Health detective

What is wrong with me? So often, people come in and say, "I have this symptom. What's wrong? I also have this symptom and this and this - what's wrong?" Typically, they've seen several doctors, or one or two doctors several times, insisting something is wrong, but the doctor says, "You're fine." The tests are negative, therefore, "Nothing is wrong with you." But you know there is. These are symptoms you don't usually have, or have had for a long time, but didn't at some point in your life. It isn't "normal." What is one to do?

Many people decide to become their own health detective, and turn to the Internet to do research to try to figure out what is wrong. But that can be confusing, especially if you are not in the medical field.

Understanding the body and its symptoms as simply body messages gives us a clue. Every symptom has a meaning, no matter how seemingly insignificant it might be. The body doesn't just up and say one day, "Hey! I have nothing else to do today, I think I'll have a little fun and raise his blood pressure!" Or, "I need to mess things up a little here. Why don't I stop tolerating gluten and make her have to work harder to eat right!"

Many times, the body tells us in several different ways what is wrong. While we do look at symptom groupings to help us identify a disease, we don't always look at the underlying mechanism of what caused it to go wrong in the first place. There are a whole set of other similarities that oftentimes get overlooked.

For example, there is a connection, from a standpoint of causative factor, between gall stones, kidney stones, cataracts, bone spurs and arthritis. Conventional medicine would handle those as completely separate diseases, with entirely different medicines or protocols. Yet they all have something in common - calcium metabolism issues, combined with a weakness or damage in the affected area. Why?

The most important question we can be asking is, why? That's where becoming a sleuth comes in. We have to act like an investigator and look at the whole picture, the whole person. The small details are as important as the more obvious ones. What is the body trying to tell us?

For example, if your cholesterol went up, why? Cholesterol is used for nearly 200 different functions in the body. If it's elevated, which one of those functions is suffering, and what is the issue the body is trying to remedy? Cholesterol isn't so much the bad guy - it's the other problem it's trying to fix.

The body is amazingly intelligent. When we cut ourselves, we don't have to tell it how to heal. It does it without our interference, and does a better job than we could ever do. We just have to learn to listen to it better, and know where to turn to, to help it out.

Holly Carling is a Doctor of Oriental Medicine, Licensed Acupuncturist, Doctor of Naturopathy, Clinical Nutritionist and Master Herbologist with more than 32 years of experience. She is currently accepting new patients and offers natural health-care services and whole food nutritional supplements in her Coeur d'Alene clinic. Visit Carling's website at www.vitalhealthandfitness.com to learn more about Carling, view a list of upcoming health classes and read other informative articles. She can be reached at (208) 765-1994 and would be happy to answer any questions regarding this topic.