HEALING CRISIS

We live in a high-tech world of bio nanotechnology today where stem cells and genetic engineering promise hope of curing chronic diseases and cancers. Many of us are skeptical that simply changing diet and activity level would have much effect on reversing diseases.

Most of us know that processed foods, smoking, alcohol, sleep deprivation, stress and lack of exercise is bad for health. But we still choose to live that way. Doing the right things for health seemed so hard for so many when it actually cost effective in the long run.

Losing health and treating diseases are expensive but most of us are on this path knowingly. Weird! We do what we do not want (living unhealthy), we want to do the good (live healthy), but we cannot do it. And we do the very thing that we do not want (living unhealthy) [Paraphrased from Rom 7:15-20]. This sounds like addiction! The same thinking and behavioral pattern occurs in all forms of addictions you name it; drugs, gambling, alcohol and sex. It seems like 'unhealthy living' is addictive. Why?

When we are pleasuring ourselves with 'unhealthy living', we are oblivious to the end results of sickness and eventually death because it feels so good that we do not want to stop if there is no reason to do so. A sudden change to 'healthy living' would cause displeasure, pain and discomfort that we want to immediately revert back to the pleasuring sensations and maintain the status quo of 'unhealthy living'. This is what we call, "HEALING CRISIS".

When the body experiences dramatic symptoms of cleansing as a result of improved organ function and immune efficiency, it is referred to as a healing crisis-"healing" because it expels toxins and brings about improvement in health, "crisis" because the symptoms associated with toxic removal can be dramatic.

The symptoms of the healing crisis are the same as those of a disease crisis (illness). For this reason, the healing crisis is greatly misunderstood and often believed to be an illness that must be treated to restore health. The healing crisis is a positive event, a sign of improving health. Unfortunately, many people mistakenly view it as a disease crisis. One is the result of the body overcoming disease, while the other is the result of the body succumbing to disease.

The Body's Power to Heal
All natural methods of healing are based on the concept that the body is capable of curing just about any illness if it is given the opportunity- that is, if negative influences such as environmental toxins, emotional stress, malnutrition and etc. are removed.

The body has an amazing capacity to heal itself. When we get a cut, tear a muscle or get bacterial infection, the body immediately goes to work to repair the damage. We develop symptoms (fever, mucus discharge, coughing, vomiting, diarrhea, fatigue, etc.) to fight and remove harmful substances. The body knows what to do in every case.

When an injury or localized infection occurs, the body quickly initiates an inflammation response, an important part of the healing process. Inflammation is a process by which blood circulation in a particular area is greatly increased. This allows for the rapid influx of defending white blood cells into the affected area, Damaged cells are removed, along with any infectious organisms that may be present. Healthy cells in the area are stimulated to quickly begin multiplying to replace the damaged cells removed by the white blood cells. This way, the injured or damaged parts of the body are healed.

Similarly, cancerous or degenerative cells are also removed. All of us have cancerous cells in our bodies. The reason we all do not develop cancer is because the immune cells quickly remove these cancer cells before they become too big.

When the immune system is overworked or when nutrients essential for the production of healthy white blood cells are lacking in our diets, our immune system cannot adequately do its job, sickness and diseases results. If the white blood cells are just barely able to keep daily toxins and pathogenic invaders in check, poisons are easily trapped in tissues and build up over time. These poisons can disrupt normal cellular activity, causing degeneration and further burdening the immune system. Good diet and lifestyle choices are the keys to maintaining a strong immune system.

Treating Symptoms
Treating symptoms is easy, convenient for patients and good business for physicians because of the rapid turn over. But is this how healing is supposed to be?

Symptoms are not the cause of the disease; they are only the body's response to it. Suppressing or masking the symptoms will not cure the disease. Taking a pain killer will not cure a headache, it only numbs the nerves so that the pain is not felt. The cause of the headache remains. Taking cough medicine does not cure chest colds. Sleeping pills will not cure insomnia. Antidepressants will not cure depression. Cortisone steroid will not cure arthritis. Anti-hypertension will not cure hypertension. When the cause of the problem is not removed, medications must be used regularly to suppress symptoms. This is the current healthcare (or rather sickness-orientated) system unfortunately. Removing the symptoms brings about a false sense of well-being and perpetuates the attitude of getting a quick fix to solve medical problems. Drugs provide quick relief to many symptoms of illness but don't do a thing about curing the problem.

Drugs by their very nature are toxic to the body and add to the toxic body's load, often making health worse. All drugs have side effects! Natural healing methods focus on the cause of the problem and so their effects on symptoms are not as dramatically noticeable as drugs. When used properly, natural methods cause no adverse side effects, nor do they load the body with harmful toxins.

Symptoms associated with common illnesses are part of the body's natural cleansing process. When our bodies become dangerously overloaded with toxins, our immune systems weaken and we become vulnerable to infectious organisms. When we become sick, our body is telling us to rest so it can focus its healing energies on housecleaning (detoxification). Symptoms of sickness- runny nose, fever, diarrhea, nausea, sneezing, coughing, loss of appetite, etc.- are all process of cleansing.

The symptoms we often regard as sickness are are in fact the protective mechanism that keeps us healthy and alive. There is always an underlying cause for every symptom. That should prompt the physician to investigate further. Sometimes doctors know the causative pathogen and treat specifically and sometimes doctors do not know what is the cause and the empirical treatment approach is adopted.

A healthy protective system and process of detoxification such as fever, urination, opening bowels, sweating, coughing, sneezing, tearing, pimples and boil eruptions are always on standby mode to 'cleanse' the body. These symptoms becomes a 'disease' when the process FAILS to rid the body of the offending agents and toxins. As the result, these symptoms persist and affect more systems until it overwhelms the whole person. That is what we commonly regard as being sick.

Therefore it is crucial for us to understand the distinction between a healing crisis and a disease crisis for appropriate action to be taken.

To put in simply:

DISEASE CRISIS is the process associated with illness and the body's efforts to remove disease-causing agents and restore health. If the body is weak and unable to overcome illness, death or permanent disability may result. In a disease crisis, the body is struggling to remove toxic levels of poisons and microbial infestation in an effort just to survive.

 

HEALING CRISIS is the process associated with heightened cleansing and cellular rebuilding. It is a sign of improving health and results in better health as disease-causing factors are removed. Healing crisis only occurs to the degree at which the body can tolerate without injury and therefore will not cause harm.

The 4 Pillars of Healing

Ancient system of healing approach sickness as a problem of balance and relationship, the result of disharmony between the sick person and his environment rather than the product of specific disease.

Similarly, Hippocratic tradition constitutes detailed clinical observation and an attempt to cultivate techniques of healing that work in concert with the forces of nature, restoring to the body its natural harmony of function. The Hippocratic  physician cared not about the disease but about the patient as the a whole, striving "to know what man is in relation to food, drink, occupation and which effect each of these has on the other." Dietetics was the cornerstone of Hippocratic therapy. The Hippocratic approach dominated Western medicine for almost two thousand years.

The disease process is not caused by the microbe alone. In the case of tuberculosis, people who are infected with the bacteria do not always develop the disease. When the immune system is strong, the bacteria is imprisoned by the white blood cells. The tubercle is not a product of the bacteria, but a defense thrown up by the host. When immunity falters, the bacteria escape. Impairment of the host's immunity is as important for the development of tuberculosis as is the microbe itself.

The physician's task was to support the body's natural healing processes. Signs of sickness is not the manifestation of the disease but the manifestation of the body's attempt to heal itself.

Medicine was about disease, not about health or longevity, and the physician's task was to discover, in life, through physical signs, what organic lesions were present in the patient's body.

Rudolf Virchow, Germany's "Pope of Pathology", established the cell as the ultimate unit of sturcture and function in the body and initiated the movement that traced sickness to cellular dysfunction. However, Virchow resisted the temptation to localize disease within the cell and believes that the social conditions under which patients lived to be more important determinants of health than the tissue changes he saw through the microscope,

Louis Pasteur, the father of microbiology, demonstrated that the conditions of life, not the microbe alone, are the cause of disease with his chicken experiment. Both chickens were injected with the deadly anthrax bacteria. One bird exposed to cold temperature before infection (died), another kept at warm temperature (lived).

Functional Medicine aims to restore the balance between the sick person and his environment. It is not merely suppression of disease. Functional medicine strives to improve the physiological, emotional, cognitive and/or physical function of individuals, sick or well. Restoration or enhancement of health is the aim. The principles that guide the restoration of health are different from the principles that guide the suppression of disease.

Disease suppression therapies have a role to play in medical care, but their importance has been exaggerated.

The 4 Pillars for the Restoration of Health:

1) RELATIONSHIP: social support is linked to health and mortality. Satisfying relationship may buffer the impact of stress, lowering the levels of chemical mediators, decreasing the strain on mind and body. The rewards of friendship may include an increase in self esteem and with it a boost to perceived self-efficacy. A high level of self-efficacy improves an individual's ability to cope with symptoms, adopt healthful habits, and cooperate with medical treatment.

2) DIET and regulation of the daily cycle of rest and exercise.

3) ENVIRONMENTAL hygiene: a major determinant of health and sickness.

4) DETOXIFICATION: The supply of enviromental toxins, chemical and microbial, appears endless.

The human body has many natural defenses against environmental toxicity. These include:-

• The constant shedding of the skin and the lining of the gastrointestinal tract, which slowly dispels environmental toxins from the body.
• The activity of protective immune response that limit the attachment of toxins to the surfaces of the lungs or the gastrointestinal tract.
• Enzymes systems in the liver that destroy toxins and prepare them for excretion in the bile or the urine.
• Enzymes that repair damaged cells and promote healing.

Traditional approaches to detoxification are fasting, purging, and herbal remedies to "cleanse" the intestinal tract.

Elie Metchnikoff (Noble Prize winner for Medicine in 1908) was the first modern scientist to study the notion of intestinal toxicity. He theorized that intestinal bacteria cause senility and degenerative disease by producing toxic chemicals called ptomaines, which are absorbed into the body. He advocated yogurt with "friendly" bacteria called Lactobacilli, would inhibit the growth of harmful bacteria.

Toxins that enter the body from the intestinal tract are directly transported to the liver, which is the chief site for detoxifying enzymes in the body. Strategies for supporting and directing liver detoxification will offer great potential as innovative treatments.

To maintain or regain your own health, understand and actively support the Four Pillars of Healing:

• Nurture relationships with others. Commit some time each day to give your undivided attention to a friend or family member.

• Involve yourself in a group activity that is meaningful to you and enjoyable.

• Eat regular meals with people you care about. Avoid snacks or meals in front of the television. Especially avoid the salty high-fat snack food.

• Exercise regularly with at least moderate intensity for thirty minutes a day or more. Brisk walking is a good start. Do it with a friend.

• Get enough sleep at night so that you can awaken without an alarm clock.

• Reserve 15 minutes or more for quiet, focused relaxation every day.

• Become aware of the environmental hazards in your community and your job.

• Keep to a minimum your use of alcohol and drugs, including medical drugs.

• Consume a nutritious diet that is rich in "detox" vegetables like broccoli, carrots, tomatoes, avocado, Brussels sprouts, and cabbage, and in nuts and seeds. Add sea vegetables and green onions as condiments.

(Adapted from Leo Galland's "The Four Pillars of Healing")