Life is an incredible journey, with plenty of ups and downs and in-betweens to navigate along the way. Sometimes it is easy to forget that at the end of the day, all of our emotions, our thoughts, our nutrition, our interactions with others, our work, the amount of sleep we get (or don’t get) -all leave a footprint on our health and well-being. The triggers are different for everyone, but there is no debating that stress affects quality of life – so why wouldn’t it affect a persons health and healing? It most certainly does, and science is starting to prove it to us. After the jump I’ll explore an immensely important article on infertility, the mind-body connection, and why you should put your intuitive health at the top of your priority list.
An Infertile Silence
The August 2010 Issue of Self Magazine has published a lengthy and wonderful article around the emotional turmoil behind a diagnosis of “infertility.” I have rarely seen such an honest, heartfelt account of what couples are going through when they are having difficulties trying to conceive. The stress, anxiety, frustration, shame, fear and depression can swallow up couples in their suffering. And the isolation created by feelings of inadequacy or “broken-ness” (as the article notes), makes it difficult to open up to friends and family members about the struggle. The reason? The article supposes that it is because there is not enough awareness about infertility as a medical diagnosis, treatment options or even research in the field to provide adequate treatment (the most modern IVF treatments still have a 60% failure rate according to recent studies). Giving a voice to infertility may increase awareness, increase funding for research and studies and decrease the isolation that so many couples are feeling.
That may be so, but there are plenty of health situations one could replace “infertility” with that cause the same amount of shame, fear, anxiety and stress (maybe even more). While being able to talk about the struggles one faces does help lift the weight, the stress on the patient and now to loved ones supporting that patient can take its tole on everyone’s health.
The Mind-Body Connection and Health
What caught my attention most about the above article was the preliminary study done by Dr. Domar wherein 97 IVF patients in Boston participated in 5-10 mind/body sessions and were 160% more likely to succeed in becoming pregnant than the control group. That is a whopping number! So what are these mind/body sessions? The article didn’t state exactly, but mind-body medicine stems from various different arenas in the health field: therapy, meditation, yoga, guided relaxation and – yep, you guessed it – acupuncture.
Stress can play an enormous role on our health on a day-to-day basis, and it exponentially exacerbates when we are faced with a difficult circumstance (ie: a health problem or medical diagnosis). Patients may be taking care of themselves in a perfect way, eating right, exercising regularly, having appropriate tests run, taking appropriate medications, and still not achieving their goal and (even worse) feeling desperation and despair. For this reason alone Eastern medicine and modern medicine can bridge the gap in health care by accounting for what many mind-body practitioners will refer to as the “subtle or energetic” body in addition to the physical body. While western medicine is motivated to cure disease, mind-body medicine is motivated to support the healing process so we are better equipped to handle whatever experience we have.
Why Does It Work?
The mind-body connection is an unseen energy communication between the physical body and the conscious and unconscious mind. Acupuncture helps to release stress stored in the body, which can cause many physiological changes in the body. It does this from an energetic standpoint, unwinding clogged energy and invigorating flow to under-served areas in an effort to achieve balance and health. There is also a subtle neurological component where the synapses of the brain actually change upon the insertion of the needles (which is why, for example, people can undergo brain surgery in China using only acupuncture as the anesthesia). The mind can convince us of many things, which get stored in the body and can manifest as illness in some cases. If that is true, then the idea that we can undo illness (or, heal) by changing the way we think or releasing somatic memory through bodywork, makes logical sense.
“Whether You Think You Can Or Cannot – Either Way, You Are Right”
This is where the idea of affirmations comes in – actually repeating new thoughts out loud so that eventually you adopt them as your own. As a great yoga instructor once told me while holding an extremely difficult pose: Stay in the now. Don’t let your mind tell you that you are too beautiful for this pose – or that you are not beautiful enough, or not strong enough. Focus only on the breath. The mind is stubborn and it can often try and keep us where we are at because it is what we know. For that reason, there are the mind-body techniques out there to work with the mind, gently helping to restore a balance between the wisdom of the body and wisdom of the mind. Healing is a journey, as it takes a while for things to build up in the system, it can take a while to set them right again. Acupuncture is a great way to support the mind-body connection and will not interfere with most other treatment therapies (and in particular, has a great success rate for improving pregnancy outcomes separate and aside from stress release).
Scientists are still studying the boggling scope of mind-body medicine. Because every mind and every body is different, there is no “magic pill” or “magic therapy” to cure an ailment in everyone. This can make it hard for the analytical person to swallow how or why such a therapy might be useful, and how to choose which one to utilize. My personal advice: trial and error. And learn to trust your intuition as much as you trust your doctors treatment plan. While they take care of your medical health, stay in-tune with your emotional and spiritual health and seek out advice from experienced practitioners that can support that side of you. It is, at the very least, equally as significant to healing as medical care.
2 Comments
It is great that Western Medicine is slowly and surely starting to recognize, accept, and even uphold the inevitable mind-body-spirit connection. Whether dealing with infertility, cancer, or some other medical diagnosis, it is very important to address and honor the power of the mnd-body-spirit connection.
Thank you for the comment Ceci, and for the important mind-body work that you do!