An Unconventional Journey to Doctorhood
Dr. Matt in his home office.
In our most recent post, I explored the very personal question of why I went into medicine.
There’s also the practical, training and experience-related side of The Buddha’s Medicine’s history. From a training and experience standpoint, what’s my deal? What do all those letters after my name mean, anyway?
And how does Ayurveda enter the picture?
Let’s go back in time a bit. Longer ago than I’d like to admit. The mid-2000s at New York University, where I attended college. I started out pre-med with a major in biology. Four years (including three summer semesters) later, I graduated with a B.A. as the class Standard Bearer with a double major in biology and sociocultural anthropology and a minor in music.
I suppose now would be a good time to acknowledge that I have a bit of an over-achiever streak. It’s the pitta in me.
It was during the college years that I also attended my first Yoga asana class at the now-closed Laughing Lotus, NYC. It’s hard to describe how deeply that experience resonated with me. My previously frequent trips to the Palladium gym at NYU slowed to a trickle. I spent at least 90 minutes at Laughing Lotus 5 days a week at minimum from then on.
It also probably bears mentioning that, after beginning my yoga asana practice and switching to a vegetarian lifestyle, my lifelong lactose intolerance issues and adolescent-onset migraines both self-resolved entirely. My curiosity was piqued.
And so, during my senior year of college, I also completed Yoga teacher training at Laughing Lotus Yoga. The intention was simply to deepen my practice. I ended up teaching - a lot. More on this in a bit.
During this time, I received my acceptance to Rutgers New Jersey Medical School (previously UMDNJ New Jersey Medical School) and the School of Public Health for their dual degree program (MD - Medical Doctorate and MPH - Master’s in Public Health).
Manorama Thea D’Alvia
It was during my Yoga teacher training that, on a whim, I walked into a satsanga program taught by a true yogini and scholar of Sanskrit, Manorama Thea D’Alvia. My memory of this experience is as vivid now as it was the day after: I walked in, made instant eye contact with Manorama, and felt like I had been hit by the Magic School Bus. The Sanskrit verse we practiced that afternoon was an invocation to Kundalini. I remember the sound and the resonance of that verse too well. And Manorama’s wisdom, presentness, and voice were magnetic.
A handful of weeks later, I began a traditional study with Manorama in the lineage of Sri Brahmananda Sarasvati Udasina (her guru). All at once, my study in Yoga was much more than a study in physical posture; it became a deep dive into the philosophy and spiritual underpinnings of Yoga. And suddenly, I found myself learning Sanskrit - the language of Yoga itself. My meditation practice took off. Everything shifted in the most meaningful way.
It was also during my yoga teacher training that I was first introduced to Ayurveda - and instantly fascinated. Ayurveda and Yoga go together in the most profound ways. Ayurveda is the art and science of healing the body; Yoga is the art and science of healing the mind. The promise of Ayurveda, which is tied so intimately to Yoga - an art that I personally found healing in - was very alluring.
Yoga teacher training and college wrapped-up at around the same time, and true to my modus operandi, I leapt out of the frying pan and into the fire. The week after I graduated college, I started the MPH program during a summer semester. It was a way to keep my brain in the mode of academics, and at the same time ease my way (sort of) into graduate and professional-level education.
And then medical school began in August of 2009. There was a lot of rote memorization and relatively dry book reading and material regurgitation at that time. This was especially true that first semester, which was largely about studying anatomy on cadavers and answering multiple choice questions. My expectations for that first year were very tame - read, memorize, dissect a cadaver, test, rinse, and repeat.
So imagine my surprise (and great delight) when we were visited by a physician practicing blended family medicine and Ayurveda for a guest lecture! Well, okay, it wasn’t the whole school that she gave a talk for - this was for the Complimentary and Alternative Medicine club, which I joined eagerly at the start of the term. This physician, Dr. Bhaswati Bhattacharya, was practicing in my old NYC stomping ground across the liver, and not just practicing - she was also leading training in Ayurveda through her own school, the DINacharya Institute.
The opportunity was too on-the-nose to pass up. I coordinated with Dr. Bhattacharya to bring together a cohort of students interested in Ayurveda and the training began.
Vaidya Vasudha Gupta
Somehow and all at once, my medical education had become much more than the allopathic standard. I was in medical school, and also taking classes for my master’s program in public health (epidemiology, in particular), studying Sanskrit and Yoga in lineage, and studying Ayurveda. Through the DINacharya school, I got connected to my personal mentor, Vaidya Vasudha Gupta. And I think I promised I would come back to instructing Yoga asana - did I mention I was teaching weekly classes during this time, as well?
Just a whirlwind later - which included studies and a private practice in Thai massage and a sojourn to South India for an Ayurveda experiential - and I was at the end of my medical school career, and ready to move onto residency. I matched into a family medicine program - the discipline that I felt would best equip me with the knowledge I needed to practice in a modern context - in Washington state.
Here seems like a good place to interject some important context: Ayurveda was then, and remains now, a completely unlicensed profession in the United States. There are a lot of reasons for this, both practical and political, but the most important of them, in my view, is the following: Ayurveda cannot be standardized, randomized, or placebo-controlled, because it is inherently about the treatment and care of the individual. Ayurveda further leans on a worldview that is altogether foreign to the western paradigm: a paradigm that includes the spirit and the intangible subtleties of human beingness.
As such, it is practically impossible to distill Ayurveda down to one or more multiple choice exams and similar assessments for licensure that have any hope of being approved on a nation-wide scale. There are organizations that are making efforts, though in my view, these efforts are quite flawed. That is not necessarily for a lack of trying. I also make this statement without judgment - I assume wholesome intentions and good faith on the part of these organizations.
Dr. Matt and his wife Jamie.
In addition (and largely because Ayurveda is unlicensed here), the way to knowledgeability and direct clinical experience in Ayurveda is highly limited in the United States, unless one is otherwise licensed to care for patients as a provider. There are not many paths to medical literacy and literacy in Ayurveda at the same time.
And this, in a nutshell, is why I followed the path that I did - there was one clear-cut way for me to reach the goal of practicing Ayurveda as a legitimate, licensed medical professional. And that was to become a licensed medical professional through the existing allopathic channels, and blend Ayurveda in on the back end of my training.
So I earned my first letters: MD, MPH.
I would not be truthful if I didn’t admit to some kicking and screaming, so to speak. In fact, I remember, one spring day before moving to Portland, OR (my residency was in Vancouver, WA), lamenting to Vaidya Gupta about slogging through more non-Ayurvedic practice. And I remember even more clearly the words of wisdom she shared: “go and be a doctor.”
Go and be a doctor. That is, after all, what I had set out to do, and it was the way forward.
So I underwent formal training in family medicine, and it was very valuable. I completed the Andrew Weil Center for Integrative Medicine fellowship in integrative medicine. And then I spent a handful of years (in no particular order) practicing in outpatient family medicine offices; I delivered babies (which was particularly delightful) for a time; I practiced addiction medicine; I did some per diem work in an urgent care clinic; there was some HIV medicine thrown in there; and I spent some time as medical director for a pair of skilled nursing facilities (SNFs), which is where people go for rehabilitation services after challenging hospital stays.
I made sure to get my clinical chops. And while all of that was going on, I completed board certifications with the American Board of Family Medicine, the American Board of Integrative Medicine (the ABOIM credential), and the American Board of Lifestyle Medicine (the DipABLM credential).
I did ultimately retire from instructing yoga asana before my first child, Kavi, came into the world, but not before stepping into the role of teacher training instructor at a handful of studios on both coasts. And that is how I (rather unintentionally) received the YACEP designation: Yoga Alliance Continuing Education Provider. (The Yoga Alliance is a controversial body that is better left to discuss another time.)
Dr. Matt and Manorama Thea D’Alvia
And through it all, my eye was always on coming back to Ayurveda.
To this day, I meet with Vaidya Gupta weekly, both because she is someone I view as family, and because we like to bounce cases and material off of each other. And I remain ever in the tutelage of my guru, Manorama ji, sipping regularly from the firehose that is Sanskrit and Yoga/Vedanta.
Without the many wonderful family members and teachers that so graciously supported me, and continue to support me - most especially Manorama ji and Vaidya Gupta - I would not be in this privileged position today. I share this little piece of my story with my deepest gratitude for them, and my most heartfelt humility.
Professional disclaimer: please do not initiate any herbal or other medicinal interventions without the guidance of a knowledgeable provider. Herbal medicines such as guduchi have been shown in studies to reduce seasonal allergy symptom burden, but may also be unsafe in the context of certain health conditions such as Hashimoto’s and other autoimmune issues.
Dr. Matt Van Auken, MD, MPH
Dr. Matt is an Ayurveda-trained, triple board-certified physician.
