IC: An Antiinflammatory Drink

The inflammation that occurs with your IC pain as we’ve talked about in the past is from the hot and mobile qualities from an energy science viewpoint

As you know this pain can be excruciating and unrelenting causing undue stress on relationships and plans

And there are things that we have discussed that can help with temporary relief of symptoms  But what would it be like it you lived a life without any bladder symptoms at all  This is the cure of the apparent curable condition of IC

The Hot Quality

As we’ve mentioned before the human energy anatomy Ayurveda says that there are three energy patterns that give us function  The Vata, Pitta, and Kapha physiologic energies gives the body movement, transformation, and stability respectively

Pitta the energy of transformation is the only one of the three energy patterns that has the hot vibrational frequency  This energy of transformation is responsible for your flares  Makes sense doesn’t it?  Hot transforms right?   But too much of this energy produces IC   Burning wood, burning thoughts, burning stomach burning bladder, burning pelvis, burning vagina  Holy smoke!  Burned up relationships!

This is the energy that slso makes us competitive but if more hot enters into the equation it leads to aggressive behaviors that turn people off

Choosing Hot

So when it’s hot in the environment the same hot is aggravated in our own mindbody energy field   And when you eat trigger foods the same thing happens whether we can appreciate it or not  That’s why the food guidelines are so important because sometimes you can’t appreciate what’s happening

The hot from the sun is never as long term provoking as the hot that we ingest   As I’ve discussed in other blogs consumption of the hot quality has a much longer staying power of influence  This is a very important point since the physiology is affected literally for 35 days after a trigger food is chosen to be ingested

What happens when too much hot is in the energy physiology? You guessed it! INFLAMMATION

What To Do  What To Do

Sooo…. here’s a recipe for a delicious cooling herbal cocktail that you may find valuable particularly during flare seasons

2T of aloe vera gel(NOT the juice)

2oz of pomegranite juice

2oz of water

Chug a lug! Hmmmm delissios

Here’s to cooling off

IC and Pain Management: Role of Meditation

Probably one of the most challenging clinical conditions in medicine are those where physical pain plays a role in the chronic disesase  Although there is always a psychological or emotional component to this pain, it is the physical pain that becomes so daunting  This is the case in the IC bladder pain syndrome(interstitial cystitis, vulvodynia, chronic prostatitis, IBS, GERD, and fibromyalgia) and what makes it so challenging for people afflicted  But what makes it so challenging?  Is it really the pain?  Or is it something else?

Anybody confronted with chronic pain will attest to the fact that it’s the continuous physical discomfort that doesn’t go away that leads to the challenge  But what if the person is given things to do to help with the pain but won’t do them because they make the assumption that it won’t work  This becomes a problem

Case Study

Let’s talk about a middle aged woman with high Vata energy who has a 4 year history of sharp burning electrical pelvic symptoms that move up toward her head  But over the last 6 months these pelvic symptoms progressed to severe bladder symptoms with burning pain during and after urination to the point of incapacitation so she cannot work or do normal daily activities  She’s given specific therapies that will indeed help her with the pain but is unable to do even a small part of them because she believes that they are making her symptoms worse  In the end her mind is so strung out that she becomes confused with loss of ability to maintain direction in helping herself with healing

I know there will be some who would argue that this is just part of the problem and that is indeed true  But what we have here is a mind that is interfering with the person getting better by preventing her from even using the therapies to begin with  Physical pain freaks the mind out  It produces enormous unsettling so that there is confusion, disarray, loss of ability to maintain direction, and lack of faith in any process

Role of Meditation

Obviously meditation does not eliminate pain but it has one very important attribute  It settles the mind so that there is a potential for faith to peek its head in the door and nuture some calmness to the freaked out mind

We see a lot of people in the clinic with chronic disease who have perhaps underlying psychological or emotional pain but not obvious physical pain and so these people can also benefit from meditation

But it’s one thing to deal with helping people with chronic disease but quite another to try to help those with chronic disease who have chronic physical pain

Meditation does not eliminate the pain  It helps settle the mind so that it is not so anxious and is able to accept suggested therapies without freaking out  There are times when pain is so commanding of our attention that a trial of a particular approach freaks us out Everything is uncertain and we just want the pain to go away  This is specifically a very bad place for people with chronic disease

IC and Ways to Reduce Inflammation

The IC bladder pain syndrome(interstitial cystitis, vulvodynia, chronic prostatitis, IBS, GERD, and fibromyalgia) is caused by a pelvic neuropathy from an energy science point of view  What this means is that abnormal vibrational frequencies from the gut infiltrate the nervous tissue in the pelvic complex of nerves to produce symptoms in the bladder, vagina, prostate, and distant organs as in fibromyalgia

These abnormal vibrational frequencies or qualities are given names which we are familiar…hot, light, dry, mobile, static, sticky, and sharp  These match the symptoms that all people with the IC bladder pain syndrome experience and report to their physicians  The symptoms are a result of these qualities occupying the pelvic nerves leading to organ symptoms  And this model of disease has been articulated by current IC medical researchers but because the matter science human model cannot take this neurological process any deeper they are left with the inability to treat the IC bladder pain syndrome

Ways to Reduce Inflammation

Rose petal jam…pacifies Pitta in the heart and prana Vata and cools the system

Rose is renown for its cooling effects and the energy science shows us why that’s the case

Sesame crunch

Refined sugar cravings are addictions  The body however is energetically looking for more energy substrate called soma  Refined sugar provides the soma but at the price of addiction  Sesame crunch provides soma without the addictive quality

Avoid onions/garlic…kills friendly bacteria, replace with cabbage and brussel sprouts

80/20 water/homemade yogurt with soma salt and Pitta masala

Green Composite Protein Recipe

This is an alkalinizing diet that reduces acidity in the GI tract which is the source fo inflammation It is a cornerstone to begin removing inflammatory sources for the GI tract

Early bedtime…go to bed 30m b4 anticipate going to bed…go at it slow

All products can be obtained at chandika.com

Antiinflammatory Tea

From an energy science view painful IC flares and bladder pain are a result of inflammation in the urinary channel(UT) since too much of hot produces inflammation.  Interesting isn’t it that the words burning and flare are used to describe what is physically going on?  I wrote a while ago about the use of the antiinflammatory cocktail using pomegranite juice and aloe vera gel and several of you have contacted me to tell me how helpful this has been.

So here’s another antiinflammatory drink!   This time a tea made from cumin coriander and fennel(CCF) seeds   Due to the cold energy of these herbs they also can be benefiicial in dealing with excess hot in the UT   Create a stash of seeds by placing equal amounts of cumin, coriander and fennel into a ziploc bag and shake it so it’s well mixed   From your stash you can draw one teaspoon and steep in cup of hot water   Or if making a thermos to carry with you during the day placing enough in the thermos for the amount of hot water that will be placed   The tea may need diluting if it gets too strong at the end of the day

Spices = Herbs = Medicinal Effects

Your kitchen’s spice drawer is a medicine cabinet and using spices skillfully over time can produce positive medicinal and physiologic effects  But the converse is also true   If you are using spices randomly and for flavor alone there can be adverse consequences   For example, most spices are heating so they can be provoking if you have IC   Or another example is the use of salt – too much leads to water retention

In general the value of spices is that they buck up our digestive fire or enzyme system responsible for digestion, absorption, and elimination  This is why for us in the northern hemisphere at this time of year the use of spices is important because our digestive strength gets diminished

Cumin coriander and fennel uniquely have an energetically cold effect to the physiology when using them and so are particularly useful in dis-eases with lots of inflammation with poor or impaired digestive strength   Cumin(not to be confused with curcumin from tumeric) is a unique digestant in that it bucks up digestive strength but brings balance to the GI tract   Coriander seeds come from the plant we get cilantro   The use of the fennel bulbs in the fresh vegetable section can give you a double whammy if you cook with it as a vegetable

Another interesting aspect of CCF is that all 3 herbs resonate with the UT   They are specific to the UT channel and therefore bring their cold quality to the UT mucosa

Making CCF Tea

If you have a lot of heat already(hot flashes, burning in the pelvis) then reduce or eliminate the cumin which is hot  So put an equal amount of each seed in a ziploc bag(unless you’re eliminating or reducing cumin) mix around in the bag and then use 1T/8oz, boil for 5 minutes and then sip through the day

Of course not all spices are created equally   For the easiest way to find which spices are safe to use go to icdiet.com   There are grades or shades of hot within each herb so within the Favor list there are those asterisked    These are spices that should be used in moderation

Notice the positioning of fresh basil and fresh ginger   These are both beautiful spices to use on a consistent basis to bring about balance in the GI tract and improve digestion

IC and Urological Evaluation

The IC bladder pain syndrome(interstitial cystitis, vulvodynia, chronic prostatitis, GERD, IBS, fibromyalgia) has many different causes  When everything has been ruled out with CT scan, cytology, and cystoscopy then the urologist is left with the diagnosis of IC bladder pain syndrome  So the evaluation of IC pain is a diagnosis of exclusion

To the astute clinician often the symptom complex of IC stands out from other pelvic pain complexes having nuances that separate them apart from the IC label   Be that as it may it still is important to have studies done to be sure what you are dealing with IC

Then you can be rest assured that an energy science healing approach will clear your problem, symptom free and able to live a normal life

What Happens If You Don’t Get Better

I am so certain of this approach that I can say that if you’re doing this energy science work and you don’t notice a change in your symptoms or reduction in flares in 3 months you should return to your urologist and have studies repeated

I have seen patients in the past who even had a clear Hunner’s ulcer in the bladder by endoscopy and a complete workup who continued to have recurrent symptoms   She  failed to return on appt times and later I found a high grade cancer of the ureter

So it’s incumbent upon you to followup with your urologist despite supportive findings of IC if you don’t get better with the energy science approach

Flare Change

One thing to note about improvement is that the intervals between flares becomes longer, the intensity of the flare lessens, or both  The below diagram shows what happens as you reduce the imbalance of the hot quality

Journey to Balance

As you can see the apex of the graph depicts symptoms of the pain complex represented as spikes but as you make conscious choices to bring about cooling the physiology by nutrition and many other energy science techniques the flares lessen and lessen until they are negligible

Three Things You Can Do Right Now

Go to foodsheal.com right now and take the quiz    Then choose the appropriate nutritional format and print the pdf format off so you have it to follow

Read the incompatable food combination list and print off that file as well and post both on your refrigerator so you can reference them regularly  Incompatible foods produce inflammation

Use aloe vera gel(not the juice) on a regular basis (2T three times per day)   Take it to work, travel with it, and make a ritual out of its use  Why?  This herb reduces the hot quality(think of applying aloe on a hot sunburn) by using the opposite quality of cold

IC and Healing Time

Obviously this is a common question posed by those doing energy science work for clearance of their IC complex of bladder pain and possibly IBS, GERD, chronic prostatitis, vulvodynia, and fibromyalgia

As a child you may have asked, “Are we there yet?” and “Now are we there yet?”  So when will this IC be over?   The short answer is, “It’s over when it’s over.”  But to be more specific, in general it takes 2 months of release for every year of imbalance   So if you have had symptoms of IC for 10 years it will take 20 months of work to clear the energy qualities that have accumulated

This would make sense wouldn’t it?  The longer the imbalance the more work is required to get resolution   This doesn’t mean that there will not be improvement of symptoms   The flare intensity get less as the months go by and then the frequency lessens   But real healing takes time!

Are You Particle(Molecule) or Wave?

The body is simultaneously a matter field and an energy field.  The former expresses itself as molecules or particles and the latter as waves of energy   So this is how the energy field expresses dis-ease    In waves

Sound familiar?  The waves are flares that occur in the body.  And they continue to express themselves until you do something about it.  Until you decide to intervene   Otherwise the expression of the excess qualities will continue to occur

Because the matter field is a gross expression of the more subtle energy field, you now can see why dis-ease begins with qualities that then eventually become manifest as particles or molecules in the matter field   This is why I can say with certainty that the matter science will never be able to heal IC with its molecular approach to dis-ease

The Concept of Release

Once the pelvic nervous system and the urinary tract is involved with the energy patterns of Vata and Pitta, the symptoms of Vata presence begin episodic expression of light, cold, rough, dry, and mobile which lead to urgency, frequency and a feeling of incomplete emptying of the bladder   Pitta’s presence of inflammation lead to burning on urination, burning pain in the pelvis, vagina, and even rectum due to the sharp, hot, liquid and spreading qualities

These qualities lodge in the urinary tract and express as energy or wave   So the intermittent flares that occur in the body are waves of energetic expression

But what happens when you decide to do things to differently?  You begin paying attention to your day and how you live it   Energy science nutrition becomes important and you start seeing food as medicine   You choose certain herbs that can help with IC and use them regularly

When you no longer support the overexpression of these qualities in the body by the foods that you eat, the body naturally begins letting go of these excess qualities of light, cold, rough, dry, mobile, sharp, hot, liquid and spreading   This takes time but by and by there is lessening of the symptoms that the qualities brought and healing begins to occur

What you see is gradual regression of the symptoms   They do not stop all at once   There is a receding of the complex of symptoms much like the outgoing tide on the beach