Stress

Most chronic illness today has an emotional component. Your emotions have dramatic effects on hormone production, digestion, immunity and circulation. People who are chronically stressed produce excess amounts of the hormone cortisol (similar to cortisone) causing reduced wound healing ability, decreased immunity, poor circulation and blood sugar imbalances contributing to weight gain.

Traditional Chinese medicine also believes that emotional factors affect meridians in a negative or positive way example being that anger or frustration inhibits proper liver meridian flow and worry affecting the spleen meridian.