‘Likely Lads’ writing about Psychophysiological Dis-ease

Emotional Memory Images

Recently, my colleague, Matt Hudson and myself published our third co-authored article titled Split-Second Unlearning: Developing a Theory of Psychophysiological Dis-ease in which we discussed chronic stress from a psychological educational perspective.

We suggested that significant emotional events in early life (traumatic and benign) create emotional memory images (EMIs) that can be re-triggered later in life, re-playing stress responses and leading to a state of chronic ‘psychophysiological dis-ease’.

We propose a therapeutic model, called ‘split-second unlearning’, that draws on a range of ideas from different disciplines to connect trauma, stress, and intervention. I first met Matt at a Northern Pain Network Conference, where he presented a mesmerising talk about how he helps people living with pain. This sparked my interest in psychophysiological dis-ease and its relationship to pain.

Two ‘Likely Lads’ from Wallsend

Matt Hudson is a mental health coach and Chief Executive Officer of Mind Help Limited. His therapeutic approach to helping people living with pain was unique and a refreshing change from the biomedical approaches used at the time.

Matt and I immediately hit it off because we originate from the same part of Tyneside (Walker and Wallsend respectively). At that time Matt was living in my hometown, Wallsend, literally 500 meters from the hospital in which I was born.

Wallsend is famous for shipbuilding and for producing a raft of famous footballers via Wallsend Boys Club. Matt and I have strong Geordie accents and are able to speak in our local dialect without people from outside our region being able to understand what we are saying.

In many ways we are a couple of Likely Lads, similar to the famous sitcom set in Tyneside in the 1960s and 1970s.

Words and wellbeing

Our first venture into co-authoring was a paper titled: Generalizing, deleting and distorting information about the experience and communication of chronic pain.  We discussed how a  person's mental map of themselves and their world, affects their experience of pain.

We examined how this mental map is reflected in language used in daily conversation, including the stories people tell about their pain experience.

This article has become one of my favourite publications because it really helped me to appreciate how words and phrases can shape who you are, and how these words can sabotage wellbeing.

Check out Matt’s book The Saboteur Within if you want more about overcoming Self-Sabotage.

Matt and I have a variety of projects on the go and at the moment, including finalising a theoretical paper on emotional memory images. We also launched a monthly webinar series in December 2021, called Mind and Body Talks, in which we discuss psychophysiological dis-ease from a wide variety of perspectives... and that venture will be discussed in a future blog.