A Dou Shu Divination: A Rare Disease
By 巫垚
AI translated from the original Chinese.
I met a friend I hadn't seen for many years and we had a great talk. While chatting, she mentioned that an elder she respects had recently had a splitting headache for 4 days straight that even strong painkillers couldn't relieve, and hospital tests found a rare disease. Before she finished speaking, I cast a divination to see what was going on with the elder's health.
Time: the 酉 hour, January 17, 2021
Person: born ROC year 54
Event: splitting headache
From this data we get the following chart:
Again, there's not much to say from this chart, so as usual let's transform it and bring in the elder's heavenly stems:
The elder was born in 1965, an 乙巳 year; the main star is 太陰 (Tai Yin), which falls in the 丑 Palace.
The question is about health, so we bring in the data of 破軍 (Po Jun), representative of the lord of illness:
- 破軍: stem 丙, 廉貞 (Lian Zhen) becomes 化忌
- 破軍's 疾厄宮 (Health Palace): stem 辛, 文昌 (Wen Chang) becomes 化忌
The 廉貞 化忌 brought by 破軍 has no negative effect on the 1965 elder's 太陰 in 丑; but the 文昌 化忌 brought by 破軍's Health Palace directly affects 太陰.
- Me: The elder's main star is 太陰 in the 丑 Palace. 太陽 (Tai Yang) symbolizes the head, and with 文昌 and 文曲 (Wen Qu), there's a serious headache problem.
- Friend: Yes, four days of headache and strong painkillers haven't helped.
- Me: Actually, besides the headache, since 太陰 and 太陽 also represent the eyes, and 文昌 and 文曲 the lens, it looks like there's also high eye pressure, possibly even cataracts.
- Friend: Yes, this disease gradually blurs the vision.
- Me: Beyond that, 昌曲 also represent verbal expression. Does this disease also affect speech?
- Friend: This disease also damages hearing, so in the long run it does harm speech.
- Me: 貪狼 (Tan Lang) in 寅 is flanked by 化忌; its stem 戊 makes 天機 (Tian Ji) become 化忌; and 天機 in 卯, stem 己, makes 文曲 become 化忌. 天機 is a Wood star and 文曲 a Water star; when Water and Wood are in trouble, it generally points to problems with blood quality and immunity. What disease does the elder have?
- Friend: Vogt-Koyanagi-Harada syndrome.
- Me: Whatever the disease, its expression in the 丑 Palace has its poor points, but with proper treatment and medication, it should be possible to keep the disease from worsening so quickly.
Looking it up, Vogt-Koyanagi-Harada syndrome is also called Harada's disease. Broadly, its symptoms come from immune cells attacking many organs: the uvea of the eye, the meninges, the inner ear membranes, the hair and so on. This matches the symptoms shown by the Dou Shu stars quite well. Its prevalence is 15.5 per million, which is very rare. Because it is an autoimmune disorder, treatment isn't easy, but with active treatment the symptoms can be slowed and the disease even controlled so that it doesn't flare up. I hope my friend's elder will pursue treatment actively, and at least keep the current condition stable without worsening.