The Monkey on your Back No One Sees
There’s usually a moment people can point to…the appointment, the phone call, the scan result when everything changed.
A diagnosis…
Whether it’s cancer, a chronic illness, or a sudden medical event, what follows isn’t just physical. It can leave a psychological imprint that looks a lot like trauma, even if no one has ever named it that way for you.
A lot of people walk away from these experiences feeling like something in them has shifted, and not just in their body.
You might notice yourself constantly scanning for symptoms. Paying attention to every sensation, every change, every “what if.” Thoughts start popping up like, “What if it’s back?” or “What if I missed something?” You might feel on edge in a way that’s hard to explain to other people. Like your body doesn’t fully feel like a safe place anymore.
For some, the response is to avoid anything that brings it back up (like the appointments, follow-ups, even talking about it). For others, it goes the opposite direction. You start researching everything, tracking everything, trying to stay one step ahead. If you can just understand it enough, maybe you can control it. Both of those responses make sense.
When your body has gone through something overwhelming, your brain tries to protect you from ever being caught off guard like that again. That can show up as hypervigilance, avoidance, or even intellectualizing. And underneath all of that, there’s often a deeper shift that people don’t talk about enough: the loss of trust in your own body.
Before all of this, your body may have felt automatic. Reliable. Something you didn’t have to think about. And now it might feel unpredictable… or even like it betrayed you. That alone can change the way you move through the world.
There’s also this quiet identity shift that can happen. Even if you’re “doing better” or things are stable medically, there can still be this lingering question in the background: who am I now? You might find yourself missing the version of you that didn’t have to think this way, didn’t have to carry this.
A lot of people describe it as feeling like there’s always something sitting on their shoulder. Like a constant awareness that never fully goes away. Even on the good days, there’s a part of your mind that’s still scanning, still bracing. It can feel like there’s always a monkey on your back. And if you’ve ever thought, “Why can’t I just move on?”… it’s because your nervous system has learned that your body isn’t guaranteed to be safe.That’s not an easy thing to unlearn.
Healing from this isn’t about pretending everything is fine or forcing yourself to “be positive.” It’s about slowly rebuilding a sense of safety, learning how to tell the difference between fear and actual danger, and reconnecting with yourself in a way that isn’t defined only by what you’ve been through. If any of this feels familiar, you’re not overreacting. You’re not being dramatic. And you’re definitely not alone in it. It makes sense that your mind and body are trying to protect you. The goal isn’t to eliminate that part of you, but to help it realize it doesn’t have to stay on high alert all the time.
Kaitlyn Pettyjohn, LCSW
Reclaim Therapy + Coaching