Amblyopia: Case Study

I began writing the October edition of the Clear Spring Newsletter on Amblyopia after my first few Zoom calls with a LinkedIn connection. We had been discussing her interest in studying Chinese medicine abroad when, as is often the case in a clinical setting, the conversation turned towards a physical symptom that she’d been living with for some time. After our talk, it occurred to me that one of my closest childhood friends had the same condition, colloquially called ‘squint eye’ for those familiar with it.

My friend has had Amblyopia for 45 years. He's only suffered minimal organic damage to the eye's muscles/ tendons and the same goes for his vision. His depth perception is slightly poorer in the Amblyopia eye.

After telling my treatment plans to my teacher, Heiner Fruehauf, which included the use of Evergreen Pearls for the base formula and Spirit Pearls to assist with neurogenesis, he recommend including Shenxian Dushi Dan for ocular discomfort and degeneration of the physical eye muscles/ tendons. At this point, I was feeling that things were coming together.?

My friend has been a heavy drinker since we were young. I had been slowly coming to the conclusion that he was a functional alcoholic. Sugar Pearls will do nicely for that condition and round out his patent prescription.

When prescribing a large number of patents you should counsel your patients to adjust the dosage depending on the how their symptoms present. If his addiction cravings are strong then more Sugar Pearls are called for, and so on. The total number of Pearls (pills) should usually not exceed 12/ day and ideally kept at 8 Pearls for chronic conditions.

All this time I had been messaging my LinkedIn connection about the diagnosis that I had been working on for my friend, but I had yet to consult with her about what would serve as her Root patent. All of a sudden she had no time for Zoom, responded with short, abrupt messages, and has yet to get back to me about my original Amblyopia post. My discussions with my childhood friend also took on a skewed, if not harsh tone. All of this left me dry, floating on a log, adrift, so to speak.

These current incidents remind me of previous encounters that I've had with patients. I don't want to blame my friend and LinkedIn connection for the way the consults turned sour and yet I also don't feel like carrying this load myself. This dilemma speaks to the true nature of this problem.

Opposites thinking inevitably leads to suffering. Breaking through this dilemma means waking up. My teacher would instruct his students to hit the floor before answering a question. A loud, sudden noise, a hit from a stick, anything that would bring the attention back to the present moment, letting go of our thinking, and our attachment to trauma.

The true nature of this condition has its source in shame. When children are not being adequately taken care of there are reasons that mostly come from dark places. Living in a war torn country is dark enough but the sequela from war can often lead humans down a more nefarious path. Intergenerational trauma manifesting as personality disorders is a result that can lead to disorders like Amblyopia. Children, hit the floor and wake up..,

Boom, I've let the demon out of the bag folks!