{"id":15452,"date":"2026-03-10T11:41:05","date_gmt":"2026-03-10T11:41:05","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/gpbookstore.org\/articles\/uncategorized\/is-it-possible-to-feel-sympathy-pains\/"},"modified":"2026-04-10T05:59:30","modified_gmt":"2026-04-10T05:59:30","slug":"is-it-possible-to-feel-sympathy-pains","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/gpbookstore.org\/articles\/angels-and-miracles\/miracles\/gods-grace\/is-it-possible-to-feel-sympathy-pains\/","title":{"rendered":"Is It Possible to Feel Sympathy Pains?"},"content":{"rendered":"

I was frustrated. I\u2019d been angry and irritable all day, but I couldn\u2019t figure out why. It was my first semester of college in Massachusetts. Classes were going well. I was making friends. Still I couldn\u2019t get out of my dark mood. I retreated to my dorm room and contemplated calling my mother in California. Before I could, the phone rang. It was Mom. \u201cI\u2019m having the worst day,\u201d she said. She was frustrated, angry, irritable. And it hit me. I wasn\u2019t upset because of anything in my life. I\u2019d been feeling my mom\u2019s feelings\u2026from 3,000 miles away!<\/p>\n

That experience fascinated me. But I labeled it a bizarre mother-daughter<\/a> moment. Recently, however, I came across a story sent in by Mysterious Ways <\/em>reader Diana McCulloch. \u201cI believe I have a God-given ability to discern when something is wrong with one of my sons,\u201d she wrote. Intrigued, I gave Diana a call. She recounted a story about her youngest son. She was watching television one night with her husband. Around 11 o\u2019clock, she doubled over in pain. Stomach cramps. Strange because she hadn\u2019t eaten anything out of the ordinary. The next morning, Diana called to check on her son, who was in recovery from drug addiction. That\u2019s when she discovered he\u2019d had a relapse the night before and ended up in the hospital. His stomach had been pumped. At 11 p.m.<\/p>\n

\u201cI knew, without any question,\u201d Diana told me, \u201cthat I\u2019d felt his pain.\u201d<\/p>\n

I got off the phone with Diana, stunned. Sure, sharing in the suffering of others is a hallmark of many of the world\u2019s religious traditions. So it\u2019s not completely surprising that many spiritual people are also empathetic. But is it really possible to experience another\u2019s pain as if it\u2019s your own? And if \u201csympathy pains\u201d actually exist, what\u2019s the point?<\/p>\n

Most of the evidence for sympathy pain is anecdotal. Its most famous expression, couvade syndrome (i.e., husbands who pick up the pregnancy pains of their wives), is widely scoffed at. Then there\u2019s the religious phenomenon of stigmata, or bearing Christ\u2019s crucifixion marks on one\u2019s body. Many saints have reportedly experienced them. Padre Pio, an Italian friar, most famously. A vision in a chapel left him with nail wounds in his hands and feet. The markings, which never healed, left him better able to understand Jesus\u2019 pain, as well as that of others.<\/p>\n

While cases like Padre Pio\u2019s are rare, research from the University of Birmingham indicates it is possible to feel another\u2019s pain beyond just sympathy. In 2009, psychologist Stuart Derbyshire had 123 undergraduates look at videos and photographs of people in pain. All the participants reported an emotional response to what they saw. About 30 percent, though, also felt physical symptoms, like stabbing sensations. MRIs confirmed they weren\u2019t just imagining it\u2014the images actually triggered the parts of the brain that process physical pain.<\/p>\n

So could it be that some of us have a special ability to take on the suffering of others? Or do we all <\/em>have the capacity to feel another\u2019s pain? I took my questions to Dr. Joel Salinas, a neurologist at Harvard Medical School and the Massachusetts General Hospital and author of Mirror Touch. <\/em>Synesthesia is a neurological condition that causes senses to get mixed and matched in the brain. Dr. Salinas has many forms of the condition, including mirror-touch synesthesia\u2014he feels sensations he observes but in mirror opposites. \u201cIf I saw someone hit their right thumb, I would feel it in my left thumb,\u201d he says. While scientists are still studying mirror-touch synesthesia, evidence suggests that empathy may be at the root of it.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen those of us with mirror-touch synesthesia perceive touch or pain in someone else, our brains automatically try to recreate it vividly\u2014based on past experience and context\u2014as if it were literally <\/em>happening in our own bodies,\u201d Dr. Salinas says. \u201cOur perceptions of our bodies and theirs might overlap. The boundary between self and other becomes blurred. That \u2018shared body perception\u2019 is thought to be tied to the same parts of the nervous system that are responsible for empathy.\u201d<\/p>\n

Although mirror-touch synesthesia affects just two out of every 100 people, \u201cthe brain\u2019s mirroring system linked to empathy is present in everyone,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n

\u201cPeople with mirror-touch synesthesia fall on the extreme end of the spectrum\u2014they can pick up on information that\u2019s hard to notice yet still perceivable,\u201d Dr. Salinas says. \u201cBut we all have the hardware and software for that extreme type of empathy.\u201d<\/p>\n

That might explain how even complete strangers are able to pick up on each other\u2019s pain. Take the experience of my Mysterious Ways <\/em>colleague Kathi Rota. Years ago, Kathi visited an ashram in India. There she met a married couple. The husband was talkative. The wife was withdrawn, distracted. As they chatted, Kathi felt a sharp pain in her lower back. It disappeared the moment the couple walked away. The next day, Kathi learned the woman was battling pancreatic cancer.<\/p>\n

But how are people able to experience one another\u2019s distress across long distances? \u201cWe have 100 billion neurons and 100 trillion connections in our brain, constantly taking in information often below our conscious awareness,\u201d Dr. Salinas says. \u201cThere\u2019s always a possibility that there\u2019s something going on outside the realm of what science can explore.\u201d<\/p>\n

That\u2019s something Dr. Larry Dossey<\/a> contemplates in his book One Mind. <\/em>Dr. Dossey argues there\u2019s a higher consciousness, or One Mind, that we are all able to tap into. He points to the story of identical twins Marta and Sylvia Landa. In 1976, Marta burned her hand on an iron and got a blister. At the same time, miles away, Sylvia also developed a blister\u2014in the same shape and spot on her hand as Marta\u2019s.<\/p>\n

Dr. Dossey refers to these episodes of extreme sympathy pain as \u201ctelesomatic experiences.\u201d He hypothesizes they\u2019re a necessary part of the human experience, often driven by deep emotional bonds. They reveal we\u2019re connected in ways that transcend physical barriers, even distance and time. \u201cThe common pathway in all One Mind moments is the experience of a hyperreal level of awareness, connection, intimacy and communion with a greater whole, however conceived\u2026all of which is marinated in an experience of intense love,\u201d Dr. Dossey writes.<\/p>\n

That love appears to be at the heart of sympathy pain. Caterina Mako, the director of spiritual care and pastoral education at Catholic Health Services of New York, agrees that there\u2019s a deeper spiritual dimension at work.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere seems to be an intense love and connectedness within the relationship of those experiencing it,\u201d she says. \u201cThe intensity of that connection is an example of God\u2019s love for us.\u201d<\/p>\n

I thought back to Diana\u2019s experience with her son, Kathi\u2019s with a stranger and my own with my mom. Perhaps they weren\u2019t moments of mere intuition or empathy, but a reflection of a greater love running through humanity. A glimpse at how connected we all truly are.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I was frustrated. I\u2019d been angry and irritable all day, but I couldn\u2019t figure out why. It was my first semester of college in Massachusetts. Classes were going well. I was making friends. Still I couldn\u2019t get out of my dark mood. I retreated to my dorm room and contemplated calling my mother in California. 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