At a time when few physicians understood that the mind and body are connected and that there is such a thing as an unconscious mind , Sarno developed the theory that many painful symptoms , whether they are skeleto-muscular , gastrointestinal or other , are an unconscious distraction to aid in the
repression of deep unconscious emotional issues . In other words , it is preferable to feel physical pain than to experience deep emotional pain .
Sarno believes that when patients can begin to think about what may be unconsciously upsetting them , they can defeat their minds ' strategy to repress these powerful emotions ; when the symptoms are seen for what they are , the symptoms then serve no purpose , and they go away . Sometimes this can happen when the patient receives this kind of psychoeducation and exercises through the pain ; sometimes the patient needs the help of
psychotherapy to do this . Sarno is one of a handful of physicians who works collaboratively with psychoanalytically-oriented psychotherapists who understand the nature of psychosomatic disorders . Sarno has said
The enormity of this
miscarriage of medical practice may be compared to what would exist if medicine refused to acknowledge the existence of bacteria and viruses . Perhaps the most heinous manifestation of this scientific medievalism has been the elimination of the term psychosomatic from recent editions of the
Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders ( DSM ), the official publication of the American
Psychiatric Association . One might as well eliminate the word infection from medical dictionaries ( Sarno 2006 , p . 3 ).
I urged Kay to make an appointment to see him and referred her to his books , Healing Back Pain : The Mind-Body Connection ( 1991 ), Mind Over Back Pain ( 1999 ). The Mindbody Prescription : Healing the Body , Healing the Pain ( 1999 ) , and The Divided Mind : The Epidemic of Mindbody Disorders ( 2006 ), featuring chapters by six other doctors and