So let’s get that particular myth out of the way. Period pain is not in your mind. It’s very real and it’s in your body. You might feel it in your womb, which is low down in your abdomen, or in your thighs, or in the lower part of your back. It can cause sore breasts, a swollen belly, migraine, depression, extreme fatigue, irritability, clumsiness, vomiting or constipation. And you are not imagining any of it. In fact being told ‘It’s all in your mind’, or ‘You’ll grow out of it’, or ‘You’re not like other women’, doesn’t help, but simply makes you feel worse. And, of course, it’s not true. It’s pretty generally accepted these days that if you’re afraid, your fear will make the pain worse.’ But fear or anxiety won’t give you the pain in the first place.

You are not abnormal if you suffer from period pain. Most women do. The trouble is that most women also suffer from a feminine conspiracy to keep it secret. It’s a sad fact that period pain is the one pain most women don’t admit openly. The young man who sprains his ankle playing football over the week-end will talk freely about the discomfort he’s in and gladly allow his friends to rally round and support him until he recovers. A woman in pain rarely admits it, and she certainly won’t expect the men she works with to support her. We still have a sneaky feeling that anything unpleasant that happens to us as a result of our sexuality is somehow our own fault. So we keep quiet about it. Or most of us do.

Fortunately, thanks to Dr Katharina Dalton, a stalwart campaigner on our behalf, and doctors like her, there are now plenty of facts and figures available about periods and period pain. Because of Dr Dalton’s work, we now know that there are two different kinds of period pain, and that about seventy per cent of women suffer from one or the other at some time or other in their lives. In other words, pain with a period is the norm in Western society. So if any group of women could truly be said to be ‘abnormal’, it’s the lucky thirty per cent who never experience any pain at all!

There’s one last myth to tackle before we get down to the practical details. It’s still quite common for women who suffer from period pain to be told by friends or relations, or even by some medical personnel, that there’s not very much they can do about it. That might have been true twenty-five years ago, but it isn’t true today. There are all sorts of things you can do to help yourself.

Not all of them work for everybody. Some will provide dramatic relief, others will help to reduce the pain to bearable limits and some will have no effect at all. We all need individual treatment.

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Your immune system is quickly exhausted if stress is allowed to become chronic. You become susceptible to colds and flu and find it hard to pick up after an illness. My first therapy of choice is moxibustion, a form of acupuncture. Such a gentle warming and relaxing therapy. Even children accept this smoky therapy after the first treatment, and grown-ups ask for it.

Stress that can lead to a ‘nervous breakdown’ is unnecessary when you have acupuncture. What you envisage would wipe you out for months is gone in two treatments. Patients are always embarrassed at how quickly they feel better. It is as if they had been putting it on, which they certainly weren’t.

The degree of stress experience varies with the delay in doing something about it — such as having a break, a holiday, denying there’s a problem or not recognising the signs. It’s the difference between being a hero or running away like a coward. The same amount of adrenalin is involved. It will depend on just how much stress you have put yourself under. How much can you take? Where is your breaking point? Treat the condition before you are a shaking mess.

I recommend whatever will help you quickly and effectively with as little expense as possible: hot baths; massage; adjustment; acupuncture; B complex vitamins; maybe a new job? A self-improvement course!

What you can do to help yourself:

1. Read self-help books.

2. Attend courses to raise your self-esteem.

3. Educate yourself beyond your present standard.

4. Use ‘new age’ techniques like rebirthing.

5. Try self-awareness courses.

6. Use accelerated learning techniques.

7. Seek professional help.

8. Write your own story, it helps to set it down.

9. Make your misfortune an asset. Remember Jimmy Durante or Barbra

Streisand’s nose?

10. Meditate on a flower. Memorise it as if you had to draw it from memory.

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Betrayal-If people have repeatedly let you down in the past, then you will have difficulty trusting others and yourself.

The Bach Flower remedy cerato is for distrust and lack of confidence. Group classes in personal development are also very helpful, as you can slowly achieve comfort within a supportive network of similar minded people who are willing to help and be helped.

Exhaustion-The many complex causes of energy wipe-out are discussed very fully in my first book Why Am I So Tired? However, emotional tiredness, due to conflicting emotions, can cause exhaustion. I have experienced burn-out and found that two weeks’ total relaxation, mostly spent sleeping, was my cure.

In my clinical experience, vitamin B complex is very important (taken with meals), and I advise taking a Bach Flower remedy mixture of centuary, olive, hornbeam, vervain, wild-rose or clematis, depending on the specific circumstance.

If your belief system doesn’t work for you, change it. When people tell me I’m tired and I know that I have another three hours work, then I reject the suggestion until I have time to be tired. Don’t forget, though, tiredness is natural after hard work.

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It is embarrassing to have to try desperately not to wet yourself when you laugh, cough or sneeze. The pelvic floor muscles have become weakened when you have babies, have surgery, arrive at menopause with the invariable loss of oestrogen, become overweight or suffer constipation. Another cause is when you have repeatedly lifted objects that were too heavy for you, thereby stretching muscles and ligaments which lose their elasticity.

Types of incontinence:

1. Stress incontinence . . . involuntary loss of urine caused by a weakened sphincter muscle usually in the female. Some relaxing drugs can cause this condition.

2. Urge incontinence … an agonising desire to void. This instability in controlling the desire to urinate happens most often in the elderly, and is aggravated by caffeine, alcohol, anxiety, cold weather and even turning over in bed.

3. Overflow incontinence . . . involuntary loss of urine caused by an obstruction at the outlet of the bladder (usually the prostate gland; therefore this is a male condition).

You need to do pelvic floor exercises. (Gripping the buttocks and tightening the abdominal muscles while holding for as long as possible.) The ‘bridge’ other yoga exercises are very helpful too. Be consistent.

Please try acupuncture before deciding on an operation as it can be very successful. The water meridian is found to be drastically deficient and once we have toned up the kidney and bladder points, nature will correct the difference.

First things first. Remember to have your chiropractor balance your pelvis. If it is out of alignment, all the exercises in the world won’t help you for long. Your structure holds everything up. All the muscles and ligaments attach somewhere to it. It’s logical. If you are having trouble with the roof of your house, then you’d check the foundations, wouldn’t you? Engineers understand that reasoning. Structure governs function. Fix the structural problems when they happen and the faults won’t follow you into maturity.

An elderly lady had been suffering the indignity of losing a little urine every time she sneezed or laughed and had an occasional constipation problem that she handled with slippery elm.

Several months later, her ankles started to swell, especially the left one and she became tired after lunch. Finally her daily walk was interrupted by a sore heel that couldn’t take her weight any more.

As the heel pain was a real nuisance, she visited her chiropractor. Her leg lengths were measured and found to be uneven due to a pelvic ligament problem. This was then adjusted. It didn’t hurt one iota. In fact she; returned for another adjustment. It was a real pleasure.

She noticed that when the pelvis was settled correctly, her bowel habits, returned to normal and the bladder wasn’t upset by the peals of laughter to which she was prone.

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Ageing is a normal and natural process, as is having grandchildren. But injuries will occur when you bend over to lift them up. I call it grandma syndrome.

A fifteen-month-old bundle who runs to you to be picked up is often the beginning of elderly backache. It is the most common cause of pain that I see in older women who have rarely had a back pain before. She is shown how to sit on a high hard chair and to entice the heavy little darling to crawl onto her knees where she can help them up from her now supported position.

Pain in the lower spine and pelvis can be combined with pain in the knees and hips. When lower back sprains occur, the pain radiates down to the legs and feet. The problem is caused by repetition of the leaning over and twisting upright movement.

Therapists loosen your spine with massage and electrical therapy or acupuncture. They teach you the correct way to lift while bracing the buttocks.

In the ageing process, spinal discs narrow and ligaments lose much of their ability to stretch and move. This is due to diminished elasticity and everyone over forty is advised to take a vitamin E capsule daily.

Spinal joints can have arthritis or degeneration, therefore you are more at risk of hurting your back with poor postural lifting. If you have kept up your swimming or long walks around the block, you’ll be in better shape to handle toddlers.

Mechanics and home car enthusiasts often suffer lower back injury. Prevention is better than worker’s compensation. So if there is a problem, do not continue to aggravate the area. Have, it treated and give it time to heal. The fact is that 85% of the population will experience back pain at least once during their lives.

Yoga is good, preferably started young, and so is an exercise bike. Aerobics for the over fifties should be performed fluidly without jerking. Aquarobics is fun in warm water and can be recommended. When gardening, kneel instead of bending over, and bend your knees rather than your back. For this reason, bowling is good, because you have to keep your back straight, and bend your knees and your hips.

Full and complete recovery from a lower back injury can be a long, time-consuming process. The patient is usually free of all symptoms long before the healing process is complete. You consider yourself fully recovered, you put aside precautionary measures, and too often interrupt the healing process with a new injury! It may be only slight, and the symptoms only minor, but the vulnerable

joint has been re-sprained. The supporting ligaments are again stretched and torn.

Even the minor lower back injury requires a minimum period of six weeks to repair fully. This is because the nature of a sprain involves ligaments which lose their elasticity when hurt. They have to support the joint. Ligaments contain no blood vessels and depend on an indirect nutritional supply. So it takes time for full healing.

Indeed, in the elderly, back cases complicated by congenital or degenerative damage may never be normal. They may demand special postural care and deliberate precautions on your part forever.

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Indigestion is involved in nervous dyspepsia, colic, constipation, pain, diarrhoea, nausea, vomiting, gall stones, heart disease, ulcers, and stomach cancer. So it’s worth putting some effort into healing the problem.

The chiropractor must assess the spine for any interference to the nerve supply around the middle of the dorsal spine which controls the stomach, liver and gall bladder. Adjustments to this part of the spine can be your first and best solution to this trouble.

The next step after adjusting the spine is acupuncture. Leg points are the effective ones and the stomach meridian is an important stimulus to all chi flow.

Poor posture, showing up as an exaggerated curve called a kyphosis, has to be addressed. Yoga exercises are useful. Backstroke in swimming, or standing tall as you walk are vital for improved posture which will aid digestion.

When it comes to diet, insufficient gastric acids are one of the major problems with indigestion. You can buy digestive enzymes from your health food store, or you can try a teaspoonful of apple cider vinegar in a glass of water with each meal.

Pawpaw or papaya contains a digestive enzyme and is an excellent start to a meal. Take pineapple juice as a drink with your meal, and use lemon and grapefruit juice on your salads. No drink at all with meals is often best!

‘Food combining’ is a strict routine of eating which has solved many a digestive problem and those who suffer need to know the rules. Not every person has to be so exacting in their choice of foods. The purpose of life is defeated if you are fanatical over your food choices, unless you do have the problem. Worry over such things creates stress and bad health may follow. Remember, relaxation and laughter heal.

Hay Diet

Rules for digestion:

1. Starches and sugars should not be eaten in the same meal with protein and acid

foods.

2. Vegetables, salads and fruits should form a major part of the diet.

3. Proteins, starches and fats should only be eaten in small quantities.

4. Only wholegrain and unprocessed starches should be used, and all refined

processed foods should be taboo, in particular white flour, sugar and all foods

made with them as well as highly processed fats such as margarine.

5. An interval of at least four to four-and-a-half hours should elapse between meals

of a different character.

This last rule of course does not apply to low blood sugar patients. They need that important protein meal at breakfast and can have their fruit meals from lunch on. This is easier to handle once their sugar metabolism is stabilised.

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A specific problem causing headaches can occur in some people who use bifocals. The line between the lower and the upper lenses creates an odd blurred effect,and it isn’t easy to look at something through this area of the glasses. Unfortunately, the normal angle at which we hold the head means this line often falls just at the top of the page we’re trying to look at. It is not uncommon to see people with bifocals putting their head back slightly in order to be able to read the top few lines of the piece of paper they’re holding in their hand..

Unfortunately, bending the head backwards in this way strains the joint between two vertebrae in the neck which, after a period of four or five years, can give rise to headaches. It is much better if you keep your head where it ought to be and use your hands to move the book down slightly so that you can read the top line of the page without cocking back your head. Alternatively, get a multi-focal lens with a gradation in strength over the whole of the visual field, with no sharp cutoff. Because there is no cut-off line there is less need to cock the head back

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Very high blood pressure does cause headaches, though. They are characteristically severe, and typically worse on waking up, rather than later in the day – which is interesting because you’d expect it to be the other way round. Blood pressure falls during sleep, and on waking your blood pressure is likely to be lower; yet, it’s at this time that the headaches occur!

‘Blood pressure headaches’ like these only occur if the hypertension is severe and untreated. However, those with a moderate rise in blood pressure do tend to suffer more frequently from headaches from other causes. In other words, severe blood pressure can trigger early-morning headaches by itself; lower levels of blood pressure seem to multiply headaches due to other causes.

Headaches caused by high blood pressure are probably related to the direct effects of pressure on the arteries of the brain, and the number and frequency of headaches largely depends upon the extra pressure. Reduce the blood pressure and the headaches go away.

Sometimes blood pressure can rise as a side-effect of the contraceptive pill. It can also rise in pregnancy. However, the rise of pressure is small by comparison with ‘ordinary’ blood pressure. Small increases in blood pressure are potentially much more serious if you’re on the Pill or pregnant. Changing to a different pill, or even stopping entirely may be necessary: in pregnancy, rest and sedation may be required. You will need to consult your doctor about both these situations.

Type of headache

The headache of severe blood pressure is typically worst on waking. It’s also worse if you sleep in, so headaches from high blood pressure are often worse at the weekend because of this. The headache is on both sides, and can be at the front or the back of the head, severe, bursting or throbbing, and sometimes accompanied by blurred vision, dizziness and in extreme cases, vagueness. Headaches like these are entirely related to the level of excess blood pressure: reduce the pressure and the headaches reduce also.

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Genetically, certain people are prone to having little balloon-like blebs, called berry aneurysms, on the arteries supplying the brain, and because these blebs have thinner walls than the arteries, they are more prone to rupture. Arteries supply blood, so the blebs are under high pressure, making them more likely to rupture, especially in someone who has high blood pressure. When an aneurysm ruptures, the blood spurts out with some force into the surrounding space overlying the brain tissue itself. Often the haemorrhage occurs at a time of straining; for example, on trying to open the bowels; during exercise; or during intercourse. On these occasions the blood pressure has (naturally) risen slightly, but this extra rise in pressure is the proverbial straw that breaks the camel’s back: an already weakened and thinned artery wall finally gives way under the strain, and the high-pressure blood inside forces its way out.

The results can be dramatic. A sub-arachnoid haemorrhage can strike down a previously healthy man or woman in seconds: typically, the patient feels as though she has been hit on the back of the head with a lump of wood. Exactly what happens after this depends on where the leakage has occurred, and how big it is. A sudden big leak can produce an explosive headache, then render the victim unconscious within seconds; she collapses as though pole-axed. In less dramatic bleeds, the patient may well not lose consciousness completely, but may be drowsy and irritable, with altered consciousness – and a massive headache. Others, who have just a tiny tear with a continuous but small leak of blood, may feel unwell in a vague sort of way, without any obvious pointers to what is going on, except for the feeling that they have had a knock on the back of the head, and, of course, a headache.

Often the patient develops a stiff neck, just as in meningitis, but unlike meningitis, the stiff neck will have come on very quickly (within minutes) and the patient won’t have a temperature or any other signs of infection. On the other hand, a small leak from an aneurysm may produce little in the way of a stiff neck -or, indeed, any other symptoms, other than a headache.

Sometimes the amount of bleeding can be very small, and in a number of cases there are several small ‘warning’ bleeds before the big one strikes. It’s only on looking back that these warning bleeds can be recognised for what they are, rather than being dismissed as minor headaches from viral infection or stress.

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There are four groups of sinuses – the frontal sinuses are in the bones of the forehead over the eyebrows; the maxillary sinus is underneath the eye, to each side of the nose; the ethmoid sinus is deeper in the facial bones, at the level of the eye, and the sphenoidal sinus is deep within the nasal cavity.

The sinuses are not closed spaces within the bones, but open – like little sacks, whose mouths open into the nasal cavity. This opening is called the antrum, Which is very important in sinusitis, as we’ll soon see.

The sinuses are lined with mucus-producing cells, together with cells with a covering of little hairs on top. These hairs are called cilia; they all move in unison and under the microscope the surface of the cells looks like waving fields of corn. St the cilia move, they propel any mucus that’s collected in the sinus out towards the antrum, from where the mucus enters the main nasal cavity, and thereafter can get lo the outside world, blown out on to the handkerchief or swallowed down the back of the throat. The mucus traps any dust, dirt or bacteria, and the cilia propel the accumulated rubbish out through the opening.

The weak point of the system is the small size of the antrum, which can all too easily become blocked. The cells lining the antrum can swell with inflammation (both allergic and infective), and the sinuses themselves can get infected, changing the thin mucus into thick infected pus, which is much harder for the cilia to waft out.

Once the antrum is blocked there’s a quick rise in pressure inside the sinuses as
more and more pus is produced. This pus is a mixture of bacteria, mucus, extra fluid from the inflamed cells lining the sinus, and white cells from the blood, which have migrated in to fight the infection.

Because the sinuses are carved out of bone, there is nowhere for this excess fluid to go, and consequently the pressure inside the sinuses rises very quickly. (It’s exactly the same as with a pimple on your nose. These are unbearably painful, simply because there is the same rise in pressure: when the pimple erupts to the outside surface and bursts there is an immediate reduction in pressure, and a corresponding immediate reduction in the amount of pain – even though the amount of pus released from that small spot may be little more than a pinhead.) It’s not the amount of pus that causes the pain, it’s the pressure it creates that causes the discomfort.

Sinusitis often follows a cold. The pain can be fiendish, with constant pain in the face or head, which gets worse on bending down, a stuffed-up sensation in the nose, and (often) infected green mucus coming down the nose. You may have a temperature. The sense of smell usually goes away (the sensitive organs of smell in the nose get liberally covered with sticky green pus, which delicate smells can’t penetrate), though sometimes when the infection is more or less localised to the sinus itself the patient can smell the pus.

You might think that infection in a small bony hole would be insignificant as far as the rest of the body is concerned – don’t you believe it. Sinusitis can make you feel dreadful, not just because it’s painful, but because a lot of pus is produced. The toxins that this pus liberates can enter the bloodstream and make you feel very rough.

An important diagnostic feature of sinusitis is that the pain is much worse when putting your head down. Often, there is local tenderness of the bone over the sinuses, and your doctor will press over these areas lo see if this increases the pain (pressing on the bone increases the pressure inside the sinuses even more, and it’s basically pressure that causes sinus pain).

In more difficult cases, or where there is long-continued sinus infection and Inflammation, it may be helpful for the doctor to arrange X-rays of the face and skull. It is easy lo see when the sinus is infected – normally sinuses have air inside them, which shows tip as dark shadows in the bone (X-rays penetrate air more easily than bone). II these air-filled sinuses get filled with pus or fluid, under X-ray they look more like the shading of the adjacent bone, so the radiologist can quickly spot which sinus is infected.

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