MIND-BODY HYPERTENSION

[Guest guest]

MIND-BODY HYPERTENSION JoAnn Guest Feb 03, 2005 19:17 PST

 

By Annemarie Colbin, CHES

 

http://www.foodandhealing.com/article-hypertension.htm

 

 

High blood pressure is considered a “silent epidemic,” as lots of people

have it but don’t know it. The usual treatment is drugs, and there are

some dietary suggestions as well, especially cutting down on salt and

fat as promoted by Dean Ornish and Nathan Pritikin. Stress reduction is

highly recommended as well. However, there seems to be more to the issue

than salt and stress.

 

Recently I encountered the work of Samuel J. Mann, M.D., an associate

professor of clinical medicine at the Hypertension Center of The New

York Presbyterian Hospital in New York City. You would hardly think that

a revolutionary idea would come out of such a well-established medical

institution, but Dr Mann’s work is certainly what I would consider

ground-breaking. It also deserves attention and discussion.

 

As a hypertension specialist, Dr Mann has seen thousands of people with

all varieties of high blood pressure. Eventually he began to notice a

pattern that did not accord with the common view that stress is linked

to this condition. “Even patients with severe hypertension did not seem

more emotionally distressed than others,” he writes in his book Healing

Hypertension: A revolutionary new approach (John Wiley & Sons, NY:

1999).

 

“If anything, they seemed less distressed. Their high blood pressure

appeared to be more related to what they did not seem to be feeling than

to what they were feeling.”

 

He began to see in his patients that old, un-healed, repressed trauma

seemed to be a major culprit in the problem.

 

These are the main concepts covered by Dr Mann in his book, and they

warrant serious attention.

 

1. Blood pressure fluctuates, and there has been extensive over

diagnosis and unnecessary treatment of millions of people.

 

2. Anger or stress can elevate blood pressure temporarily, but do not

actually cause hypertension.

 

3. Here is the kicker: “it is our hidden emotions, the emotions we do

not feel, that lead to hypertension and many other unexplained physical

disorders.”

 

4. To deal with hypertension at its core, it is necessary to bring those

hidden emotions to the light, to consciousness, and to deal with them.

 

5. For those who are under the care of a physician for hypertension,

incorporating this new information can help the physician select a more

appropriate drug, if required, to match it to the cause of the

condition.

 

While for many people there are contributing factors to hypertension

such as genetics, obesity, and salt consumption, for countless others it

may be driven mainly by repressed feelings due to traumatic experiences.

 

 

It generally is not easy to deal with these, and the process can be

painful, but it may be worth it. Dr Mann points out that for those who

do not want to deal with their hidden emotions, standard medical

treatment will help control the condition.

 

I can testify to the validity of this approach. In the summer of 2000, I

read about Dr Mann in a little free newspaper that covers my New York

neighborhood. At the time this seemed a surprising syncronicity, as I

had suddenly found myself grappling with some episodes of extremely high

blood pressure, as high as 220/120. I was unable to sleep at night, or

at most slept 2-3 hours, a completely new development for me; I also had

trouble concentrating.

Although I am very resistant to taking pharmacological drugs, I did

consult a physician and took some anyway. I also went to my usual

alternative medicine practitioners, such as my chiropractor, homeopath,

and acupuncturist, which helped a little, but I knew it wasn’t enough.

 

After reading the article, I bought the book and read that. Then went to

see Dr Mann at The Presbyterian Hospital, and with his encouragement

started looking at what kind of hidden emotions I could be harboring.

 

It didn’t take long to figure that the place to look would be in my

repressed, or perhaps pre-verbal, memories of the three years I spent

during World War II in Budapest, when I was two to five years old. I was

there with my mother (my father was somewhere away at the front), and we

spent many nights in cellars and basements with 30-40 strangers, hiding

from the bombs and grenades. In terms of emotions, I knew there was

something there, but I had no memory of it.

 

One day in August, after a weekend of sleeping one night out of three, I

found myself again with a 200/100 pressure, and I went for a walk in the

park, barefoot in the grass, which I had taken to do as a de-stressor.

Thinking about the war years, and also about how I felt the sleepless

night before, I realized that my night wakefulness was quiet and

watchful. I did not think, worry, toss, or turn. I was just on high

alert.

 

Then remembered my mother telling me about one time when we were staying

in some cellar/basement, and she was summoned upstairs by the occupying

soldiers for a party, together with another young woman there. Thus, she

had to leave me alone in the dark cellar with all the strangers, none of

whom cared about me. I suddenly got in touch with a profound terror --

that which a 3 or 4-year old could feel -- the fear that my mother might

not come back. I realized now that I knew then that if she didn’t return

I was dead - as simple as that. I had no home, no family, no friends

around, nothing - it was just she and I and without her, that would be

the end of me.

 

I think I must have stayed awake all that night waiting for my mother,

and now, in my sleepless nights, I was reliving it. I lay in the grass

and cried, feeling and releasing that old terror.

 

After a while of shaking and crying, I got up and went home. Then I

checked my blood pressure: it had gone down to 137/82. In one hour! I

knew I was on the right track.

Since then, it still has gone up and down, and I had to do quite a lot

more spiritual work, but at the time of this writing, four months later,

my blood pressure seems to be keeping itself normal with no medication.

It’s been a harrowing four months, and I’m not finished yet, but I am

certainly on the path to cleaning out that old emotional baggage, thanks

to Dr Mann’s revolutionary insights.

 

Food, of course, is still a major healing tool for me. I found that

eating beans daily helped a lot as well. So here is a nice recipe for

Black Bean Soup.

 

 

---

 

Black Bean Soup

 

1 tablespoon extra virgin olive oil

1 medium onion, diced small (about 2 cups)

1 small carrots, diced (about 1 cup)

2 celery ribs, diced small (about 1 cup)

1 ripe tomato, peeled and seeded, chopped

1 teaspoon ground cumin

1 teaspoon turmeric

4 cups vegetable or chicken stock or water

1 cup dry black beans, soaked 8 hours in 4 cups water, drained

1 tablespoon agar flakes (for extra minerals)

1 teaspoon sea salt

4 teaspoons fresh chopped cilantro

 

1. Saute the onion, carrot, celery, and tomato in the oil for about one

minute each before adding the next one. Add the cumin and turmeric, mix

well, and saute another 30-40 seconds.

 

2. Add the stock, the beans, and the agar, bring to a boil, and simmer,

covered, for about 1 hour. Stir every 15 minutes or so. Or pressure cook

for 40 minutes. When the beans are soft, add the salt, and continue

cooking for another 15 minutes.

 

3. Serve hot, with a teaspoon of fresh cilantro per serving. Makes about

4 servings.

 

© 2003 by Annemarie Colbin

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