The medicine we all need
I ate crap for about three weeks while my wife recuperated from emergency surgery. It’s understandable how food prep went out the window. I just did not want to spend the time on it and that meant fast food or ordering out. Too much sugar, too much crap, too much non beneficial calories. I do the cooking when at home but I was staying at my daughters place which has a very small kitchen and we were both tired by dinner time.
There was no yoga either so I’m full of crap, sugar, and scatter brained.
A while ago I read the book The Walls Protocol written by Terry Wahls, M.D. who has Multiple Sclerosis. This book is about how she treated her MS through diet. She uses Paleo Principles and Functional Medicine.
Her form of MS started with relapsing remitting and moved into progressive MS and eventually having to depend on a wheelchair. I’m currently on that same track.
Like she was; I’m following the conventional path of medications that are no longer providing the same benefits that they once did. I’ve had MS for 25 years and I’m still on my feet. Conventional meds have worked to this point so I have to give credit where it’s due. However if I can’t turn the tide soon walking will become an even more of a difficult task.
It’s a pretty detailed and well researched book. Diet is the driving force of all her conclusions and results. The very first requirement, which I’ve started, is to eat nine cups of fruit and vegetables broken into three categories; leafy greens, fruit and vegetables with colour, and sulfer rich vegetables every day. That is triple to what I was doing.
When I read this book the first time I did try to switch to the food plan laid out in the first diet plan. I tried this for a while and I did not notice any improvement. This time I’m going to follow it more closely and maybe (maybe is the optimum word here) try the second level of the diet and give it more of a chance to work. The diet derives much of its nutrients from meat, organ foods, fruits, and vegetables. I have not eaten meat for at least 15 or more years. There is a vegetarian option but benefits are not fully realized. I’m physically worse now than when I tried it before so I’m hoping for improvement.
This book was recommended to me by a Natural Doctor a few years ago. I picked it up and read it from back to front quickly. I believe in science and evidence and this book has both. The author, a doctor, used scientific principles and methods to validate her own results of self experimentation. So I’m going to try it again while staying on my meds.
I’ve noticed since I did the Mysore Challenge back around New Years and stopped my meds that I did some damage. Not the challenge; it was the combination of stopping the meds and the challenge together. I can feel it mostly in my legs and lower back. This got worse over this last month and I’m assuming this is because of stress.
Relapsing remitting MS tricks you into believing your ok some of the time. You remit and fall into the false security of being ok. But all the while it’s there secretly progressing until it’s not so secret. My MS does not seem to be remitting any more.
I must also consider age as a component of my current situation. I don’t really consider age as part of the calculation which is probably denial. But that does not acknowledge the reality of it all. April was a terrible month that brought much stress into my being. It was the first time in my life I actually felt the years that have gone by. But I make no effort to think old (is there such a thing?), I’m still young in my head.
It’s May now and as a Taurean I feel almost new again. I’ve never considered myself as less than. MS takes stuff away, age takes stuff away, stress takes stuff away. But love puts it back……
The best medicine ever.
Be safe