Okay, welcome. Welcome in everyone. I’m Margaret Jacobson, the Mother Rising, and this is the Yin-care® podcast. We’re deep into the Medical Indoctrination Series now, and today we’re gonna be covering the cascade of interventions. If you’re feeling moved, provoked, or grounded by these episodes, it really helps when you like the episode, subscribe and turn on notifications and share it with a friend or a loved one who’s quietly questioning the system.
These conversations travel through women who pass them along. So let’s do a quick check-in before we go forward. Let’s honor the gentle act of sovereignty from episode three of this medical indoctrination series. Notice one should, that was what we did. We wanted you to notice one should in your inner dialogue about health and gently [00:01:00] question it.
When you caught yourself thinking, I should schedule that screening, or I should just do what the doctor said, or I should already know what to do here you were to pause and ask who says. Is this coming from my own grounded desire for health or a real time intuitive knowing, or a fear or shame script I inherited from the system?
You didn’t have to change your action yet. Just name the voice. This is my inner good patient talking, or this is my scared mama. Part that’s talking, right? And then see if a deeper kinder voice wanted to add anything. So just take a breath here and scan back over the last week or two. Did you notice any shoulds around appointments, meds, screenings, or even food or movement in your [00:02:00] life?
What did you discover when you asked? Who says, did you hear more than one voice inside you? If you feel called to share, I would ~genuine,~ genuinely love to hear what you have to say. You can leave it in the comments for us or on any of the platforms that we have, or message us on our social media channel or even complete our contact form [email protected].
Even if you didn’t catch a single should, that’s okay. Your awareness is already shifting. This is a new muscle and we are here to work it out. Right. So let’s just recap where we are in the series just to orient us. Episode one. We named Modern Healthcare as a control system, not a neutral field built to manage.
To profit and contain more than to cultivate sovereign self-trust in [00:03:00] humans. In episode two of the series, we mapped the pyramid of power with you at the bottom in the current system and then flipped it. Imagining a world where you sit on at the top of your own pyramid, right? What would that be like? Be completely different.
In episode three, we went inside to see how the system installs. An inner good patient or good mother voice that shames and scares you into compliance before anyone else has to. Today we’re gonna look at something very specific and very sneaky, the cascade of interventions. Just one little test or just a quick prescription becomes an entire machine you never meant to enter.
So we’re going from routine to runaway. Most people don’t sign up for the whole thing. They sign up [00:04:00] for a quick checkup. Or a routine screening or just to be safe or just to rule things out. But the system isn’t just a series of neutral, one-off choices. It’s an algorithm, a flow chart. Once you step onto a certain branch of that chart, there is a built in next step and the next and even a next.
That’s the cascade of interventions. ~Today I want to walk you through a very sorry.~ Today I want to walk you through a few very normal scenarios, show you how the cascade unfolds, and help you see where your sovereignty gets silently eroded along the way. All right, so what is the cascade of interventions?
Let’s define it in simple language. A cascade of interventions is when one medical step that may or may not be necessary [00:05:00] creates the conditions for the next step to become necessary, and that step then creates the conditions. For yet another step until you are miles away from where you started and it all feels inevitable.
You’ve probably heard this term used around birth induction leads to stronger contractions, leads to an epidural. Leads to fetal distress, leads to an emergency C-section. But this logic is actually everywhere. It’s in primary care practices, it’s in pediatrics, it’s in oncology, it’s in mental health, and even geriatrics.
The cascade is built into the structure. So let’s walk through one example. You’re a woman going in for your routine annual exam, and you think I’m being responsible, I’ll get my pap smear. Maybe some labs [00:06:00] ask a question or two. Here’s one way the cascade might unfold. Step one, the routine pap smear. You say yes because it’s framed as basic standard.
Everyone does this. Step two, you get an abnormal result. Many so-called abnormalities are transient and would resolve on their own, but the system is designed to flag and pursue step three, coloscopy or a biopsy. Now it’s framed as we need to just get a closer look. We wanna catch things early and often with a heavy dose of cancer, fear ~excuse me, step four.~
~Hang on.~
~Okay. Step four, A LEAP procedure or a more aggressive treatment. The language becomes, excuse me, we’d rather be safe than sorry. We don’t wanna take any chances. The reality might be procedures that affect your service. Oh my gosh. Let’s start with step four again. ~Step four LEAP procedures, or a more aggressive treatment.
The language becomes, we’d rather be safe than sorry. We don’t wanna take any chances. The reality might be procedures that can affect your cervix, your future [00:07:00] pregnancies, your emotional relationship with your womb. Cervical trauma on an incredibly innervated area and sexually potent organ that in Chinese medicine, the tip of the cervix is related to the heart, and the tip of the penis is also related to the heart.
So when men and women are having sex. Those organs touch, there’s a powerful spiritual force that that is, that happens when these two heart centers touch each other, and yet we are allowing ourselves to have that routinely biopsied or like I said, you know, a more, a more invasive procedure such as a leap procedure.
And this can really damage the organ as far as your sexual emotional state. Step five, ongoing surveillance. After all [00:08:00] this, you’re now in a category that requires more frequent visits, more testing, and more anxiety. What began as, I’m just going in for my checkup has become a multi-step cascade with physical, emotional, and spiritual consequences.
Was any of it ever presented as a flow chart at the beginning? Did anyone say, if we do this pap and it’s X, then the next step is Y and then potentially Z, and here are the risks, benefits at each stage. Usually, no. You were invited into just one test and the rest of the cascade was silently waiting.
Here’s another classic example. Your child has a fever, a sore throat, or an earache. You book a visit because that’s what good parents do. Here’s a possible cascade. Step one, quick exam or rapid test. [00:09:00] Maybe a rapid strep test. Flu test, or COVID test, COVID test where your child gets the swab jammed up their sinuses.
Right. And it can actually create an injury with cerebral spinal fluid leakage that could lead to meningitis. Did you know that step two though? That was just, that was just a quick rapid test right? Anyway, you can see how that would spiral quickly, right? Step two, a positive result. Just in case antibiotics, you’re told, we’ll just put them on antibiotics to be safe sometimes even when the cause might be viral.
Step three, gut microbiome disruption. Now your child’s internal ecosystem is altered. Possible diarrhea, rashes, yeast overgrowth, increased susceptibility to future infections. Step four, [00:10:00] recurrent issues, more visits, more meds. Now you have frequent ear infections or chronic sinusitis, digestive issues which the system meets with more antibiotics, possibly steroids, and maybe even surgical interventions down the line.
Again, cascade. Right? At no point were you likely shown the long arc of antibiotic overuse of microbiome depletion, of the immune system, never getting a chance to resolve things on its own. You were just told, we don’t want this to turn into something worse. And because you love your child, you say yes.
This is where we have to be very honest. Cascades are profitable, defensible, trackable, and easy to standardize. They generate more appointments, more [00:11:00] procedures, more prescriptions, and more billable codes. They also protect the system from liability. A practitioner who doesn’t follow the cascade risks being accused of missing something.
A practitioner who does follow the cascade can say, I did exactly what the guidelines and protocols said. So even if you would prefer a slower, more observational, more terrain focused approach, the entire architecture around the your practitioner is whispering. Keep moving. Don’t pause. Follow the flow chart and remember from our last episode, your own internalized good patient, good mother voice is often saying the same.
So the cascade is not just structural, it’s psychological, medical indoctrination people. Here’s what tends to happen emotionally during a [00:12:00] cascade. At first, you might have a little doubt. Do I really need this? As each step escalates, you feel more anxiety, more urgency, more pressure. You’re often given very little time to think we should do this right away.
Let’s just do it while you’re here. Let you hesitate the shame and fear lovers come out. You don’t wanna ignore this. Most people would want to be safe. I’d recommend this for my own family. And somewhere in the middle of that many women report feeling a kind of numbness. I just went along with it. It was like I wasn’t really there.
I knew I didn’t want it, but I couldn’t find my voice. That numbness is not proof that you didn’t care. It’s proof that you were overwhelmed. Cascades are overwhelming by design. So what do we do with this? We don’t have to throw away [00:13:00] every test, every imaging, every intervention, but we do need to bring consciousness to the flow.
A few key questions Can, you can ask before you agree to that one simple thing, if this test is abnormal, what would the next step be? Or, and if that is concerning, what happens after that? Or are there options to wait and watch before going down that path? Or what are the risks of intervening now versus waiting? These questions slow the cascade down.
Ask the practitioner to reveal the underlying flow chart and give you a chance to decide whether this river is actually a river that you want to step into. And also remember that you can always say you’re gonna go home and think about it. Or you can even [00:14:00] ask them to step out of the room so that you can have a private moment to clear your thoughts.
Sometimes after hearing the full flow, you might still say yes, but it will be a different, yes, it will be a sovereign yes, not a reflexive and coerced one. So let’s reflect here. Before we end this episode. I wanna leave you with this, where in my past did a single medical yes, turn into a whole cascade and what was happening inside me.
In each step, ask that of yourself, and you might even journal about it. Was it a birth, a surgery? A diagnostic workup, a screening that led to more and more and more without blaming yourself. See if you can trace where you first [00:15:00] felt the no, where you overwrote it. And most importantly in my book, what kinds of pressure were present.
It’s really important to address that because. That’s where you can actually reframe it and realize how powerful you were holding yourself in the midst of all that pressure. So it’s not to say that you had the sovereign yes that you wanted. That it maybe didn’t come out for you at that time, but you can recognize how powerful you were given those circumstances.
And that really helps to reframe it for you so that you can start to re-establish that trust with yourself and know that you are trustworthy, that you can depend on yourself. You are likely protecting yourself from all of the things going on. So pat yourself on the back for that. And in [00:16:00] closing, here is your gentle act of sovereignty.
Between now and the next episode, the next time a test, procedure, or referral is suggested ask two simple questions: If I say yes to this and the result is abnormal, what is the next step you typically recommend? Are there any reasonable options to wait, watch, or support my body in other ways before going down that path?
You do not have to argue. You do not have to decide on the spot. You’re simply inviting the whole flow chart into the room instead of being walked down it one step at a time without context. Then if you can pause even if just for a day and notice, how does my body feel about this cascade? Is my yes, coming from my fear and urgency, or from grounded [00:17:00] clarity?
If you try this and you wanna share how it went, whether it felt empowering, awkward, or something else, I would absolutely love to hear this in the comments. So please do share. It can often help other people as well. If you share your story, there are thousands of people out there who have these stories.
Please be brave and share them. Remember, you are not overreacting when you feel overwhelmed by just one more thing. “Just one more thing.” You are standing in front of entire flow charts that were written long before you were born by people and institutions who do not know your soul, your path, and your body.
You are allowed to ask what river you’re stepping into. Take time to decide and sometimes say, not this path, not right now. If this episode resonated, [00:18:00] it truly supports this work when you like the episode, leave a comment or review. Turn on those notifications. Share it with someone who’s been through a medical cascade and is trying to make sense of it, and subscribe.
Or again, turn on those notifications so you don’t miss the final episodes in this series. You can find the Yin-care® Podcast on YouTube and Rumble, Apple Podcast and Spotify. And please do connect with us on Instagram at @yin_care or TikTok, Facebook, YouTube, and Rumble. @yincare. We’re still in the blazing energy of the year of the fire horse, a year that asks you to claim your reigns and choose your path consciously.
May you stay rooted in the herd and may you rise wild and free. I’m Margaret Jacobson, the Mother Rising, and this has been the Yin-care® podcast. Thank you for walking this path of health [00:19:00] creation with me. Until next time, honor yourself, celebrate your strength, and empower your transformation with your Yin-care®.
