We tend to look at physical and mental health as two separate entities. On the contrary, they’re both heavily linked to one another. Mental health issues can impact your physical health and vice versa. 

In essence, that’s the topic of today’s post; how do physical health issues affect you mentally? I think the best way to explain this is by looking at examples of different physical health problems and how they connect to your mental wellbeing. So, let’s get started…

Obesity/Being Overweight

Being overweight is a health problem as it causes harm to all areas of your body. People who are obese have a lower life expectancy than normal, largely thanks to an increased risk of heart disease. This is very much a physical problem caused by an accumulation of body fat. Still, there’s a massive link between obesity and mental health disorders. One shocking stat is that obese people are 55% more likely to suffer from depression. It stems from the fact that nobody wants to be overweight, so you start hating yourself. As you can imagine, there’s a very short jump that takes you from these thoughts to feelings of depression. 

Hearing Loss

Loads of people suffer from hearing loss, mainly when they’re above the age of 60. Regardless of how old you are, hearing loss is a physical health problem that really plays with your mental wellbeing. Unlike obesity, it has nothing to do with hating yourself or feeling like you’re a failure. Instead, hearing loss is linked to feelings of isolation and social anxiety. This is because you worry about social situations as you can’t hear properly. It’s embarrassing to ask people to repeat themselves, and you feel self-conscious when wearing hearing devices. You also feel like you lose independence as you need help with everything. Consequently, you can become reclusive and suffer from depression and anxiety as you prefer to stay inside instead of dealing with tricky social scenarios. 

Chronic Pain

This is a very broad topic that covers a range of health issues. You can add chronic back pain and arthritis into this category, along with any other conditions causing pain. Being in pain plagues your mental health as you can’t stop thinking about it. This leads to distractions during the day, and you often feel depressed as the pain won’t leave. Additionally, there’s the issue of addiction and pain management. As you seek ways to deal with chronic pain, you tend to turn towards medication. The more you use it, the more you depend on it for pain relief. Therefore, you can quickly become addicted, which leads to a whole host of other mental health problems. 

As you can see, physical health issues affect your mental wellbeing in many ways. We have three examples, all of which differ from one another. With obesity, mental problems stem from a sense of self-loathing. For hearing loss, it’s more about your lack of independence and feelings of embarrassment. With chronic pain, it’s about becoming addicted to relieving your pain. The moral of the story is that you need to address your physical health problems before they start to damage your mental wellbeing!