We all have our own affinities. When teaching yoga I love to teach about organ systems. There is nothing more exciting than helping someone to release their organ bodies in a yoga pose and see the pose soften and expand.
With acupuncture one of my affinities is scar treatments. A scar treatment for those of you who haven’t had one (most of the world) is a way of needling perpendicular to the scar in order to help the scar heal.
Most acupuncturists see scar treatments as frivolous or cosmetic. They say if there is significant pain or other health issue, there is no reason to waste precious treatment time on a scar. Well, I respectfully disagree.
We don’t get to choose what is important in the body. We don’t get to ignore things with the hope that we can heal everything else and then get to that. It is a package deal. If a scar is large enough and wasn’t properly healed it can create a significant blockage in the organ meridians. Blockage in one end of a meridian can wreck havoc throughout the rest of the channel.
It is hard to explain to patients that their overall state of health can be improved by restarting the energy flow in the area of an old scar. It is an area of acupuncture that I think is important for chronic issues.
What’s In A Scar?
Think about the scars on your body. Examine them with these questions to rate the state of their recovery.
- Is the scar flat? A healthy scar should not indent the skin. It should be level with the rest of the body.
- What color is the scar? A healthy scar is almost always whitish or peachy depending upon the color of your skin. An unhealthy scar retains its pinkish or reddish coloring from the recovery process.
- Can you feel the width of the scar when you run your fingers over it? A healthy scar should feel like skin. Sometimes old scars that have healed well will be thinner the skin around it. Almost as if you can feel that the skin around the scar has greater density than the scar tissue. An unhealthy scar will be bumpy like a stitched seam where you caught up too much of the other fabric by accident.
- Does it move? A healthy scar moves away from the muscle layers below the skin and is moveable the way skin is moveable. Push it away and it slides. An unhealthy scar grips on to the layers beneath it and won’t budge.
Scars That Should Be Treated
- Brand new post-surgery scars (get it done now and speed up the recovery process)
- Old surgical scars that require large sections of the body
- Scars around joints that still have stiffness or pain
- Scars that still twinge on occasion even years later
- Scars that you find unattractive in any way
- Large abdominal, low back scars or spinal scars (areas are just too important)
For more information check out my scar treatment page on my website.