What If I'm Asking the Wrong Question?

What If I'm Asking the Wrong Question?What if we're asking the wrong question about illness?In this episode, we take a step back from the question at the heart of Before the Diagnosis: what happened before someone became ill?Rather than searching backwards for a single cause - stress, grief, trauma, anger, relationships or something else - we explore a more complicated idea: context.What was happening in someone's life? What were they experiencing? How were they coping? And how might the mind, body, nervous system and environment interact over time?Drawing on her experience as a nurse, cancer patient and somatic coach, Kyna explores the important distinction between association and causation, and why acknowledging the mind-body connection should never become a way of blaming someone for their illness.But the question doesn't stop there.If our experiences can influence our physiology, what might that mean for recovery? What can we learn from placebo and nocebo research, meditation, expectation, belief and the stories of people who have experienced extraordinary or unexpected recoveries?Kyna explores ideas around radical remission, the work of Kelly Turner, David Hamilton, HeartMath, Joe Dispenza and Helen Pilcher, as starting points for better questions.Because a story isn't proof.But a story can give us a question.And sometimes, questions are where research begins.This episode slightly re routes from episode 1 and sets out the philosophy that will shape the rest of Before the Diagnosis:Curious enough to explore.Grounded enough to question.Hopeful without creating false certainty.And perhaps the question isn't simply:“What caused my illness?”Perhaps we should also be asking:“What was happening to me before I was diagnosed?”