Healing, Caring, Curing
Who heals? Who cares for the sick? Who cures?
Healing
Healing is the first cure, the natural cure. All living things heal, from the smallest cell to the largest plants and animals. Cellular healing consists of many natural growth processes and repair of cell damage. Multi-cellular organisms develop more sophisticated healing mechanisms, which are driven by cell reproduction – replacing damaged cells and consuming damaged or diseased cells, tissues, and infectious agents. Organisms with more complex bodies, limbs, and organs have complex systems of exercise and rest, consumption, and fasting that heal and promote healing cures at many layers of healthiness.
Caring
Caring is the second cure. Caring comes from communities. There is a gradation between healing and caring based on intentional actions. Healing occurs without intention – caring requires good intentions. We care for ourselves: our bodies, minds, spirits, and communities. We develop communities that care for individuals – and even for communities. All animals live in communities and care for each other. Even trees – as has been demonstrated scientifically, care for their offspring, sacrificing their nutrients to ensure the healthy growth of progeny.
Curing
Curing consists of intentional actions directed at an illness’s present cause. In this model, curing lies underneath the concept of healing cures, seeking to address underlying causes of illness. In most cases, the balance of the cure comes from healing. A dog bites or licks at a thorn and pulls it out. This is a minor surgery – when done by a veterinarian. Healing takes over naturally to repair the damage done by the thorn and, if necessary, by the surgery.
The above is taken from the paper The Nature and Evolution of Healing, Caring, and Curing published on Academia.edu and Researchgate.net in December 2023.
Theory of Cure
Healing, caring, and curing have many definitions. The paper The Nature and Evolution of Healing, Caring, and Curing defines these terms, and explores the definitions from the perspective of a comprehensive theory of cure, one that covers every type of curable illness, disease, and sickness.
The paper puts forward the concept that healing, caring, and curing are gradations between the above definitions, depending on the case.
Most injuries are healed, some require medical attention to be cured, and some require ongoing caring. Sometimes, caring cures an illness. Sometimes curing is a caring act. Sometimes caring heals, sometimes it cures without conscious intent.
The concepts of healing, caring, and curing are explored for attribute illnesses, where the cure is a single action - like prescribing an antibiotic, and also for causal illnesses, where the cure is an ongoing process required to maintain the cured state.
Who heals? Who cares for the sick? Who cures? The paper proposes a clear definition, and explores the implications of those definitions, concluding with:
Curing has several components
heal the damage
care for the person
address the cause
cure the illness.
To your health, tracy
Author: A New Theory of Cure