Leisha I have finished a book that has been growing through my work for a long time. Dried Blood Analysis: A Practical Guide to Understanding Health Through Patterns came from my belief that this is another special tool people can learn to use to understand what is going on within their own body. The body is continually showing us how it is responding to food, stress, emotions, environment, digestion, circulation, sleep, and the way we live. A dried blood blot gives us a chance to see some of those responses and to better understand what the body may be trying to tell us.
I have worked with several different tools throughout my years as a practitioner. I studied and used iridology, live blood analysis, and dried blood analysis, while also bringing in Ayurveda, terrain theory, nutrition, herbs, the microbiome, and everything I learned from the person sitting in front of me. I have always had a knack for reading people and sensing where the different pieces connect, but there came a point when I realized I was wearing too many hats during one consultation.
There was so much information coming through that it became overwhelming for me and for the person I was working with. Each tool opened another door, each answer led to more questions, and I wanted to explore all of it. About five years ago, I decided to focus mainly on live blood analysis so I could give my full attention to what I was seeing in the circulating blood. Even with that decision, the amount of information that can come from a live blood sample is still enormous.
During those years, I continued to learn from every sample. I would study what I saw, question it, investigate it, return to my books, and compare it with what the person was experiencing. I drew from physiology, traditional systems of health, the microbiome, nutrition, and my own experience. I do not like forcing the body into a clinical box because the body does not work in separate compartments. Digestion, circulation, hormones, mineral use, stress, the liver, kidneys, connective tissue, and the microbiome are all part of the same living system.
Still, I kept being pulled back toward dried blood analysis. Each time I returned to it, I understood a little more of what the dried patterns could reveal. I began to see that I had not fully appreciated the depth of this work or the way it could help us understand the terrain in which the blood, cells, tissues, microbes, and organs are living.
That realization brought this book into being. Dried blood analysis does not replace live blood analysis, and I do not see one as being better than the other. They show different parts of the story. Live blood lets us observe the blood while it is still moving, while dried blood allows the sample to separate and form patterns that reveal another layer of information. When the two are understood together, they can bring a much deeper view of what may be happening within the body.
Writing the book also brought dried blood analysis back into my work in a more serious way. I am now offering it as another option for the people who come to see me, and I am excited about this because it allows us to explore the terrain from a different angle. It can help bring more clarity to patterns involving digestion, oxidative stress, adrenal stress, circulation, inflammation, connective tissue, the liver, kidneys, hormones, lymphatic movement, and the ways the body has been adapting.
I learn through this work too. Every sample leads me into more exploration and investigation. I study the whole blot, where the patterns form, how they change through the series of samples, what appears together, and how this relates to the person’s history and present experience. I bring in what I have learned through years of practice, but I am also willing to question what I think I know and throw away the purely clinical explanation when it does not fit what I am seeing.
Much of my work has grown from bringing together information that is usually kept separate. I look at the science, but I also look at the person, their constitution, their environment, their food, their emotions, their history, and their ability to adapt. Ayurveda has helped me understand that two people can show a similar pattern while having very different reasons for it. Terrain theory has taught me to look at the conditions surrounding the cells and tissues, not only at the symptom that has appeared.
My work with soil has deepened this understanding even further. Healthy soil is built through relationships between microbes, fungi, roots, minerals, water, organic matter, plants, insects, and the larger environment. The human terrain is also a living ecosystem. Our microbes help transform food, produce important substances, communicate with the immune system, support the intestinal lining, and influence the nourishment available to the rest of the body. The blood carries part of that story.
My goal while writing this book was to make the information easy to understand and useful. I did not want to create another book filled with complicated language that leaves people feeling that knowledge about their own body belongs only to experts. I wanted to explain how the patterns develop, how they relate to one another, and how the reader can begin to understand the larger picture rather than memorizing a marker and attaching a fixed meaning to it.
The book includes hundreds of photographs and illustrations, along with explanations of the seven zones of the dried blood blot, the sequence of the samples, common terrain patterns, artifacts, and markers that can easily be confused with one another. It also brings in Ayurveda, the Doshas, Agni, Ama, Ojas, and the Dhatus to help the reader understand the person behind the pattern. My hope is that this gives people a practical foundation while encouraging them to keep looking, questioning, and learning.
There is still much I want to understand, and I expect this work will continue to grow as I continue to study more samples. This book holds what I have learned so far through years of observation, investigation, mistakes, questions, and moments when something finally made sense. I have tried to render all of that information in a form that is understandable and usable for someone who wants to learn.
I also hope that one day those dear to me will appreciate this work, perhaps after I am gone. My books carry a part of my life and the knowledge I have gathered through years of searching, working, teaching, growing food, studying microbes, looking at blood, and trying to understand the relationship between nature and human health. They are part of what I will leave behind.
I hope this book helps people become more curious about their own body and more willing to listen to the clues it is giving them. The body is not working against us. It is continually adjusting, compensating, protecting, and trying to bring us back toward balance. Learning to recognize that communication can help us take greater responsibility for our own health and make choices based on a deeper understanding of what is happening within.
The printed edition is available through Amazon
The digital edition is available directly through Living Ground
