My Life with a Nervous System Disorder

About ten years ago, I was diagnosed with dysautonomia, which is a disorder of the nervous system. From a medical perspective, living with this condition means dealing with a series of imbalances throughout the body that make everyday life a bit more complicated than it is for people whose nervous systems function normally. Those of us who live with this disorder may, for example, faint or feel dizzy for no apparent reason when we suddenly change position. This happens because our blood tends to pool when we’ve been in the same position for a long time. We also tend to get dehydrated easily, feel fatigued, have digestive issues, and experience sudden changes in blood pressure or heart rate, among many other symptoms.

Of course, this may not be the same for everyone, but in my case, this nervous system dysfunction has meant being extremely sensitive not only to noticeable external stimuli—like loud noises, bright lights, or strong smells—but also to things most people don’t typically perceive, such as the energy of others, including their emotions and thoughts. Some of you may be familiar with the term "highly sensitive person" (HSP), and yes, my nervous system disorder made me a highly sensitive person—or perhaps the other way around: being highly sensitive might have led me to develop physical symptoms that are collectively known as dysautonomia. It’s a chicken-and-egg situation—I’m not quite sure which came first—but what I do know is that the two are closely related.

Interestingly, many sources say that highly sensitive people are also empathic. While empathy is generally considered a desirable trait, for those of us who are highly sensitive, it can sometimes feel overwhelming.

These traits often translate into perfectionist, introverted, and/or people-pleasing personalities. It's very common for us to struggle with setting boundaries, saying no, and tending to our own emotional needs, as we often put others’ needs before our own.

If you’ve never encountered these topics before, you might wonder how a nervous system disorder could lead someone to be sensitive to energy, emotions, or thoughts. At this point, there are two things to consider. First, the nervous system is essentially a complex network of electrical impulses through which our brain interprets signals generated outside the body in order to produce a response. Second, every human being emits an electromagnetic field—this is the energy picked up by an EKG or EEG, for example. Alternative medicine disciplines that work with energy interact with this field to promote physical, emotional, mental, and spiritual well-being.

Donna Eden, one of the pioneers of energy medicine, says that energy holds memory. Other authors suggest that our memories, traumas, emotions, and thoughts are recorded in our energy field and can create patterns that lead to bodily imbalances or illness.

Going back to the main topic, people who are highly sensitive or have a dysregulated nervous system tend to have a very receptive antenna (the nervous system) that picks up on others’ energy to such a degree that, without meaning to, we allow it into our own electromagnetic field. This makes us more vulnerable to physical and emotional illness.

I only began to understand all of this recently when, during a conversation with a dear friend about the symptoms I was experiencing due to dysautonomia, she told me about highly sensitive people. When I began researching the topic, I resonated deeply with it and realized how closely the two are connected.

Unfortunately, I spent most of my life completely unaware of these dynamics. My mother, who was also a very sensitive person, wasn’t able to be open with others about her sensitivity and everything she perceived. One of her greatest fears was that people would think she had a mental disorder. As a result, she never received the support she needed and couldn’t guide me in learning how to cope with it either.

Just like my mother, I spent many years trying to hide this part of myself. Between the physical symptoms and everything I perceived but couldn’t understand, life felt difficult. I had a hard time connecting with other children and often thought I wasn’t normal, as I could feel other people’s emotions and even experience their physical discomfort in my own body, which was overwhelming. I was a very quiet and introverted child, and because of this, my family reinforced my belief that I was different or strange.

As a teenager, I gave up my dream of becoming a doctor. I began studying to be a nurse, but during my hospital training, I felt completely overwhelmed by the emotional and physical pain of the patients. The idea of possibly causing someone even more pain terrified me. I ended up studying and working in a completely different field—translation—where I excelled thanks to my intuition. I always exceeded expectations, but at the cost of my health. I worked excessively and was overly pleasing because I didn’t know how to set boundaries.

As an adult, one of the things that caused me the most distress was the feeling that I was invading people’s privacy. I would unintentionally have visions of the challenges they were facing, and even though I didn’t know it at the time, I was also seeing scenes from their past lives. This made me question my mental health many, many times.

I developed a love-hate relationship with people. On one hand, I could understand their struggles deeply, but on the other, I felt overwhelmed by it all.

I spent many years unwell, and it wasn’t until February 2023 that I discovered I wasn’t alone. I heard a speaker named Amy Stark at the Body Electric Summit talk about the connection between energetic sensitivity and physical illness. One of the things she said that struck me the most was that highly sensitive people have an overactive sympathetic nervous system, which stays on far longer than it should. This system is meant to activate only in emergencies or during stressful, survival-based situations. She also mentioned that their parasympathetic nervous system—the one responsible for returning the body to balance and allowing for healing—is rarely activated. In other words, highly sensitive people don’t just feel overstimulated by the outside world; that overstimulation keeps them in a constant state of stress that makes it difficult to relax or rest deeply. Today, the medical community acknowledges that stress is at the root of nearly every physical illness.

Since then, I’ve done a lot of research and started using tools that have helped me improve my physical and emotional health. I hope that anyone who resonates with this, whether or not they’ve been diagnosed with a nervous system disorder, takes a moment to consider that they might be highly sensitive to external stimuli—and that this could be affecting their well-being.

Some of the most important practices for highly sensitive people are learning to set boundaries, protect their energy, and clear it regularly. Honestly, though, all of us—sensitive or not—can benefit from these practices. In future posts, I’ll talk more in-depth about them.