Is a headache a symptom? or is it an illness, or a disease? Do we cure symptoms? Illnesses? Or only diseases?

Does aspirin cure headaches?

“A headache for example might be the result of a cold, a migraine, high blood pressure, meningitis or a brain tumour, each requiring a different treatment rather than a “cure for headache“. – Craig Thornbur – Theories of Medicine

What does the Theory of Cure say?

In the theory of cure, we cure by addressing “curable cases of illnesses.” A cure is an action, not a thing, that addresses a cause of illness. An aspirin cannot cure – but the action of taking one might cure.

An illness is the intersection of a cause and its negative consequences, the signs and symptoms of the cause. If we successfully address the cause with an action – the negative consequences will disappear. The illness will be cured. If the illness also caused damage – that damage is another illness, requiring another cure. However, a simple headache is just a symptom, not an indication of other damage.

When we only address the negative consequences, the cause is still present. In many cases, the cause will recreate the negative symptoms. The illness was not cured, or perhaps it was only temporarily cured. In today’s medical theory, temporary cures do not exist. In the new theory of cure, temporary cures are common, sometimes effective tools on the path to a permanent cure.

In the theory of cure, an illness is cured when:

• the cause has been successfully addressed,
• when signs and symptoms have disappeared or dropped below the level of an illness, and
• no more medicines are needed for that illness.

Is cured vs Has Been Cured

Sometimes a case of illness “is cured” without conscious actions. Sometimes an illness “has been cured.” The phrase “has been cured” indicates that the cure was a consequence of intentional actions – by ourselves, family, friends, or others – perhaps professional medical assistance. Healing is unconscious, unintentional curing. Curing is a conscious action to cure. “Is cured” is a statement that the cause is no longer present, no longer causing illness. “Has been cured” refers to intentional curative actions to address the cause.

The common cold is cured when
– the infection is gone,
– when the signs and symptoms have disappeared, and
– when no more medicines are needed.

However, we can only say that a case of the common cold “has been cured by…x” when we believe that the action x is responsible for the cured status. At present, our medical systems claim “there is no cure for the common cold” because they do not believe any action can be responsible for a cold cured. Most cases of the common cold are easily cured, without medicines. The same is true of most illnesses.

Most cases of headache are easily cured, without medicines.

In many cases, the signs and symptoms of a headache are the only present cause of the illness. The other causes are stresses in the past, not accessible to present cure actions. Some cases of headache are best viewed as simply symptoms of distress, without a cure cause. When our health, healing, or time, addresses the stress – the headache is gone. Cured. In these cases, an aspirin cares for the pain as the headache passes.

Some cases of headache have a present cause, causing signs and symptoms of the illness. Addressing the signs and symptoms, without addressing the cause, does not cure.

Healing is curing. Curing intentionally, is not healing. Curing and healing address the present cause of the illness. Caring only addresses signs and symptoms, but not cause, as illustrated in this image.

The overlapping areas indicate situations where a single healing, caring, or curing accomplishes multiple goals . Sometimes, caring addresses cause – with or without intention. The distinctions between healing and curing are not always clear. Sometimes, a single action might be healing, curative, and caring.

Let’s look at a few examples.

Dehydration Headache

The presence of dehydration can cause a headache. If we take an aspirin to deal with the pain, but do not address the dehydration, then once the aspirin wears off – the headache will reoccur. In this case, the headache is the symptom, dehydration is the cause. The illness is only cured when the cause is addressed. In this case, the aspirin is only a temporary cure.

Dehydration can be caused by excessive consumption of alcohol in the past “the morning after the night before.” A hangover is often cured by healing and our natural life processes. We wake up in the morning, drink some water, juice, coffee, or tea, and gradually, the dehydration fades away. We might take an aspirin to diminish or stop the pain – but we don’t expect it to cure the headache, nor to cure the dehydration. We take the aspirin – and see that the headache is cured. But we understand that taking the aspirin was not the cure. If it helped us to get moving, helped us to re-hydrate. Perhaps it was a part of the cure, an action of caring for the sufferer, alleviating the suffering as the natural cure progresses.

Like the common cold, many people want to find a miracle cure for a hangover – even though most hangovers are easily cured by healthy actions, and few by medicines, and none by miracles.

The dehydration that causes a headache often causes other negative signs and symptoms. We ignore the dry mouth, the muscle aches, the nausea, because the headache is the most severe. If we cure the dehydration illness – all of the signs and symptoms will disappear. But an aspirin can’t do that.

“Diseases which arise from repletion are cured by depletion; and those that arise from depletion are cured by repletion; and in general, diseases are cured by their contraries.” (Hippocrates)

The only dehydration cure is re-hydration.

Injury Headache

A whack on the side of the head can cause a headache. In this case, the “whack on the side of the head” is in the past. We cannot go into the past to address it. The head is aching because it is injured. It may take time for the injury to heal – and depending on the damage, it might never heal completely.

In this case, taking an aspirin is a palliative treatment, a symptomicine, caring – not curing. We don’t expect it to cure. It makes us feel better. We understand that the aspirin will wear off and we will decide to take it again, or not, as the symptoms fade.

Stroke Headache

Having a stroke can cause a headache. The stroke that causes a headache might be mild, almost invisible, moderate, or severe and deadly. Taking an aspirin for the headache not only cannot cure – it might cause the patient to avoid medical attention for some time. The aspirin might allow the condition to grow worse by making the person feel better.

Can stroke be cured? The short answer is yes, stroke can be cured — but it occurs in two stages. First, doctors administer specific treatment to restore normal blood flow in the brain and stop further damage. Then, the patient participates in rehabilitation to cure the secondary effects that result from the stroke.
Flint Rehab: Can Stroke Be Cured?

In this case, the stroke is the illness to be cured. A headache is a sign or symptom. An aspirin might appear to cause a temporary cure, but it does not address the cause of the pain, the damage of the stroke.

Unknown Cause

What if we don’t know the cause of the headache, and we take an aspirin, and it goes away?

When we view the headache as the “cause of our discomfort” and the aspirin addresses that cause, then taking an aspirin is a cure. If there is only one headache – and now it’s gone, that’s sufficient. Some might argue that the cause of the headache was not addressed by the aspirin, but such debate is moot. The headache is gone. Maybe it was just a temporary status, a temporary pain, cured by the aspirin.

Chronic Headache

When a headache is chronic, or repeating, we can view the series of headaches as a higher level illness with a higher level chronic or repeating cause.

The cure of a chronic or repeating illness is to address the chronic nature of the cause.

If, for example, someone gets a hangover headache every Sunday morning, we might guess the cause – excessive drinking on Saturday night. If we successfully address that cause, by eliminating the Saturday night excesses, the chronic or repeating headaches will be cured. This cure does not fail when -next year – the patient drinks too much and gets a headache. A single case is not a chronic or repeating headache. The chronic headache was cured.

The cure for chronic or repeating headaches does not cure any specific case of headache. It also does not stop the patient from occasionally overindulging and getting a new, non-chronic headache.

Cure-ious Quotes

The theory of cure gives us a wider perspective, a way to look at quotes about cure in different ways, from a broader perspective, helping us to develop a more comprehensive view of cure.

The Theory of Cure website has a random “cure quote generator” that presents a random cure quote from a growing library of over 2700 quotes about cure from hundreds of different authors. Cure-ious quotes is a set of posts that explore those quotes from the perspective of the theory of cure.

To your health, tracy
Author: A New Theory of Cure

We can compare a flat tire to an illness, and its repair to a cure. Why should we make this comparison?

Medical cures are, frankly, full of baggage. It is illegal, for example, to market a cure in the USA unless it has been approved by the FDA. The FDA, however, has no guidelines for approval – nor for refusing to approve any cure. The FDA does not even have a complete definition of a cure for most diseases, nor for many cases of curable diseases. Neither does any current or historical, conventional or alternative, medical theory or practice. Perhaps this is the reason many, perhaps most doctors avoid the word cure, are uncomfortable talking about cures with their patients, and advise their staff to avoid the word.

The concepts of the new theory of cure (there is no old theory of cure) are general enough to be applied to any intentional system and to any component or process of an intentional system. Living things are intentional systems. Humans create use, and take advantage of intentional systems ranging from short term creation and use of a stick tool to complex interconnected economic systems of countries. Any physical or process component of an intentional system might be faulty or broken, judged sick and in need of a cure.

The theory of cure applies to intentional systems, not to things. We cannot cure a rock. It dead. It’s not a system, much less an intentional system. We cannot cure the solar system, nor the system of air movement that creates a tornado or hurricane either. We call these systems because of their complexity, but they have no life intentions.

A tire is part of a transportation system, has many components, and is connected to many other components. It might function poorly or fail for many reasons. In each case we can view the problem as an illness to be cured.

By studying flat tire illnesses, their causes and cures, we can better understand many illnesses and their cures, without encountering the contradictions and the baggage of our current medical systems. Let’s begin.

Most illnesses are trivial, easily cured. We get a cold, a cut or bruise, minor indigestion, or the flu – and our body cures it with little conscious attention. We might scratch it, patch it for a while, rest to recover, or exercise to loosen up a stiffness. It is cured. We forget about most of our illness. They are cured so easily we rarely call them a cures. We think all cures are hard, impossible, miracles.

As we study flat tire illnesses, we will learn that most flat tires are also trivial, easily cured. We might even design, or buy “self-healing” tires. Some flat tires cures are more difficult, requiring assistance from our communities, and some require the work of a professional, a tire doctor. Some are only cured by replacement, or transplantation. Some are not worth curing, or incurable. The same is true of our illnesses.

1. Jen’s Tire is Flat: An Illness

Last Tuesday, Jen noticed her front bike tire was flat. A quick examination revealed a thumbtack. Jen, a serious biker, has seen flat tires before.

The Cure – Jen took out a patch kit. Removed the tire and tube, found the hole, roughed it up with the sandpaper, brushed it clean, applied the glue and held the patch to the tire for a few minutes while the glue cured. She put the tube and tire back on the wheel and pumped it up with a hand pump. It held. After a short ride, , no problems. A few days later, Jen had completely forgotten the flat tire and its cure. It was gone. Not important. It was no miracle cure, just a fact of life and bikes.

Discussion:

1. Most flat tires, like most illnesses, are trivial, easily cured. Many illnesses are cured by our own actions, often aided by unconscious processes or actions. Unconscious growth is a powerful curative. Jen diagnosed and cured her flat tire illness without a second thought.
2. There were many possible cure alternatives. There are manufacturing standards for tire patch kits – or Jen, being resourceful might have made one from an old inner tube and some adhesive from a hardware store. Jen might have decided to use a glue patch, or a non-glue patch, faster but not as effective. Maybe it was time to buy a new tube – a more expensive, time consuming cure – but perhaps more reliable and effective in the long term. Every case of illness has many potential cures.
3. The cure is to address the present cause or causes. In this case – the causes were simple, elementary – a tack that caused a hole in the tire. This is similar to a small skin puncture or wound from a thorn or a nail. Remove the tack or thorn, if it is still present, and promote healing. A bodily cure takes longer because it is accomplished by healing, but the process is the same. We clean it off, maybe apply some approved antiseptic, or perhaps vinegar or moonshine, protect it with a bandage while it heals, cures. The injury is the present cause of our problem, the cause of the illness – when the injury is addressed, healed, the illness is cured.
4. We might use the phrase “has been cured” when the cure was a result of conscious actions. Many illnesses “are cured” entirely from unconscious actions or processes. Jen didn’t have a self-healing bike tire – so the tire puncture required conscious actions. Even a self-healing tire might require some assistance from an air pump.

2. Jen’s Granddaughter’s Cure: A Sickness

A few weeks later, Jen’s granddaughter, Joey (short for Josephine) had a similar flat tire, but she kept riding the bike, unaware, unconscious of any problem. Jen saw the bike swaying wildly and took a closer look. The tire was deadly flat.

The Cure: Jen took the time to show Joey the problem, the flat tire illness, and how to cure it. First, she asked Joey to find the nail, the cause of the flat tire – which Jen had already seen. She gave Joey a pen to mark the spot and then asked if Joey could pull it out with a set of pliers. Done. Then they took the bike into the garage and Jen explained how to remove the wheel and the tire, and watched as Joey did it herself. Jen explained how track the hole to the tube, and how to find it exactly by rubbing some spit on it. Joey roughed up the tire, picked a patch, and spread some glue, as Jen advised – not to thick, but covering an area wider than the patch. Joey applied the patch – getting some glue on her fingers – not a problem. Tire repair glue is not crazy-glue. She held the tire and patch together it for a few seconds and left it to cure for a few minutes.

Joey already knew how to pump it up. Jen explained the need to check the patch before putting it all back together. It held. Let the air out, and put the wheel back together. Joey was off again, wiser for her tire’s illness. She had hardly noticed the flat tire, and now she understood the symptoms, the signs, and the cure.

Discussion:

1. Many diagnoses and cures come from individual actions. Some come from our communities. It’s hard to understand everything by ourselves – our communities bring intelligences together.
2. In the theory of cure, an illness is what the individual suffers from and wants cured. A sickness, on the other hand, is an illness judgment by someone else and a disease is an illness judgement by a professional. Joey didn’t even know her tire was flat, much less how it was cured. No mechanic was consulted. Grandparents often cure ignorance – as well as illnesses – with knowledge and vision gained from life experiences.
3. Most illnesses are so trivial we don’t go to a doctor. Many cures come from personal and community actions – without assistance from a professional or medical community.

Bob’s Flat Tire: A Disease

Bob learned to ride a bike as a child, but never really spent much time at it. Now, as an adult, he decided to buy a new bike and explore the parks near his home. One day, when he was nearing home, he noticed his rear tire was making a strange noise and dragging. Flat tire. Knowing nothing about bike tires – he took it to the bike doctor at the store. There were lots of people there, buying bikes and bike parts. Bob was asked to leave the bike for repair. He walked a short way home.

The Cure: The mechanic examined the tire, removed a nail, and made a phone call to Bob.

Bob: “Hello?”

Mechanic: “Hey, this is Judy, at the bike store. Your bike tire has a hole from a nail. I’ve removed the nail. I can recommend two alternatives.“

Bob (wondering what’s to come): “Yes?”

Judy: “We can patch the tube, and it will hold up quite well. But patches are not perfect cures. Sometimes they work loose, or stiffen up and cause other problems. Alternatively, I can replace the entire tube and it will be as good as new.“

Bob: “What’s the cost?“

Judy: “Patching is $22. The tube is a bit more expensive, but not a lot. Installed, it’s $25.30 with tax.“

Bob: “That’s hardly any difference. Go ahead with the new tube. Thanks.“

And the tire is cured – good as new, just as Judy promised.

Discussion:

1. Sometimes even a simple illness prompts the attention of a professional. This is more likely to occur for problems we haven’t yet experienced or don’t understand.
2. Most flat tire illnesses – even those at the bike shop – are trivial, easily cured.
3. The bike shop, however, is in the business of selling things. A flat tire has many alternative cures – and some of them are more profitable. By replacing the tube, Judy can make money on the repair and on the tube as well. Replacing a tube is faster than patching a tire, less error prone, and less likely to lead to side effects or remission in the short term or the long term. The sale is easily justified. In Jen or Joey’s case, replacing the tube would have necessitated a trip to the store, some extra expenses, and a longer wait, but for Bob – it’s the best cure.

Summary: Illness, Sickness, Disease

We’ve seen three similar illnesses from three perspectives – an illness (cured by Jen), a sickness (cured by Jen, a grandparent) and a disease (cured by Judy, a professional, a bike doctor). This diagram illustrates the three perspectives – and the agreement reached by different participants.

This diagram helps us to understand that an illness is not a “thing” it is something we observe and judge, which can also be judged cured. In the first case, no agreement was required. In the second, the child came to an agreement with Jen. In the third, the rider and the bike mechanic came to an agreement. If it was a car tire, and Bob had insurance – an additional agreement would be require to reimburse the expenses. Most of our illnesses are minor, not requiring community involvement, never seen by a doctor.

Although the past cause – the nail, and the initial signs and symptoms of these three illnesses were identical – the tire was flat -the perspectives, the specific situations, and the cures varied. In the case involving the bike mechanic, a new cure appeared. In many cases of illness, there can be disagreement about the actual illness and the best cure. Joey, for example, did not consider her bike to have any problems until it was pointed out by Jen.

There were also three different cures for the illnesses. Jen’s tire was cured with a simple patch. Joey’s tire required external advice and assistance. Bob’s tire was cured by a professional, with a new tube. Of course, all three needed to be reinflated as well. These curative actions addressed different causes of illness and different cure expectations.

Theory of Cure

In each case, the cure was to address the present cause and causes. Once an illness, or a flat tire occurs – prevention is of no use, a cure is needed. None of the riders could go back in time and avoid the nail. A flat tire might function badly for a short time, but failure to cure can result in more damage. The cure improved the healthiness of the tire, improving the bike’s functionality.

As we explore 101 flat tire cures, we will see many more types of flat tires – and encounter many types of cures.

to your health, tracy

Author: A New Theory of Cure

It’s not as obvious, but we can’t cure alcoholism, anorexia, arthritis, back pain, Crohn’s, cancer, depression, diabetes, epilepsy, fibromyalgia, gout, hypertension, heart disease, immune system disorders, even obesity, and many more. Cured is not even defined for any of these diseases. The list goes on and on. Were they always incurable? What happens when a case is cured?

There are several patterns in the above list. All are non-infectious diseases. We have no medical nor scientific definition nor test for any non-infectious disease cured. When a non-infectious disease is cured, we can’t tell. We might know a cure is present, both doctor and patient might claim a cure – but proof is not possible. We say maybe it’s remission. We never say cure.

There are more patterns…

All are chronic diseases. Cured is not defined for any chronic disease. We have them until we die, even if they go into remission for decades. We might lose weight, be once diagnosed, we can’t cure obesity.

Some diseases on the list are also mental disorders. The American Psychiatric Association (APA) referring to diseases, prefers the term disorder. At the same time, they diligently ensure though every mental disorder aligns with a disease code in the World Health Organization’s list of disease codes. Otherwise, statistics would be compromised. The APA doesn’t claim mental disorders are incurable. Instead, they work to “improve understanding, reduce stigma, and advance the treatment and eventual cures for these conditions.” (DSM-5 2013). Eventual cures? The APA does not have a definition of cured for any mental disorder. As a result, we have no medical nor scientific ability to validate or disprove a cure of autism, ADHD, depression, bipolar, or any other mental disorder, when it occurs.

Some are also nutritional diseases. A google search for “cure for anorexia” offers: to treat eating disorders, to help us get rid of anorexia, and recover completely. But the word cure is not used. The Mayo Clinic in three long web-pages describes anorexia, diagnosis and treatment, offering doctors and departments – but the word cure does not appear. Their pages for OBESITY refer to a not-cure once, “But weight-loss surgery isn’t a miracle obesity cure,” but never to cure. A cure, apparently, is a miracle. There is, according to Malachy McCourt, “no recovery from alcoholism, it is an incurable disease. And it also is a disease that tells you, you don’t have a disease.” Amazon offers several books claiming cures for alcoholism, including “The Medically Proven Way To Eliminate Alcohol Addiction” – but none are recognized officially. The prestigious Mayo clinic webpages on alcoholism use the word cure only once, another not-cure “although it won’t cure.”  (Mayo Clinic 2019) Patients might be cured, might be diagnosed as NED (No Evidence of Disease), but we can’t prove the cured state, much less the cause of the cure.

The more we look, the worse it gets. The common cold, influenza, and measles, AIDS – and COVID, are infectious diseases caused by a virus. We have no cures for any disease caused by a virus. Even though most people who get the common cold, measles, even COVID recover. We don’t use the word cure. Can AIDS be cured? There is no definition of and no test for AIDS cured.

Part of the problem is medical chauvinism.

1. If it wasn’t cured by a medicine or a surgery, it’s not a medical cure.
2. If it’s not a medical cure, it doesn’t count.
3. If it doesn’t count, it’s not counted.
4. There are no statistics of cured for any disease outside of research studies.

It’s interesting to search for a medical definition of cure. Medical dictionaries use the word cure a lot, in many ways, without presenting a definition for cure. There is no agreed medical definition of cure for most diseases.

We might wish to believe that when a cure is found in a clinical study, big pharma swoops in and takes it to market. Or we might fear that, when big pharma discovers a cure, they hide it away – because cures are not profitable. The truth although not obvious, is much simpler. When a cure occurs in a clinical study that does not have a defined test for cured – the cure can only be ignored. When a cure occurs on the placebo arm, it is doubly ignored.

We can easily demonstrate that most clinical studies do not define, and therefore cannot test for cured. Clinicaltrials.gov today offers “382,731 research studies in all 50 states and in 220 countries.” A search for trials with the word cure, lists only 6,427, less than 2%. As we look closer, it only gets worse. Many of those few references to cure are acronyms like Culturally Relevant Exercise for Diabetes (CURE-D), patented devices (that don’ t cure) like CURE-EX device or non-curative treatments like “Thermal Cures in the Treatment of Multiple Sclerosis.”  

Our failure to recognize cured has extended beyond conventional medicine to all so-called alternative medical practices. No chiropractic, osteopathic, or naturopathic treatment can possibly cure any disease, because cured is not defined for any disease treatment used by these doctors. Conventional medicine can’t cure the same diseases. What happens when a chiropractic treatment cures frozen shoulder or back pain? Nothing. What happens when a conventional medical physical therapists cures them? The same nothing. This failed logic extends to Traditional Chinese Medicine, Ayurveda, osteopathy, homeopathy, and naturopathy. What happens when any of these practices cure a disease? Nothing. Cured is not defined for alternative medical practices. In most cases, no proof of cured is possible. Occasionally, it is possible to prove a cure of an infectious disease. These cures are easily ignored – those diseases can be cured by approved conventional  medicines.

Our current theories, definitions, and understandings of cure are a failure. We can’t cure most diseases. We can’t even tell if they have been cured. Current statistics for the COVID show, worldwide, at least 170 million patients RECOVERED. Not one cured. The count is updated every day. Cured? Never.

It’s time for a change. It’s time for A New Theory of Cure. One that covers every curable medical condition, every curable disease or disorder. But where do we start?

The book A New Theory of Cure defines a framework of a general, comprehensive definition of cured for any curable illness, disease, or medical condition, whether the cause be in diet, body, mind, spirits, community, environments – or somewhere else instead.

Let’s begin a study of cure. Let’s develop the theory of cure.

To your health, tracy
Founder: Healthicine

ps. Is there an old theory of cure? If you can find one, I’d love to know about it.