Cellular memory – what is it? How does it work to either cripple us and keep us stuck, or to help us effect deep healing and permanent change?
My first personal experience of cell memory was when someone offered me apple juice at least ten years after I had been hospitalized to have all my wisdom teeth extracted under a general anaesthetic.
After this procedure I was really ill, and swelled up like a balloon with bruising way down on my chest. It was so bad that when my parents came to visit me that night, my dad walked right past my bed, not recognizing me! The only thing I recall about that night in hospital was the excruciating pain, and at some point someone bringing me apple juice – not in a clean glass, but in one that had previously held my grape juice. Even with no science background at that point, I could not imagine why, with four gaping wounds in my mouth, they would not have brought me a clean glass. Suffice it to say, I went off apple juice. Years later when I decided to try it again, I nearly vomited from the memory of that excruciatingly painful surgery and recovery process.
I’m sure if you stop and think about it, each of you have had similar experiences – where some physical or emotional experience happened and there was a taste or a smell or a sound associated with it, to name just a few possible sensory experiences. I remember reading a short story by DH Lawrence called ‘The Odour of Chrysanthemums’. It was about the flowers in the house and then on the grave of a Welsh miner. Not only did the story have a profound impact on my psyche, but thereafter I had no desire to have a bouquet of chrysanthemums in my house or even growing in our garden.
My first clinical experience of cell memory as a health professional in my first year of acupuncture practice was when a young woman came in to be treated for PMS (Premenstrual Syndrome). What you need to know is that there are recipes for PMS treatment, or the therapist can choose to create a personalized treatment which brings the 12 pulses in the wrists of each hand into harmony and balance and sets the stage for the body to heal itself. I have always been the latter kind of practitioner, because I truly believe that each Body/Mind is unique and that the same treatment will not work for everyone even if the condition is similar.
Anyway, this was my first year of practice, my patient wanted relief from PMS symptoms, and as I inserted needles to balance the pulses she had a full on re-experience of a car accident she had been in. Her body writhed on the table in the same contortions that she had probably moved in at the impact of the other vehicle, and she let out a terrified scream. I knew this was certainly not PMS, and she quickly recounted her car accident experience.
Luckily, we had great success both healing her PMS and releasing the cell memory of her physical trauma with the car accident. But it started me thinking even more deeply about how it is all connected – physical, emotional, mental and spiritual. And how we can take a holistic approach to treating anything, whether with acupuncture or some other therapy.
Over the years I have had many more experiences like this in my clinical practice – where some simple physical intervention should fix something but doesn’t, until we address the emotional pattern that may be keeping it stuck. I guess the point is that we are complex multidimensional human beings – Body, Mind, Emotions and Spirit. It appears that Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) has always known that, and in fact has always treated the person and not the dis-ease – nothwithstanding the recipe approach referred to above.
I have been fascinated by the notion of cell memory for a very long time. Probably since I noticed that people who had an overwhelming experience like a car accident or a work injury or a sudden unexpected death experience of someone they loved began to exhibit some kind of illness – mental or physical – on the anniversary of that overwhelming experience. Sometimes it becomes a chronic ailment like an autoimmune disease. This interest was further sparked when I was studying with Deepak Chopra and he talked about cancer cells as ‘cells which have lost the memory of their dharma’ (or purpose in plain English).
The good news is that when we tap into the underlying energy template of our physiology and can revisit what may well have been the primary cause of our dysfunction, healing can and will occur.
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If you're interested in learning more about cellular memory, you can start by perusing this curated reading list from scientists and medical doctors offering first-hand accounts of healing.
If you'd like to explore the healing and restoration of cellular memory for yourself, we have created a Cellular Memory Essence Combination designed to support this process.
