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Hello June!
Summer is finally here! This month we talk about natural pregnancy and childbirth (the second time around), we have a lovely healing and restorative postpartum soup recipe (thank you Cindy from Root+Spring), an article on vitamins and why you need them and the final installment of our wonderful series on External Qi Healing. We hope you have had a wonderful June, and the Chinese Medicine Living family will be one tiny person larger when we see you next in July!<3
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Here Are This Month's Articles...
- Natural Pregnancy & Childbirth 2.0
- Vitamins! Why You Need Them & Where To Get Them
- External Qi Healing - Part 3
- Quote of the Month
- Inspiration - Tortoise Gets Second Chance After Healing With Acupuncture
- Chinese Medicine & Acupuncture in the News
- Recipe of the Month - Postpartum Recovery Chinese Herbal Soup
- About Chinese Medicine Living
Natural Pregnancy & Childbirth 2.0
By Emma Suttie, D.Ac, AP
I am presently pregnant with my second baby. My first is 18 months, and I am expecting to give birth any day now. It has been an intense year and a half. I described motherhood to a friend as like being swept up in a tsunami and just having to let go while trying your best not to drown. It is a kind of chaos, with terrifying moments and wonderful ones, all shaken up together. Your life before you had a baby is a distant memory, as there is nothing that remains from it now as you become unrecognizable, even to yourself. Emotionally, the best way that I could describe it, is that having a child is like having a piece of your heart walking around on the outside of your body.
Pregnancy Number One
My two pregnancies have been very different. During my first, I was in my lovely healing community of Sarasota. I was having my friend - a ninja massage therapist, yoga instructor and reiki master - giving me massages every two weeks. I was going to her yoga class several times a week. I was meditating on my own and going to my awesome women's meditation group every two weeks. I was walking around my neighbourhood every day and walking on the beach at least once a week. I was taking supplements every day and eating like a superhero. I was meeting friends for tea and doing everything I could to be a healthy, happy human in preparation to bring a life into the world. I felt awesome and didn't suffer with any unpleasant symptoms that I had heard about from so many patients over the years. I was so lucky.
I was also very lucky to be in a place where I had a whole community of healers who I had relationships with, us all treating each other, to keep me healthy and balanced. There were many birth centre's in Sarasota and a wide variety of midwives which was amazing. I went to a few places and decided on the one I liked the best. My appointments were uneventful as everything was going well and I was feeling great. I ended up giving birth almost a month early to a healthy baby boy. I had him in the tub (where my husband was with me) all natural with no medications and although I was not prepared for how intense it was going to be or how much pain was going to be involved (no words could possibly express this), it was an incredible experience and one in which my husband and I participated fully. There were two midwives present, but they just observed, occasionally checking vitals, but other than that, they were just there to make sure everything went smoothly and not to interfere. A friend who was there said it was incredible, and that my hubby and I totally gave birth to that baby all by ourselves. She cried throughout, and said it was a beautiful thing to have witnessed. I was under the impression that my labour would take a while (first time mamas usually have longer labours) and that we would get to chat and have tea, but I said not one word to her the entire time as my labour went insanely fast. It took 4 hours start to finish. I was busy concentrating and was completely unaware of my surroundings for most of it. I was trying not to pass out from the pain. I was concentrating on making it through each contraction. It also became immediately apparent that the process was almost completely out of my control and that I just had to let go and let it happen or I would make it a whole lot more uncomfortable for myself. So many lessons, oh my!
Vitamins! Why You Need Them & Where To Get Them
By Emma Suttie, D.Ac, AP
In Chinese medicine food is the best medicine, therefore, getting enough of all the important vitamins from what we eat is something we should all be constantly working at. It can be overwhelming and hard to remember which vitamins do what and where to get them, so this is why I wanted to have a practical list to help list which vitamins we need, why they are important and where to get them. A good way to think about getting everything you need is to "eat the rainbow" meaning eating as many brightly coloured fruits and vegetables as possible (which also tends to indicate how rich they are in antioxidants). Also, having a small child to feed has made making sure that all the meals I prepare are smashed full of as many vitamins as possible for growing bodies and minds! I hope this information is helpful and will help you to eat a healthier, more balanced diet.
Vitamin A
Vitamin A is a fat soluble vitamin, meaning that any extra that you are getting from your diet is stored in the body. Vitamin A is a powerful antioxidant, which are important for combatting free radical damage which leads to premature aging. Antioxidants also reduce inflammation in the body which helps to combat many diseases. Because of their effect on free radicals, a diet high in antioxidants helps to combat premature aging, actually slowing the aging process. Vitamin A is important for many of the body's vital functions, and is especially important for children as it helps vision and neurological function, so make sure your babies get plenty of the foods listed below for their brain and eye health.
External Qi Healing - Part 3
By John Voigt
**Disclaimer. This article is written for educational purposes only. It is not offered for the healing of any serious illnesses. If a person is sick he or she must see a proper professional, in either (or both) western or traditional Chinese medicine.**
E - FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS.
Is it necessary to ask permission before doing a Sending?
Absolutely yes. The practitioner must ask permission from the receiver before emanating qi. To send without gaining approval is insulting, offensive and invasive.
Is it “your” qi that you are sending? Or does it come from somewhere else?
Well, yes and no to both questions. At one level qi is the energy you have brought into your body by breathing and eating; and have built up and preserved through qigong practices, as well as by reducing or eliminating physical and emotional problems. Additionally it is important to reduce or stop the loss of Jing (often thought of as being sperm or ovum, which is only partially true.) Jing is better understood as being a highly perfected subtle energetic potentiality: in other words the essence of life. So from this perspective, you are not the one sending your qi, but rather only being a conduit for a universal force that is flowing its jing-essence-qi down and through you.
Where does this essence come from? Many healers cannot, or refuse to, answer that question. Others simply say it comes from nature, or the sun, or the direction of certain stars. There isn’t enough space here, nor do I have the wisdom, to explore this much further, except to point out that throughout the ages mystics when in visionary states perceive all and everything as a unity in a universal consciousness. So much so that each of our individual consciousnesses appear as being joined together within a larger and more profound reality. Personally I call this reality the Dao (Tao), but here definitions are not that important; rather it is about experiencing, manifesting and using this Power. A number of quantum scientists have reached a similar understanding in believing that such things are beyond rational verbal definitions, but nevertheless do offer entrances into practical applications in the use of energy. Likewise EQH offers practical applications in the use of Life Energy (Qi). Whatever your specific beliefs, this more speculative approach offers possibilities to help prevent a basic problem in sending healing qi: the depletion of the healer’s personal qi. It no longer is just “your” qi. It comes from the outside and through you. However, there are different schools of though about whose qi is it anyway.
Quote of the Month
We do not inherit the earth from our ancestors, we borrow it from our children.
~ Indian Proverb
Inspiration
Tortoise Gets Second Chance After Healing With Acupuncture
Though this wildlife center cares for thousands of animals every year, this is the first time they have ever used acupuncture on a patient.
The special case was a 10-year-old gopher tortoise that was found on the side of the road with a deep crack in her shell and no motor control left in her back legs.
The South Florida Wildlife Center (SFWC) took the tortoise into their care and started a life-saving treatment of “electro-acupuncture”: a therapy that connects electrical leads to acupuncture needles with the goal of improving the stimulation of damaged nerves through mild electrical currents.
Their efforts paid off within just a week in April, as she regained movement in her back legs. One month later, the tortoise was wandering around her outdoor enclosure and munching on tasty grass shoots.
A threatened species in Florida, gopher tortoises make their homes by burrowing into the dirt. To ensure this particular patient’s survival, the final step is waiting until she regains her digging abilities before releasing her back into the wild.
The tortoise was a perfect example of SFWC’s promotion of the One Health concept, which recognizes that each individual species is linked to the survival of every other.
“Gopher tortoises are a keystone species,” said the Humane Society of the United State’s senior director Debra Parsons-Drake. “The burrows they dig are essential to the survival of hundreds of other species who use them for safety and shelter.
“By saving this one animal, we are not only benefitting her, but positively affecting the environment in which we all co-exist.”
Acupuncture & Chinese Medicine in the News
Hundreds of Nuns Trained in Kung Fu Are Biking the Himalayas To Oppose Human Trafficking
43 Mozambicans to be Trained in Chinese Traditional Medicine
Buddhist Medicine Class Start in Beijing
The Finer Points of Acupuncture - Harvard Med
Acupuncture Benefits Patients with Asthma
FDA Recommends Doctors Learn More About Acupuncture
TCM Recipes to Keep Summer Irritants at Bay
Acupuncture Therapy Relieves Pain in Polio Paralysis Patients
Why Women Have Been Using Acupuncture for Fertility
Pilot Area Launched for Internationaliztion of TCM Education
Is This Ancient Chinese Practice the Answer to Acne?
Acupuncture Surpasses Drug for Hot Flashes and Insomnia
An Ancient Traditional Chinese Medicinal Herb is Being Used to Treat Malaria Patients in Africa
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If you would like to read about the latest scienntific studies involving Acupuncture and Chinese Medicine, please see our "Current Research" page to find all the latest. :)
Recipe Of The Month with Root + Spring
Postpartum Recovery Chinese Herbal Soup (Sheng Hua Teng)
INGREDIENTS (Makes 4 Servings)
- 1 root + spring’s Postpartum Recovery herbal mix
- 2 1/2 pounds of chicken, pork bones, or beef bones
- 4 slices of ginger, each at least a quarter inch thick
- 5 shiitake mushrooms, fresh or dried
- 6 - 8 cups of water
DIRECTIONS
- Lightly rinse herbs under running water.
- Optional: Some Chinese people believe par-boiling the meat for ten minutes first helps to remove any residual fat and toxins the meat. If you’d like to include this step, simply cover the meat with enough water in a pot, bring to a boil for ten minutes, and remove. Rinse the meat. It is now ready for Step 2.
- In a pot, combine herbs, meat, ginger, mushrooms and water.
- Bring to a boil before covering and simmering for 1.5 hours on stovetop, or 3 hours in a slow cooker.
- Salt to taste.
- Consume this soup regularly for the first two weeks after labor. Do not consume after one month past labor, or while pregnant.
Read full article..
About Chinese Medicine Living
Chinese Medicine Living is a place where Chinese medicine principles are applied to the way we live our lives to improve health on every level. In our articles, interviews and information we strive to teach how the body and the world is seen through the eyes of Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) so you can better understand its theories, and how to live a healthy balanced lifestyle according to its principles. How TCM views the body and its connections to emotions, living in harmony with the world around us, and how to achieve the balance synonymous with health are the ways in which we strive to impart the limitless wisdom of Chinese medicine. Welcome.
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