Mary Angelie M. Alagao
After three days of 2-hour sleep, your body starts to weaken and your head starts to ache yet you know you cannot give in to sickness. There are still so many things to do and the deadlines are up. You find yourself summoning a power from within. You tell yourself, “I cannot get sick. I have to finish this!” The body allows itself to recharge only when everything has been done. The power of the mind has been victorious.
Some people do not get sick even when everyone else does because they think they won’t catch the disease, not to mention taking the necessary precautions. Others get sick because they think they will.
There was a story about a 39-year old woman who was able to change her positive skin test for varicella zoster, or chicken pox, at will. She used imagery to change it from positive to negative. She imagined that the redness and swelling in her skin were getting smaller and smaller, while sending the “healing energy” to that area. This was a documented case by Dr. G. Richard Smith and his colleagues from the University of Arkansas, College of Medicine. It was also reported that the same woman used the same technique to catch the disease again, 6 months after.
One of the most-feared diseases we have today is cancer. According to the ‘surveillance’ theory, our bodies develop cancer cells all the time. Before they evolve into dangerous tumors, our white blood cells destroy them. When this routine is threatened, the immune system is suppressed, thus, fostering malignancy. This explains why the cancer doesn’t occur in one part the body only.
Mental and emotional factors affect the immune system adversely. If this is the case, stress can be correlated with cancer. Quoting a 1976 study by L.E Hinkle, events do not cause stress, rather, how we interpret situations that arise. In short, we have control over stress.
A researcher and a psychiatrist at the Stanford University Medical School, Professor David Spiegel, once refuted the idea that cancer and mental health are correlated. In a study he conducted, he observed 86 women with breast cancer for 10 years. He was stunned to find out that the women who received group therapy and lessons in self-hypnosis lived twice as long as those who were given medical treatment.
Another study by Dr. Sandra Levy and Dr. Ronald B. Herberman of the University of Pittsburgh led to the discovery of the effect of depression in the immune cell activity. It was observed that depression diminished the cell activity of the natural-killer T-cells and caused the tumor to spread fast in breast cancer patients.
Mental process can also strengthen or restore our immune system. In an investigation by Dr. Barry Gruber of Medical Illness Counseling Center in Chase, Maryland, and Dr. Nicholas R. Hall of the University of South Florida, the patients were asked to imagine themselves waging a war against the cancer cells. It was found out that depending on the level of relaxation and imagery, the pattern of the immune response changes. It can stimulate the lymphocytes, increase the production of antibodies and interleukin-2 cells, enhance the cell activity of the natural killer cell and the augment the effectiveness of the cytotoxic T cells. Another striking fact was that it also increased the determination of the patients to overcome the disease.
There are a lot of techniques used in overcoming stress, which in effect, aid in healing diseases. One that is dominant in the case studies cited above is imagery. Other techniques include yoga and meditation. What is important is a fighting spirit, the determination to get healed. As they say, the real healing power comes from within. Whatever you feed in your brain manifests in physical reality. Anima sana in corpora sano. A sound mind in a healthy body.
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