Common places the body holds onto emotions and trauma

From jaw to the pelvic floor, here are a few common body parts that can hold onto emotions and trauma for a long time.

When we suppress the emotions and the trauma in the body, it always finds a way to come out in the expressions. "What’s suppressed, the body will find a way to express. Through pain and tension, the body responds intelligently to external threats, chronic stressors, and overwhelm. It contracts in preparation to respond to threat or impact. So, when our system gets stuck in hyper/hypo arousal, as well as different states of self-protection, our body can learn to stay contracted," wrote Therapist Alexis Florentina Borja.

Common places the body holds onto emotions and trauma (Unsplash)

She further added that some parts of the body are designed to hold onto trauma and emotions, and the suppressed trauma often finds a way to be stored there - "Similarly, what is unprocessed can be housed within our tissues, within our sacred spaces of the body that are designed to hold. So, when we are working with both trauma and/or chronic unexplained symptoms (like pain) it’s important to explore some of the spaces and places that might be responding to events that overwhelmed our system. The jaw, diaphragm, womb space and psoas muscle are incredibly common spaces within the body that might be problem areas for us when we have unprocessed emotion or trauma." Here are the common parts of the body that holds onto emotions and trauma:

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Jaw: Head trauma, chronic anxiety and the feeling of biting onto the tongue to suppress emotions in life often find a way to be stored in the jaw, leading to chronic tension.

Diaphragm: Shallow breathing and chronic bracing of the diaphragm is often associated with suppressed emotions and high impact trauma in the diaphragm.

Psoas muscles: These muscles connect the torso and the lower body – when trauma is stored in these muscles, it can lead to hip pain and chronic low back.

Pelvic floor: The female reproductive system is a powerful space that can hold onto trauma. It is deeply associated with sexuality and can hold onto suppressed emotions for a long time.