truly feel shapes our lives. And even when we choose not to see something or not to face it, the body does not ignore it.

From this perspective, the body cannot solve the outer situation directly, so it expresses the unresolved inner tension in its own way. A symptom, disorder, or illness may sometimes be understood as part of the body’s attempt to respond to emotional conflict.

This is not a replacement for medical care, but another layer of listening.

Emotional conflicts that may accompany digestive difficulty

Below are examples of inner conflicts that, in these body-centered approaches, are associated with digestive issues:

• “I can’t digest something in my life” — may relate broadly to the digestive system
• “I can’t forgive this,” “I’m holding onto this,” or “I’m stuck with this” — associated with the rectum
• “I can’t accept this,” “I can’t absorb or integrate this,” or “I wish I could wash this out of my life” — associated with the small intestine
• “I thought I had this, but it disappeared,” or “I can’t swallow this” — associated with the esophagus
• “I can’t digest this” in relation to a recent family-related conflict — associated with the stomach
• “I can’t digest the same old unwanted thing” — associated with the large intestine

These associations are offered as reflections for inner inquiry, not as medical facts.

Practical self-help for digestive issues

If you want to work with digestive difficulties in a self-healing way, these steps may help:

1. Look back to when the problem began. What was happening in your life when the symptom first appeared? Which of the conflicts named here might have been active then? The timing matters. Try to remember what came just before the onset. Ask yourself what you truly felt—and remember, only the truth within you has real power.

2. Practice observation. Once you identify the conflict, let yourself look at it directly. Observation means agreeing to see what is there without judgment, without rushing to fix it, and without trying to change it immediately. Simply look, with understanding and with love for your body.

3. Speak inwardly to your own system. You might write a letter to your brain in words such as:

   My beloved, wise brain, from this moment I choose to care for this conflict consciously. I ask that my digestive system no longer carry this burden for me or try to solve it through pain.

In closing

Digestive problems may point not only to physical difficulty, but also to emotional strain. They can reveal deep inner conflicts and the biological processes that may accompany them. Understanding this may open new ways of relating to what the body is expressing.

If you are living with digestive difficulties, it may be worth exploring both the physical and the emotional layers—with care, honesty, and appropriate support.

And if this reflection may help someone you know, feel free to share it.