When the Rape Flowers Are Yellow, Patients Go Wild
When I was in junior high, once my cousin and I rode our bicycles home from school for the weekend. Halfway there, we were stopped by a barking Shiba Inu. This dog, in a field of rape flowers, kept trying to attack us; the two of us were terrified at the time. This incident left a deep impression on me, because we were almost bitten by the dog.Anyone who grew up in the countryside knows that in the third lunar month, village animals such as dogs, cats and chickens are more aggressive. It is not only animals; people are the same. The folk proverb says: when rape flowers are yellow, patients go wild. In the warm spring season, two kinds of patients suffer most: one is psychiatric patients (depression, anxiety, schizophrenia and so on), and the other is allergy patients, especially those allergic to pollen.Some patients are both allergy patients and psychiatric patients, because allergy patients are generally more prone than ordinary people to psychiatric illness. The allergy specialist Michael Blaiss found that adolescents allergic to pollen generally have higher rates of anxiety and depression. These people show more hostility and impulsiveness and frequently change their minds.These two types of patients are highly sensitive to temperature, air pressure, air currents, and the pollen and dust in the air. Spring is also the season when temperature, air pressure and air currents change most markedly; the spring air is also filled with various pollens and dust, and many microorganisms in the air are more active in spring than in other seasons.Spring is also a period of vigorous human metabolism; internal environment and endocrine activity undergo a series of changes, some hormones are aroused, and the human immune system is in an over-excited state.The Huangdi Neijing (Yellow Emperor Inner Canon) has this passage: The three months of spring are called the season of issuing and laying forth. Heaven and earth together give birth, and all things flourish. Go to bed late and rise early, walk broadly in the courtyard, loosen the hair and relax the body, so as to let the will arise. Give life, do not kill; give, do not take away; reward, do not punish. This is the response to spring qi and the Way of nurturing life. Going against it injures the liver; in summer there will be cold diseases, and there will be little to supply the long summer. This shows that ancient medical scholars already noticed that in spring people emotions are more heightened than in other seasons.Traditional TCM holds that there are many warm diseases in spring. The Huangdi Neijing has another passage: injured by cold in winter, one will fall ill with warm disease in spring. So TCM in spring mostly uses heat-clearing, detoxifying, yin-nourishing and blood-cooling herbs, such as Mohanlian (Eclipta), Nüzhenzi (Ligustrum), Maidong (Ophiopogon), Mudanpi (Moutan bark), Shengdi (Raw Rehmannia), Xuanshen (Scrophularia), Baishao (White Peony), Tiandong (Asparagus), Danshen (Salvia), Yujin (Turmeric), Wuweizi (Schisandra) and so on. TCM holds that spring belongs to wood in the five phases, and the liver and gallbladder also belong to wood; so in spring liver qi is exuberant and liver yang easily becomes hyperactive. Treating spring diseases should use more herbs that soothe the liver and resolve constraint, and level the liver and extinguish wind.Modern pharmacology has found that this class of TCM herbs has a strong immunosuppressive action, suppressing the over-excited immune system and also suppressing excessive secretion of many hormones, which can calm the patient irritable mood. When treating disease in spring, one should avoid using warm-dry herbs as much as possible.Spring is also a high-risk season for the rapid development and recurrence of many cancers closely linked to emotion, especially those closely linked to human endocrine, such as breast cancer, ovarian cancer, prostate cancer and thyroid cancer. Behind this phenomenon lies the law of evolution: all living things live in the natural environment, and changes in the natural environment cause a series of human reactions.But over the long history of human evolution, nature has also found us the optimal solution to this problem of human functional disorder caused by seasonal change; so most normal people, although also prone to emotional agitation in spring, do not fall ill. Only a few people with excessively high immunity (human immunity should be moderate; too low and too high both induce disease) or endocrine defects are in a diseased state in spring. This is just as most people do not develop cardiovascular and cerebrovascular disease in winter, but those with hypertension and obesity are more prone to sudden cardiovascular and cerebrovascular events in winter.As patient family members, we must understand this point: when spring arrives, give patients more care, and as far as possible do not push them into an agitated state. This can lower the probability of episodes, ease the patient suffering, and also enhance family happiness.