Moving Strongly Forward

Insomnia Update – Tribute to DOM

The fact that I slept well last night is a tribute to the treatment two days ago by my Doctor of Oriental Medicine. It is amazing that I even slept given that I learned that my mother died. She was mentally ill but still functional. We hadn’t spoken in 14 years (due to an exceptionally extreme event), and I have no good memories of her. Her death brought back a lot of bad ones.

Regardless, I slept even knowing that today I would learn from the sheriff’s deputy what happened, I would have to determine what to do with her body, and I would have to begin to figure out what to do with her property, such as it is.

I am immeasurably grateful for all of the people who love me and support me.

GAPS Update and Insomnia

The other day I posted that my body odor quickly disappeared while on GAPS for only a few days. Yesterday it came back on the right side of my body, which means that I am already detoxing something.

Amazingly, the dress that didn’t fit quite right is fitting pretty well again. I mentioned that I believe the bread had done me in due to weight gain and renewed aches and pains. Well that is not all the bread could have done.

I visited my Doctor of Oriental Medicine yesterday due to about two months of insomnia that had gotten really bad (one to two hours of sleep a night for about two weeks – I hadn’t been that bad in about 11 years!). The insomnia is related to financial challenges, layoffs and the job market. I thought I could beat it on my own, but it became quite clear I was losing, as some minor premenopausal symptoms were back, signaling adrenal fatigue, and the lack of sleep seemed to affect me less and less. In fact, I had an overabundance of energy through parts of the day. I couldn’t meditate, TAP, or exercise my way out of it.

Why couldn’t I beat it on my own? My doc thought I would have had a good chance except for the bread. He said that the external job-related challenges were coupled with me feeding myself something that internally challenged me, and the two combined could have pushed me over the edge so that I couldn’t conquer the insomnia on my own. He said it was like I formed a log jam which was keeping my energy channels open and not allowing them to shut down at night. I said I was amazed at how much energy I had, as if I permanently pushed past being sleepy. He said it is incredible how much energy the human body has – more than people realize.

He treated me with acupuncture and a machine that operates at a frequency that promotes healing and regeneration. It took about 10 minutes and all of a sudden my right foot jerked like I was falling asleep. Then my body slowly began to relax and sink into the treatment table. After about 40 minutes my stomach let out a great big long rumble like thunder that keeps going and going. My doc was happy to hear it, as he explained that my digestion had pretty much stagnated and now it was moving. I said that I hadn’t had hunger since the insomnia started and I just ate because it seemed I should. He said that was a good thing, as I have been hypoglycemic for awhile, and I didn’t know it. That explained the weakness I felt.

As the treatment went on my stomach rumbled more and more. By the end of the treatment I was getting nauseous. My doc said to go straight to Whole Foods (he chose Whole Foods because it is literally a couple of block away, not because he thinks it is a great place) and get a high fat, high protein snack. By the time I paid for the treatment and the special tea and Adrenalcalm cream, I said I needed to eat a whole dinner right now (again, Whole Foods is not the best place to eat, but I was STARVING!) He said go for it.

Wouldn’t you know, Whole Foods doesn’t have high fat food at the food bar. Even so, I had to eat something as my nausea, sweats and shakes grew. I settled on BBQ Chicken and potato salad. Then I went home, ate more chicken, a bunch of raw cheese, a beef hotdog, more raw cheese, raw milk…and I was still hungry! It took awhile for it to all digest and for my hunger to go away.

How did I sleep? Only a couple of hours again, but it was a deeper sleep. I also woke up with the sneezies that I always get when I don’t sleep enough. I haven’t had those sneezies in about three weeks. They are a welcome sign that my body is heading in the right direction.

The human body is amazing in what it can do, how it can take what we do to it, and how it excels when we treat it well.

Aches, Pains, Stuffy Nose…and Back to GAPS

Bread. It all began with bread. My Doctor of Oriental Medicine introduced me to a baker that properly ferments bread. Regardless of the fermentation, it is the best bread I have ever had. I began to introduce more people to it, and I became a small bread hauler for my town on Saturdays.

We started with two loaves a week. They were mediumish loaves, and two split between three people isn’t a lot, right? Then we moved to three loaves a week and kept on for about six weeks when I realized I gained five pounds! And my back started to ache. And my body odor returned. And Colson’s nose got stuffier. All from bread. I thought it was the staff of life, right? Guess again.

Now we are back on the GAPS Diet. We have been on for a week. It took only three days for my body odor to go away, and my shorts are fitting better. Colson is still stuffy and I am still achy, but that could be due to the core exercises I started and have now quit.

Injuries are tough. I have an old groin injury (which I received at the height of premenopause four years ago – thank goodness that is reversed!) That injury is now cranky because I have overdone it with squats and lunges during my walks. Why was I squatting and lunging? Because walking alone wasn’t a hard enough workout and I thought I couldn’t run thanks to my fractured back 14 years ago. All those squats and lunges served me well, though, as I discovered earlier this year that I am a bionic runner with no training and no pain. No pain until I switched to Vibram shoes and ran too far, straining my ankles. Who knew that 40 years of atrophied foot muscles would be so hard to overcome. Now I am back to walking, my groin hurts, my back hurts and I am back on GAPS.

Given how quickly my body odor cleared, I am thinking this GAPS experience will be about six weeks. Hopefully I will be pain-free by the time it is over.

Here is one more thought about grain and bread. Since the mid-1800s physicians have been able to predict that incidence of cancer based on grain consumption. Check out this article by Dr. Tom Cowan, MD to learn more: A Holistic Approach to Cancer. My family only experiences inflammation, pain and a stuffy nose thanks to too much bread prepared in the healthiest way possible. Bread is an easy food, but clearly in my family’s small, non-scientific but life-based experience, it is hurtful. Put into the larger context of this article makes me even more grateful for discovering the GAPS way.  

Plantar Warts – My Clove Oil Experiment

Note the update on this post. The Clove Oil seemed to kill the wart, but it came back early Spring 2011. I am sorry for not updating sooner. I am playing around with Calcium Bentonite Clay poultices, as that is supposed to be very effective. You can read more here:Calcium Bentonite Clay Update.

I have this plantar wart on my right foot. It has been frozen and burned out three times and it came back again. This time I searched the discussion board of the Holistic Moms Network. One member recommended Clove Oil for treatment of plantar warts, and it worked. Painlessly and easily. Somehow the clove oil just attacks the wart and the slightly raised painful area declines and the dark wart roots slowly make their way to the surface.

I treated my wart with clove oil twice a day, morning and night, and covered it with a band aid. Sometimes I rubbed the area with a pumice stone in an effort to expose more of the wart and then put clove oil on it, but I don’t think that was necessary. Clove oil – who’d of thought?

Another Attempt to Run and a Barefoot Update

I injured my ankles running too far in my Vibrams about 40 days ago: Vibrams – Injury?. I treated my pain with Traumeel, as discussed here: Traumeel for Injuries…and my First Barefoot Adventure. I have been pain-free ever since.

This morning I thought I would try a short run in my Vibrams to the soccer field and four barefoot interval laps around the field with some squats and lunges thrown in. Muscles, heart and lungs were all kicking, but after lap four the ankle pain started again. GGGRRRRRRR!! I don’t think I am running again until 2011! That is such a bummer, as I REALLY like to run. It is going to be a cold winter on my bike.

As for my little family’s barefoot practice, I have no idea how far Ryan, Colson and I walk in the woods, but Ryan and I can finally keep up with Colson. We are building great resistance to the rocks and roots and we can walk easily on our neighborhood streets now. I guess I really do need to test my ability to run by using only my barefeet. Walking on the trail is one thing, but running is completely different. I bet I won’t make it more than 10 strides on the trail, and if I tested myself there instead of on a cushy soccer field, then I probably wouldn’t have aggravated my ankles again.

The journey continues.

Sugar Grows Cancer – Thank You UCLA!

I blogged about my mother-in-law’s death and the role of pancreatic cancer last January: Ryan’s Mom Passed Away This Morning. We miss her.

Today was another reminder of her too early passing. This article, Fructose Drives Cancer Growth, discusses the breakthrough research at UCLA and documents in the mainstream media and medical community that sugar feeds cancer. It helps cancer grow. The doctors that were supposed to help my mother-in-law were in fact feeding her cancer. They were helping it grow. How? By feeding her Ensure. I knew it. Other people knew it. How come the doctors didn’t?

Truly, if you do not take responsibility for your health, if you do not eat real food in order to live a vibrant life, you have a good shot at becoming one of the one in two people who are diagnosed with cancer (soon to be 1 in 1.5 people). Then you likely will be at the mercy of doctors similar to those that quickly ushered in the death of my mother-in-law.  

Is there good news? Yes. You can decide to change what you eat and change your life. With every bite you eat, you determine how you will live.

Back to GAPS Soon

The Gut and Psychology Syndrome Diet (GAPS) has dramatically improved my family’s health. I gush about our gains throughout my blog, and here is a post that summarizes much of them: Memory Victories – A Huge Reason to Celebrate! It is amazing how our bodies thrive and decline around food. There are a few entries in my blog about health declines when we stray too far from GAPS, and today is another one of those days.

This summer we were turned on to a fantastic fermented sourdough bread by our doc. It is the best bread we have eaten. We went from eating a few slices of bread each week to THREE LOAVES OF SOURDOUGH! Lots of bread in our diet coincided with corn season. I decided that we were healthy enough that we weren’t going to miss corn season again, so we are eating corn (that comes with worms) a couple times a week. Throw in the maple syrup we are using on our sourdough French toast, the rice we are eating and the non-GAPS friendly beans, and now we are achy, foggy, stuffy messes. Actually, only Ryan and I are achy and foggy and I gained five pounds and have regained my body odor. Colson is just stuffy.

Note: you know your body is out of balance when you have body odor that is not stress related. I have been body odor free for eight months or more until this summer.

I knew we needed to go to GAPS again to reduce our inflammation and get rid of our achy joints, but listening to Colson struggle to breathe through his nose while he was sleeping motivated me. At least he is still breathing through his nose. It is amazing to me that a super healthy diet can still promote discomfort, but fortunately our bodies are clean enough that we can hear them talking. In the next week or two, after we enjoy the last of the corn, we will transition back to GAPS. Last time we went back we rebounded quickly and shed our annoying ailments. I expect the same this time because we have no food cravings. No cravings mean that our gut flora are not too out of whack, which means that our bodies should recover quickly.