An Invisible Stress

It was a summer time. One lady of 35 years old visited me for complaint of skin rash on her both hands. The skin rash was very red, swollen and itchy. It was diagnosed as urticaria. She tried all sorts of medication but with temporary relief. In the detailed history it was revealed that she is suffering with this complaint since 2 years and very particularly it comes during summer time when she is on holiday. So I enquired further as to what had happened exactly before the start of the complaint during holidays. And she replied that during holiday we come to my in-laws place to meet and spend some time with them. I said, OK. Then what happened? She replied, actually doctor, nothing big happened as such but I get irritated by the comments passed by my in-laws. Passing comments is very normal for my in-laws. Everyone is used to it. But somehow I am not able to tolerate it and I cannot let go it. It makes me very angry but I cannot express it. And 2 years back my in-laws directly passed comments on me in front of guest and the very next day severe itching started on my body. I then explained her how her suppressed anger affected her skin and why all other medicine worked temporarily in her case. Initially it was difficult for her to accept that the cause was stress but with the explanation she understood it and with personalised medicine recovered soon. The presentation and location of disease talks about the probable causative stress and so in her case the intense redness and severe itching talked about degree of anger suppressed in her.

Most of the diseases and disorders have one of the underlying causative factors as Stress. But interestingly whenever a doctor tells to the patient that it is stress related or in other terms Psychological, after ruling out the entire material causative factor, immediately the patient’s facial expression changes from worry to most negative expression. This tells us how much negativity is linked to the word Stress.

As per my observations, this negativity is because of lack of awareness about the word Stress. People think about the word Stress as something abnormal. And this makes it more difficult rather challenging for doctors to treat patient as patients are not ready to accept this causative factor due to the kind of associated stigma. Patient starts thinking, ‘what other people will think about me?’, “I am not psychologically ill.” Etc.

But in reality, Stress is not always psychological; though our body is governed by our mind the stress can be physical. According to Webster dictionary, Stress is a state resulting from constraining force or influence such as, excessive physical workout, excess household work, too much of walking/ running/ playing, lifting heavy weight or anytime overusing of any part of the body can lead to physical stress and strain. If we observe and analyse ourselves carefully then we can minimise this physical stress.

Many times hearing of the diagnosis itself creates added stress, because of its association with different stories and the news.

Some people are addicted with certain habits since childhood. For example, being punctual in everything including meal time and sleep time. Being punctual is off course a good habit but when any good habit becomes rigid it starts to create invisible stress on an individual and this stress is being transmitted to his/ her environment creating more negative environment. When a person becomes very rigid about following time, he/ she cannot enjoy holiday’s or he/she cannot relax anytime because if he/she miss something, for example lunch time during holiday then all sorts of anxiety starts to creep in which leads to increase acid secretion causing hyperacidity. Similar mechanism happens when he/she miss sleep time.

We never realise that habits can become a stress to someone. In above example it not a fault of an individual but it is an environment where an individual is brought up. By having an awareness of this, one can become flexible and stress-free with practice.

Similarly our perception of ourselves and our surrounding can create stress. As we have seen in the above case example. The lady perceived the comments passed by her in-law as a “stinky” and wanted to get rid of it but she could not. This lead to secretion of certain chemicals in her body affecting her skin. Whereas other members of the family were not affected as they have accepted that fact and were able to let go of it. Until and unless patient is made aware of what is happening in the body and given personalised medicine by considering this causative factor, the disease will not be cured completely.

In today’s competitive world we all are victims of constant invisible stress and hence there are rise in lifestyle disorder, autoimmunity and cancer.

All these invisible stress factors work as a constant irritation to body. Any constant irritation leads to lifestyle disorder, autoimmunity and cancer. Hence with proper education, awareness, following good practices and when needed, taking personalised medicine, we can overcome them.

People do Yoga, Meditation and Workouts in Gym to remain fit but if you add this little introspection into it then you can achieve healthier life.

An Invisible Stress…. Yes it is Invisible but not Impossible to overcome it.

Dr Anuradha D Sanap

Homoeopath

Filter

FILTER

While practicing Homeopathic medicine, I came across many chronically ill patients. And in the patient’s history/ life space situation, I observed that most of the lifestyle disorders have their origin in the life experience they have gone through, be it recent or in the past. When the event is sudden and unexpected, then the impact is deeper. This observation made me very curious to know how these life experiences impact our body’s balanced condition. So, I started rereading books on medicines and am fascinated by the word “filter”. This is the word I came across while reading in nearly all systems of the body.

And the meaning of the word Filter is – something that filters out the bad stuff and keeps the good stuff for good cause. Our body systems work for this good cause and through this, we are able to maintain a balanced condition.

For example, our digestive system not only digests the food we eat but also filters out waste products through stool. Our Kidneys filter blood and excrete waste products via urine. Our skin filters out toxins through sweat. Our eyes filter out ultraviolet radiation and our nervous system acts as a stimulus filter.

Isn’t it amazing! I feel that the human body is nature’s most intelligent creation until now. We take rest, we sleep but our cells work continuously.

And the more amazing fact is that as there are various filters in various systems of our body, there is one very important filter we all have in our conscious and subconscious minds. That is our “perception”. Perception of ourselves and of our surroundings or environment we live in works constantly. It is dependent on our perspective. We get stimulus from our environment, from all of our special senses (touch, smell, noise, vision, taste, and proprioception) and then this stimulus becomes a sense in connection with our history and gives a meaning which then becomes a sensation. This sensation then acts on a specific brain center to order specific cells or tissue to work accordingly.

For example, when you see your favorite food, then your mouth starts watering. Here the visual stimulus has passed through your perception filter and you perceived that it’s your favorite food and you can’t resist having it. Hence, your brain center responsible for salivation gets stimulated and your mouth starts to water. Or when you smell something very bad, you feel nauseating or when you are in an environment where your friend is going through a very bad situation and is sharing with you with tears in his/her eyes then you also feel the same or get tears in your eyes, etc. These are all felt senses, in other words, our perception, and these are completely individual.

We do not realize it in day-to-day life in the same way as we do not realize how our brain and heart work continuously.

This filter of perception is also responsible for our daily reactions and thought processes. And it plays a pivotal role in maintaining our life healthy and in balanced condition.

One day, in a family, get-together, a husband passed a general jesting comment against women. As soon as the wife heard this comment, she became agitated. But she could not show it in public and remain silent. In this unexpected event (for her), in a fraction of a second, through her senses, she made the connection with her past life history and this gave meaning to her perception that it is “not right”, “I cannot tolerate this”, “how can he say like that “etc. But as she cannot express it immediately, it becomes pathological as it is indigestible. At night after the party, she suffers from severe nausea and pain in the abdomen.

In the above example, no other woman in the party got affected so deeply as this lady. But if she would sense that comment as a mere joke, then she would not have this pathology later.

Whenever you have fear, anxiety, or any emotion in excess or in the continuous form then it sends signals to your brain to secrete certain stress hormones and enzymes which act on target cells leading to a particular disease.

Like the above example, there are cycles of events that keep occurring in life. But the one, who is good at having self-awareness and acceptance, is able to live a healthy and happy life.

Interestingly, there are different phrases in different languages referring to this concept:

In Marathi, they say, “Baghanyacha Drushtikon”!

In English, there is a phrase “have no filter” which means having a tendency to say exactly what one is thinking without considering the consequences.

All these phrases talk about the same that is “filter of perception”.

The more mindful our perception is of ourselves and our surroundings, the healthier and happier our lives will be.

Dr Anuradha D Sanap

Homoeopath

Are you really Healthy……?

One day, I came across a very common question from one of my patients that, “Doctor I do yoga and meditation every day. I do cycle on weekends and I do take care of my food habits. But still, I fall sick with slightest cause like getting wet in rain or exposure to certain things. Why it is so, that I fall sick easily? What shall I do to keep me stronger in order to prevent falling sick?”

Like this patient, many of us are wondering that how we can keep ourselves strong to prevent falling sick? We are wondering because we have not understood very well about health, for that matter exactly what makes us sick!

Health is a STATE, a state of equilibrium of the body or a state of HOMEOSTASIS in scientific terms. In simple term, Health is a BALANCED STATE wherein all the chemical processes are taking place at cellular level automatically in accordance with each other without any disturbance.

When this BALANCE is disturbed, we fall sick which means we experience DIS-AT-EASE i.e., DISEASE.

So, what actually disturbs this Balance? Once we understand this, can we prevent sickness?

Now let us understand first what happens at cell level. Our life is dependent on how cell responds to the environment. Cell responds to environmental stimuli by PERCEIVING the environmental stimuli through cell membrane. There are receptor PROTEINS located on this cell membrane which activate specific gene to react to those environmental stimuli. This means all these processes happening in our body day in and out, are based on these PROTEIN CHAIN REACTIONS. And are BALANCED in harmonious way to maintain HOMEOSTASIS in the body. Hence to maintain state of Health, PROTEIN BALANCE is essential. In other words, any form of PROTEIN IMBALANCE will make us SICK.

We often hear people saying that, ‘oh that day I fell sick due to getting wet in rain’ or ‘I have the acidity problem because I ate specific dal or food’ or ‘my child is allergic to nuts’ and so on. But are they really causes of your sickness?

There are many people who get wet in rain at same time in same situation but only few of them fall sick or there are many people who eat same food but do not get acidity or for that matter not all children in same environmental situation are allergic to nuts. Why?

Because these all are only PRECIPITATING factors of our sickness. Those who fall sick, have DISTURBED HOMEOSTASIS already in their body and hence they fall sick.

According to Newton’s law, for every Action there is equal and opposite reaction, which means for every action (disease) to happen, there is proportionate cause and reaction. So, the cause for our sickness is PROTEIN IMBALANCE and reaction or effect of this cause is our SICKNESS or disease.

There are various factors which lead to this PROTEIN IMBALANCE in the human body such as nutritional deficiency, overstrain, sudden atmospheric changes, radiation, traumas and most importantly emotions!

EMOTIONS play major role in maintaining cell equilibrium. Sudden unexpected life situations are perceived by each one of us in completely different manner and so the emotions. These emotions influence Limbic system in the brain to secrete certain neurotransmitters which are nothing but proteins, ultimately causing disturbed homeostasis in cell.

In short, in order to maintain state of Health, we have to maintain this PROTEIN BALANCE not only with regular exercise and diet but also with maintaining BALANCED EMOTIONS.

Now you may wonder here that what is BALANCED EMOTIONS and how do we achieve it?

BALANCED EMOTIONS means a balance within you, your expectations, worries and happiness.

Excess expectations from yourself or others, excess worries and even excess joy will lead you to more intense EMOTIONS such as anger, irritation, fear and excitement which in turn cause excess secretion of neurotransmitters leading to PROTEIN IMBALANCE and as a result we fall sick despite doing regular physical exercise and maintaining diet.

According to Darwin’s Theory, survival of the fittest is the rule to successful living. Each one of us is struggling for this survival. But the only difference lies in our WAY. Each one of us has OUR OWN INDIVIDUAL WAY of understanding and working. If we try to understand this phenomenon and respect each other to work harmoniously like our body cell work, then we can achieve a GOOD HEALTH.

American Cell Biologist, Mr. Bruce Lipton says:

” The moment you change your perception is the moment you rewrite the chemistry of your body.”

Be the CHANGE for good HEALTH!

Dr Anuradha D Sanap

Homoeopath