Meditation

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The mere mention of the word makes the eyes of many people glaze over, “it’s boring”, “I don’t have the time for it”, “my knees won’t let me sit in that position” and “I tried it once but I got nothing out of it” are all common gripes about meditation.

For many of us the word conjures up images of people seated in uncomfortable looking positions for hours at a time who might belong to obscure religious sects. Some kinds of meditation can be found in such settings but the fact is that many of us meditate without even realising it. So what is meditation and can it be scientifically defined and verified?

The human brain is an electro-chemical organ and an electroencephalagram (EEG) can measure the electrical activity inside the brain. Beta waves are the waves I am using right now, fully awake and focused on the rational task of writing this blog. In our normal waking and thinking state Beta waves predominate. When we meditate our thoughts turn inward and we disengage with the outside world and other types of brain waves become more active.

When we meditate our breathing and heart rate (pulse) slows, blood pressure falls and the parasympathetic nervous system predominates (the sympathetic is more active when we are not meditating). The brain waves that are most active when we meditate are called Alpha, Gamma, Theta and Delta waves, these waves are also more active when sleep. We experience these waves when we are being creative, are lost in the reverance of nature, reverently enjoy art and music, when we unconsciously run on “auto-pilot” and doing yoga. Swimming and surfing are active forms of meditation too.

Meditation and hypnosis have things in common, they both require a deepened state of relaxation both mental and physical for them to take place. There are different methods of inducing this state, a common one is to deliberately slow your breathing by focusing on it and then relax your muscles one part of your body at a time. You can use props like incense, soothing music and dimming the light, some claim that sitting or lying in a pyramid frame is useful too.

Going to bed of a night time is an easy place to start meditating, lie flat on your back, slow your breathing and fully focus your attention on it and then limb by limb go floppy. If you fall asleep in the process it does not matter because it is bed time anyway, if it worked you will awaken very refreshed and happy. You will usually have good quality sleep if you fall asleep this way.

Meditation calms us down but makes us more alert too, so if you are worried that it will somehow make you “lose your edge” don’t be because it won’t. Finding the time to meditate is like finding the time to exercise, you have to create space in your life for it, you do it BEFORE you do other things not after.

Fibromyalgia

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Fibromyalgia is an autoimmune disease that effects up to 5% of the population. Being an autoimmune disease it has no definate cause, no permanent cure, no definative diagnostic test and it does not manifest the same in all the people who have it.

A person of any age can get fibromyalgia, even children. Women suffer from it more often than men do and one in four sufferers can no longer work because of it.

The symptoms can be severe and varied, everyone who suffers from it will have muscle and joint pain which is where it’s name comes from (fibro-fibrous tissue such as tendon and ligament, myalgia-muscle pain), but other symptoms can include insomnia, fatigue, rashes, weakness, depression, headaches, nausea, menstrual problems, poor memory, foggy thinking and weight gain.

Some sufferers can notice a big improvement after a year while others others  have a hard time with it for much longer. One single “magic bullet” will rarely bring the symptoms under control, the best results usually come from using several different strategies and treatments together.

Medications both pharmacuetical and non-pharmacuetical, massage, chiropractic, osteopathy, acupuncture, stretching exercise and alkaline based diets all work to some extent for fibromyalgia sufferers.

Fibromyalgia like polymyalgia rheumatica is most intense first thing in the morning, it can make you feel much older than you really are. Sufferers tend to loosen up a bit as the day progresses but even on a good day with active fibromyalgia resourcefulness is required to go about your daily business.

If your knees are effected getting on and off the toilet can require extra thought and planning, showering will be easier than getting in and out of baths and using a long handled shoe-horn might come in handy too.

If your shoulders are effected getting in and out of coats might become an embarrassing task on a crowded bus and reaching objects off the top shelf at the supermarket might make you feel like a croc too.

Maintaining an upbeat outlook on life can be seriously tested with fibromyalgia and it can create pressures in even the best relationships. Despite how bad you might feel with it you can still look quite normal and because blood tests cannot detect it you might feel like a hypochondriac, it is hard to avoid suffering over your suffering with fibromyalgia.

Unfortunately it is not just hale and hardy physical people who get down about this condition because of the way fibromyalgia can effect your powers of concentration, even something passive like reading a book is more difficult than usual.

If meditation isn’t your thing learning some other form of mental relaxation using breathing techniques or even hypnosis might help you take your mind off it. If you are not a person who would normally entertain using alternate medicine you might need to change your mind because being stubborn won’t do you any good atall with this condition. Likewise if you don’t normally like “taking drugs” you might need to if want to keep working.

Cupping

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If you have ever been to the beach and saw somebody walking around with a pattern of large round bruises on their back they have probably been treated by an acupuncturist with cupping.

Cupping is a procedure that uses suction cups to help draw the extra fluid that is present in sore and stiff muscles closer to the surface. When this happens relief is experienced because pressure is removed from the nerves in the muscle tissue. Lactic acid contained in the fluid is likely to be drawn out of the muscle tissue through this suction action also.

Bruising does not always result from getting Cupped but if you are quite fair or anemic it is likely to show more and this can put people off getting it which is a shame because when used appropriately cupping brings relief of muscle pain and stiffness.

The use of cupping is common in Chinese Medicine but cupping has been used a long time in Eastern Europe too and in recent times has been discovered by many physio therapists.

Cupping is also commonly used in TCM (and Eastern Europe) to treat colds and flu, the cups are commonly placed on the upper back to do this. The rationale that is offered for this practise is that perverse energy enters the body through wind exposure which can give you a cold. By literally sucking out the pathogenic energy the symptoms are claimed to be reduced.

Whether you are employing the use of cupping to sooth over-exercised muscles or to alleviate the symptoms of a cold the results are often quite impressive, it usually does seem to work.

As already stated Cupping can leave bruises that might not go very well with your new backless ball gown but otherwise the appropriate skilled use of Cupping is quite side effect free, non-invasive and only mildly uncomfortable (if uncomfortable at all).

Bamboo or glass cups are briefly heated on the inside then quickly placed on the skin, as the air inside the cup cools a suction is formed, this is how Cupping is traditionally performed. In more recent times small pistol-grip styled hand pumps and plastic suction cups with valves have been designed to do Cupping, they both work quite well.

It is no doubt easier for many to visualize excess fluid being sucked out from stiff muscle than it is to think about invisible pathogenic energy being physically drawn from your upper back but there are many things in health science that we are yet to learn about. Whatever the case Cupping really does seem to help people feel better.

Cupping can be easily used with other types of therapy, after a Cupping is applied for instance it is easier to make an impression on stiff muscles with massage, stretching and manipulative techniques.

Hip Pocket Sciatica

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Otherwise known as pseudo sciatica, hip pocket sciatica is usually brought about by carrying around and sitting on an object (usually a wallet) in your back pocket. Even a very thin wallet will have this effect because it is the equivalent of sitting on a chair with a bump on one side.

Men are the chief culprits of this, hip pocket sciatica can cause pain and tingling in the buttock area and cause pain to radiate to your lower back. The hard lump you sit on interferes with the blood circulation to the gluteal muscles and it tips your pelvis up on that side. This can have a kinking affect on the lower lumbar discs which in turn can be a contributing factor to the “real” sciatica that radiates down your leg from your lower back.

The prevention is simple- take your wallet (or other objects) from your back pocket before you sit down. It is even better to find another pocket to carry it in because then it won’t matter if you forget to remove it when you sit.

It is surprising how much better this simple act can make your hips and back feel, if you are reading this and thinking “I always have my wallet in my back pocket and I feel fine” take it out for a few days and see if you feel any different.

Hip pocket sciatica is also called pseudo sciatica because it feels like sciatica but it isn’t. Sciatica can make your buttock sore through pain referring along the sciatic nerve from lumbar nerve root pressure in you lower back, sciatica is an indirect cause of hip or buttock pain. Pseudo (or hip pocket) sciatica on the other hand is a direct cause of hip and buttock pain because of direct pressure from what you are sitting on.

The very act of sitting unevenly like when you cross your legs also creates uneven weight distribution on the buttock muscles and can have a pseudo-sciatica  like effect. You may get away with sitting cross-legged or on your wallet for a long time before it effects you and this is why that sitting in such a way may not be considered by yourself to be the cause of that searing pain in your butt.

Poor quality seating should be on the list of suspects for hip-pocket sciatica and lower back pain along with any objects that you my habitually carry in your back pocket. Some of us have sitting habits such as tucking a leg under your butt when sitting or maybe leaning towards one side, it is easy to do when you have been on the computer for a long time.

Hip-pocket sciatica is aptly named for more than one reason because it will end up costing you money to get it fixed.

Constipation

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Constipation is one of the most common digestive complaints and it has many causes. Insufficient dietry fibre (roughage), dehydration, drug side effects, pregnancy, stress, not enough exercise and back pain are all major contributors to constipation.

To properly understand the importance of regular bowel movements it is important to consider what your bowel is supposed to do which is getting rid of the worst of what your body contains.

It is not common for most of us to trade notes about our excrement with one another so what you think as being normal may not be normal at all. I have met people who only pass feces once every three weeks and thought everybody else  did too. For the average person once or twice a day is a good regularity and the stool should have the consistency of soft clay.

People who do not eat enough fruit and vegetables run a high risk of constipation and get a lazy colon if this eating habit continues for a long period of time. When your colon becomes flaccid constipation is not the only, nor the worst thing that can happen to you. Diverticular disease can be a very distressing condition to suffer from and it can shorten your life, it is more likely to happen to you if you suffer from chronic constipation.

For many constipation sufferers their stool will be dry and hard, if there is not enough water entering your body it may be part of the cause. Lower back pain sufferers often find that when they get acute pain, bearing down can be painful and they might hold back because of it. If you take pain killers that have opiates (codeine, morphine) in them these will slow your bowel down too. Heroin addicts can have a devil of a time with constipation.

When you move about alot your internal organs tend to rub against each other and massage one another and this helps your digestion. If you are usually sedentary and worse still if you sit in a hunched position  your entrails get cramped for room. Inactivity does not help your blood circulate throughout your body and this includes circulation to your  intestines.

If you are a big drinker of fruit and vegetable juices but do not eat fruit and vegies you get vitamins but no roughage. Whole fruit and vegetables are a much healthier option than their juices alone.

Constipation (along with child birth, heavy lifting and anal sex) can give your hemorroids, this happens because of straining too hard. Learning to use your abdominal muscles in a downward wave-like motion like belly dancers do will put way less strain on your rectum if you need to do some pushing. Getting therapuetic massage can help alot too especially if your massage therapist shows you how you can do it for yourself.

Laxatives can assist constipation but taking them long term can cause problems with over excitation of the bowel wall. Prevention can be way less drastic than cure.