Hydrotherapy at Home Post 2

Like the cold-sock treatment, the second regimen is an excellent method of kick-starting the immune system to fight off any illness you might feel coming on or actually be in the midst of. Unlike the cold-sock treatment, this is a therapeutic application difficult to apply to yourself. It is a very powerful adjunct to any healing program. It is somewhat complicated, but well worth the trouble.

The first thing you need to do is gather your materials. You will need the following:
1 sheet
2 wool or acrylic (read warm!) blankets (1 large & 1 small work well)
4 hand towels
An accurate timer

Make sure your house is warm. Lay the larger wool blanket on the bed, and then lay the sheet on top of that. The patient must take his shirt off. Have the patient lie on his back on the bed so that the blanket and sheet can be wrapped around the entire body, but can also be easily opened. Go ahead and wrap the legs and feet, tucking in the coverings snugly. Cover the legs with the smaller blanket, folded down in such a way that later it can easily be pulled up over the patient’s torso. Leave the torso uncovered for now, or if the patient feels chilled, wrap with the sheet and large blanket while continuing with the next step.

Take two of the hand towels and run them under hot water, as hot as you can stand. Wring them out thoroughly, open up the patient’s coverings, and put the towels on the skin of the chest. Wrap up the patient with all the blankets and let the towels stay there for five minutes.

At minute four run one new towel under hot water and wring it out. When the timer goes off, put the new hot towel on the chest, with the two old towels over it. Re-cover the patient. Let the three hot towels stay there for one minute and in the meantime run another new towel under very cold water, again being sure to thoroughly wring it out.

When the minute is up, put the cold towel on top of the other three and flip all the towels over so that the cold towel is against the skin of the chest. Remove the top three towels, again wrap the patient snugly, and wait 10 minutes.

You’re not done yet! When the 10 minutes are up, remove the cold towel, flip the patient over onto their stomach and repeat the above steps, applying the towels to the skin of the upper back.

If your patient is anything like my son, he or she will squeal loudly about that cold towel! However, it does warm up pretty quickly, according to my boy, and as long as your patient is snugly wrapped, he is in no danger of getting chilled.

When I used this treatment on Harley, he was in the midst of a stubborn chest cold. We were of course treating it with herbs along with rest, lots of fluids, etc. The hydrotherapy regimen described above seemed to really help him turn the corner in getting well, and while it is a bit complicated, I would highly recommend it. It’s definitely less expensive than a trip to the doctor and/or a course of antibiotics!

I’ve been told you can do a modified form of this treatment on yourself, using the microwave to heat the towels (which is of course an option for treating someone else, too).

Hydrotherapy dates back to the time of Hippocrates, whose axiom was “First, do no harm.” It definitely fits that criteria and, in my opinion, there’s a reason a therapeutic modality sticks around for so long — it works! The next time you feel an illness looming, try the cold, wet sock treatment. Or if you have a sick child or other loved one, give the second, more complicated method a shot. The great thing about these regimens is that they can’t hurt. Either will definitely boost the immune system, preventing illness and/or shortening recovery time. And you get to be the healer, always a gratifying experience!