Amyloidosis

Your body is producing proteins that can no longer fold correctly. Instead of fulfilling their function and being broken down, they clump together — and deposit themselves in your organs. Kidneys, heart, liver, nervous system — gradually these deposits clog the structures that keep you alive. The tissue hardens. Function fades. What should have flowed grows rigid.

Medically, amyloidosis is a rare and severe illness in which misfolded proteins accumulate as insoluble fibrils in the organs. Treatment requires specialised medical care — that is not open to question. But the psychosomatic perspective raises an additional question: what does it say about your inner life when your body produces something it cannot process? When what it creates does not dissolve, but instead takes hold — layer by layer, organ by organ?