PCOS and Healing: My 3rd Ayurveda Panchakarma Treatment
Coimbatore, Tamil Nadu, India
Om Namo Bhagavate Maha Sudharshana Vasudevaya Dhanvantaraye
Amrutha Kalasa Hasthaaya Sarva Bhaya Vinasaya Sarva Roka Nivaranaya
Thri Lokya Pathaye Thri Lokya Nithaye Sri Maha Vishnu Swarupa Sri Dhanvantri Swarupa
Sri Sri Sri Aoushata Chakra Narayana Swaha
I bow down and pray to the Lord Dhanvantari who is the incarnation of Lord Vishnu and called as Sudarshana Vasudev Dhanvantari.
You hold in your hands, the Kalasha (copper vessel) filled with the nectar of immortality. Lord, you can remove all fears and diseases.
You protect all the three worlds (heaven, earth, underworld) and you are the well wisher of all created beings. You are the Lord of Ayurveda and the manifestation of Lord Vishnu.
You are the ultimate healer of all the living beings. We worship you and pray to you.
- Prayer to Lord Dhanvanthari, the Lord of Medicine and Healing
I’m writing to you from my Ayurvedic Healing Center in South India where I’m in day 6 of 27 of Panchakarma treatment (Panch - five; translates to five therapies or procedures), a process that cleans Aam, or undigested waste and toxins from the body. This is my third time getting treatment to balance my hormones and it will be the longest I’ve spent here - my first treatment was 19 days (2017) and my second one was 21 days (2019). After my first treatment, Ayurveda did for me what numerous doctors told me was not possible - to fully balance my hormones. All within 6 months.
After my first treatment, I wrote a blog post (Re) Balancing My Hormones, PCOS, and Where I Am Now. In that post I shared more about what I did at that time to improve my hormonal health.
In addition to having a tremendous impact on my health, that first treatment catalyzed my journey into Ayurveda and holistic healing modalities. I began informally studying and experimenting on myself - I began cycle syncing which meant matching my food, exercise, work schedule to the seasons and the four cycles of the month (menstrual, ovulation, luteal, and follicular). I cut out alcohol, other external substances, matched my daily routine to the Ayurvedic system, and started seed cycling - eating specific seeds to balance my hormones during different times of the month. I’ll write another post that goes deeper into how I did this, but it was these things in conjunction to the treatment that forever changed my relationship to the inner workings of my body and mind.
6 years after my first treatment, I’m now formally studying to be an Ayurvedic practitioner (and likely moving to the doctor track). I started my current company, SHE Health based on my own spiritual and emotional healing journey as well the basic principles of Ayurveda. Back then I considered formally studying Ayurveda, but decided to start a company first. I had my practical reasons of why I’d do the latter (like the urgency I felt behind SHE’s mission and deciding my early ish to mid-20’s was the best time to take this risk). In retrospect, I also needed to go deeper into my own healing journey before knowing how to heal others.
Since then I’ve gone deep into my own wounding through healing generational trauma and releasing pain I’ve carried around for most of my life. Some of this work was catalyzed by the ending of relationships, work failure, and navigating existing relationships. The moments that break us help us go through a death and rebirth cycle like the Phoenix rising from the ashes. All of it has been a gift - it has made me who I am, brought more light into my life, and led me to my spiritual teachers.
I know now that I needed to go through my own unique healing as a first generation South Asian woman to recognize how our own unique body types, history, trauma and generational pain can manifest as specific physical ailments. With the added context of studying Ayurvedic medicine as well as my personal experiences, I’m learning so much more as I go through treatment this time.
As I move through this process, I’ll share details about my treatment and journey studying Ayurveda. I’ll be posting on this blog, my newsletter, and on Instagram. If you want to be emailed every time I send a newsletter or write a blog post, you can subscribe to my Substack here. Can’t wait to stay in touch ❤️
i love you. i appreciate you. thanks for reading.
Love,
Rina
P.S. Since I’m pretty secluded, I’ve been reading a few books. Here are some of the books: (linking a thrift book website because let’s start thrifting more books, people:))