Tui Na and Anxiety treatments
Why does disease and illness affect people in different ways even they seem to be living their lives in exactly the same way. We know that diet, environment, exercise and our genes have an important influence on our health and longevity. Now we are also realising that the way we think, and thusly how we react have a huge impact on our physical health. This is something that has been spoken and written about for millennia in Taoist and other ancient forms of medicine throughout the world. Negative stress and anxiety are two common commonalities in our all-round health.
Stress is normal in the natural world and is a characteristic of the “fight or flight” predisposition within all of us and was and is necessary for our survival. It only becomes an unhealthy problem when that stress continues far too long. We weren’t designed for the long stresses we have created, especially in the last hundred years with debt, work, wars, over-population, expectations either from the society, family or belief systems that you belong to etc. Humans need down time, socialising, feeling safe and enjoying the things that we work so hard to achieve.
Robert Sapolsky, a Stanford University neuroscientist author of several books including “Why Zebras Don’t Get Ulcers” stated: “Just a century or so back, the primary threats to human life were pneumonia, tuberculosis, childbirth, the flu and the like. Nowadays, relatively few people die from the flu; instead most humans die of ailments that are relatively new to our species, such as heart disease, cancer, diabetes and Alzheimer’s disease. These are all diseases that are either caused by or being worsened by stress. Homeostasis, is a state in which an organism or group is in balance, meaning for example, that there is an ideal level of glucose in the blood stream and the body’s temperature is favourable. A stressor is anything in the outside world that knocks an animal out of homeostatic balance”.
He continued to say, “You’re a zebra, a lion has leapt out, ripped your stomach open and you still need to get out of there, this counts as being out of homeostatic balance. The stress response is what your body does to re-establish homeostasis. That’s all you need to know about the subject if you’re a zebra. In the case of humans, however, the definition is expanded. Humans can anticipate that something unfavourable is about to happen to them and can have a stress response prior to the event, which could help them cope. On the other hand, if a person believes they are about to be knocked out of homeostatic balance, but they are really not and this belief continues, then they are dealing with chronic stress”.
Because everyone will experience some form of anxiety at different stages of their life, it is hard to gauge when we have had too much. For that reason, the circumstances that create our anxiety aren’t all that apparent and develop slowly over time, the symptoms also are not that noticeable. We are designed for normal anxiety which has a limited time such as an interview for work. We aren’t designed for frequent and persistent situations such as mortgages, bills, family and social issues, work and long-term illness etc, but these impact on day to day functioning and our quality of life.
Symptoms of Anxiety
There are many symptoms which depend on the specific situation, these are some common ones:
• Physical: panic attacks, gut tension, hot and cold flushes, racing heart, tightening of the chest, quick breathing, restlessness, headaches or feeling tense, wound up and edgy
• Psychological: excessive fear, worry, catastrophising, or obsessive thinking
• Behavioural: avoidance of situations that make you feel anxious which can impact on study, work or social life
Chinese Medicine’s power comes from its intrinsic holistic approach to illness of all types and the use of the 5-elemental model.
Is the individual’s anxiety good or bad, what is the cause of your anxiety, and does it come from their emotions, constitution or disposition? An individual’s constitution is their natural disposition, those things that we are prone to. This is the way we were born and our nature, with some people being affected by certain emotions quicker than others but being aware of these traits can help us stop it before it becomes a health issue. Our moods can be affected by the environment such as Cold, Damp and Heat etc, but also by reasons that are apparent to us such as work we find we hate and stressful relationships. Repressing one’s nature can lead us to having problems, where as understanding our nature can help us deal with things that press our buttons in a much healthier way.
Tui Na works like acupuncture by working on the channels and pressure points using soothing movements, stagnation and Qi deficiencies can be moved. Abdominal Tui Na can help with stuck emotions held in the viscera by aiding digestion and bowel movements and eventually the mind.
