Thus, her severe constipation was treated
By JIRARA
© JIRARA, October 2022, Published by JIRARA on matrubharti.com
All rights reserved. No parts of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, for any commercial purposes without the prior permission of the author and/or publisher.
Disclaimer: It is the same as in my previous articles published in matrubharti.com.
Preamble: Here (and may be in some future closely related articles) is my personal account of the health care that I and my BA (mother) have/had received from our family (and other doctors) over a period of more than last three to four decades. Here, I am going to mention the names of the drugs/medicines/tubes/drops (where applicable and based on my memory) used for our treatment/s, because it is very important to mention these for the sake of clarity and completion (and usefulness in the future); rather than hiding these names for the fear of adverse or over-publicity or being ‘dubbed’ as an advocate of the medicines and/or their manufacturers; and I want to ascertain here, that I am not the brand ambassador of any of these (allopathy or ayurvedic/herbal) medicines, and this story-article is not sponsored or suggested by any of the doctors involved in the treatment. I am writing a true story related to the health of some individual/s, and hence, it is important that I clearly and openly mention the true names of the doctors and the medicines without any hesitation; and I am not interested in any kind of my personal publicity.
*****
Dedicated To: My wife Smt. Virmati, and our son Mayur who had taken immense of care of my mother during this phase (2017-2022); and to Dr. D. Amaranarayan (CMO, NAL-HC) for his tremendous support and treatment during this phase of my mother.
Acknowledgements: This story, and subsequent medical treatment related stories are profusely dedicated to our family doctors: NAL-CSIR doctors (in Bengaluru): Dr. D. Amaranarayan (CMO), Dr. N. Ramakrishna (CMO), Dr. Mrs. Swetha Desai, Dr. L. Prakash, Dr. Ms. Malvika; and the physiotherapist Y. Nagaraj; who from time to time had provided correct diagnoses, complete prescriptions of medicines, and proper referrals (including health care aspects/suggestions/treatments) to other doctors and/or Hospitals in respect of me, my BA as well as all the members of my family for several decades. In fact, due the treatment that we had received, our health-index had been very high.
We are also grateful to some doctors of Chinmaya Mission (Indiranagar, Bangalore) for correct initial diagnoses of my mother’s problem. For sometimes in the year 2022 my sister and her family members took care of our mother in their own house, and presently since February 2022 my second younger brother and his family are taking care of her in Jamnagar.
***
Note: As I have said earlier, we all are mortals, and we basically need oxygen, water, and food (hence lot of energy) to sustain our lives on this planet. Most of our food is plant based, and these plants ‘prepare’ food by absorbing energy from the Sun. Even though, the most non-veg food comes from animals, these animals also eat mostly plant-based foods, and hence their stored energy in some form comes to us. Now, if there is any contamination in any or more of these ingredients, in most cases we fall sick: breathing problems, food-poisoning, vomiting, acidity etc. Also, if there is deficiency in any or more of these, we become malnutrition-ed; the balance of food is always necessary for usual and normal life sustenance. We also fall sick due to: i) over work (get exhausted, and weak and our immune system becomes weak, and might lead to other complications), ii) some genetic problems inherited from our parent/s, and iii) in many cases due to bacterial and/or viral infections. There are other diseases/ailments: a) blood pressure (BP), b) diabetes, c) vertigo (Chakkar), d) cancer, and others. Also some problems are related to i) liver, ii) pancreas (diabetes Type I and II), iii) kidneys (stones, failures), iv) intestines, v) eyes, vi) heart/lungs, and vii) brain. There are many more minor or major issues (urinary track infection/UTI, allergies, eye-infections, and so on…), since the human body is a vast system in the number of components it has, and the continuous functioning of these sub-systems and their interactions are so involved that a common lay person cannot understand, except only superficially.
**
The medical doctors, in my opinion, are like our own ‘relatives’, and true friends; and the correctly prescribed medicines are our routine companions.
Thus, her severe constipation was treated
It was in November of 2017, one morning after the breakfast, my mother went to the bathroom to clean her mouth, and she started to cough severely, (lot of mucus came out) and we noticed that she was having a serious problem, but after a while she felt alright.
The next day, or so, after her bath while she was coming out, she fell down because she had giddiness, and was shivering, and complaint that she had a very tough time for the motion, and still she was not comfortable at all; and she was exhausted because she had applied lot of pressure to pass (out) the hard-motion, and she was scared as to what would happen. We immediately took her to the emergency of Chinmaya mission hospital, where she was treated, and we were advised about her diet, etc.; here the doctor had used some suppository tablets (Dulcolax) which was required to be inserted into her rectum; this will soften the hard stools, and the patient would get relief, at least in next 15 minutes.
**
Then, we met NAL-HC doctor, who also gave some syrup that should be taken by her after the dinner as long as the problem persists, and some packets of powder (Movicol sachets?) were given for oral administration. She became normal within 2 days, and we put her on the diet of fibres, green leafy vegetables, and fruits. However, after a few months this reoccurred, and then the treatment was repeated and again she recovered.
What was she doing for her regular motion till that day?
She used to take triphala or himaj (ayurvedic herbal medicines) powder in the early morning, at about 4 am., and then she used to be alright; this she had been doing then for several years; but it seems this was not working well now, and when she used to take the powder, this used to instigate her coughing, if the fine power touched her tonsils, etc., this was also a nuisance, and sometimes she had to take it again after one hour or so; and every time she got up to take this powder, the process used to make noise of the plastic bag, and sometime spoon falling, even the powder falling down in the bed, and this would wake me up; and this used to be daily early morning noisy and boring ritual.
So, I looked for other solutions, like anima, and I imagined how will I hang such automatic device in her bathroom, so that she can regularly use it on her own, and so on; I browsed the net and checked so many such schemes, and their prices, and studied the ease of use by herself. But none was suitable for our kind of bathroom set up.
Then, I decided to come out with a liquid concoction, and I prepared it myself by using the ingredients available in our own kitchen.
Liquid concoction:
The ingredients are: i) Three table spoons of triphala/himaj powder, ii) one table-spoon of coffee, iii) one table-spoon of tea powder, iv) one tea-spoon each of turmeric powder, salt, sugar, dry ginger; and v) half-tea spoon each of clove, black pepper, cardamom, and cinnamon powder; in all totally 11 (eleven) items.
How to prepare:
Choose a thick plastic bottle to store this decoction when ready, fill it with drinking water and empty it in a steel vessel (add a little more water to evaporate while boiling), and put it for boiling; add the ingredients just mentioned above and boil the content for nearly 10 to 15 minutes, keep stirring. Then cool the decoction, filter it, and fill the same bottle with the decoction from the steel vessel, and store in the refrigerator.
How to use:
Take a cup of water at the normal temperature and heat it in microwave for 1 minute or a little more, and then fill the cap (once or twice) of the bottle with the decoction and pour it into the warm/hot water, and then serve to the person who has the problem of bowel movement, in the morning on empty stomach. The person should wait for 15 minutes, can do small activities, but need not lie down.
Effect of each ingredient:
i) Triphala/himaj are for digestion if taken after the meals, and if taken in the morning then useful for cleansing the bowels, ii) the coffee/tea to bring freshness, iii) turmeric is antibiotic, iv) salt for cleansing, v) dry ginger, clove, and black pepper for digestion, vi) cardamom, and cinnamon for antacid and flavour, and vii) sugar to cut the bitter taste of the triphala/himaj.
In most cases, and most of the times, this will work well. I had put this recipe on matrubharti.com.
What has happened for my mother for last 5/6 years:
i) The decoction has been given every morning for all these years regularly, and has/had worked well.
ii) The eating of direct powder has been avoided, so far not needed; but it is one of the major ingredients of the decoction.
iii) When there was still a problem (this occurred only two times so far), the suppository tablet has been used by her, she would insert it in her rectum on her own, and the motion would be clear in 15 minutes.
iv) Also, if she had taken some heavy meals, mainly during some festival or so, then we give her liquid laxative: Looz syrup, Emty oral solution, or Liquid paraffin.
v) So far again no emergency hospital treatment was needed.
The offspring benefit has been that for these 6 years she rarely faced the cough-problem!
During one occasion:
It was during November 2018, that she faced the problem and we felt it was a bit serious, but we did not take her to hospital; she was treated at home with all the methods mentioned above. It so happened that my wife and I were to go to Bhutan for five/six days, and our trip was already fully booked by my son much in advance, and we had to leave our mother alone under the care of my son, and since she needed a daily help for medicines, diet food, bathroom visits, etc., and that she was feeling weak, I called my niece from Jamnagar to come and stay here for 9/10 days during the time we were away. She came and took good and enough care of my mother (her own grandmother also), despite of the fact that, her father’s bypass surgery was slated on 25th November (in Ahmedabad), and we were to be out of the country from 22nd November to 27th November.
Our special thanks to Ms. Meethali P. Raol for this help.
*****
