Autoimmune Disease

Your body's regulation system, and 

Why relaxation is the key to good health.  

As I am sure you know, our bodies are miraculous in the way they are created, develop, heal, grow, and reproduce.  Each cell contains the blueprint for your entire body, your DNA.  If you get a chance, and are interested, absolutely amazing images of the process of human development from conception on the cellular level is contained in the 1982 NOVA documentary called "The Miracle of Life" by Lennart Nilsson.

[How about the way we MOVE! Consciously, our bodies attempt to obey our every command (that's the part that blows my mind completely). Unconsciously - well those moves are even more astonishing to me ... like the way you contract, scream, and then either fight or fly when you're startled/scared, or the way you are attracted and physically move toward another, or the way you are repelled and physically move away from another.]

As we interact with our environment, our health is either distorted or is enhanced.

Each of us, though unique, have so much common biological and anatomical function.  All of it grows into existence from a perfect, unique-to-us*, design.  As we interact with our environment, our health is either distorted or is enhanced.  We are are all ultimately driven to attempt to achieve the perfection of our design.  (Spoiler alert: We all die trying).  But! along the way, each of us has many opportunities for optimal health and to achieve our encoded destinies - to live, love, express our uniqueness, reproduce, and love some more, for as long as we live.

* perfect and unique.  So, no two lives are the same.  There is no one standard of perfection. Each of us is perfectly unique, just like everybody else... I'm sure you're familiar with "all men are created equal..."  which does not mean we're all the same by any stretch, only that we are all equally valuable.

Anyway - all this to say, when I see you, I see the perfect you.  I see how your life experience has distorted your physical body, your "myofascia", ("myo" means muscle, "fascia" means connective tissue), your health, and I see how, with some (maybe a lot of!) support and some (maybe a lot of!) release of tension in your myofascial body, you can return to a more perfect version of yourself.  This process involves learning how to relax.  Relaxation is where the healing begins.  

The mind and the brain - two different things entirely.

I don't know if you noticed, but my whole rambling discussion here describes the body as separate from "us".  For the purposes of learning about relaxation, I will continue to differentiate between the "brain" and the "body mind".  So the myofascial body, your "body mind", can (and does) operate optimally completely seperately from the frontal cortex, the "thinking part" of the brain.  Abosolutely ZERO input is required from the executive functions of the brain for the body to function optimally.  So.  The FIRST thing you have to do in order to learn to relax is to figure out how to distract or amuse or entertain your brain.  (That's why my profession is called "body work" - what the brain's ultimate purpose is is way beyond the scope of this discussion.)

** Relaxation is highly discouraged by our culture, our world - but you know who runs the world and he does NOT want you to relax, he wants your soul - he wants your to be his slave... but I digress. 

Relaxation, where was I... oh yes, relaxation.  

a holistic, whole-systems approach 

• disease - dis ease or ill at ease

• immune system - Key Components:

  • White Blood Cells (Leukocytes): The "soldiers" of the immune system that circulate through the blood and lymph.

  • Lymphatic System: A network of vessels, lymph nodes, the spleen, and the thymus that filters bodily fluid, stores immune cells, and mounts responses to infections.

  • Bone Marrow: The spongy tissue inside your bones where all blood cells originate

• syndrome - a group of symptoms that has no known cause.  A consistent, recognizable collection of signs and symptoms that tend to cluster together.

• -itis: it's red, inflammed, and it hurts

• -osis:  generally indicates an abnormal condition, disease state, pathological process, or an increase in a physiological element (such as a cell count). It differentiates from -itis, which specifically denotes inflammation

• -emia:  means a blood condition or the presence of a substance in the blood. Derived from the Greek word haima (meaning "blood"), it is used to describe various systemic disorders, infections, or chemical imbalances related to the circulatory system.

  • Anemia: A condition characterized by a deficiency of red blood cells or hemoglobin, leading to reduced oxygen transport and fatigue.

  • Bacteremia: The presence of bacteria in the bloodstream.

  • Hypoglycemia: An abnormally low level of glucose (sugar) in the blood.

  • Leukemia: A type of cancer of the blood and bone marrow, marked by an abnormal increase in white blood cells.

• -ia:  Words ending in -ia typically denote conditions

  • Poikilothermia:  a medical condition in which the body loses its ability to internally regulate its core temperature, causing the body's temperature to fluctuate with the surrounding environment. 

• -asia (along with related forms like -asis and -osis):  a condition, state, or process. It usually denotes an abnormal, unhealthy, or diseased state of a specific body part or system.  Common examples include:

• Ectasia: The dilation, stretching, or expansion of a hollow organ or vessel (e.g., bronchiectasis, the abnormal widening of the airways).

• Phasia: A root/suffix combination relating to speaking or speech conditions (e.g., aphasia, the loss of ability to understand or express speech).

Chronic - long term

accute - right now

Here is a list from the Autoimmune Disease Organization:  Alphabetical List with Symptoms 

• Achalasia

• Addison’s disease

• Adult Still’s disease

• Agammaglobulinemia

• Alopecia areata

• Amyloidosis

• Ankylosing spondylitis

• Anti-GBM/Anti-TBM nephritis

• Antiphospholipid syndrome

• Autoimmune angioedema

• Autoimmune dysautonomia

• Autoimmune encephalitis

• Autoimmune hepatitis

• Autoimmune inner ear disease (AIED)

• Autoimmune myocarditis

• Autoimmune oophoritis

• Autoimmune orchitis

• Autoimmune pancreatitis

• Autoimmune retinopathy

• Autoimmune urticaria

• Axonal & neuronal neuropathy (AMAN)

• Baló disease

• Behcet’s disease

• Benign mucosal pemphigoid (Mucous membrane pemphigoid)

• Bullous pemphigoid

• Castleman disease (CD)

• Celiac disease

• Chagas disease

• Chronic inflammatory demyelinating polyneuropathy (CIDP)

• Chronic recurrent multifocal osteomyelitis (CRMO)

• Churg-Strauss syndrome (CSS) or Eosinophilic granulomatosis (EGPA)

• Cicatricial pemphigoid

• Cogan’s syndrome

• Cold agglutinin disease

• Complex regional pain syndrome (formerly known as reflex sympathetic dystrophy)

• Congenital heart block

• Coxsackie myocarditis

• CREST syndrome

• Crohn’s disease

• Dermatitis herpetiformis

• Dermatomyositis

• Devic’s disease (neuromyelitis optica)

• Discoid lupus

• Dressler’s syndrome

• Endometriosis

• Eosinophilic esophagitis (EoE)

• Eosinophilic fasciitis

• Erythema nodosum

• Essential mixed cryoglobulinemia

• Evans syndrome

• Fibromyalgia

• Fibrosing alveolitis

• Giant cell arteritis (temporal arteritis)

• Giant cell myocarditis

• Glomerulonephritis

• Goodpasture’s syndrome

• Granulomatosis with polyangiitis

• Graves’ disease

• Guillain-Barre syndrome

• Hashimoto’s thyroiditis

• Hemolytic anemia

• Henoch-Schonlein purpura (HSP)

• Herpes gestationis or pemphigoid gestationis (PG)

• Hidradenitis suppurativa (HS) (Acne inversa)

• IgA nephropathy

• IgG4-related sclerosing disease

• Immune thrombocytopenic purpura (ITP)

• Inclusion body myositis (IBM)

• Interstitial cystitis (IC)

• Juvenile arthritis

• Juvenile diabetes (Type 1 diabetes)

• Juvenile myositis (JM)

• Kawasaki disease

• Lambert-Eaton syndrome

• Lichen planus

• Lichen sclerosus

• Ligneous conjunctivitis

• Linear IgA disease (LAD)

• Lupus ( a chronic autoimmune disease )

• Lyme disease chronic

• Meniere’s disease

• Microscopic polyangiitis (MPA)

• Mixed connective tissue disease (MCTD)

• Mucha-Habermann disease

• Multifocal motor neuropathy (MMN) or MMNCB

• Multiple sclerosis

• Myasthenia gravis

• Myelin oligodendrocyte glycoprotein antibody disorder

• Myositis

• Narcolepsy

• Neonatal lupus

• Neuromyelitis optica / devic disease

• Neutropenia

• Ocular cicatricial pemphigoid

• Optic neuritis

• Palindromic rheumatism (PR)

• PANDAS (Pediatric autoimmune neuropsychiatric disorders associated with streptococcus infections)

• Paraneoplastic cerebellar degeneration (PCD)

• Paroxysmal nocturnal hemoglobinuria (PNH)

• Pars planitis (peripheral uveitis)

• Parsonage-Turner syndrome

• Pemphigus

• Peripheral neuropathy

• Perivenous encephalomyelitis

• Pernicious anemia (PA)

• POEMS syndrome

• Polyarteritis nodosa

• Polyglandular syndromes type I, II, III

• Polymyalgia rheumatica

• Polymyositis

• Postmyocardial infarction syndrome

• Postpericardiotomy syndrome

• Primary biliary cholangitis

• Primary sclerosing cholangitis

• Progesterone dermatitis

• Progressive hemifacial atrophy (PHA) Parry Romberg syndrome

• Psoriasis

• Psoriatic arthritis

• Pure red cell aplasia (PRCA)

• Pyoderma gangrenosum

• Raynaud’s phenomenon

• Reactive arthritis

• Relapsing polychondritis

• Restless legs syndrome (RLS)

• Retroperitoneal fibrosis

• Rheumatic fever

• Rheumatoid arthritis

• Sarcoidosis

• Schmidt syndrome or Autoimmune polyendocrine syndrome type II

• Scleritis

• Scleroderma

• Sjögren’s Disease

• Stiff person syndrome (SPS)

• Susac’s syndrome

• Sympathetic ophthalmia (SO)

• Takayasu’s arteritis

• Temporal arteritis/giant cell arteritis

• Thrombocytopenic purpura (TTP)

• Thrombotic thrombocytopenic purpura (Ttp)

• Thyroid eye disease (Ted)

• Tolosa-Hunt syndrome (THS)

• Transverse myelitis

• Type 1 diabetes

• Ulcerative colitis (UC)

• Undifferentiated connective tissue disease (UCTD)

• Uveitis

• Vasculitis

• Vitiligo

• Vogt-Koyanagi-Harada disease

• Warm autoimmune hemolytic anemia