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I have been interested in health and nutrition for a long time, starting way back when I was a teenager and my father was told he has severe arterial blockage, and if he didn’t do something to change that, he would have to have bypass surgery. He did drastically change his diet, becoming a vegetarian, and he started a vigorous running program, eventually running even in marathons! Fifteen years later, however, he got cancer and even though he put up a good fight, and tried many alternative therapies, including taking handfuls of supplements (artificial, alas) every day, he succumbed to the cancer at the rather young age of 61. I often think of how much I have learned since then, and wish I had had that knowledge back then – maybe I could have helped him to beat the cancer.
Well, back to my story. I am one of those people who was born with a rather weak constitution. I was sick on and off all winter long during my young childhood years, including ear and strep infections several times per year as well as the mumps and scarlet fever. In between though, I was full of energy and “joie de vivre.” In high school, I did gymnastics and played basketball with great fervor. When I was 19, however, I began to experience a great, abnormal, physical fatigue. Shortly after that, I had appendicitis and had my appendix removed by emergency surgery. After the operation, I had an extremely bloated abdomen, but doctors assured me that it had nothing to do with the operation. In retrospect, I must have gotten some kind of infection or parasites in the hospital. After, the bloated stomach got so bad that I lost weight and was down to 88 lbs! (Now, I am only 5 feet tall, and my normal weight at that time was around 97 lbs, but 88 lbs was way too skinny). This was the first time I went to a natural health care practitioner who gave me nystatin and put me on a special diet for Candida, but it did not help. I slowly got a little better, and just went on with my life, but never had the energy nor the “joie de vivre” that I had before.
During this period of my life, I was a semi-vegetarian, choosing to follow in my dad’s footsteps, but I think this was a contributing factor to my progressively worsening illness. I ate too much sugar and bread products and tofu and not enough fresh vegetables or (yes) saturated fats that, among other benefits, help protect your liver from toxins. In fact, I think that my dad’s vegetarian diet may have contributed to his immune system becoming weak enough that he ended up with cancer. I think his heart disease got better from eating less sugar and more vegetables, quitting smoking and starting a consistent exercise program (not from cutting out meat). I went to college and got good grades and got a good job when I got out. However, I was tired all the time and felt like I really needed each weekend just to catch up on my energy.
Then, in my late 20’s, I started experiencing panic attacks and anxiety, which I now know was due to hormonal imbalances, nutritional deficiencies and the start of my problems with chemical sensitivities. I began to be bothered by perfumes and chlorox bleach. Some people get headaches and nausea from perfume and other chemical exposure. In fact, some estimate that up to 25% of the population is now sensitive to perfumes – that’s because they are mainly made up of water and petrochemicals. I got brain fog, anxiety and throat swelling. I started developing an acute sense of smell, and could detect bleach odors when my husband was using it in the washer 1 ½ flights of stairs below me! At this time, I knew that the chemicals were bothering me, but I didn’t know that it was causing these other physical symptoms.
Soon after that I got pregnant and had a miscarriage. Miscarriages are often a sign of physical problems in the mother or father, and I was definitely showing them. However, I did get pregnant again and had my first child at the age of 31, a boy. Two and one half years later I gave birth to a girl, at the age of 33. After each child I felt my health and vitality decrease. I had less energy, more brain fog, and more problems with chemical sensitivities. I started getting sinus problems and my memory got worse and worse. At this time, I became aware of the connection between my allergic throat swelling and chemical exposure, and I started using all-natural Bi-O-Kleen cleaning products as well as natural body care products like shampoos, skin care and body lotion, and I started trying all sorts of vitamin supplements. I knew that the baby takes all the best nutrients the mother has for itself, and if you don’t have enough, it’s the health of the mother that suffers, so I intuitively felt like my two pregnancies and subsequent nursing had left me nutritionally deficient. I did feel somewhat better in my own home by this time, since I had cut back on the chemicals I was exposed to there, but had a hard time going anywhere without my symptoms acting up.
After trying my regular physician who thought my symptoms were all in my head, and who had never heard of “chemical sensitivities” back then (1998), I also started going to the first of a series of natural health care practitioners – an “alternative” M.D., several chiropractors, an acupuncturist, and several naturopaths. With most of them, I actually got worse, not better. With those who seemed to help me, it did not last. I now know that part of it was the supplements they were giving me. Almost everything they gave me had fillers or other toxic ingredients, and my body was so sensitive, that I was reacting to it. For a long time I thought I was just reacting to the ingredients; I did not realize that it was more the toxic fillers than anything else.
Then, a couple of years ago, I found the Weston A. Price Foundation. I highly recommend that you go to their website and read some of the information there. The Weston A. Price Foundation is a nonprofit, tax-exempt charity founded in 1999 to disseminate the research of nutrition pioneer Dr. Weston Price, whose studies of isolated non-industrialized peoples established the parameters of human health and determined the optimum characteristics of human diets. Dr. Price's research demonstrated that humans achieve perfect physical form and perfect health generation after generation only when they consume nutrient-dense whole foods and the vital fat-soluble activators found exclusively in animal fats. I made some major shifts in my diet, but still found optimal health eluding me. At least I had finally learned how important it is to use supplements that come from 100% living, whole foods, without additives, but I was having a hard time finding a complete line of supplements that were top quality whole food source.
I then found the Quantum brand of nutritional supplements, and found a practitioner who used them, and finally started getting better. These were the first supplements I was able to take for longer than a few days to a week without reacting to them. Like many people who have been chronically ill for years (decades in my case), the road to wellness is not easy and is not as quick as we might like. Although I am still on my path to wellness, I feel certain that with the help of these quantum-quality supplements, along with the better diet and fewer chemicals in my home, I will become strong and healthy in the years to come.
I liken my experience to the “canary in the coal mine.” If you haven’t heard that story, I will explain it briefly: Before the age of chemical/gas detectors, the miners used to take a canary down into the coal mine with them. They would keep an eye on the canary, and if it got sick or died they would quickly all go up to the surface before they would be overcome by odor-less fumes that they were being exposed to. The canary, being so small and sensitive, would be affected before the people. I think that people with chemical sensitivities are like the canaries –we are adversely affected by the overwhelming increase of chemicals in our environment today because partly because it is simply overwhelming and partly because we don’t have the proper nutrition to counteract the effects of these chemicals. Antioxidants, especially, are needed in much greater amounts when we are exposed to so many chemicals. I think that everyone needs to try to reduce the amount of chemicals they are exposed to in their environment today by using natural cleaning and body care products, and trying to make their home as non-toxic as possible, and at the same time eating more nutrient-dense foods and adding vitamins and supplements, including detoxifying supplements, from potent, 100% natural living food sources.
Good luck in your quest for optimal health!
Karen
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