Therapy for Mind, Body, Energy and Spirit

For more information on Mindwork, see here.

I like models that shed some light on who we are as human beings and help to explain what we do and why. At the back of my well-thumbed and annotated book Integral Psychology by Ken Wilber there is a collection of charts that compare levels or stages of human development as hypothesized by a variety of psychological and spiritual leaders. It is as fine a summary as I know, collected into a single resource. 

What isn’t there, however, is a model which clarifies the relationship between mind, body, energy and spirit, and how/why a particular “therapy” applies better in one situation than another when dis-ease arises. (Dis, of course, is a Latin prefix meaning “apart from” or “against”, and ease means comfortable. Thus dis-ease is against or apart from comfort.)

I recently read Idris Lahore’s book The Three Secrets of Reiki Tao Te Qi, and there I discovered a succinct and insightful clarification of this issue that seems to me simple and very helpful. If you think of each of us as made up of several “layers” or “levels” of different densities, beginning with solid and ending as very ethereal, and the appropriate “treatment” for “dis-ease” at each of these layers, you have something like this:

At the densest layer, is the body itself: structural, physical, cellular. When there is injury or dis-ease that originates at this level, the most appropriate treatment is biomedical, biochemical, and/or physical therapy. In short, if you break your leg on the ski slopes, see your doctor.

Emotional dis-ease exists as a less dense layer of self without physical presence (you can’t see it, or weigh it) but often there are strong physical symptoms. For example, think about how you would feel before speaking to a large group of strangers, or standing on a high bridge before launching into a bungee jump. For most people, just the thought can bring up the sensation of butterflies in the stomach and a shortness of breath. For most of us, these are unusual events and not worth “treatment,” but for those prone to emotional trauma on a regular basis (say, someone with arachnophobia—fear of spiders, or someone who suffers from chronic anxiety or depression), treatment may be appropriate.

Intellectual or cognitive dis-ease, caused by disruptive or disturbing thoughts, habits, or dreams is, in a way, less “solid” than emotional dis-ease. Physical symptoms are likely to be less clear-cut than those caused by emotional dis-ease, and the “problem” may not even be regarded by a person as a dis-ease, or even a problem. Yet someone suffering from an obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) who can’t stop checking the door ten times to be sure it is locked, or someone who cannot stop thinking about or dreaming about some event in the past is not at ease. For both emotional and cognitive dis-ease, some form of psychotherapy is the most appropriate therapy or treatment.

Energetic dis-ease is caused by some disruption or distortion in the body’s energetic centres or energetic pathways. Mainstream Western allopathic medicine tends to dismiss the body’s energy system as not worthy of consideration and treatment, but Eastern tradition takes this body essence very seriously. Energy imbalances sometimes manifest in the body as headaches or backaches or tiredness or other chronic manifestations that have no obviously physical cause. Energetic health and treatment modalities such as yoga, massage, qi gong, Reiki, and acupuncture can help the body’s energy centres and pathways remain strong and clear when practiced regularly.

Lahore calls the next layer “relational systemic” and suggests dis-ease at this level is generated by one’s relationship with family members, social groups, work colleagues, or with the ancestors—one’s place within a system. The concept that one’s social relationships can contribute to psychological dis-ease is well accepted by psychologists and counsellors, and is also well understood in many cultures where one’s role and acceptance or rejection by others is acknowledged to have significant implications. In addition, from our parents and family we learn our value systems and many patterns of thought and behaviour that impact on our life choices. As with cognitive and emotional dis-ease, psychotherapy and family constellation work are useful to resolve issues here.

The final and most ethereal layer in Lahore’s model is that of spirit or spiritual essence. Dis-ease here—rarely identified by an outsider, but rather something felt from the inside—can be addressed with a wide variety of spiritual practices that may include yoga, meditation, shamanic journeying, travel, writing or journaling or other creative practice in art or music, and religious or solitary retreats.

Lahore points out that the most effective therapy occurs at the primary source of the dis-ease, which is almost always the most subtle layer at which it occurs. Thus the prescribing of antidepressants (biochemical treatment) for a patient who is in the middle of a messy divorce (relational systemic level) is not likely to resolve his or her divorce issues, just as stomach stapling surgery for a person with emotional eating issues may not be the best-choice “fix”.

Ken Wilber, in the aforementioned book, supports that observation. He writes, “Therapy at one level will usually acknowledge and even use all of the therapies from lower levels, but rarely from any higher.” Wilber, of course, goes into this in much more depth and from a somewhat different perspective. And thereby hangs another tale...

Will DOC's Dumping of 1080 on New Zealand Forests Save the Birds?

beech trees

The New Zealand Department of Conservation (DOC) is just now commencing their biggest aerial drop ever of the controversial toxin 1080 over some 700,000 hectares (about 1.7 million acres) of forest land at a cost of some $25 million. Heralded earlier this year with a campaign called “The Battle for Our Birds”, the Conservation Department claims if we don’t drop enough poison, we will have a rat plague this year of “Biblical” size, thanks to a beech mast. 

A mast is a natural phenomenon that occurs on a cyclic basis with many plants, not just beech trees, and occurs when plants produce more seed than usual in a given year. It is theorized that masting might be connected with climate or weather changes. The last big New Zealand beech mast occurred in 1999-2000, although Northern Hemisphere beech are estimated to mast ever 5-10 years. Ironically, while DOC paints a masting as a catastrophic event, in the UK, a mast year is seen as “a great opportunity to experience nature at its best.”

The problem with beech masting in New Zealand, according to DOC, is that extra seeds mean extra food for rodents, and their argument is that the rat population will grow larger than normal this year (in fact, become “a plague of Biblical proportion” according to the July 14 DomPost), and that when the beech mast food supply runs out, the rats will turn to birds as their food source. 

I’ve written about 1080 use in New Zealand before, most recently in January when this DOC project was first announced, and earlier about 1080 in general. It’s pretty clear I am no fan of 1080. It used to be possums that were held up as the scourge of New Zealand and the reason 1080 needed to be broadcast through our forest. Now possums get nary a mention, and suddenly it is rats and stoats who are the villains. The fact that masts are a natural phenomenon that happen on a regular basis and haven’t been seen as cause for alarm in the past, and now are suddenly given as a reason for a massive increase in poison use, is puzzling. The fact that 1080 is toxic to everything that breathes makes its wanton use in virgin forests inexplicable. The fact that rat population recovery after a 1080 drop is relatively quick paves the way for further drops in the future. 

It’s winter. Folks “on the ground” observe that the beech masting in New Zealand is now over. Any uneaten seeds have sunk into the ground or composted, adding to the nutrient level on the forest floor. Actually, some suggest it wasn’t really much of a “masting” to begin with. (Notice the “Save Our Birds” campaign was already ramped up well before the masting even occurred.)

Meanwhile, not only will rats and mice be killed by the poison that rains down on them from the air, but so will deer and wild pigs, weka, kea, tomtits and morepork. Not to mention the countless insects and the other critters that help keep our forests alive. I don’t know how many birds will be “saved,” but no doubt DOC will come up with a number, and will argue that any birds that died as a result of the poison drop are fewer than those that would have died if they didn't drop 1080, and who could prove otherwise? Daft. Sad, and daft.

I can come to no conclusion other than this campaign is DOC’s way of keeping their budget up and staff in employment! They're not saving birds, they're saving themselves.

What is the Difference Between Anxiety and Depression?

For more on Mindwork see here.

   In a nutshell, depression is caused by looking into the past with regret, and anxiety is caused by looking into the future with apprehension or fear. We tend to treat both anxiety and depression as “things”, like diseases, as if they have a life of their own, and the pharmaceutical industry encourages this medicalization because it’s good for their business. However, depression and anxiety are in fact mood states we create ourselves because of particular thinking patterns. People who create depression often also create anxiety and vice versa.

Blue Nude by Henri Matisse

What else affects mood states?

   There is a caveat to the idea that we create our own mood states from thinking patterns, however. Various drugs, both prescription and illegal, can affect the way we feel and think regardless of our thinking patterns. This is true not only when taking the drugs, but also when withdrawing from them. A classic example we are all familiar with is alcohol. Although alcohol is a depressant officially (and who wants one of those!), many of us like the way alcohol allows us to relax and enjoy ourselves, especially in a social situation. Have a glass of wine or a couple of beers and like magic, the difficulties in our lives feel less imperative and the present moment becomes more enjoyable. Cheers! Yet have a few too many drinks and you may wake up the next morning with a sore head and a grumpy demeanour—“Whadda mean the sun is shining? Work? Ugh!”

   And of course personal tragedy or grief or loss can certainly generate both depression and anxiety, and that’s a natural response. The loss of a loved one, for example, not only leaves a hole in the present but may create a sense of regret for things not said or done before in the past, and may also affect one’s future in uncertain ways. Lack of stability is great fun if you’re playing with an inner tube and waves at the beach, but becomes a lot more stressful when your home, family, health or livelihood is threatened.

Can anxiety or depression be good for you?

   Some would argue that these states are a wake-up call. Your internal sense of harmony is out of balance, and something fundamental in your life needs changing. This may be something external (maybe I need a different job...) or something internal (I need to stop thinking about that all the time...) If you harken to these undesirable mood states and accept them as a signal that something needs to change, and you take steps to make those changes, then the anxiety and/or depression is a valuable signal for you. On the other hand, if these states are not perceived as a call for action...

What can you do about anxiety and depression?

   Firstly, it’s important to accept that neither state is a significant problem on a short term basis, especially if a clear cause can be identified. If your faithful family dog passes away and you feel weepy for a few days, that’s a natural and appropriate response. If you feel anxious about going to the dentist to have a tooth pulled, that’s likewise temporary and natural. Feel the moment and accept it. You know it will pass with time.

   According to the DSM-IV[i], clinical depression can be diagnosed if at least five significant symptoms linger for more than two weeks and a medical cause is ruled out. See here for the DSM-IV definition of depression, and here for the DSM-IV definition of anxiety.

   Psychiatrists and medical doctors often provide anti-depressant medication for both depression and anxiety, and many people choose to go this route because (superficially, at least) it’s quick and easy and relatively cheap. However, anti-depressants do not address the issues that may be causing the depression or anxiety.

   In 2010 I completed my master’s thesis on antidepressant use and withdrawal, and for that I gathered information from over 500 antidepressant users, ex-users, and a control group of non-users. I found no overall increase in well-being created by antidepressant use, and problems with side effects and withdrawal were reported by the majority of study participants with antidepressant experience; in some cases these were debilitating. 

  Clinical trials of antidepressant drugs (mostly 6-8 weeks long) demonstrated minimal mood improvement with  use, which researchers Kirsch and colleagues deemed “negligible” given the placebo effect evident in their analysis of the data supplied to the US Food and Drug Administration. The placebo effect is how thinking a medication will help often means it really does help, even if the "drug" is a non-active fake. (for more on this, see their excellent book The Emperor's New Drugs: Exploding the Antidepressant Myth).  Personally, I wouldn’t choose to take anti-depressant medication—it’s like taking a pain killer for a rotten tooth: it might diminish the pain but it won’t fix the problem. I’d rather fix the problem.

   Therapy, provided the patient and therapist don’t spend a lot of time focussing on the “whys” of the problem, can be very useful in getting rid of depression and anxiety, and provides a valuable opportunity for self-discovery and personal growth. CBT (cognitive behavioural therapy) and NLP (neuro-linguistic programming) both have very good track records for dealing with depression and bringing about lasting change. Helping the client set clear goals and recognize things like his/her thinking patterns, past/present/future orientation, and the relationship between values, thoughts, behaviours, and moods enable positive changes to occur. Several NLP processes, in particular, allow clients to resolve internal conflicts and release negative emotions attached to events from the past quickly and easily, creating the opportunity to move forward into the future in more positive ways.

For more information on psychiatric drugs and alternative ways to understand and resolve anxiety and depression, see my new book Reframing Mental Illness.

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[i] Manual compiled by the American Psychiatric Association that classifies mental disorders.

Carbon Tax and Climate Change

Green Party leader Russell Norman posted a link on Facebook the other day about the merits of imposing a carbon tax. I was one of half a dozen people who posted responses to his post, and my response has led to several other fairly heated responses about the “facts” and “hypotheses” surrounding this issue. Here's my take.

A carbon tax is a tax imposed by government for the burning of fossil fuels (gas, oil, coal) to encourage the development and use of cleaner energy sources such as solar energy, wind, and hydro-electric that do not increase the level of carbon dioxide (CO²) in the atmosphere. CO² is one of several “greenhouse gases” implicated in what used to be called “global warming”, and is now called “climate change.”

[Following this tangent for just a moment, measuring global temperatures is a difficult task at best. The traditional method involved taking temperature readings at various locations, mostly located in urban land areas in the Northern Hemisphere and comparing them year after year. A general rise of about 0.8˚ C since 1800 has been noted by this method. Since 1979, satellite readings have given a more global perspective, and these show stable earth temperatures from 1979 to 1997, a significant jump in temperature in 1997-1998 (El Nino years), and then a levelling off. The global temperature has been stable and perhaps slightly declining since 1997-98. Hence “global warming” has kind of disappeared from the popular radar, but the idea that humans are the primary force negatively impacting the earth’s climate has not. And “climate change” is even more vague and hard to measure than global temperatures.]

From the article linked above

But back to the carbon tax issue. I believe that a carbon tax is primarily a revenue-gathering exercise likely to have little if any real impact on climate change. Here’s my reasoning:

Fact: An estimated 0.04% of the earth’s atmosphere is composed of CO²

Fact: An estimated 4% of that 0.04% of atmospheric CO² comes from the burning of fossil fuels

Fact: CO² levels have increase by about 40% since the 1880s

Fact: Global temperatures have increased by about 0.8˚ C since 1880 (nothing like 40%)

Hypothesis: The earth’s climate has been relatively stable until recently but now it is changing (Change is a vague term and difficult to quantify—how do you prove this?)

Hypothesis: Mankind’s burning of fossil fuels has upset the planet’s CO² level (Has anything else done so?)

Hypothesis: Increasing CO² levels have an adverse effect on climate stability (How do we know?)

Hypothesis: Decreasing our use of fossil fuels will help stabilize the climate (Only if the above hypotheses are true)

Hypothesis: Taxing Kiwi users of fossil fuels ($3/litre for petrol, anyone?), will cause citizens to decrease their use of fossil fuels, and this will have a significant and positive impact on the planet’s climate. (You're kidding, right? China alone accounts for 42% of global emissions.) 

This is science presented to the public in a shoddy way. The facts are fine, but too many folks are talking about the hypotheses as if they are facts, or as if they are the only hypotheses out there. Personally? I think the biggest driver of climate change is the sun and her impact (or lack thereof—notice a paucity of solar flares during what is supposed to be a grand maximum, meaning the earth’s magnetic shield is weak and getting weaker by the day) on the planet. As supporting evidence that the main driver of climate change may be the sun not man, consider the profound changes occurring on other planets in our solar system where humans are not interfering (see here and here for examples).

What’s more, it seems just as likely that warmer earth temperatures may encourage the planet to generate more CO² rather than the other way around. And although the current CO² level is very high, it should be noted that during prehistoric periods it was much, much higher.  Also,CO² is good for plants. Some scientists believe increased levels of CO² may make crops and forests grow faster, and that can be of benefit to all life on the planet.

Furthermore, water vapour and methane are much more prominent greenhouse gases than CO² and they almost certainly—just due to their greater concentrations—have a greater effect on climate than CO² but are harder to “tax” or control. Realizing that CO² only plays a small role among the large cast of participants on the climate stage, and that the proportion of CO² that we humans are responsible for belching out into the atmosphere is even smaller is a first step.

Ultimately, I am all for anything that can help us clean up the planet because frankly, we’re making a mess of our world. I ABSOLUTELY believe that cleaner energy sources (especially solar) are the way to go. However, I do not believe that imposing a carbon tax in New Zealand will make a significant difference to our planet's climate. What it will do is make almost everything more expensive, from petrol to toilet paper to roads to home heating. And the people who will be hurt most by this are those at the bottom of the economic food chain. Come on Russell, what are you thinking?

I’d like to end this blog post with a really worthwhile summary of the CO² connection to climate change, as presented by Ben Davidson earlier this year.  His passion and dedication into research on this topic and the sun/earth relationship is extraordinary.

DOC Ups the Ante with 1080 in 2014

The New Zealand Department of Conservation (DOC) has just announced plans to increase their aerial drops of 1080 poison in forest areas to cover some 12% of public conservation land in New Zealand, up from about 5%. Calling the program “The Battle for Our Birds,” they claim it is in response to an anticipated “masting” in beech forests this year which they say will cause an increase in rodent and predator numbers.

I’m no fan of the use of 1080 poison. I’ve written about the use of this nasty chemical in previous posts. My very first blog post, Of possums and a serendipitous juxtaposition tackled this topic, and subsequently I wrote 1080 (just what is this stuff anyway?), Planned 1080 aerial drop inWellington’s back yard, and 1080 Update along with a couple of other related posts like Oh, Deer.

   

Over the past year I’ve been a bit quieter about this topic, and entertained hopes that with growing awareness of the nastiness of 1080—a toxic-to-all-oxygen-breathing-species poison banned in all but 4 or 5 countries—perhaps with time its use would be diminished. Alas, this seems not to be.  Ok, so where are we now?

Two years ago, it was a proclaimed war against the possum (see my post Villain or Victim?) that was used to fuel the public’s acceptance of aerial 1080 poisoning. Now the possum hardly gets a mention as the campaign swings into action to tackle rats and stoats. This is the logic DOC is feeding us: 

It’s called a “mast” when trees or plants have a year when they produce an unusual abundance of seeds, a common cyclical phenomenon in some plant species. It is anticipated that beech trees in New Zealand’s forests are likely to mast this year. Because of the unusually abundant food supply, it is argued that rats and mice in the forest will flourish, and since stoats eat rats and mice, they will flourish. When the seed supply runs out, there won’t be enough rats and mice to feed the stoats so they, along with hungry rats, will prey on birds, and New Zealand’s native birds will be at risk. DOC’s solution is to drop more than twice as much 1080 poison on the forests as they usually do. The rats and mice will eat the poison and die. The stoats will eat the poisoned rats and mice and die. The birds will be safe.

According to Conservation Minister Nick Smith, quoted in the article in the DomPost newspaper  this morning, rats and stoats and possums eat 25 million native birds every year. Now I cannot imagine—even when I put on my super-duper jet-propelled hat of  imagination—how they could know this. Where in the world does a number like this come from?

Kea with 1080 pellet

That aside, 1080 is not species- or mammalian-specific in its effects. Originally developed as an insecticide, it is toxic to any creature that depends upon oxygen for survival, and death by 1080 is not pretty. See the Graf Boys’ must-view award-winning doco Poisoning Paradise.

On the west coast, endangered Kea killed after 1080 drops are well documented—they love the bait. Robins and tomtits are also hit by drops. So are wild deer and pigs (which DOC consider pest species even if hunters don’t agree). There is rarely much publicity about dogs and farm animals dying from 1080 poison, but the stories abound when you start searching the internet. This stuff is really, really nasty.

This map (from the DOC website) shows proposed drop areas, along with the species they claim they are “saving”. Wake up, New Zealand. They’re poisoning our world.

New Zealand wants the world to think we’re “Clean, Green 100% Pure New Zealand.” As the Tui beer billboards suggest...”Yeah, right!” New Zealand (before this proposed more-than-doubling-of-usage) uses 85% of the world’s production of 1080 poison, on a land mass about the size of the US state of Oregon. We drop death from the air in tasty cereal and carrot pellets on our forests. It’s nasty, it’s toxic, and it affects the whole forest ecosystem. When will this madness end?

Derren Brown Makes Me Squirm

Derren Brown, photographed by Seamus Ryan

TV One in New Zealand has just been running Series One of The Derren Brown Experiments on televison. If you don’t know, Derren Brown is a British hypnotist, illusionist, psychologist, and performer, and he is very good at what he does. I have on several occasions enjoyed watching Derren Brown clips on you tube. In this television series, he examines a variety of psychological phenomenon by playing game host for a willing audience. So, why do these shows, and Derren himself, make me squirm?

In the first episode, after a fairly long selection process—keeping in mind that the general rule is about 10% of people cannot be hypnotised, about 10% are incredibly susceptible, and the remaining 80% fall somewhere in the middle—he chooses a likable and likely (e.g., highly susceptible) fellow and sets out to prove whether the old belief that you’d never do something truly abhorrent under hypnosis is true or not. The subject is (unknowingly) groomed for months to commit an abhorrent act--in this case the public assassination of a popular public figure--and when all of the pieces are in place, he is subliminally cued to pull the gun and shoot. Will he do it? The program is nail-biting, and the result when he pulls the gun thought-provoking. You can watch the episode here:

Squirm factor while I was viewing it? Yep, I was squirming. But I was still squirming, and thinking about it, after I went to bed, and again the next day, not so much because of the ramifications (yes, Virginia, you CAN be brainwashed to do unspeakable things), but I was even more bothered that Brown would take this poor guy and put him through this experience, and I wondered what that would do long-term to the psychological well-being of his subject? What sort of man exploits his subject for public entertainment? (Okay, perhaps there was some genuine insight gleaned from this experiment for everyone watching, but did the end justify the means?)

I was curious what would happen in the second episode, touted as exploring how crowd behaviour can affect our sense of right or wrong, and what our capacity for evil might be. This time a studio audience was given voting buttons and invited to cast their votes whether a completely innocent and rather likeable chap should have something good happen to him, or something bad. An elaborate set-up involved a variety of accomplices and plenty of hidden cameras. You can watch the episode here:

Now I find it disturbing enough that in every single instance, the studio audience voted to make this poor chap’s life increasingly miserable, but I can kind of see how and why that might happen. The audience was, for the most part, young and out for a good time, and Derren created a sort of surreal atmosphere by asking audience members to don masks. Every psychologist knows that when you take on a mask or alternative persona, it carries with it permission to do things you might not normally do. 

Furthermore, Derren Brown provides entertainment, and the audience was there to be entertained. Perhaps there is a greater entertainment factor when people face adversity than when nice things happen to folks--its more “interesting.” And entertainment is the name of the game—this WAS presented as a game show—and all the action was seen on a big screen reminiscent of a movie or tv show or Xbox game (in fact, the computer game analogy is particularly apt given the participating audience member’s ability to choose the future of their “character”). Furthermore, Brown seemed particularly delighted each time he reported that “over half of you voted to make this man’s life worse,” a positive response that undoubtedly encouraged more “nuke him” votes.

It was bad enough that this guy was accused of a variety of things he didn’t do and made to look foolish, hauled down to the police station in a paddy wagon, told he was being made redundant from his job, and in the coup d’etat the audience voted to have him kidnapped by thugs. I think what bothered me the most, though, was the Darren Brown affiliate who broke into the man’s apartment, made himself a sandwich in the man's kitchen, prowled through the chap’s bathroom for things to chortle over in front of the audience (he found a nail clipping and managed to generate some hilarity out of that...personally, I thought it was a remarkably tidy flat, and bathroom!), tore up the bed, went through the man’s underwear drawer sharing giggles and snide comments for the whole audience, and smashed up the man’s television. Now the audience told him to do this stuff, but the idea of making fun of someone’s personal life, home, and belongings within a public forum (not just the audience, but everyone who ever watches this program on tv or you tube video) to me is so incredibly abhorrent that I can hardly believe anyone would be so cruel as to do this. This was beyond a practical joke, worse than bad taste, this was criminal. (And the new tv and letter left behind for the guy to find when he got home after his horrible night out seems no compensation at all.)

I sometimes work with people who have had traumatic events occur in their lives, and I know how even small things that others might have considered a bit of harmless, insignificant fun can sometimes have a negative impact on some people for the rest of their lives. Home invasion is particularly nasty, akin almost to rape in some cases. To have a home invasion made so incredibly public and apparently condoned by the program makers for whatever ulterior motive (Darren claims he wanted to show how group behaviour can make monsters of us all) is the ultimate in nasty. No wonder it made me squirm.

No stars for this one, Derren Brown. What you did was stinko. Meanwhile, I hope our hapless victim managed to pull some good out of this, and I wish HIM all the best. 

Is Cholesterol Good or Bad?

The cholesterol issue comes home, quite literally, when someone close within the family suddenly finds themselves with blocked coronary arteries and ends up doing a stint on the operating table. Suddenly cholesterol-lowering statins and heart-regulating beta-blockers become de rigueur, and a seriously low-fat diet (except for fish oils) is on the daily menu. This post examines the cholesterol/statin issue. I’ll leave diet for another time.

Anyone who knows me at all knows I’m not one to blindly accept the doctor’s advice without doing my own investigation and research. Although they almost always mean well, doctors promote “best practice” medicine, which usually relies heavily on what they’ve been taught, “conventional wisdom,” and the drug treatments encouraged by pharmaceutical companies anxious to increase sales of their products. Like antidepressants (one of my pet topics, see my post on psychiatric med use), statin drugs are heavily promoted in spite of some rather questionable assumptions about the role of cholesterol in the body.

The standard medical view is based on a [rather shaky] assumption that too much cholesterol causes heart disease. Since statins lower the amount of cholesterol in the body, it is assumed that statins help prevent heart disease.  But what is this stuff called cholesterol anyway? Where does it come from? Does it really cause heart disease? Is it healthy to artificially control your body’s production of cholesterol? And are statins safe?

Cholesterol is a waxy, fat-like substance that is manufactured by the liver. It is essential for the healthy functioning of every single cell in your body. It is so essential that without cholesterol, you would die. Kaput. Nada. End of story. It is also essential for the production of hormones, for digestion, for the healing of injuries, for the distribution of essential vitamins, and for brain function. In fact, the brain contains around 25% of the body’s total cholesterol, which may explain why many folks who take cholesterol-lowering statin drugs complain of brain “fuzziness” and memory loss.

A small portion of the body’s cholesterol may be derived from the saturated fats found in animal products, but the majority is made by the liver. Cholesterol is so essential to life, Mother Nature has ensured the body can produce this essential substance regardless of what a person eats.

Many health practitioners talk about two kinds of cholesterol, one called “good” cholesterol (HDL) and the other “bad” cholesterol (LDL). In fact, HDL and LDL refer to the lipoprotein molecules that transport the cholesterol around the body, not to the cholesterol itself. Cholesterol is just cholesterol. Cholesterol carried by HDL is more tightly bound to the carrier than that carried by LDL and therefore is less likely to be “off-loaded,” and thus is less likely to end up as part of the plaque build-up inside artery walls that is blamed for most heart disease. On the other hand, it is the cholesterol released by the LDL that helps repair and heal injuries that may have occurred to the artery walls. So you do want this stuff helping to heal your injuries or not?

A study begun in the 1940s identified high blood cholesterol levels as one of several factors linked with heart disease. When the pharmaceutical company Merck developed a drug that could block the enzyme responsible for the manufacturing of cholesterol in the liver in 1976, they thought they were on to something that could become a major money-spinner. They got their new drug lovastatin approved by the US FDA in 1987, after clinical trials demonstrated its effectiveness in lowering cholesterol.

Today, there are six statin drugs approved for use within the US, and they are widely prescribed for men and women (and, oddly, even children!) whether or not they have heart disease. However, a meta-analysis of eleven large studies showed no significant difference in mortality rate between people taking a statin and not taking a statin as a heart disease preventative, nor any benefit for women whatsoever, even if they have been diagnosed with heart disease. The benefit for men with diagnosed heart disease is small but statistically significant (a 2-4% decrease in mortality from any cause, depending upon the study and over the time period of the study, 4-6 years in most cases). See Barbara H. Robert's book The Truth about Statins for more details on these studies.

You can actually take this a step further. When Zoe Harcombe analysed the World Health Organisation (WHO) data on a country-by-country basis, it became clear that low cholesterol levels are associated with a HIGHER risk of heart disease, and high cholesterol levels are associated with a LOWER risk of heart disease, and that is a statistically relevant difference. But nobody wants to talk about that.

Clearly, there is good money to be made by the pharmaceutical companies if they can convince you and your doctor that preventative statin treatment IS of value, so they’re hardly going to go out of their way to point out their drugs don’t prevent heart disease.

Furthermore—and they don’t like to talk about this either—statins come with certain side effects and risks. A Dutch survey found 40% of statin users reported muscle pain, 31% reported joint pain, 16% reported digestion problems, and 13% complained of memory loss. The US FDA warns use of the drugs can result in liver damage, muscle damage, the development of diabetes, and brain impairment. A low cholesterol level, drug-induced or not, is also associated with a higher suicide risk.

I’d like to come back to the original supposition made by the medical community, that high cholesterol causes heart disease, and suggest an alternative. I think high cholesterol is a symptom of heart disease, rather than a cause, like a rash is a symptom of measles or bleeding is a symptom of a cut. When you’re immune system is out of whack or there is injury somewhere that needs repair, or you are simply going through a normal aging process (cholesterol levels naturally go up as we age) I think your body increases production of cholesterol to deal with those issues.

I have an enormous amount of faith in Mother Nature. I believe our bodies are intelligent and designed to serve us, and to heal when some damage has been caused. I don’t think a chemical intervention is superior—especially as a “preventative”—to Mother Nature’s own way. Just my thoughts.

If you’d like to know more, follow the links in the post. The  book The Great Cholesterol Con by Malcolm Kendrick and the documentary video Statin Nation are also recommended.