Ayurvedic perspective on Diabetes

    Ayurveda is basically the connection between one’s body, mind, and spirit. These all work together with their own energies in order to maintain a balance that helps you have a balanced life. It has originated in India where it is referred to as a naturopathic, natural, alternative medicine. There are many plants and other forms of medications that are natural. There are some properties that are compared to Earth such as our five senses: hearing, touch, vision, taste, and smell. These are related to air, space, fire, water, and ground/Earth where they have different energies that will take on a different purpose for their own principle. There is energy everywhere and things which form Vata (space and air), Pitta (fire and water), and Kapha (water and earth). These are called Doshas and people can take tests on this to see how they are feeling in their environment and what to do to balance themselves out. The connection between parts of the body is that they all rely on each other in order to perform a specific task. It all starts from a chemical level with different functional units and builds up to organ systems and more. Our body and the environment are also influenced by each other because it depends on what we need for our bodies.

A unique remedy I came across was hair-oiling, it is thought to have many healing properties and is what people use to rejuvenate themselves. It is used to restore balance so that you can have a better mindset in order to make decisions and think in general. This shows that the body, mind, and spirit all are connected with each other and are really just the science of life. It uses many other forms than just the hair-oiling technique but uses diet, lifestyle, physical activity, herbs, and especially yoga as well to balance it out. It is also very focused on the individual and how each person has their own personalized plan best for the person. This makes sense because no one really is exactly the same as each other which is shown throughout society and the world that we live in that allows us to make our own decisions about what our goals are as well. By taking this holistic approach, it shows the root problem or main goal that one is desiring. Everything is more tied together and connected than we have thought. It is even informational that the place you live in can affect how to balance yourself out starting from that. This made me connect ideas of how no single thing will describe a person because there are so many other great factors that make up a person based on their preferences. Since an imbalance will cause or lead to diseases, it is important to be aware of these factors and how to manipulate each of the doshas into your own personalized plan.

Next, Metabolism is a very interconnected concept as its complexity is similar to the representation of a circuit board. So it relates to many different areas of study because living things have many systems that connect and work together. Cells constantly carry out reactions to keep them healthy, whole, and alive. These chemical reactions take place in the cell's metabolism working with signal pathways, regulation flux or flow, and overall balance of the body. There needs to be an analysis of the entire body in consideration so that we can give an accurate diagnosis of what treatments or adjustments to our diet and exercise.

Relating to pathways, Diabetes is one of the most common diagnoses and affects the United States at large pretty prevalently. This is caused by the imbalance in cells and between organisms which will affect society and healthcare as it has many connections to systems in living things (biotic). There are two different types of diabetes which consist of type 1 and 2. Type 1 would be when you are born with basically called hyperglycemia, less prevalent, auto-antibodies present, and can be at any age. Type 1 is also known as a slowly progressive T-cell mediated autoimmune disease because of how slow it builds up based on the chemical breakdown of nutrients in the body is not at its best. Type 2 would be when it is something that you develop later in your life based on diet and lifestyle where it is more prevalent, makes up almost 90-95% of U.S. diabetes, and mostly in adults. So during a fasting state, there is a normal glucose regulation. Once you eat, there will be a spike in metabolism that activates the liver production is inhibited and sugar levels also spike but it is healthy to have the levels out slowly and progressively which is what it should be like. This can be obtained from a careful balance in pathways to control glucose are major hormones involved in this balance. 

With that information, there needs to be controlled glucose production and clearance from plasma glucose and that depends on where. It can be from hepatic insulin and muscle fat insulin. Based on these levels of glucagon and insulin, will dictate the actions of cells and organs. This is what allows the cells to take up glucose. This implies that hyperglycemia is harmful because the body will be above and have too high of levels glucose. For type 2, there has to be a history of gestational diabetes and high blood pressure, cholesterol, body fat, etc. to even put yourself at the risk of developing diabetes type 2. Looking at the big picture, other factors such as race/ethnicity and family history also play a big role in determining the diagnosis of diseases and illnesses because they can be part of the family genes that relate to certain diseases or factors that can either benefit or be traumatic to their health. 

For diabetes in general, it is very dependent on different factors that apply as well. So there are environment, social factors, and lifestyle which consists of diet and exercise. It is so up to what you can do for putting up with the odds of benefitting yourself the most as possible. The environment is an important thing to consider even though many people would say that it does not contribute to the underlying cause and why the disease affects them as much. This is because for many reasons we are so caught up in the moment of life where we are focused all of our energy in. This really shows that we need to take a holistic approach to examine our own lifestyle so we can do as much as possible to minimize the effects that it will bring. 

Beyond biology, diabetes is also quite important when compared with other things. There have been global pandemics, other top leading causes of death, and affecting our world at a base where things are out of our control. The pandemic is something huge that has affected each and every single one of us because we were impacted in one way or another. So that shows significance to our growth and learning of how to handle these situations as we haven’t really been able to experience that since there have been so much growth and advancements made throughout the years. In another sense, there are more diseases that are huge such as heart disease and other complications that are affecting even more individuals in their health. So it's important to focus on the things that we do have control over such as exercise, diet, and other factors that we do on a daily basis. Small things always accumulate to a large portion that is significant in our healthcare. Overall, metabolism is very interconnected and diabetes is just one of the many health complications that can affect the health of an individual at large.