Healing Energies and Sickle Cell Disease

For the past two months I have been feeling more awake, alert, physically energetic, and overall better than I have in more than three years. I feel as though a fog has been lifted from my mind and a weight lifted off my body. I want to share with you what I’ve been doing differently, so please, keep an open mind.

Though modern medicine has kept me alive for 42 years, I do believe there is value in: acupuncture, acupressure, Eastern medicine, healing energy, and other alternative medicines. Meditation, for example, is a powerful tool in my life that allows me to manage my pain and reduce my stress. About two months ago, I read the follow books:·    

•  “Chakras: Awaken Your Internal Energy” by Veronica Baruwal
• “5-Minute Chi Boost – Pressure Points for Reviving Life Energy, Avoiding Pain and Healing Fast” by Sifu William Lee.

The first book talks about the seven energy points in your body called chakras. Among other things, the author details where these chakras are located and how to stimulate them through meditation. The second book is basically an eighty-page instruction manual on how to stimulate various pressure points on your body. The author describes how to slap and/or tap various pressure points, thus allowing your body’s energy (Chi) to flow properly. In both these practices, it’s believed that proper energy flow can have positive and profound affects on the mind and body.

After reading these books, I decided I had nothing to loose by trying it. So I began meditating for about fifteen minutes each morning in the manner suggested in “Chakras: Awaken Your Internal Energy.” After meditating, I took the necessary time to perform the acupressure routine described in “5-Minute Chi Boost.”

Following this routine for about two weeks, I woke up one morning feeling GREAT! After a couple days of feeling amazing, I began asking myself, “What am I doing differently?” Apparently I’m not too bright because it took me awhile to remember.

It has now been almost two months since I began the daily routine I described above. I do my best to not miss a day; and when I do skip a couple of days, I begin feeling poorly again. I have been, and continue to be, amazed at the monumental difference in how I’ve feeling by spending 15-20 minutes a day doing these simple practices. It is nice to feel like myself again. It’s nice to be energetic and have a clear mind.

I know some people will probably think what I’m experiencing is a “placebo affect” or the power of suggestion. If that’s the case, so be it. But I truly believe these simple exercises are what has made such a profound difference in how I feel.

My purpose in sharing this is to help other people open up to the possibility. If chakra meditation and acupressure stimulation has worked to improved my health, maybe it can work for you too. When you live with a chronic illness, I feel it's important to be open to other methods and remedies. After all, what harm is there is trying a new practice to see if it helps improve your health?

Meditation: Coping with Stress & Sickle Cell

When my means of transporting my wheelchair fell apart, I was under a serious amount of stress. For nearly three months I was consumed with thoughts as to how I was going to get out of the dilemma I was in. I was so stressed that it was beginning to impact my health, and I worried it was going to land me in the hospital; something I’ve avoided for almost three years now.

The anxiety I felt caused an odd tingling chill to run up and down my spine. My skin itself felt as though it was shivering. My whole body had a faint dull ache.

When I began feeling this way, I decided to start meditating. As can be read in “More on Meditation” and “Controlling Your Pain,” I use to meditate three times a day; always before taking pain medication. The past year or two, I’ve been hit and miss with that practice. But being as stressed as I was, I knew I needed to resume my meditation sessions to help calm myself down. And it worked.

Sometimes I used audio recordings of singing bowls. Other times I used my own singing bowls. Regardless of which I used, the benefits were immediate. While meditating, I often recited various phrases in my mind. Here are some examples:

   • “My mind is calm. My body is relaxed. I am totally at peace.”
   • “I am mentally calm. I am physically relaxed. I am totally at peace.”
   • “I am filled with light and laughter.”
   • I may imagine Jesus Christ is reaching out to me, touching me with his hand, and saying to me, “Your faith hath made thee whole.”

I also adopted the practice of ending my meditation sessions with a prayer. By combining prayer with meditation, I felt a greater level inner calm. At the close of each meditation session, the physical stress and mental anxiety I previously felt, had vanished. There is zero doubt in my mind that my meditation practices helped keep me out of the hospital during these past few stressful months.

All through my life meditation has been of huge importance to my physical, mental, and spiritual health. In regards to my chronic pain, my doctors marvel that I’ve been on the same pain medication regiment for many, many years. I haven’t had to increase my dosages or change prescriptions for some time now. I explain to them this is because I use a variety of techniques to mentally manage my pain along with my medications. Meditation is my first tool in managing my pain. Pain medication is the second.

Whether you use it for stress or for pain management, I hope you also learn to use the powerful tool that is meditation.

Coping with a Sickle Cell Pain Crisis

I thought I would talk more about pain crises again. On the facebook page Sickle Cell Warriors, I read two posts from two separate individuals who were/are having a severe pain crisis; the thunder, lightening, monsoon kind of pain crisis. One person asked what to do when your pain is 10 and the pain medication only drops it down to a 7.

Thankfully I don’t have the monsoon kind of pain crises too often. But when I do, they can last days or weeks. Usually I can control the pain myself and don’t have to go to the hospital. Morphine and methadone are the pain medications I use to control my back and hip pain. When I have a pain crisis, those prescriptions only dull the pain; quite often, they do little to nothing to help with a bad crisis and the only thing I can do is endure it. When I’m having a monsoon-level pain crisis and the pain medication stops providing any relief, sometimes the best thing for me to do is stop taking pain medication. Usually the pain is far less intense within twenty-four hours. Usually.

About two years ago, my hemoglobin dropped from eight to four. I’ve had so many pain blood transfusions that it’s become dangerous for me to have them. Blood transfusions are an absolute last resort with me. Instead, my doctor first tries to raise my hemoglobin with a prescription steroid called Prednisone. Though I had been given Prednisone before, my last experience soured me about ever trying it again.

It was suppose to help raise my red blood cell count, but the side affects were terrible. I was on edge, irritable, it kept me awake at night, and worst of all it caused horrific pain. On top of the pain crisis I was already having from a low hemoglobin count, the steroid caused my muscles to ache something fierce. The slightest amount of pressure from another person’s touch sent me into orbit. On a scale of one to ten, the pain I experienced for three months was a twelve. Like chick-flicks, the pain medication did nothing for me. It took all of my mental focus to cope with and manage the pain. By the end of the three months I was mentally exhausted.

The thing about Prednisone is, it takes two or more weeks for it to leave your system. Once my doctor told me to stop taking it, I still had to endure the pain it caused for another two or three weeks. All the pain was for nothing. Though it raised my blood count a little bit, I had to be transfused anyway two months later. Like I said, I had been given Prednisone in previous years, but it never caused the severe pain I experience the last time I took it. Needless to say, I have no desire to repeat that experience.

My purpose in sharing this with you isn’t just to ramble on mindlessly—which admittedly is a little problem of mine—but to show how important it is have a toolbox full of pain coping strategies. I’ve shared nearly all of mine in Sections 06) Controlling Your Pain and More on Meditation. Whether it’s: a monsoon-level pain crisis like when I was on Prednisone; a light mist-level pain crisis like I’ve had for the past month; or just my everyday back and hip pain, I use some form of meditation to manage my daily pain.

I was curious to know if other Sickle Cell patients use meditation to help manage their pain. Based on the response I received on the Sickle Cell Warriors facebook page, I don’t think many people do. In fact, several people scoffed at the idea of meditating while having a pain crisis.

Sometimes people have funny conceptions about what meditation is. You don’t have to shave your head, wear a robe, and kneel before a Buddha statue to meditate. Be it sitting in a classroom, riding in a car, watching TV, or sitting in a chair in a quiet room, there are countless techniques that can be used in just about any situation.

The doctors who prescribe my pain medications marvel that I have been on the same dosage for nearly ten years. Most people build a tolerance up to their dosage and constantly have to have it increased. I fight against that and use meditation to help prevent that from happening. Not to toot my own horn or anything—toot toot--but I feel I’ve been very successful in doing that.

If meditation isn’t in your toolbox of pain coping strategies, I would strongly encourage you to explore that option. There are many benefits to mediation that go beyond pain control.

Meditation Beads & Sickle Cell Pain Management

I purchased a strand of 108 meditation beads last summer. As you can see from the picture below, they look like a bead necklace. The bead that is raised up and attached to the tassel is a kind of marker bead. It lets you know where your rotation of the beads begins and ends. It’s not easy to see in the picture, but there is typically a tiny knot tied in between each bead. The knots are there to help make moving from one bead to the next a little bit easier.

One thing I did learn and remember in my research about how to use meditation beads is, the way you hold them is important. Drape the beads over your middle finger, and loosely hold the strand between your middle and index fingers where the first joints are below your fingernails. From what I read, there are pressure points that help the body relax.

Beginning with the first bead after the “lead bead,” use your thumb to move from one bead to the next each time you exhale. Breathe in, and as you breathe out, use your thumb to rotate one bead toward your body. Repeat that process. Move one bead at a time with each exhale, until you complete a full circle, and begin again if necessary.

For me, using meditation beads has been of great use. This is what it does for me: 1) it distracts my focus off my pain and onto the beads; 2) when I’m in pain, it allows me to control my breathing more easily; 3) obviously, it relaxes me; and 4) it helps to clear my mind and enter a meditative state. I use this technique often. As a result, my brain has learned to associate the process of holding the beads and controlling my breathing with pain relief; as a result, it doesn’t take too long before my pain is reduced.

I take my meditation beads with me just about everywhere I go. I often wear them around my neck under my shirt so they are handy when I need them. It’s been a WOUNDERFUL tool.

You might wonder why I have so many different meditation techniques [you can click here to see my various other methods of meditation I listed in "Controlling Your Pain"]. Well, one can never have too many tools. There are days when one method works better than another. It’s also nice to have variety. When you are skilled in different pain relief methods, it gives you the power to manage your pain in just about any situation. If I don’t have my beads or singing bowl with me, I have a number of other techniques I can use that don’t require any kind of physical object.

For anybody who has chronic pain, I highly encourage you explore as many meditation methods as you can. Some will work for you better than others. Also, the more techniques you learn, the more power you have to control your pain.

About Meditation Beads

Meditation Beads, often called Mala Beads, are something that I very recently added to my meditation toolbox. It might sound funny, but meditation beads first caught my attention while watching the 2012 Summer Olympics. The cameraman zoomed in on a coach of the Chinese women’s gymnastics team. The commentators noted he was holding and using meditation beads in between the routines of his gymnasts to help him stay calm. I thought it was interesting and did some research.

The history of meditation beads dates back thousands of years and is used in just about every culture. Some religions use prayer beads, much like the Catholic rosary. Other faiths and cultures use them for meditation. The number of beads on a strand is both significant and varies from culture to culture and faith to faith. Often, there is a whole belief system behind how many beads must be on a strand. Frequently, the number of beads must total 108, or be in numbers that can be equally divided into 108, like nine, twelve or twenty-seven.

Many believe that the type of beads you use impacts the spiritual energy of your body. For example, beads made from the wood of a certain tree has a different effect than beads made from pearls or jade. In no way am I knowledgeable enough to educate anybody about the many beliefs behind prayer and meditation beads.

For me, how to use the beads in my personal meditation is far more important to than all the details of: their history; the meaning of the number of beads used; what kind of beads to use; and the possible benefits of the material used in your choice of beads. Don’t get me wrong, I totally respect the importance those things have to other people and how it applies to their beliefs. For my purpose, however, I just wanted to learn to use them to help manage my pain.

Singing Bowls & Sickle Cell Pain Management

The first singing bowl I bought was made only of one metal and was machine made. About a year later I purchased another bowl that was made from seven-metals, as Tibetan Singing bowls should be. And let me tell you, the difference in sound quality between the two is incredible! When struck, the seven-metal bowl chimes much longer than the other bowl and has an amazing range of tones.

The note at which my seven-metal bowl is tuned to is D, which targets the “Sacral Chakra,” the stomach area. I was amazed when I first began using the seven-metal bowl; it felt as though the tones from the bowl truly targeted the stomach area of my body. I could feel the harmonics of the bowl resonate in that area of my body more powerfully than any other part. It’s really interesting.

When I use my singing bowl in my meditation, and I don’t always use it, I may choose to do one of the following. I will sit in the chair I use for meditation, relax my body and close my eyes. I hold the bowl in one hand. (The hand must be flat; if you put your fingers on the side of the bowl, your fingers will absorb the vibrations and the bowl won’t sing.) Holding the mallet (also called striker) in the other hand, I move the striker around the bowl’s rim.

People often ask me, “Doesn’t the act of moving your hand around the rim of the bowl make it harder to relax and meditate?” In truth, I’ve found that it allows me to clear my mind and enter a meditative state quicker and more easily. Often I will make the bowl sing for only a few minutes, long enough to enter the desired state of mind, and then stop using it.

The second way I use the bowl in my meditation is, rather than making it sing, I use the mallet to strike the bowl. When struck, the “chime” is first loud and slowly fades. I may think of the fading chime as my cluttered thoughts becoming more and more quiet, or as my pain becoming less and less intense.

If I’m making the bowl “sing” by rubbing it with the mallet, I may imagine the sounds of the bowl as: a healing energy that fills my body; drives out my pain; or instructs my body to produce healthy red blood cells. Sometimes I imagine a bright white light flowing out of the bowl, into my body, filling my room, my home, and spreading out across the world. I’m sure there are many other ways to use a singing bowl in meditation that I haven’t learned yet.

Here is a third way I sometimes use the bowl in meditation. I will lay on my bed, place the bowl upon my stomach or chest and strike it with the mallet. This allows my body to feel the bowl’s vibration much more powerfully. Every twenty seconds or so, I’ll strike it again, each time trying to feel the vibrations from head to toe. The only problem with this method is that it’s very relaxing and easy to fall asleep. When I’m in a sitting position, I never fall asleep while meditating.

For me, the use of Tibetan Singing Bowls has helped to make my meditation more enjoyable.

This was the first bowl I purchased. It was machine made.

This is the second bowl I bought. It is a seven-metal bowl that was hand hammered.

You can see that the seven-metal bowl is larger than the other. The tone is also deeper.

The mallet on the left came with the seven-metal bowl. Like the middle mallet, it has leather wrapped around it. The leather helps to bring out some of the lower tones when making it sing. The striker on the right has felt wrapped around it. When used to "strike" the bowl, it brings out the deeper tones. The felt is thick and is only used for striking the bowl; it's impossible to make it sing with a felt striker.

About Tibetan Singing Bowls

In Section 6 "Controling Your Pain," I spoke about the various methods I use to help manage my pain. The use of Tibetan Singing Bowls was one method I failed to mention. Not long after I began making meditation a regular part of my pain management, I purchased, and began to frequently use, a singing bowl. Singing bowls are an ancient method used by, shocker, Tibetan monks and dates back thousands of years.

Authentic singing bowels are made from seven different metals. Each metal represents a planet in our solar system and is connected to each of the seven “chakras.” In the Tibetan belief system, the human body has seven vital energy points known as chakras. Each are located at various parts of the body starting from the top of the head to the base of the pelvis. Each chakra is represented by its own color and musical note. The system of how singing bowls relates to chakras is pretty deep, and I understand only a fraction of it. Personally, I don't delve too deep into that aspect of using these bowls.

Singing bowls from Tibet are hand hammered the same way they have been for thousands of years. Each bowl has its own sound and musical note. Typically, a set of seven bowls is used in meditation so the seven chakras are affected by the sounds.

There are two ways to make a bowl sing. The first is to strike it with a wooden mallet that is often padded, though not always. A large and high quality bowl can chime for several minutes after it’s been struck. The second method is to go around the rim or outside of the bowl with a wooden mallet that often has leather wrapped around it. If you’ve ever made a crystal class hum by rubbing your finger around the rim of it, the idea is the same.

Seven-metal singing bowls tend to be a bit expensive. I paid nearly $80 for the one I have. The copper bowl I first purchased was around $45. Now that I’ve experienced the difference between the two bowls, I will only buy seven-metal bowls in the future. Some day I hope to have a full collection of seven bowls, one for each chakra. I’m curious to see how bowls that target the various chakras will feel.

Obviously the cost of a bowl will largely depend on its age and size. You can buy very old singing bowls, but of course they will be more expensive. The size of singing bowls can range in diameter from a few inches to over eighteen inches. Some have very deep tones while others are high. I personally favor the bowls that have a deeper sound to them.