Читать книгу The Cancer Directory - Dr. Daniel Rosy - Страница 29

Things became even more interesting when it was found that the immune system has a memory, and that painful memories or repeats of past experiences in which a person has failed or been defeated, can also trigger immune collapse. Researcher Dr Susan Kobasa had described a psychological syndrome she termed ‘learned helplessness’, when those who had experienced failure earlier in life tended to keep repeating the pattern. Now science was showing that this result was mirrored in the immune system. On the other hand, she had also found that a ‘personality hardiness’ in those who respond to stress as a stimulating challenge resulted in a similarly healthy immune response. Here, at last, was a reason why earlier researchers could not make a direct link between stress and cancer – it depended not on stress per se, but on how the individual responds to stress.

The lesson here is:

• It is very important to provide psychological support to those who are not coping well and who see themselves as losers in order to change this underlying negative belief and replace it with strong, positive coping skills and experience of success.