Power Within

When I was a small child of 7 years old I went through a rather challenging ordeal medically. In March of 1995 I was diagnosed with a rare inflammation disease named after the doctor that discovered it in Japan named Dr Kawasaki. If you would like to read more about that, see my Kawasaki's disease notes post. Because of that ordeal I was left with a very damaged heart. I had 3 coronary aneurisms and we found out when I was 18 that my right coronary artery that is responsible for supplying the right half of my heart with oxygen is 80-90% blocked from scaring that was caused by the ordeal that I went through as a 7 year old.

Now that I have set the ground work, let me share with you from my small example how powerful the human bodies ability to adapt and heal on its own. Like I said when I was 18 we found out about how blocked my coronary arteries were. Other doctors were surprised that a person as young as me could have such damage to his heart and have no symptoms. I had taken care of myself for the most part but I was not by any means a picture of health. After we found that out we did some other tests to find out if there was any damage to the heart muscle. Incredibly they found that the heart had no muscle damage even though half of the blood supply had been cut off. Later we discovered that the left coronary circumflex artery (this normally just supplies the back of the heart) had grown around to the right side and is supplying the right side heart muscles that were supposed to be supplied by the right coronary artery that was damaged. This all happened on its own without any medical intervention. Also we found out that I have a larger lung capacity then other people my size. I also hypothesize that my height is also a result of my body adapting to the medical complications I had while I was a child, (my father and 2 brothers are 5'10"-11" and I am only 5'6" tall). My life has been just a small example of how powerful our bodies capability to heal on its own.

I propose that we all think of our bodies as more than just a machine full of chemicals. There is an intelligence at play here. Call it whatever you want, a spirit, innate intelligence, the soul, subconscious, whatever label you put on it, it has the ability to know better than we do what the needs of our body is. Another example to help illustrate  what I am trying to say is this, you have left the stove top on but it is not hot enough to be glowing. You place your hand on it and immediately pull it away. Who told you to pull it away? Did you even know it was hot before you pulled you hand away? Your body was able to respond quickly to minimize the damage. Also without even thinking about it your body has already began to heal the damage to the body. No one had to teach you body to do that. There are so many other examples of this intelligence in your body that I cannot write about them all.

I hope that this article has helped you to better appreciate the power within yourself to heal and adapt to your environment. I am not trying to say that we don't need medical intervention when necessary. I will be eternally grateful for the doctors that have helped me. I simply want to express the great awe that I have for our bodies inborn abilities to cope with our daily lives and function at 100%.

-Mike E