When a person's physical symptoms and psychological distress can be described more clearly by themselves or understood more accurately by others, the symptoms often diminish. Because many symptoms are not just the illness itself, but also a way of expressing long-suppressed, neglected, or unspoken emotions and traumas. When these feelings are consistently left unexpressed, they continue to voice themselves through the body and mind in the form of anxiety, insomnia, pain, fear, and other symptoms. And when a person finally can use language to name their feelings, understand their experiences, and express their needs, the messages that originally needed to be conveyed through symptoms no longer require symptoms to communicate. The body is not always creating pain; it often speaks on behalf of the self that cannot speak. So, when you learn to speak for yourself, your body no longer has to suffer on your behalf.