What the latest autoimmune research reveals about medical dismissal, childhood adaptations and the extraordinary relationship between our minds and bodies.

The danger of using psychology to explain away biology is that we risk dismissing genuine physical illness. Yet the irony is that psychology and biology are intimately connected. Our experiences, emotions, nervous systems, hormones and immune systems are in constant communication (hence the field of study: psychoneuroendocrinoimmunology). So I got to thinking; perhaps the real problem lies in the lens through which we're interpreting psychology itself. Rather than using it to bring medical enquiry to an end, what if we used it to understand more about the human being experiencing the illness?

This month, a headline about women's health brought this paradox into sharp focus.

On 13 October 2026, The Guardian reported that women with autoimmune conditions were significantly more likely than men to have their symptoms attributed to psychological causes .

And as you can imagine, the comments section erupted.

Women shared stories of spending years trying to convince doctors that something was physically wrong. Years of being told they were anxious, stressed, depressed, overthinking, or perhaps simply experiencing the ordinary inconveniences of being female. (Because apparently, having a uterus comes with a complimentary subscription to medical scepticism.)

But beneath the understandable outrage, I think there's a fascinating angle worth exploring.

One that involves three different lenses: the clinician's interpretation of illness, the patient's interpretation of that explanation, and the identities we develop throughout our lives that can influence how our nervous systems and immune systems respond to the world.

And I think understanding these lenses might help us move towards a much more sophisticated conversation about women's health.

Two People. Two Lenses. One Consultation.

The research, published in eClinicalMedicine , surveyed 6,607 people living with autoimmune conditions.

It found that 43.3% of women reported having their symptoms previously attributed to psychiatric causes, compared with 32.7% of men.

Participants who reported a previous psychiatric explanation for their symptoms

Women also reported longer diagnostic delays and more consultations before receiving an accurate diagnosis.

Although the study relied on patients' reported experiences, its findings raise an important question.

What happens when a clinician's interpretation becomes more influential than the patient's lived experience?

Every clinician brings a lens into the consulting room. A framework of assumptions, training, experiences and expectations through which they interpret the information in front of them.

And sometimes, especially where physical symptoms resist a straightforward explanation, the psychological lens can become a convenient place to put them.

The danger is that a possibility becomes a conclusion, the diagnostic process closes down and the woman leaves with a psychological label instead of the medical investigation she may desperately need.

But there's another lens operating in that consultation room.

The patient's.

Imagine being a woman who's spent years living with unexplained pain, fatigue, dizziness or inflammation.

You've seen several doctors. You've had tests. You've tried to explain yourself.

Then somebody suggests that stress or psychological factors might be contributing to your symptoms.

What do you hear?

And suddenly, a conversation that could potentially expand your understanding of your health feels like another projection of blame.

The meaning we give to an explanation can be just as influential to our emotional response as the explanation itself.

If you've spent years being disbelieved, the word psychological may have become synonymous with imaginary , self-inflicted or your responsibility .

For some women, it may even echo earlier experiences of feeling dismissed, misunderstood or having their reality questioned.

The doctor may be seeing an anxious woman but the woman may be seeing another authority figure who refuses to listen.

Both are interpreting the same encounter through different lenses, although the clinician's interpretation carries considerably greater power over what happens next.

And here's the irony.

The very act of feeling dismissed may activate the woman's stress response, creating another physiological experience within an already complicated biological picture.

Which brings us to the science.

The Science That Challenges the Divide

There's an entire field of research called psychoneuroendocrinoimmunology .

Quite a mouthful, I know. You could probably diagnose something in the time it takes to pronounce it.

Essentially, it explores the relationship between our psychological experiences, nervous system, endocrine system and immune system.

And the fascinating thing is that these systems are constantly communicating with one another.

Our brains influence hormonal and immune signalling. Our immune systems communicate with our brains. Our hormones affect how we respond to stress, regulate emotion and experience our bodies.

Chronic stress can influence inflammatory processes. Inflammation can affect mood, cognition, energy and motivation.

The communication runs both ways.

A 2020 meta-analysis published in JAMA Psychiatry , involving 56 randomised clinical trials and 4,060 participants, found that psychosocial interventions were associated with measurable changes in immune function, particularly inflammatory markers. The strongest evidence involved cognitive behavioural therapy and combined psychological interventions.

Now, this is fascinating because it challenges the idea that psychology exists in some separate, abstract realm, floating around above our shoulders while our bodies get on with the serious business of being biological.

Psychology has biological consequences. Biology has psychological consequences.

And evidence of that relationship tells us about influence, rather than establishing the cause of any individual woman's illness.

For me, this makes the old division between psychological and physical illness increasingly difficult to defend.

Because our biology is constantly responding to our experience of being alive.

And that experience begins long before we arrive in a doctor's consulting room.

As a hypnotherapist offering regression therapy, this is the bit I'm particularly interested in.

The Childhood Identities Our Bodies Learn to Live With

As children, we learn how to navigate our environment.

We discover which behaviours bring closeness, which create conflict, which earn approval and which help us feel safe.

And gradually, we develop identities around those discoveries.

The good girl. The strong one. The capable one. The rebel. The carer. The intelligent one. The one who needs nobody. The one who needs everybody.

These identities can become so familiar that we experience them as our personalities.

But what if some of them began as adaptations?

What if the good girl learned to suppress anger because being agreeable maintained connection?

What if the capable one learned to stay perpetually alert because relaxing meant something might fall apart?

What if the rebel developed a constant readiness to resist because autonomy once felt under threat?

Each of these adaptations involves a different way of anticipating and responding to the world.

And anticipation matters enormously to the nervous system .

Take the good girl, for example.

Perhaps she grew up in an environment where maintaining harmony meant anticipating everybody else's emotional needs.

She became incredibly skilled at reading the room, sensing disapproval and adjusting herself accordingly.

As an adult, she might experience guilt whenever she sets a boundary, disappoints somebody or prioritises herself.

I explore this dynamic in How to Manage Guilt From Relationships with Emotionally Immature Parents .

The fascinating thing is that guilt can become so familiar that it feels like evidence of wrongdoing rather than an emotional response to stepping outside an established relational role.

And every time she anticipates disapproval, her nervous system may respond as though connection itself is at stake.

Then there's the rebel.

Perhaps they grew up in an environment where their preferences were dismissed, their choices controlled or their emotional reality repeatedly overridden.

They learned that independence required resistance.

As an adult, even well-intentioned guidance may activate an instinctive need to push back.

I've explored this in Autonomy Trauma: Rebellion, Shame and the Path to Healing .

What's interesting here is that an identity that once protected us can eventually become an automatic way of relating to the world.

The situations change. The people change. Yet the nervous system may continue preparing for an old battle.

And because our nervous systems communicate with our hormonal and immune systems, these patterns may form part of our wider physiological experience.

There's research supporting this broader relationship.

A review published in Neuropsychopharmacology explored how early-life adversity can influence developing brain–immune communication, with potential consequences for later inflammatory processes.

This research examines early-life stress rather than personality roles themselves, but it opens up an interesting question about how our environments can become part of our biology.

What began as a psychological adaptation may become a habitual physiological response.

Perhaps the most interesting part is that we can spend decades calling these adaptations just who I am .

I've explored another side of this in The Red Flag in the Happy Childhood .

Because sometimes the adaptations that make us exceptionally functional also make chronic tension feel completely ordinary.

And this brings us to the possibility of change.

Changing the Lens, Changing the Response

Imagine someone whose entire sense of self is organised around being capable.

She's the person who copes. Who anticipates problems. Who keeps things running. Who rarely asks for help.

Her life may look wonderfully successful from the outside.

Yet underneath that competence may be a nervous system accustomed to vigilance, responsibility and the constant anticipation of what needs doing next.

Even rest can feel threatening because it conflicts with the identity she's built.

This is something I often explore with people who describe feeling anxious even though nothing appears to be wrong .

And this is where I think hypnotherapy can offer something interesting.

As a clinical hypnotherapist, I'm fascinated by how we can help people update long-standing internal expectations.

Through hypnosis, imagery, emotional exploration and behavioural rehearsal, we can create opportunities for someone to experience themselves differently.

Perhaps the capable woman begins to feel safe receiving help.

Perhaps the good girl discovers that expressing anger can coexist with love.

Perhaps the rebel begins to experience choice without feeling compelled to resist.

The aim is to develop greater flexibility in the patterns that organise our emotional and physiological responses.

And there's evidence that hypnosis can influence genuine physical symptom experiences, too.

For example, a 2025 randomised clinical trial involving 250 postmenopausal women found that self-administered hypnosis produced greater reductions in hot-flush scores than an active control intervention.

This demonstrates an important potential for symptom management, while evidence for changing the underlying course of autoimmune disease remains limited.

As a trauma-informed clinical hypnotherapist working online and in Brighton , my work centres on helping people explore the emotional adaptations, automatic responses and internal expectations through which they experience themselves and their world.

Because sometimes changing our relationship with an experience creates new possibilities for how we respond to it. It may not always lead to a health condition magically evaporating, but it may create the conditions for the body itself to begin responding differently.

And there's research to support this possibility.

A 2020 meta-analysis published in JAMA Psychiatry , involving 56 randomised clinical trials and 4,060 participants, found that psychological interventions were associated with measurable improvements in immune function, including changes in inflammatory markers and immune cell activity. Some of these effects persisted for at least six months after treatment.

The strongest findings came from cognitive behavioural therapy and combined psychological interventions, but what fascinates me is the broader implication.

If our nervous systems can learn patterns of threat, perhaps they can also learn new patterns of safety. And as those patterns change, the biological signals travelling between our brains, hormones and immune systems may begin to change too.

Perhaps the body can gradually find a different physiological balance, a new way of regulating and responding to the world.

And for me, that's where the really exciting possibility lies: that the adaptations we've carried for decades might be capable of changing, psychologically, neurologically and perhaps even immunologically.

A Bigger Lens for Women's Health

So, returning to the autoimmune headlines, I think the researchers and journalists have highlighted something deeply important.

Women deserve to have their physical symptoms taken seriously, investigated appropriately and treated with respect.

But perhaps the next chapter of this conversation involves moving beyond the assumption that illness belongs exclusively to either the mind or the body.

A move beyond the belief that psychological influences imply personal responsibility.

And a move towards understanding that our experiences, identities, nervous systems, hormones and immune systems form part of an extraordinarily interconnected human being.

Because a woman can have an autoimmune illness requiring medical treatment, a nervous system shaped by decades of adaptation, and psychological patterns that influence her response to stress.

All of these realities can coexist.

So the real opportunity lies in developing a form of healthcare sophisticated enough to hold the whole human being in view.

One where psychology becomes another doorway into understanding, rather than the door that brings medical enquiry to an end.

Sally Garozzo | Trauma-Informed Clinical Hypnotherapist & Transformational Coach, Brighton & Online