In ages preceding ours, the stature of the doctor was near that of royalty. Home visits would be pre-empted by frantic cleaning and clearing, ensuring a prim and proper environment for the smartly-dressed Doc to stride into and make his long-awaited diagnosis. It's almost as if there existed an innate fear that he might blame a slightly messy housing environment on the poor health of the patient in question.
A huge facet of this unquestioning respect of the Doctor was the taking of their proclamations as absolute, unerring, manna-from-heaven truth. Leave it to the professional. They're the expert.
It was with this in mind that I would sometimes encounter friction with various medical professionals in my visits, frequent and infrequent, to my local hospital. Personal observations would occasionally clash with rigid medial ideology and long-standing beliefs, or even belief systems.
What emerged from this was a realisation of the very real need for the reinforcement of independence from, well, any kind of overarching ideology from any kind of institution. While it is necessary to heed the advice from it, nothing should ever be completely consumed and practised without self-verification, surely?
Before I go further with notable examples, I would firstly wish to make a small disclaimer: this is in no way any sort of attack on the medical profession, as without its assistance I would undoubtedly be unable to write this blog, due to being dead. By and large, I and my body have benefited from the administering of various drugs (and especially several pints of blood!). Here, I am merely reflecting on observations that, for the sake of sanity, I wish to share. They are select moments of collision between personal beliefs, based on experiences, and what felt like medical dogma.
The first example of 'Wait, what?' concerns the relationships between diet, emotion and Colitis.
This condition has now lived with me for around six years - yes, a drop in the water compared to many - but in that relatively short time I have been irrevocably convinced that diet and emotion do, in their respective ways, affect Colitis and the state of the guts (and, subsequently, the body).
It transpired repeatedly, after perhaps too many ill-advised 'treats', that certain foodstuffs and their itty-bitty invisible components could only serve to irritate and exacerbate. Even now, with all of this supposed wisdom (hur hur), all it takes is a houmous & falafel wrap from Starbucks - as I found out on a railway photography trip (note: trainspotting) to Doncaster last Thursday - to initiate the Return of the Red.
Perhaps thankfully, such a sudden and obvious reaction an serve as an impossible-to-miss declaration of DO NOT EAT. I have witnessed such reactions for a few long years now, and had already clocked up several 'Oh, bugger' moments the day after having scoffed delightfully delicious gut-abusing delicacies (such as the dreaded and fearsome Teacake) before this shocking admission from a medical professional was uttered.
And what, before I lose your attention and you your patience, was this verbal ruling?
'It's got NOTHING to do with diet or emotion.'
Reproduced verbatim, these were the words of someone actively involved with poor arse-spraying souls for some time. I was absolutely floored to hear the denial of something apparently so bleeding (ha) obvious from someone whose profession was based around blood-addled defecation.
As for the emotional side of it: I was fascinated to learn the story behind why the gut is referred to as something of a second brain - it's a nerve centre. This serves as an explanation behind such phenomena as getting 'butterflies' in your gut region, as well as the phrase 'gut instinct'. I myself routinely surrender to the damaging habit of emotional internalisation, to the point where it is difficult to get out of it - secrecy is becoming an ingrained trait.
That made it doubly shocking to hear an apparent professional flatly deny the link, direct or tenuous, between such an integral part of our bodies and, well, another integral part of our bodies: mind and gut.
It's akin to claiming that exhaust has nothing to do with pollution, or that money has nothing to do with Simon Cowell's perpetual smugness.
The second example of inexplicable practise was when I was staring down my second great flare-up.
During the first onset of claret, I discovered that Prednisolone - medical steroids - was the go-to medication for efficiently dealing with excessive colitis symptoms in an emergency state.
Having already been on a course of 'Pred' some time before, I was now in a very real position of urgently needing something to stop this latest flare-up.
I suggested a(nother) course of Prednisolone to a pair of medical professionals, while in a routine meeting with them. They reacted with near-horror, warning of the dangers of going on too many courses of Prednisolone: osteoporosis and stunted growth, amongst others. Having had my suggestion shouted down, I retreated, went home and continued bleeding, one of the pair's final conclusions ringing in my ears: 'I think you are having a seasonal flare-up'. Dear God.
A week later, I was back in hospital.
On steroids.
Perhaps luckily, I was too weak to get even moderately annoyed, let alone angry, so when one of the aforementioned pair came to see how I was doing in the hospital, I enquired about why my suggestion of going on a course of steroids had been rebuffed initially, when I was now on them anyway, having essentially been proved right.
'I don't know, really,' came the reply. I nearly fainted.
With these two examples, the overarching point I am attempting to articulate here is the need to retain a sense of independence from the medical authorities. While they are indeed authorities, doing your own damn research on your condition, taking place in your own body, is of paramount importance.
Western medicine, in my thankfully few instances of over-zealous prescribing, appears to take rather extreme reactions to conditions such as colitis and reserves an unhealthy sense of near-condescension towards anything approaching holistic approaches and naturopathic suggestions of treatment.
Take the example of a consultant suggesting bowel-carving surgery as the next step from my first flare-up. Thankfully I had all members of my immediate family around me and we all nearly sprang back in horror, before protesting energetically. Surgery? In the midst of only the first flare-up? A surgeon was even summoned to come and explain the procedure to me.
My poor mother, looking on as her not-even-twenty-year-old son was reduced to a blood-farting wreck with the strength of a paperclip, was justly baffled that none of the consultants and other wallahs were talking about overhauling my diet as a potential remedial action. Why not heal the gut, instead of already removing some of it?
She was even more shocked at this attitude after having studied an incredible book, Dr. David Klein's Healing Colitis & Crohn's, and reading of his inspiring journey to complete health without the need for any medications.
Imagine the following scenario: you wear a certain pair of gloves in your day-to-day life/work, but they regularly irritate the skin on your hands, causing them to bleed. What do you do - find a new pair of gloves, perhaps fashioned from different, non-irritant material, or do you chop your hands off?
No comments:
Post a Comment