Childhood Asthma is on the rise. Since the 1930s there has been a hypothesis that it was caused by a disconnection between mother and child. Now all the research has caught up to prove the connection. Best yet, mind-body medicine approaches, such as the BodyTalk I do, can effectively heal asthma in young children. It comes by healing the connection between the primary caregiver and child.
“When you look at a plant that’s not developing, you’re not going to diagnose it with a disease, you’re not going to yell at it to grow up. You’re going to see what’s missing, what conditions are lacking — nutrition, minerals, sunlight, irrigation. Same thing with human beings, and it just so happens that the most important influence in human beings is actually the emotional contact with nurturing adults.” Dr. Gabor Mate
Dr. Mate’s words are so profound. We must look at the underlying conditions. Dr. Mate also says the more stressed parents are the higher rates of asthma you will see, as the more stressed and preoccupied the parent is, the less connected they are with their child. Bonding issues is known to be at the heart of asthma. This makes complete sense given body psychology/consciousness and pre/peri natal psychology (PPN).
Body Psychology – The mind and body mirror each other. What is happening at the mind/soul level tend to be a reflected to you at the physical level as symptoms. All as a way of making you more aware of the problem. Mental/spiritual uneasiness is much easier to ignore than pain/disease. The Book: Secret Language of Your Body relates asthma to needing to please others, disempowerment, being controlled and more, all which fits with our BodyTalk resources on what the Lungs represent. The consciousness of the lungs relate to our ability to take in and release life, emotions and experiences. Bring in the new with each breath and releasing the old. It is about transitions, surrendering attachments, feeling like you don’t belong, unworthiness, there is unfair or unequal exchanges of energy- love given isn’t being returned. Feeling like one is not allowed to live fully, feeling stifled, smothered, suffocated. On one end of the spectrum we feel we are alone, don’t belong, have resistance or difficulties to taking in the prana/Qi life force that breath is and on the other end of the spectrum we can feel smothered, stifled, controlled – and helicopter parenting is also correlated to higher rates of asthma. Either way there is disconnection of bond and attunement between mother and child. The emotional connection to the primary nurturing adult that is essential for health, physically, mentally & emotionally is strained.
The PPN research on maternal -infant bonding from Dr. Tony Madrid on healing childhood asthma is outstanding. He has an >81% success rate in full recovery in children under 10 by treating the mother and the Non Bonding Event (NBE) that took place between them.
Non Bonding Events (NBE) are:
- separation from the mother at birth or early infancy
- maternal depression, grief or stress
- Birth Trauma, C-sections deliveries
- maternal trauma
- other events in the mother’s life that interrupts her focus on her baby.
I use Dr. Madrid’s protocol within my BodyTalk practice. Working with the mother to find and address the issue that impaired bonding, heal the trauma and to redo the experience without the NBE in the way. We imagine and feel the connection through a new pregnancy, birth and postpartum. Allowing the mother to feel the deep connection and love that was interrupted by the earlier stressful events. Without treating the child directly, we see immediate improvements in the child’s asthma. I do also include BodyTalk work for the child as well to help rebalance anything else that is still needed just for good measure, but it is working with the mother that is crucial. Children are a mirror of our own stress.
NBEs and your child’s asthma is not your fault. It is the repercussions of trauma, stress, grief, separation, depression and lack of support. It can be healed.
If you are pregnant and dealing with stress and issues that are disrupting your ability to connect with your baby we can do work now to prevent later issues in your child. If you suffered birth trauma or separation from your baby, or any other event/depression that created disconnection, we can work to heal those wounds and help repair the bond and the essential connection needed for healthy development. Dr. Madrid’s data found this protocol works best with children 9 and under, but I have also successfully treated adults asthma with BodyTalk. BodyTalk is always worth trying and will never do harm.
Want to treat your child’s asthma through this maternal bonding approach with BodyTalk? Book a 90-minute adult-child session either in person or online. Remote sessions are not recommended for this approach as we want to actively reimagine the pregnancy/birth/postpartum without the NBE in the way.