erie ?s schizophrenia

December 28, 2005

Chinese Traditional Medicine , Becky <bsalibrici> wrote:

>

> First of all, I don't trust any psychiatrist's labeling of

people. People are over-labeled and over-medicated.

I am anong the first to admit that psychiatry is one of the most

abused and fraud-filled branches of medicine in the West. For any

readers who don't believe me, do a Google for psychiatric fraud

abuse. Also, all too often MDs and DOs make a diagnosis

of " psychological " that they're not qualified to make instead of

doing the work of ordering the tests and using their training and

minds to arrive at a correct diagnosis. A lot of patients have

their real problems untreated, get sicker, and even die because

someone went overboard with the " it's psychological " trip. Also,

many of the psychotropic drugs have some very horrendous side

effects.

But please keep in mind that this is a list about Traditional

, and TCM looks at this subject in a very different

way than Westerners do. A far more sophisticated and practical way

than in the West.

The main thing to keep in mind is that TCM doesn't really

differential between physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual. TCM

takes it for granted that any imbalance can and will manifest in

various ways, including what we in the West call physical, mental,

emotional, and spiritual. It is extremely rare to find a person who

has the psychological symptoms of what is called schizophrenia in

the West who also don't have very severe physical health problems or

who will develop very serious health problems. The same Root that

is causing the psychological manifestations also is causing or will

cause the severe physical problems if left untreated. Also keep in

mind that TCM healers treat TCM imbalances, not Western defined

medical conditions.

I see a lot of justified anger at having been jerked around and

mistreated by what all too often passes for healing in Western

allopathic medicine as currently practiced in the US. I see a person

who has some very serious, mulitple health problems, who is scared

as well as angry, and who doesn't know who or what to trust because

of previous betrayals, or know exactly where to turn because

multiple problems that have gone on for so long are so overwhelming.

This is a very typical reaction of people with mulitple, serious,

and worsening health problems. Part of being a healer is to learn

that this is often the reaction when multiple problems have gone on

for some time. Western allopathic medicine doesn't offer much in

the way of helping the client (or the healer) deal with this, but

TCM does.

I also want to point out that this reaction also is common in

situations where a person is a lot more savvy than the people in his

or her immediate environment and isn't into denial like others in

the person's life are. People in this position frequently feel

like " Cassandras " desperately trying to convince others that there's

a problem. It doesn't help that any abusers and exploiters in their

lives deliberately are invalidating their perceptions in order to

cover their own tracks and be allowed to keep on with their abuse

and exploitation.

In these cases it helps when the person learns and accepts that

other people see the same problems that the individual sees, and are

doing something about the problems. From time to time there are

discussions on here about what is wrong with Western allopathic

medicine as currently practiced in the US. I would say a majority of

people on the list who are from the US recognized some time ago that

there are some serious problems in health care in the US. We have

the most expensive health care in the world with the least

satisfaction. When it comes to measurements of health care, all too

often the US doesn't rank at the top or even near the top. At best

the US ranks in the lower middle. In some cases the US ranks near

the bottom. I forget what the particular thing was that was

measured, but I remember the only country in the Western hemisphere

that ranked lower than the US was I believe Haiti.

Of course, none of this will be of any help to you right away. The

accent at present needs to be on your needs.

> I don't believe that the living have any control over the dead.

This is as arrogant as believing earth is the center of the universe.

Actually, they are not the same type of thing. The " earth revolves

around the sun " is a scientific statement. Central to the idea of

something being scientific is " falsifiability " . This means that the

statement is capable of being proven false.

Falsifiable statements fall into two categories: testable and

nontestable. For example the statement that the earth revolves

around the sun is both falsifiable (capable of being proven false)

and testable. It's been tested in various ways for centuries. The

statement " there is intelligent life on another planet " is

falsifiable but untestable. In order to prove it false, one would

have to check out every single planet in the universe. BTW,

scientists don't just willy-nilly come up with stuff. They have to

have reasons to believe that something may be, and then they have to

come up with a way to prove it false (if it is) and to test it.

Statements about the ultimate nature of reality are unfalsifiable -

incapable of being proven false. Thus, they are outside the realm

of science. It is just as arrogant to state as absolute fact that

the living have no control over the dead as it is to state as

absolute fact that they do. No one has done either on here so far.

These are beliefs that help individuals to make sense of things and

to navigate life. These are individuals' best understanding at

present. They are outside the realm of science. Not everything

needs to be proven as true or false. BTW, the Chinese don't look at

things as being strictly either/or.

One thing I think that just about everyone can agree upon is that

regardless or what may or may not be the ultimate nature of reality,

the people left behind need help in coming to terms with the loss of

a loved one. The bottom line is it doesn't matter if the living

affect the dead or the only effects are within the living. The

Chinese - like engineers - are concerned with what works. Later on

we can figure out why, later on we may or may not know the ultimate

nature of reality, but for now this works and works well (or doesn't

work as the case may be).

There is a strict no politics on this list unless it relates

directly to healing. Healing is one of the few areas where there are

more or less equal numbers of people across the political spectrum.

From time to time info is going to be introduced on this list that

you and some other readers may find very disturbing because it is so

far outside of anything you're familiar with. Or it's something

you've been made familiar with in the wrong way. Visualization is

one common example.

I get very impatient with Westerners (or anyone else) who tries to

present visualization as something that people automatically can do

and which automatically is going to produce " mind over matter "

results. What they frequently are pushing (without realizing it) is

denial, not visualizaiton and healing. There really are people who

*deliberately* can control their autonomic nervous systems with

meditation and visualization, BUT these are people who have been

practicing for years. Plenty of people do it without realizing

they're doing it, sometimes bringing about sickness instead of

healing, but doing it deliberately is something else. Also if a

person has been unknowingly visualizing poor health for years,

that's a pattern that won't be broken by one session of meditation

and visualization.

Plus, when a person has some very pressing health problems, this

isn't always the best time to start learning how to meditate and

visualize. The person usually can start to learn, but don't expect

the meditation equivalent of a star quarterback after the first

attempt or the first few attempts. These things are learning

journeys, and it takes times to establish new patterns. Also there

some imbalances that can make learning to meditate or practice

meditation very, very difficult. One of these things is Yin

Deficiency. The healer may first need to address the Yin Deficiency

problems before the person can learn to meditate or go into a

relaxed state. Some other things can interfere with meditation even

when the person is experienced in it and good at it. For example,

some people have problems when a storm is moving in.

Some other " odd " things which come up from time to time on the list

are things like healing archetypes. For some reason the minds of

some people will produce healing archetypes when the person is very

sick. It may be the effects of fever or biochemical changes in the

body, but for some reason, if these archetypes aren't rejected

(pushed from the mind), they can release a lot of healing energy.

Mononucleosis - especially chronic mono (aka glandular fever) and

CFIDS (Chronic Fatigue Immune Dysfunction Syndrome) are two medical

condition where this tends to happen a lot. They are extremely

powerful symbols. They can be so powerful that they are more than a

little frightening.

Healing has many aspects.

December 28, 2005

Hi Victoria

Great post. Could you please elaborate a bit more about healing archetypes as

it relates to disease, especially the ones you referenced? Thanks,

TH

victoria_dragon <victoria_dragon wrote: