Masking your Pain Pt. 4

“By the great force of my disease is my garment changed: it bindeth me about as the collar of my coat. He hath cast me into the mine, and I am become like dust and ashes” (Job 30: 18,19).

“We don’t have pain, we do pain” –Dr. Alex Cahana

Pain may only stay in our bodies if we let it. By setting our faith, changing our perception of pain and removing barriers from our bodies that prevent natural healing, then we are able to have a pain free life. By including simple exercises into our everyday routine we can also maintain our healing and restore quality of life. As we learned in our previous article, Pillow Talk, pain can cause stress in the body and chronic stress can cause pain. This constant stimulation of your sympathetic nervous system causes damage to all body organs.

I found that using a mixture of deep breathing and mediation during my prayer time have done wonders for relaxing my muscles, relieving my pain and controlling my stress. This has also helped with my prayer life and gives me a deeper connection with God. I know that many Christians are against mediation, because it comes from Buddhist origin and of course if Christianity did not come up with it then it MUST be bad, right??? Let me explain to you what meditation is. Mediation involves concentrating your thoughts on a specific object  or thought, and slowing down your current process, in order to give your mind a break from the extra thoughts and stresses that run through your mind during the day. Meditation does not need to be done with chanting and alters. Meditation can be done concentrating on the meal you are eating, or the shower you are taking, or a bible verse that you have read. Many of us rush through our daily prayers; we say what we are thankful for, give God our prayer requests and AMEN. Back to living life after that. Prayer time is meant to be quality time with the Lord and not just one way conversation. My own routine, I slow down and break up my prayers into sections. I will take pauses and deep breathe fully inflating and deflating my lungs while focusing on the Holy Spirit. Not only does this allow the Holy Spirit to work on me and give time for communication but the breathing exercises help to reduce anxiety, alter heart function, lower blood pressure, sleep better, increase mental clarity and energy and relieve pain. Meditation also has these same qualities. My prayers could last for hours if I let them, God always places more on my heart to pray for when I give him more time to talk to me, and my prayers are so relaxing. I’m not just telling God everything that I need and want while trying to rush to get back to my life. I am spending quality time with the Father. We have conversations and I always awake still feeling the Spirit with me.

“And when they had prayed, the place was shaken where they were assembled together; and they were all filled with the Holy Ghost, and they spake the Word of God with boldness” (Acts 4:31).

Relaxation techniques can work wonders in controlling our response and experience to pain. When I go to bed each night I use autogenic training to relax my muscles to promote a more quality rest, and help to ensure that I will wake up pain free. I find a comfortable position to lie in and I use short phrases to tell my muscles to relax. I work from my neck down to my toes. “My neck is relaxed, my shoulders are relaxed, etc.”. With training you will start to feel as your tension leaves your body and you start to relax.

I encourage you to do your research on breathing techniques, relaxation techniques and meditation to see which exercises your body will work best with. Since we are all different, and our pain comes from different parts of the body and from different causes, the same treatment will not work for everyone.

Train your body to restore good habits:

·        

·         Stop smoking!

      Get enough sleep each night

·         Get up and exercise, walking is good for everyone

·         Laugh!

Good habits must be learned, just like bad habits were.

“But let him ask in faith, nothing wavering. For he that wavereth is like a wave of the sea driven with the wind and tossed” (James 1:6).

“And the Lord turned the captivity of Job when he prayed for his friends: also the Lord gave Job twice as much as he had before” (Job 42:10).

 Job lost everything! His children, his livestock and his body was failing before his own eyes. He was only left with a wife that told him to curse God and die, and friends that provided no encouragement. But he did not lose faith in the one who could restore him. And God did just that. His family was restored, he was given more livestock than he previously owned and Job lived a long and prosperous life. Job came through his season victorious and pain free because when God restores you he will give you more than what you previously had plus return your time lost!

The amazing book that I used for my research on holistic healing, and helped to bring my own healing, Holistic Pain Relief, by Heather Tick, MD. 

Masking your Pain Pt 3

“Whether therefore ye eat or drink, or whatsoever ye do, do all to the glory of God” (1 Corinthians 10:31).

Picture this, you are cutting up onions in your kitchen while preparing dinner for your family. You accidently cut your finger. You don’t have to tell your body, “fix my finger”. Your body automatically sends the needed cells to the site of trauma, they stop the bleeding and start the healing process. And once enough little soldiers are at the site to provide healing your body tells your cells to stop sending more. Within a few days or weeks, depending on how bad the cut, it is healed. Our body has the ability to heal ALL sickness and pain within your body. So why are some of us still suffering? We have barriers in place stopping that healing. And guess who puts those barriers there???? WE DID!!!

Many times when our body experiences symptoms such as pain, or high blood pressure or breathing problems, western medicine is designed to give you medicine to alleviate the symptoms, but not fix the problem. Then they put a diagnosis on these problems (migraines, hypertension, asthma), when in actuality they are just your body calling out to you to let you know that you need to get back in balance.

The first line of breaking your holistic healing barriers is diet.

I will be honest, even though I am a nurse, I never understood how eating unhealthy can poison your body. This goes beyond just becoming obese and getting diabetes or high blood pressure. Each meal that we ingest changes our body’s chemistry. According to Heather Tick, MD, author of Holistic Pain Relief, our gut is the gateway between the outside and inside world of our body, and diet is more powerful in preventing disease than either drugs or medical care. Diet can nourish cells or leave them vulnerable to further damage.

For many of us when we think of pain we correlate it to inflammation within our bodies. The truth is our body needs a low level of inflammation at all times in order to function properly. When we take anti-inflammatory medications to relieve pain, we are also wiping out the good inflammation. In addition to that if you are eating unhealthy foods that cause inflammation, then all you are doing is confusing your body between inflammatory and noninflammatory states.

Foods that cause inflammation:

Sugar                                                     Refined flour                                                     Saturated fat

Vegetable oil                                         Dairy products                                                   Processed meat

Fried foods                                           Artificial sweeteners                                          Gluten

Excess alcohol

All the good stuff, I know right???? I thought the same think when I first started studying about holistic healing. But let’s get real for a second. Sugar is more addictive than cocaine. What do majority of Americans eat on a regular basis??? SUGAR! We are a people addicted to food. So next time you judge or question someone who is labeled an addict for what they put in their body for enjoyment, don’t forget about your own poisons. The only difference is that our poisons are cleared by the FDA.

Last week we got our minds in the right place to start healing, now it’s time to make physical changes to maintain our healing. I encourage you all to educate yourselves about eating unprocessed and unpasteurized foods. Last week, I bought some cheese that was a different brand from what we usually buy because I recently started shopping at a Farmer’s Market versus the typical grocery store. My daughter made eggs with the cheese, and it did not melt. I was hesitant about eating it, but she is 8 years old, I thought maybe it was the way she cooked it. Later in the week, we used the cheese again for cooking, and again it did not melt. I looked at the package and it clearly said pasteurized.  It got thrown away, if my cheese does not melt when being cooked it has no place in my body because then my body will not be able to break it down properly, and all those chemicals that were put into it to make it that way are now in my body!

For many of us, breaking our sugar addiction may seem difficult. It still is for me. One of the most effective ways I have found in changing my eating habits was to start with a fast. I fasted for one day and during my lunch break at work and any time I would feel tempted I would find a quiet place, pray and remind myself why I am doing this. Remind myself that I am tired of being in pain, and spending money on doctor’s visits and medicine, and tired of being a food addict. God should be your go-to, not food. After my fast I started shopping at a Farmer’s Market buying all fresh vegetables and meats. There are many “diets” that you can use as a starting point, but personally I do not work well with following diets and they are more easily broken than followed. So I just told myself I would only buy raw, natural foods and only eat limited carbs. Some diets that can work well when trying to make a lifestyle change include:

Mediterranean diet                              Alkaline diet                                                       Gluten free diet

The Specific Carb diet                        Nightshade free diet                                            Blood-Type diet

Elimination & 4 day diet                                

“For I know that my redeemer liveth, and that he shall stand at the latter day upon the earth: And though after my skin worms destroy this body, yet in my flesh shall I see God. Whom I shall see for myself, and mine eyes shall behold, and not another; though my reigns be consumed within me” (Job 19:25-27).

Remember my friends that change may not always be easy and may not feel good. Job suffered tremendously and still kept his faith that God would restore him. You can also make the changes needed in your life to receive holistic healing but you cannot look to God to do all of the work. Next week we will discuss exercises that promote holistic healing. Until then I encourage you to really look at your eating habits and start to make changes that will benefit you in the long run. For some people slowly taking away foods will be easier than just stopping cold turkey, but whatever your preference, is perfectly fine as long as you have an end goal. Holistic healing will only be possible if your diet is changed. You cannot put old oil in your car and expect for it to run well. The same goes for your body, you cannot keep ingesting poison and expect to be healthy.

References

Adams, M. How to Heal Yourself in 15 Days. http://www.manataka.org/page2037.html

Tick, H. Holistic Pain Relief.  

Masking your Pain Pt. 2

“Behold, happy is the man whom God correcteth: therefore despise not thou the chastening of the Almighty: for he maketh sore, and bindeth up: he woundeth, and his hands make whole. He shall deliver thee in six troubles: yea, in the seventh there shall no evil touch thee” (Job 5:17-19).

Dealing with chronic pain on a regular basis, whether physical pain due to an injury or emotional pain caused by depression, can be debilitating. In order to live freely in the absence of pain and have a good quality of life without having to take medicine everyday to control your symptoms, you must rewire your body. First change your mindset, and then change your daily habits. Holistic healing is possible, it will just take more work than taking pills prescribed by your doctor.

In order to begin the healing process, you must first find the cause of your ailment. Many of us, God has allowed for our pain to occur because he wants us to overcome it, so that it can be a testimony and lead to blessings for others. Job, described as, “perfect and upright, and one that feared God, and eschewed evil” (Job 1:1) was given his pain directly from Satan, but under the direction of God. This was because God wanted to show Satan that the pain that he could afflict was not great enough to break him. For some of us, this may be our trial, but are you letting your pain break you? Are you showing Satan right?

I dealt with chronic tension headaches starting in 2009 through 2016. When they first started my headaches were so bad that I lost my vision. I went to the hospital, they feared that it could be a brain tumor but all tests came back inconclusive. After that day came the pill popping, almost every day so that I could try and live a normal life. Even when I didn’t wake up with a headache I would take something for pain in fear of getting one. I was always exhausted because I would even have pain in my sleep. This past summer I went to a Neurologist, and I kid you not, this doctor spent 3 minutes on my assessment and then prescribed me a low dose antidepressant for my headaches. And because he was a specialist I had to pay SOOOO much for that 5 minute visit! But we won’t get into that because we are believing God for all of our healing so that we can start enjoying our money instead of giving it to doctors HALLELUJAH! But, I left that building feeling like not one of my questions were answered and like this was not the solution. But, I started the medicine, and I admit it worked. My headaches would still come intermittently but not as severe. As a side effect the medicine made me groggy and I would go half of my day without fully waking up, and this was just one of the many side effects. With taking antidepressants, this is not just a drug that can be stopped when you start to feel better, so would I be stuck taking this hormonal altering drug for the rest of my life? I knew that this was not the answer that I was looking for.

One night I was praying, and I asked God, “why have you given me this pain?”. He answered me right away and told me that my pain would help to educate others on how to deal with their pain. So I ask you to find out the cause of your pain. Some pain is self inflicted or accidental but no problem is too big for the God that we serve. God is telling me that there are some people battling depression because you are in unhealthy relationships. God is using that extra push to wake you up and to get you out. Any relationship that causes pain is not meant for you!

As you are praying regarding your healing, EXPECT CHANGE! The other day I took a nap and slept on my neck wrong. It was causing me discomfort so I decided to pray on it before the pain escalated. In the middle of my prayer a force pushed my neck forward and all discomfort was relieved! Set your faith! Find the cause of your pain so that you can pray over it and handle it. Disease can only stay in the body of the believer if you let it.

“Then said his wife unto him. Dost thou still retain thine integrity? Curse God, and die. But he said unto her, Thou speaketh as one of the foolish women speaketh. What? Shall we receive good at the hand of God and shall we not receive evil? In all this did not Job sin with his lips” (Job 2:9,10).

What is your perception of pain, and how do you react to its presence? Job first lost all of his livestock, then all of his children were killed, and then he received painful boils all over his body. The crazy part is, his wife told him to die. But Job’s perception of his pain gave him strength. Job knew that if he remained faithful the God would deliver him through his storm. Some people might have been dealing with pain for decades. You have to remember some storms last longer than others, but that is no reason to turn from God because your reward will be greater when you make it to the other side. When you allow yourself to be stressed your pain tolerance decreases and you turn off your body’s natural ability to heal itself. Don’t let yourself be stressed, this is just a scene in your life. There will be many more. Don’t give your pain more strength by perceiving this as a problem that is too big for God.

Now that we have our thinking cleared and minds set on the right track to healing, we will continue Part 3 next week to start learning how we can heal our physical bodies. Your everyday life plays the main role in how you feel.