The Spirit Catches You And You Fall Down A Hmong Child

In addition, relying on a doctor who does not share the same beliefs as one does can become fearful. Trusting the doctor for full treatment is necessary but when from a different cultural background it can prevent them on trusting them. According to a research article, Cross- Cultural Medicine a Decade Later, clearly states “when the basic belief structure of biomedicine and another set of health beliefs differs radically, problems and frustrations almost inevitably arise” (Barker, 1992, p.249). The central purpose of the research was to show whether or not health beliefs between patient and doctor differs will they find it difficult to interpret the symptoms and treatment variations to accommodate their beliefs. However, the doctor having faith in one’s health beliefs can sometimes be beneficial for the patients because they’ll be fully understood and not misjudged as being crazy. As stated by the author, for the article Chinese Health Beliefs of Older Chinese in Canada, “the findings support the previous prescriptive knowledge about Chinese health beliefs and illustrate the intergroup socio-cultural diversity that health practitioners should acknowledge in their practice” (Lai, 2009, 38). Like the Chinese, Hmong’s too first go to their shaman for traditional treatment rather than going to the doctor; to them an illness and their healing is more of a spiritual thing that

I feel that Anne Fadiman narrated the story of Lia Lee’s and her family’s life in intimate and tragic detail. The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down is a poignant depiction of the struggle between loving parents, hard-working medical professionals, and a very precious child caught in the middle of a tug-of-war. Ms. Fadiman very distinctly illustrates how the collision of two cultures indirectly led to the demise of a little seven- year old girl.

Other doctors who wants to be accepted by the Hmong could use a little to this philosophy.

What happens when two very different or even mutually exclusive cultural perspective are forced into contact with one another? In Anne Fadiman’s The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down, there is a division between the shamanistic insubordinate cultural of Hmong refugees in Merced, California and the cold analytical approach of western medicine. In the early 1980s, the child of a Hmong refugee family in Merced, California is born with epilepsy, her name is Lia Lee. Anne Fadiman traces the interaction between these two cultures and Lia’s disease, she reviews that misunderstanding and miscommunication can have calamitous consequences for all involved. The author introduces many characters throughout the book and they all

Most Hmong fear western medicine because of a lack of understanding, and a refusal to try to understand. The Lees had the importance of the medicine that was given to them explained to them many times, but they still believed that their thoughts about medicine and disease were far superior. In contrast, the Americans also refused to even attempt to understand the Hmong culture; even though slightly adapting to their medicine would have likely made the Lees much more compliant. This general misunderstanding of the other culture is best summarized by Fadiman, saying,

Medicine, to the modern day world, is a way of healing the sick and helping people experience life to their full potential. It is an ingredient of a culture that allows the culture to survive through decades and centuries at a time. But what if the medicine that we know as helpful is actually harmful? When a child cuts their knee the first thing an adult would do is check the scrape and then assess the damage. After assessing the damage, the adult would normally plan a course of treatment to ensure the child would not lose a limb in the near future. After treating the child with a mixture of antibacterial wipes, bandages and ice cream, what if the child is not better, but actually worse? That is what happens when you compare the medical practices of the Hmong to the medical practices of the Americans, both cultures believe that the others will cause more damage than good in respect to healing the soul and body.

The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down (1997) is an ethnography written by Anne Faidman. It tells the story of Lia Lee, a Hmong girl with severe epilepsy, and her family’s journey with managing the condition and the cultural barriers that posed great challenges in Lia’s care. Lia was diagnosed with epilepsy at age 1. It was her family’s opinion that the condition was a spiritual gift. Lia’s parents, Nao Kao and Foua, were wary of the American medical system, preferring to treat Lia in the Hmong way. Under the more spiritually focused care of her parents, Lia continued to have severe seizures; at the age of 4 ½, she slipped into a coma that would last the rest of her life. This book serves as a testament to the importance of cultural competency

Many years ago, an epileptic Hmong girl named Lia Lee entered a permanent vegetative state due to cross-cultural misunderstanding between her parents and her doctors. An author named Anne Fadiman documented this case and tried to untangle what exactly went wrong with the situation. Two key players in her narrative were Neil Ernst and Peggy Philp, the main doctors on Lia’s case. As Fadiman describes, “Neil and Peggy liked the Hmong, too, but they did not love them… [W]henever a patient crossed the compliance line, thus sabotaging their ability to be optimally effective doctors, cultural diversity ceased being a delicious spice and became a disagreeable obstacle.” (Fadiman 265) At first glance, this statement seems to implicate Neil and Peggy as morally blameworthy for a failure to be culturally sensitive enough. However, upon further inspection of the rest of the book, it becomes clear that Neil and Peggy’s failure to be more culturally sensitive to their Hmong patients was caused by structural issues in the American biomedical system. To prove this point, this paper will first present a background to Lia’s case, then discuss possibilities for assigning blame to Neil and Peggy, then show evidence for the structural issues in American biomedicine, before finally concluding.

The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down by Anne Fadiman is about the cross-cultural ethics in medicine. The book is about a small Hmong child named Lia Lee, who had epilepsy. Epilepsy is called, quag dab peg1 in the Hmong culture that translates to the spirit catches you and you fall down. In the Hmong culture this illness is sign of distinction and divinity, because most Hmong epileptics become shaman, or as the Hmong call them, txiv neeb2. These shamans are special people imbued with healing spirits, and are held to those having high morale character, so to Lia's parents, Foua Yang and Nao Kao Lee, the disease was both a gift and a curse. The main question in this case was could Lia have survived if her parent's and the doctors overcame

The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down is the story by author Anne Fadiman, which explores the clash between a small county hospital in California and a refugee family from Laos over the care of Lia Lee, a Hmong child diagnosed with severe epilepsy. Lia’s parents and her doctors both wanted what was best for Lia, but the lack of communication between them led to tragedy.1The lack of communication due to cultural misunderstanding, mistrust, lack empathy, and poor health literacy led to care being comprised for Lia, which also affected both her parents and healthcare providers.

In ‘The Spirit Catches You And You Fall Down’, Lia, a Hmong baby girl, is born to a Hmong family living in California as refugees away from their war torn land in Laos. In Laos the Lee’s where farmers and lived in the country according to their Hmong traditions and beliefs. In California they barely understood the language, much less Western culture or medicinal practices. In Hmong tradition, illness was seen as a spiritual problem rather than a physical problem and a Shaman that practiced spiritual ceremonies and used natural remedies was sought to prevent or cure certain illnesses and/or diseases; so when Lia suffered her first seizure at the age of 3 months and was taken to Mercer

I absolutely believe that the author was evenhanded in her presentation of the two cultures. Throughout the book it was clear that she tried to look at everything from as many perspectives as possible to accurately portray the Hmong culture and medical culture.

“In the Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down”, Anne Fadiman explores the subject of cross cultural misunderstanding. This she effectively portrays using Lia, a Hmong, her medical history, the misunderstandings created by obstacles of communication, the religious background, the battle with modernized medical science and cultural anachronisms. Handling an epileptic child, in a strange land in a manner very unlike the shamanistic animism they were accustomed to, generated many problems for her parents. The author dwells on the radically different cultures to highlight the necessity for medical communities to have an understanding of the immigrants when treating them.

The book titled The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down: Talks about a Hmong Child, Her American Doctors, and the Collision of Two Cultures written by Anne Fadiman. Anne Fadiman is an American essayist and reporter, who interests include literary journalism. She is a champion of the National Book Critics Circle Award for Nonfiction, the Salon Book Award, and the Los Angeles Times Book Prize for Current Interest. In the book, Anne Fadiman explores the clash between a county hospital in California and a refugee family from Laos over the health care of Lia Lee. Lia Lee is a Hmong child diagnosed with severe epilepsy, whose parents and the doctors wanted the best treatment for her, but the lack of communication cause a tragedy. The essay paper will state and explain what went wrong between Lia’s family and the doctors. The central point is a lack of understanding between them leads to Lia’s tragedy.

I have to admit when I first read “The spirit catches you and you fall down” I thought it would be pretty boring turns out its one of the most interesting books I have ever read. The cultural conflicts can apply to anyone and knowing a little bit more now what the Hmong people have actually gone through can make everyone develop a great amount of respect for the culture. The Lee family continuously went full force colliding with the American ways in order to protect their traditions so they could preserve their culture. Unfortunately, in the end it didn’t help them but that was all they knew considering the fact that that the doctors at MCMC hospital didn’t really go out of their way to explain procedures it only makes sense for the Lee family to revert back to what they know in their traditions.