In Traditional Chinese Medicine we learn about disease diagnostics and syndromes in a very abstract way, book learning and lectures tell us what symptoms present themselves with each disease. It’s not until we begin treating patients that we start to develop some level of understanding as to how much of a disparity actually exists between textbook disease diagnostics and clinical presentations and applications.
Many of us have treated a patient with a high stress life. You know the patient…they come to your office, meager, with bags under their eyes, unable to hold the simplest of conversations. They are sleep quality and often times quantity deprived. Their digestive system is suffering perhaps with constipation or loose stools, perhaps both at different intervals. Their appetite is depressed, they have baseline personality affect, and they come to you looking for help.
How do you help this patient? Most of what is causing this patients disease is so far out of our control as a TCM practitioner there is very little we can actually do. We offer our professional advice, perhaps breathing exercise like Qi Gong, meditation or taking breaks. Relaxing right? Maybe not!
So we prescribe acupuncture and herbs. Maybe this person is the Liver Qi Yu (stagnant) type, so we move and sooth Liver Qi. We prescribe Xiao Yao San to sooth the Liver and support the Spleen Qi. Maybe the person is more of the Heart Xue (blood) Xu (deficient) type and experiences palpitations and nightmares. So we in turn nourish heart xue perhaps giving Gui Pi Tang.
Then this person could be a mix of everything. They have been fatigued, stressed and exhausted for so long that their body and Qi simply no longer know which way is up or down. How do we treat this person? How do we help? What if this person is a classmate, a spouse, family or a friend. How do we help this person find balance in a world we know to be so chaotic?
It is a known fact among TCM providers that we are often undertrained social workers. Our patients come to us and share things about their life they wouldn’t normally share. We listen, but unless there is a common experience often times our only recourse is to refer the patient to a mental health provider. Therapy is simply not within many of our scope of practice.
Our bodies tell us things if we know how and choose to listen. Our bodies tell us when it’s time to eat, sleep, and void bladder and bowel. It tells us when we are getting sick or have become too run down. Our bodies tell us when we need to rest. Most of us, like our patients do a poor job of heeding our bodies warnings.
Let us think about this for a moment. You are in your car driving and are about five miles from home. All of a sudden the “check engine” lite comes on. You realize you are well over due for an oil change and can’t remember the last time you checked the coolant. You look at all your gauges to discover the engine temperature has nearly red-lined. You are only five miles from home, perhaps 6 minutes, would you chance the drive and wreck the engine or would you pull over, allow the car to cool, perhaps adding coolant? Most of us would pull the car over immediately, after all this is a 20k plus dollar investment.
It’s absurd to respect a car so highly and disregard our own bodies warning signs. Yet we do just that day in and day out. Our sleep becomes unrested, we do nothing. Our appetite becomes depressed so we just stop eating. Our stools become soft or fails to arrive, so we throw herbs at it in order to harden or hasten the bowel. We become increasingly fatigued so we take herbs to increase energy. When we can no longer sleep at night we throw Suan Zao Ren Tang its way to encourage sleep.
How exactly is this any different than Western medicine? Is it permissible simply because it is a natural medicine? Is it ok to disregard the “check engine” lite on our bodies dashboard simply because we practice a “Natural” medicine.
In the commandments of western religions God sanctified the seventh day, commanding that it be kept holy ordering his followers to keep it holy and rest the body and mind on this day, as he did following the creation of the world. In Asian terms this God was speaking of protecting the “Hun” or the Non-Corporeal Soul, “the part of the person that is not attached to the physical body.”
In one of our most turned to texts “The Web That Has No Weaver” states clearly that the Chinese Doctor can help the Non-Corporeal Soul of a person to be steady, clear and sensitive in this life. An intact Hun produces acts of kindness or benevolence towards others and self. Without an intact Hun, a person is numb and incapable of experiencing the depth of another person’s humanity or his own. (pg 61)
We have all entered into this medicine to help others heal. Yet we continue to fail to heed the logic that our medicine imparts to us. We take into our bodies substances which inhibit Qi flow. We obtain too little sleep. We stress over things we have little or no control over. We exercise our bodies’ very little if at all. We run our selves ragged and then wonder why our bodies and minds are suffering from malnourishment and neglect.
Without rest we become introverted, isolated and narcissistic. Our soul, Hun, is hindered and our Qi become stagnant. By resting we are able to cleanse the soul. We are able to better understand our own development and obtain a capacity to empathize with the world around us. In short we become better healers!