Contents
Unlike other mental disorders that can be cured successfully by medication, eating disorders have not yet been found to be as responsive to traditional pharmaceutical medicines. Binge eating, Anorexia nervosa, Bulimia nervosa among these three eating disorders; Anorexia nervosa has one of the highest mortality rates of any psychiatric illness that is killing one person every 62 minutes, though there are few effective psychological treatments still there is no effective psychiatric medications for this illness.
People all over the world of all ages, genders, and ethnicities are being afflicted by these eating disorders, and it is estimated that about thirty million Americans involve in some form of disordered eating habit that led to problems with weight and body image.
Eating disorders are notoriously tough to treat completely, with relapse rates after traditional medication and treatment. But recently, some researchers are studying Psychedelic substances and considering adopting the traditional Amazonian indigenous healing process to treat eating disorders.
As it is already evident, that “Ayahuasca”, the Holy Medicine of the Holy and Divine Mother Ayahuasca, brings great mental health benefits and shows tremendous potentialities in reducing depression and anxiety, researchers are now considering advocating for the consumption of the Holy Medicine to help in treating eating disorders.
Anja Loizaga-Velder, director and one of the founding members of research and psychotherapy at the Nierika Institute for Intercultural Medicine in Mexico, has been studying the therapeutic potential of Psychedelic Plants for more than two decades. Inspired by her work on the Holy Medicine and eating disorders, Dr. Adele Lafrance, associate professor and clinical psychologist at Laurentian University, started to ask questions about the Holy Medicine’s potential to treat other treatment-resistant disorders like eating disorders.
Lafrance and her team published their study where the researchers interviewed sixteen North Americans who had consumed the Holy Medicine in Sacred Ceremonies. Among these participants, 10 of them had been diagnosed with anorexia nervosa, while the other six had been identified with bulimia nervosa.
Eleven of the participants stated that their experiences with the Holy Medicine led to reductions in eating disorder symptoms. The participants commonly reported changes in how they perceived themselves, and 14 of them came to an agreement that, the Holy Medicine helped them regulate their emotions. According to Lafrance, the Holy Medicine, when consumed in Sacred Ceremonies, with the right kind of preparation and aftercare under the right circumstances, shows promise as a potential assistant in the treatment of eating disorders.
It is also important to note that the participants were frequently told that the Holy Medicine altered the perception of their physical bodies, which can be easily realized by one of the participants’ statements: “I really just experienced my body as a gift,” as one participant said. “It was; I felt that it was malnourished. I could sense that; I could sense that I was not honoring the gift.”
The authors of the study also warned that strong conclusions should not be drawn at this initial finding as this study is just a starting point for the treatment of eating disorders with help from the Holy Medicine.
According to Lafrance, this study is in its infancy; she explained that as scientists, they have much to learn from the indigenous Medicines. They need to look at the Holy Medicine in a very serious, scientific way to bring new treatment options to those who do not respond to usual conventional healing modalities.
Conclusion
As science progresses, and explores the traditional proven ‘Healing’ Medicines – which may not have been tested under microscopes of science yet, but are time honoured and tested throughout many millennia – it is bound to find the tremendous ‘Healing’ potentials to ‘Heal’ both the mind and the body, of the Holy Medicine, of the Holy and Divine Mother Ayahuasca.
References
- Lafrance, A., Loizaga-Velder, A. Fletcher, J., et al. (2017). Nourishing the Spirit: Exploratory Research on Ayahuasca Experiences Along the Continuum of Recovery from Eating Disorders, Journal of Psychoactive Drugs, [online] Volume, 49(5), p. 427-435. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1080/02791072.2017.1361559 [Accessed 5th July 2021].
- Renelli, M., Fletcher, J., Tupper, K.W. et al. (2020). An exploratory study of experiences with conventional eating disorder treatment and ceremonial ayahuasca for the healing of eating disorders. Eat Weight Disord, [online] Volume, 25, p.437–444. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1007/s40519-018-0619-6 [Accessed 5th July 2021].
