Healing the Thyroid with Ayurveda

Natural Treatments for Hashimoto's, Hypothyroidism, and Hyperthyroidism

Marianne Teitelbaum

• Publisher: Healing Arts Press
• Year: 2019
• ISBN:
  9781620557839
• Topic: Médecine
• Subtopic: Maladies et allergies

A comprehensive guide to addressing the growing epidemic of thyroid disease from the perspective of the Ayurvedic tradition • Details the author's successful treatment protocols for Hashimoto's thyroiditis, hypothyroidism, and hyperthyroidism developed over more than 30 years of Ayurvedic practice • Explores the underlying causes of thyroid malfunction, the thyroid's connections to the liver and gall bladder, and the importance of early detection • Also includes treatments for common symptoms of thyroid disease, such as insomnia, depression, fatigue, and osteoporosis, as well as for weight loss and hair growth In this comprehensive guide for practitioners and those concerned with thyroid health, Marianne Teitelbaum, D.C., integrates the ancient medicine of Ayurveda with modern scientific findings to address the growing epidemic of thyroid disease. Revealing how the thyroid is the victim of many factors that conspire to create ill health--and how many cases of thyroid disease go undiagnosed--Teitelbaum focuses not only on treating thyroid problems and symptoms but also on diagnosing them at their earliest, most reversible stages. She outlines the basic principles of Ayurveda, including pulse diagnosis, a key tool for early detection, and explains the successful treatment protocols she has developed over more than 30 years of Ayurvedic practice. She details the underlying reasons for thyroid malfunction, such as inflammation, malnutrition, and toxins, and how the thyroid is connected with the health of the rest of body, including the liver and gall bladder. She explores the Ayurvedic treatment of thyroid-related conditions, such as Hashimoto's thyroiditis, hypothyroidism, and hyperthyroidism, offering guidance on the targeted use of herbs, specific dietary recommendations, proper detoxification, and Ayurvedic recipes. She also includes treatments and remedies for common symptoms of thyroid disease, including insomnia, depression, fatigue, and osteoporosis, as well as for luxurious hair growth and weight loss. Based on the treatment of thousands of patients, this book also shares success stories of thyroid healing and the scientific studies that support the author's Ayurvedic thyroid protocols. Offering an easy-to-follow yet comprehensive guide, Teitelbaum shows that optimum thyroid health as well as overall health are within everyone's reach.

1

What Is Ayurveda?

Nature itself is the best physician.

HIPPOCRATES

The first holistic health conference in America opened to great fanfare in 1975. As with so many innovations, it occurred in California. It brought together 150 of the greatest minds in the emerging field, sparking a spate of holistic health organizations. Here, finally, was a recognition of alternative medicine, an implicit challenge to the medical orthodoxy that had taken root in Western civilization.

Only problem? It was thousands of years late. On the other side of the world, in India, seers held their own gatherings as early as 3000 BCE, producing an elegant system of health care that emphasized prevention, aimed to address the underlying causes of disease, and offered supporting texts with precise protocols that were both prescient and relevant.

In those days, no one talked much about “holistic” medicine because there was no such thing. All medicine was inherently holistic, and none of it was considered “alternative”; it was just medicine.

Just think about it. Ayurveda predates Jesus and Buddha. It is the product of enlightened seers living in an agrarian society who intuited an advanced system of medicine. They described three hundred surgical procedures; created texts on psychiatry, obstetrics, and toxicology; and developed a seven-year training program for healers well before the modern medical school was conceived.

Remarkably, all of this sprang from their fertile minds thousands of years before the invention of the microscope or the adoption of blood work as a trusted diagnostic tool. The ancient rishis, according to historical accounts, cognized the system of Ayurveda through direct contact with nature while in deep meditation. It became an oral tradition passed down from generation to generation. Ayurveda is said to be knowledge based in truth, unchanging, timeless, and eternal—in contrast with modern medicine, which is based on the changing winds of empirical research. (Keep in mind that Ayurveda is not static either; it adapts to new information but hews to its core principles.)

The origins of Ayurveda are shrouded in mystery. No one knows for sure when the first Ayurvedic texts, called the shastras, were written, although most experts point to 1000 BCE. These foundational works include a number of books, such as the Charaka Samhita, the Sushruta Samhita, and the Bhagavata Purana. They present Ayurvedic concepts in sutras, “threads,” of knowledge.

The name Ayurveda itself gives us clues about the nature of the system. Veda means “science”—science that is built on siddhantas, fundamental unchanging principles. Veda refers to guided knowledge; it is not just a theory but a road map for how to derive practical benefits from the teachings.

What is ayu? Bhava Mishra, a sixteenth-century ancestor of my teacher, Dr. Rama Kant Mishra, compiled a text called the Bhava Prakasha. In it he wrote that ayu means “life”—specifically, what is good and bad for life in terms of diet, nature, behavior, or season.

The Charaka Samhita describes ayu in the sutra deha prana samyoge ayuh, “prana as the life force.” In other words, as the reception, flow, and use of prana is reduced in the body, in the cellular system, or in a specific organ or gland, that area becomes compromised, leading to increased inflammation and the gradual failure of the immune system. This is how disease takes root and progresses.

WHAT IS PRANA?

Since good health depends on the balanced flow of prana in the body, it is important to understand its definition. Prana can be found in the food we eat, the air we breathe, the water we drink, and the herbs we take. Prana is that vibration of nature that delivers intelligence to every cell in our bodies. At this deep cellular level, all parts of the body are in communication with each other, and the body at any point in time is performing highly intelligent activities: it is making hormones when it recognizes that they are too low; the cells are making ATP (adenosine triphosphate) for energy; the Krebs cycle is taking place; neurotransmitters are being made. How does the body instinctively know how to do all of this? The initial impulse to perform all these thousands of functions comes from this vibration of nature—provided that we don’t destroy it.

If we put chlorine in water, it will kill the prana; the water will be less “intelligent.” We can filter the water, but we cannot bring the prana back to life. That is why we do not recommend drinking tap water or filtered water. We also do not recommend drinking water that contains synthetic vitamins or is “electrolyte enhanced” to increase its pH. The water naturally coming from the earth in a pristine environment will automatically have an alkaline pH and nature’s life-giving vibration.

Likewise, processing food kills its prana. Processed foods have been stripped of their natural whole nature, leaving them both nutritionally and energetically deficient. Heating food in a microwave superimposes a man-made artificial vibration onto that food, disrupting the prana and rendering it lifeless. Freezing and canning also alter this life force. The ancients went so far as to observe that once cooked, food retained its pranic value for only four hours. Thus, eating leftovers was discouraged.

Ayurvedic herbs are picked and processed according to strict standards laid out in the shastras to keep their prana intact. If their prana is disrupted in any way due to mishandling, the herbs will not work as well, if at all. Taking that concept further, we can see why pharmaceuticals and nutraceuticals, which are made in labs and therefore devoid of the natural vibrational energy of prana, can stress the body, even if they also have positive effects. As these unintelligent chemicals infiltrate the body, they are immediately registered as toxins, causing the liver and kidneys to work overtime as they attempt to process them out of the body.

Notice how happy people are outdoors in nature, whether at the beach, hiking on a mountain path, or simply enjoying a quiet moment at a park. Here, the fresh air they breathe is filled with prana, and they are bolstering their own energy supply with every lungful. Conversely, notice how stressed or drained people look when they are confined in a man-made environment, whether at their desk in an office, walking along a busy city street, or even on the couch in front of the TV. Here, the pranic value of the air is corrupted not just by chemical pollution but also by EMFs (electromagnetic frequencies) from computers, cell phones, Wi-Fi networks, power lines, and so on. EMFs interfere with prana’s vibrational signature, creating havoc in the body because it is from this primordial vibration that all the cells of the body emerge. This is why radiation can cause cellular mutations and cancers.

Air, water, and foods that are devoid of prana can be considered “dumb” or “dead,” having lost their intelligent vibration. In the long run, if our food, air, and water lack prana, our own cells become dumb in their functions. This is how serious diseases such as autoimmune diseases and cancer take hold. What is cancer? It is cells that have lost their contact with nature—dumb cells that can’t remember what they are supposed to be doing and instead create abnormal growths and structures.

One of the basic tenets of this book is that we should all eat good food, drink pure water, get out in nature, and take only those supplements that have good prana to ensure excellent health.

The Three Components of Prana

Prana is composed of three elements: soma, agni, and marut.

The source of soma is the moon. It is the cooling, nurturing, stabilizing, and growth-giving component of pranic energy.

The source of agni is the sun. It is the fiery component of prana, and as such the source of transformation, responsible for transforming soma, the raw material of nature, into the various parts and systems of the body.

Marut is that energy coming out of the elements of space and air. It is the seed of all five elements (space, air, fire, water, and earth) and contains everything—all of the intelligence of creation. Marut circulates soma inside and outside the body. It is the intelligence-giving component of pranic energy, responsible for organizing the various systems of the body. Marut determines how soma is transformed into the various tissues, neurotransmitters, and hormones and how it interacts with all of these elements.

To give an analogy: when we cook rice, the flame is the agni, the rice and water are the soma, the thermostat is the modulation of the flame, and stirring and mixing of the rice into the water is the marut.

WHAT ARE THE THREE DOSHAS?

All of creation arises from a silent field of pure absolute being. It is unmanifest and unknowable, but it contains the seed within itself, the seed of everything. This seed is called swara, which transforms into the primordial sound (aum). The primordial sound is the origin from which all of creation manifests. It’s a sound vibration that creates matter. This sound vibration is called the aditattwa. The aditattwa manifests as the tritattwa (or the three primal energies, known as soma, agni, and marut), which then expresses itself as the panchamahabhutas, which are space, air, fire, water, and earth, known as the five elements. The vibration of marut becomes the more physical element of space and air, the vibration of agni becomes the more physical element of fire, and the vibration of soma becomes the more physical vibration of water and earth. Notice here that the creation of these elements goes from the most subtle, which is space, to the most solid element of earth. This is how all of creation sequentially unfolds and manifests itself.

To summarize, prana is the cosmic components of tritattwa, flowing together in our bodies and all of creation, manifesting physically as the three doshas—vata, pitta, and kapha—which govern all aspects of our body and mind. Thus, the three doshas are the physical manifestations of the vibrational raw material that is prana and demonstrate how our physical bodies connect to the vibration of cosmic intelligence.

Vata

Vata is the marut-predominant dosha, comprising the elements of space and air and relating to movement, change, and irregularity. It is considered rough, dry, cold, quick, light, and moving. It therefore controls all movement in the body and mind—movement or circulation of the blood, movement of thoughts through the mind, movement of food through the digestive tract, and so on.

Vata types are usually thin, having a hard time keeping weight on due to their all-pervasive restlessness. They are by nature lively, enthusiastic, and creative. Their hair is fine in nature, and they exhibit delicate features in general.

When imbalanced, vata can cause cold hands and feet. Vata types may feel anxious and scattered, endlessly talking and moving, making it difficult to stay focused. Because their nervous system cannot settle down, they may sleep lightly or experience insomnia. Vata is rough and dry, so they may also notice rough and dry hair, skin, and nails. It is very common for a vata type to tap their fingers, pull their hair, and develop all types of tics. Due to too much dryness, their joints tend to crack, and they might even develop a habit of continually popping their joints to relieve the buildup of air in the joint capsules. They may become forgetful as thoughts both come in and leave quickly. Vertigo, restless legs, constipation, and irregular appetite are other common symptoms they may experience throughout their lives.

Pitta

Pitta is the agni-predominant dosha, containing the fire and water elements and relating to metabolism, digestion, and enzymatic processes. It is considered hot, sharp, penetrating, light, liquid, sour, and oily. It is responsible for vision, hunger, the digestion and transformation of food, the regulation of heat in the body, and luster in the complexion.

Pitta types are generally medium in height, and they tend to have moles or freckles, fair skin, blond or red hair, and blue eyes. Their hair may go gray or white prematurely. Thinning of the hair and baldness is also common. Since pitta governs digestion, they usually have a strong metabolism, good digestion, and a healthy appetite. They tend to sweat excessively, and their body temperature may run slightly high, with warm hands and feet. Because of their tendency to overheat, they do not tolerate hot summer days or too much heat in the room.

When imbalanced, pitta can cause ulcers, acid reflux, and excessive heat in the system manifes...