A Time of Transformation: Re-Aligning to Health
To our Community:
As Sandpoint life is increasingly affected by the Coronavirus, we wanted to take a moment to reach out with some of the ways that we are personally approaching this situation. Most importantly, we offer some perspective from those in China who have already been treating patients so that we can stay ahead of the curve here and learn from their expertise. This expertise helped to inform some simple lifestyle suggestions which we have also listed below. Please take a moment to read the information we have compiled on how to best support yourself during this health challenge.
Transforming Perspectives and Our Path Forward:
To reframe this pandemic from a Chinese Medicine perspective, it is helpful to expand your lense to consider our cultural environment to better understand how this pandemic can occur. Global societal norms continuously expend our personal (and planetary) resources in the continual striving to produce and achieve more. Hard work, achievement, and pushing through pain are encouraged, and only recently is self-care even a topic of conversation. From a Chinese Medicine perspective, this continual strain on our internal vitality weakens us so that we are much more susceptible to illnesses and diseases. Currently, we see this happening on a global level, and it is devastating to know that so many will be personally affected by the virus on physical, emotional, and financial levels. However, this lens of understanding also provides us with a path forwards towards wellness and vitality.
This time of illness and isolation also affords us a unique opportunity for personal transformation. This time of slowing down and reconfiguring is offering us the opportunity to deeply reflect on what is most important in our life, what is excessive, and how we can align ourselves and our life on a path that supports our best possible health. Equally significant is to then allow these inward reflections to ripple outwards to help reshape our communities and the world we live in. So utilize this unique opportunity that has been offered to us as a positive impetus for change.
Advice and Perspectives from the Front Lines in China:
We have been closely following the studies and clinical reports coming from Chinese medicine doctors in China that have been treating patients in conjunction with Western medicine doctors (MDs). One point of consensus is that this virus causes a great deal of “dampness” in the body. Without going too deep into Chinese medicine jargon, dampness is a form of unhealthy fluids stuck within the body in a location where it does not belong. Typically, poor digestive transformation and/or a poor diet lead to dampness accumulation in the body. This dampness has a sticky quality, best equated to our understanding of phlegm. This virus particularly affects not only the lungs, but also the capacity of our digestion to transform and clear this sticky phlegm. Therefore, the most important recommendation from us and other Chinese medicine practitioners is to be extremely vigilant about our diet and digestive health (see #2 below) to offer the best opportunity for prevention and also healing from coronavirus. A diet that causes more dampness in the body will worsen the outcome. See below for our dietary recommendations as well as other ways you can help support your health best at this time.
Simple Healthy Lifestyle Support:
With many of us currently having more time at home and more flexibility in our schedules, we wanted to share some of the most simple and essential guidelines of how to live healthfully right now.
1. Prioritize Sleep & Rest: Sleep is absolutely essential for having a healthy immune system, as well as every other system in the body. Many of us are operating out of years of sleep debt, and now is the time to follow simple sleep hygiene rules and aim for 8-9 hours in bed every night at the minimum.If you want to read more about sleep, check out the amazing book “Why We Sleep” by Matthew Walker.
2. Food As Medicine: Take advantage of increased time at home to focus on simple, healthy food preparation.
Avoid any of your known food triggers.
Eliminate processed white and brown sugars, bananas, dairy, fatty fried food, gluten, processed foods, foods with artificial ingredients, preservatives, and flavorings, alcohol and caffeine from your diet.
The single most important thing you can do is avoid processed sugars, alcohol, dairy, as these particularly result in dampness production in the body and should be eliminated.
Substitute local honey, raw maple syrup or coconut sugar for sweeteners. Avoid artificial sweeteners as they adversely affect the nervous system.
Incorporate aromatic spring greens and aromatic spices into every meal, like cinnamon, cumin, coriander, cardamom, mustard, star anise, peppercorn.
Eat until you are only 80% full to optimize digestion, absorption and metabolism.
Prepare seasonal fresh vegetables with light cooking methods such as steaming, quick boiling, quick sautéing, and stir-frying, and make veggies a main part of every meal.
3. Moderate Movement & Exercise: Take a walk down by the lake or at Pine Street Woods, or even just around town. Do some simple stretching or practice yoga. Keep your circulation flowing-and if you can do it outside, that is even better! Being outside in the sun is essential for endogenous Vitamin D production, and fresh air is revitalizing for our respiratory systems.
4. Hydration: Avoid cold drinks, ice or cold smoothies. Drink plenty of filtered room temperature (or warm) water whenever you are thirsty. We don’t suggest a specific number of ounces due to guideline discrepancies within both science and natural medicine. The basic principles are that it is good to be well-hydrated, that you should listen to your body, and if you are thirsty you should most certainly be drinking more water.
Increase your intake of naturally occurring trace minerals, as these minerals are commonly depleted from the soils our food is grown in, even if eating locally-sourced organic. We add a product called ConcenTrace TraceMinerals to our water.
5. Self-Discovery, Laughter, and Gratitude: This is a great opportunity to re-focus on what is important in your life. Sincerely ask yourself what makes you happy, and what have you been longing to do in your life? And begin to do it. For us, Jessica is training to do a press-handstand, playing the flute, and learning to sew. Jeff is spending more time in meditation and tea ceremony, drumming, and working on his 1978 VW bus.
Relish in the simple joys of life, invite in laughter, and be present with each moment of life. This is a difficult situation, but most of us in the United States have so much that we can be grateful for that we take for granted every single day.
While we are spending more time tending to ourselves and our health, therefore we will be closing to in-person visits as of March 22nd until April 20th. During this time we are happy to offer remote herbal consults and continue offering herbal formulas. We have many herbs on hand that have already been shown to be useful in China for mitigating Coronavirus symptoms, as well as the herbs we consistently use to support general vitality. We are happy to do remote herbal consultations if you are experiencing symptoms or recovering. Please let us know how we can be of service to you during this time.
In Health,
Jeff & Jessica
art by: @hheininge https://www.instagram.com/hheininge/