Namaste

My friend's mom, who is a yoga instructor, gave me a bookmark a few weeks ago that I just love. It is just a plain cardstock bookmark but what is says is what makes it so special.

Namaste

I honor the place in you where
the entire universe resides,

I honor the place in you of love, of light, of peace,

I honor the place within you where
If you are in that place in you,
And I am in that place in me,
There is only one of us.

So to all of you, Namaste!

I hope you all are having a happy and relaxing holiday season.

Cooking Classes!

I've finally launched my cooking classes! I plan on starting a Health Counseling business in February once I earn my certificate to practice, and to jump-start things, I've started doing cooking classes. Yesterday was my first class, Warming Winter Soups. It went really well and I've scheduled another one in January. I'm also going to have a desserts class available soon, which I'm still planning. This is so much fun for me! I've always wanted to give cooking classes! I had to take some ibuprofen (which is really hard for me because I hate what it does to my stomach!)before the class to make sure I could chop and pick up heavy things, but I was okay taking medicine for one day...it didn't kill me! I am just so happy to be making some money and having some inkling of a future career. One thing I'm going to have to change for next time...I'll have a chair behind me to sit down every once in awhile! Scroll down for a recipe for Rosemary White Bean Soup.

ROSEMARY WHITE BEAN SOUP

SERVES 6

1 pound dried white great northern beans

4 cups diced yellow onions

3 tablespoons butter

2 quarts water

1 1/2 tablespoons miso paste

2 garlic cloves, minced

1 bay leaf

1 5-inch branch of fresh rosemary

2 teaspoons sea salt

1/2 teaspoon freshly ground pepper

IN A MEDIUM BOWL, cover the beans with water by at least 1 inch and leave them at least 6 hours or overnight. In a large stockpot over low to medium heat, sauté the onions in the butter for 10-15 minutes until translucent. Add the garlic and cook over low heat for 3 more minutes. Add the drained white beans, rosemary, water, and bay leaf. Cover, bring to a boil, and simmer for 1 hour and 15 minutes until the beans are very soft. Remove the rosemary branch and bay leaf. And add the salt and pepper. Take a potato masher and mash the beans until about half the beans are crushed (or use an immersion blender).

Yes, 'Tis the Season

I've been listening to the christmas carol radio station and watching ABC family's 25 days of christmas. I'm thinking about what I'm giving my family for christmas and I'm getting ready to send out christmas cards. My parents just asked me to make a christmas wish list. It's my favorite time of year!

All of this is helping to take my mind off the pain...I'm in a pretty bad flare of inflammation right now. It's very frustrating because I am really eating a clean diet and taking a few supplements, baths, sauna, reiki, massage, chiropractor...ugh. Maybe I need more sleep. I can't seem to stay asleep all night...I wake up in pain and have to turn over.

But, the First Snow of the season made it all better!
It started in the morning and lasted all day!

Back to School!

Hiii everyone! I have really exciting news..it's kind of old news, but it's still really exciting news! A few months ago I enrolled at the Institute for Integrative Nutrition and I'm a student again! It's a professional training program to become a Certified Health Counselor. It's so perfect because it's all online and I can take it at my own pace. I don't have to physically go to class! They've sent an ipod video with all the lectures, a few books, and there's an online forum where all the students interact and complete assignments and have discussions. I'm so happy to be going to school again.

Back to the Ceritifed Health Counselor thing...I will tell you all more about it in the future, but for now I'll just say that I am so excited that I will finally be able to help people recover their health and happiness as a career!

to learn more about my education, go to www.integrativenutrition.com

Hope Everyone Enjoyed Thanksgiving!

our beautiful bird

my contribution the feast: mashed parsnips and cauliflower

waiting for our guests

Well, Thanksgiving is officially over. It was so good to see family and have so many people at our house! I hope everyone had a scrumptious Thanksgiving--but don't be sad that it's over, now we can think about the winter holidays!!!!

the morning before the feast

Lyme Disease

Now that I have a better handle on my feelings, I can explain better about the Lyme Disease situation. I wrote an emotional post the other day, about deciding to get re-tested for Lyme disease. Now I want to explain that I'm sharing this with you all because I want everyone to be informed of their options, and all the possible causes of their pain.

A few statements just to catch everyone up to speed:

• I was diagnosed with Systemic JRA 10-ish years ago.
  
• My symptoms include a whole-body rash, spiking fevers at night, joint inflammation and pain, decreased joint mobility, aches, pains, muscle soreness and fatigue. Which is actually closer in description to something called Still's disease, a form of arthritis thought to be caused by an infection.
  
• I was tested for Lyme disease when I was going through the diagnosis process; it was negative.
• In the past 3 months I have found out that there is a huge problem in my area with people being misdiagnosed as having various autoimmune conditions when in fact they have Lyme disease.
• The universe has been giving me really strong signs to get re-tested for Lyme.
• I decided to get re-tested and I have an appointment on Dec. 4th.

Below is a quote from the Arthritis Foundation website on Lyme Disease:

"Lyme disease always starts with a bite of a deer tick that carries the bacteria Borrelia burgdorferi. Deer ticks are tiny (juveniles are about the size of a poppy seed and adults, the size of a sesame seed) and their bites are painless, so you most likely will not know that you’ve been bitten. ... Studies show that the tick needs to have been attached and feeding for 36 to 48 hours before it passes the bacteria to the host. Once infected, Lyme disease travels through three phases, as outlined below. These phases are not absolute; you may have features of different phases at the same time and you may skip an early phase altogether.

Early localized disease symptoms occur days to weeks after the infection and include:

• Erythema migrans: This is a rash that 50 to 80 percent of people with Lyme disease get.

• It usually forms at the site of the tick bite.

• It starts as a small red dot and expands as a solid red rash; or it can have a central red spot, surrounded by a clear ring, surrounded by a red ring (the classic bulls-eye rash).

• It usually appears one or two weeks after the tick bite, but always within a month.

• It usually is five or six inches across, but can be as small as two inches or as big as a foot or more.

• It persists for three to five weeks.

• It usually is not painful or itchy, but it may be warm.

• Flu-like symptoms: People with early disease may feel like they’ve got a virus.

• Fever

• Fatigue

• Headache

• Muscle aches

• Joint aches

• Swollen glands

Early disseminated disease symptoms occur weeks to months after the tick bite and include:

• Erythema migrans rashes in spots other than the bite site.

• Heart problems, which occur in about eight percent of people who did not receive treatment during the first phase of the disease.

• Irregular heartbeat

• A disruption of the electrical system of the heart known as heart block. Depending on the severity it may produce an irregular heartbeat due to skipped beats, or may only be noticeable on EKG as a prolonged time for conduction of a beat. It can also produce a very slow heartbeat due to complete disruption of the normal conduction system.

• Neurologic damage, which occurs in about 10 percent of people with untreated disease.

• Meningitis (severe headache, stiff neck)

• Temporary paralysis of facial muscles

• Numbness or weakness in the limbs

• Poor muscle coordination

Late disease symptoms occur months to years after onset of infection and is not necessarily preceded by other features of Lyme disease. Symptoms include:

• Arthritis

• About half of people with Lyme disease will develop arthritis several months after being infected.

• The knee is the most commonly affected joint, but other large joints may be involved.

• Arthritis often is migratory (first one joint will hurt and get better, then another joint will hurt).

• About 10 percent of people with untreated infections will develop chronic arthritis (typically lasting five to eight years) that can cause erosion of cartilage and bone.

• Neurologic damage

• Cognitive dysfunction

• Mood disturbances

• Sleep disturbances

• Burning, prickling or painful sensations of the limbs

• Other symptoms

• Eye inflammation

• Hepatitis (liver disease)

• Bursitis and tendonitis

• Extreme fatigue"
  

Now, I'm not a doctor, but all of those symptoms are very similar to autoimmune arthritis disease symptoms. And what is amazing is that my onset followed the exact same stages: rash, then a fever, then arthritis pain and swelling. What is particularly concerning are the fever and eye inflammation symptoms of Lyme, which are hallmark to Juvenile RA...

I am putting this information out there because I want you all to be informed. It is possible to have arthritis symptoms caused by an infection, not an "immune system gone wrong" and is you want to live pain free, you might want to consider this and get tested, work to build the health of your body, so that it does not play host to infection, and research, research, research!

It may be a good idea to get re-tested by a Naturopathic Doctor who has experience with this growing problem. Once I find out the names of a few good labs that do the full spectrum Lyme test, I will let you all know.

The AF page on Lyme Disease

Getting ready for turkey and cranberry!!!!

Misdiagnosis?

This is a really difficult post to write. Not just because my hands are in so much pain right now, but because I'm questioning the last 10 years of my life.

Let me back up. If you've been reading my blog you know that I am dedicated to finding a natural cure and healing myself. I am passionate about this. But, it's been difficult and there have been disappointments and struggle. It's really difficult to share those with you all because I want to be successful and I want to share that success. But now it is time for me to start sharing more of the struggle.

Here goes:

Today my world got turned upside down. Or at least today I realized the potential for my world to get turned upside down. I'm being dramatic, but not unnecessarily.

I just scheduled an appointment to have myself tested for Lyme disease. Again. My mind is boggled right now so I don't know how to even begin explaining this. Okay, so some of you have heard of Lyme disease, and some of you may have even heard of the common misdiagnosis of RA to patients who in fact have Lyme disease. The thing is that the symptoms of Lyme disease and the symptoms of the autoimmune forms of arthritis are identical. This means the symptoms of PA, RA, JRA, SLE, AS and even CFS and Fibromyalgia are very, very similar to Lyme disease. Here is the list of symptoms at the Mayo Clinic website.

The reason why I'm having myself re-tested is because I'm getting huge pressure from the Universe... What I mean is this: a month ago, at a cooking class, I met 2 people with Lyme Disease and one of them pulled out their doctor's business card in front of me and the woman on the other side of me copied it down. Around the same time, I was in contact with a woman in my area about her Lupus diagnosis. She was re-diagnosed with Lyme disease within a week of me talking to her. Then, a week later my parents went out to dinner with my friend's mom who used to have Lyme and she encouraged my mom to make sure I get re-tested. I called her and she gave me the number for the same doctor that the women at the cooking class had talked about. Coincidental? One of our local government candidates even mentioned the growing problem of Lyme disease misdiagnosis during her campaign. This morning we found a deer tick on my cat. Get my point? Finally, what has brought me into this state of mind-boggledness is that I just got off the phone with my health counselor and she told me that the number one thing I need to be focusing on for my health right now is getting re-tested for Lyme disease. ...Um, all I've been focusing on my diet and that sauna! This is an outrage. (But thank you, Universe, for sending me all the signs. Now I just need to figure out why you're sending them to me.) So I called the doctor that night and set up an appointment for December 4th. I don't know if I can wait that long.

Why re-tested? Why wasn't it right the first time? I don't know the complete answer to this question, but the best explanation I can give is that Lyme disease can be a few different viruses or bacteria, I'm not sure which. I need to do my research. The blood test that a normal physician would order does not include a test for all "strains" of the bacteria and/or viruses that cause the symptoms of Lyme disease. I recommend googling "misdiagnosis of Lyme's disease" if you want more info.

Anyway, the reason why I'm freaked out is because of the question, Have I been misdiagnosed for 10 years? All of my symptoms are identical to Lyme. But what if it's not Lyme? I'm so confused. I don't know what to think or even if I should think about it at all. What the hell. This is ridiculous. Right before Thanksgiving, too! geezzz

I guess I just need to get the test. I'll let you all know how it goes. I really doubt that it is Lyme disease, but I need to cover all my bases. Meanwhile I'll be eating my greens and sweating in the sauna. And please talk to me if you know anything about this.

And the Winner is...

Cathy!!

My score is 190, so Cathy's came the closest at 173 and she wins the book giveaway!

Thanks for participating! I hope to do more of these in the future.

Happy Friday everyone!

Book Give-away!

The Complete Candida Yeast Guidebook

This book is a comprehensive guide to candida, how it overgrows in the body, what health complications it can cause, and what lifestyle and diet changes you need to make if you suspect you have a candida overgrowth.

It includes several food lists (foods to eat, foods to limit, foods to avoid) and daily menus, a guide to antifungal supplements, and many recipes.

This book saved me when I first found it. After 3 weeks of following it's recommendations, I went from 11 on a pain scale of 1-10, to a 3 on the scale. But it wasn't just about the pain, my fatigue went away and my depression lifted. I don't want to sound like an advertisement, which I'm starting to sound like anyway, but I just want to share this with you all so that you can be aware and be able to decide for yourself if this is something you want to pursue.


If you want to win a copy of this book, post a comment below, with your score on this Candida Questionnaire and your email address and your first name. Whoever has the score closest to mine on the questionnaire will be the winner! (I am an honest person and will not play favorites. I've already taken the questionnaire and written down my score.) Once I contact the winner via email, you will have 2 days (48 hours) to get back to me with the address of where you want the book sent.

Good luck! Contest ends at 8pm on Thursday, 11/19/09

The Candida Recovery Plan

So, What do you do if you suspect that you have a Systemic Candida Infection? After reading so many different approaches, I've come up with three essential steps in recovering from a systemic candida infection:

Step 1: You need to stop feeding the yeast by beginning a Candida diet.

Step 2: You need to kill the Candida with natural antifungals.

Step 3: You need to repopulate your gut with good bacteria and build your immune system so that the systemic candida infection can't return.


So let me go over the steps in a little more detail.

Step One: Stop feeding the Yeast (Diet Change!)
There are two diets you can choose from: the Candida Diet or the Body Ecology Diet (BED).

Here is a quick run-down of the major differences between the two diets. They each vary a tiny bit, but are mostly the same: Gluten-free, casein(dairy)-free, sugar-free (all sweeteners are off-limits, but there are some alternatives allowed depending on which diet you choose), and no fruit or alcohol is allowed. Sounds awful, right? It's not that bad once you see how good you will feel, I promise!

The BED allows you to eat cranberries, black currants, and lemons. The Candida diet allows you to eat white grapefruit, cranberries, and minimal cooked berries. The BED allows you to use stevia and Lakanto as alternative sweeteners. The Candida diet allows you to use vegetable glycerin and minimal amounts of stevia as sweeteners.

The major difference is that the BED emphasizes eating live, cultured beverages and vegetables in order to repopulate the gut and "crowd out" the candida, while the Candida Diet does not allow fermented foods because they can irritate the symptoms of a person who is sensitive to yeast. For this reason, I would recommend starting with the Candida diet to get out of your misery. Once you have been in this place for awhile, and you have taken antifungals for a few months, you could switch over to the BED to help repopulate your gut.


Step Two: Kill the Candida!
This step is the easiest step in the way that you only have to take some pills, but the hardest because it will create awful symptoms as the candida dies off. Natural antifungals include:

Tea Tree oil (topically)
garlic
caprylic acid (Caprin)
aloe vera juice
probiotics
green supplements (chlorella, wheat grass, spirulina)
bovine colostrum
The list goes on and on, but these are the most effective. The Complete Candida Yeast Guidebook outlines each antifungal and how it works. It is fascinating. It also has some suggestions for reducing you die-off symptoms.


Step Three: Repopulate the Gut:
You can repopulate your gut and your body with good bacteria in several ways, but the best way to do it is to combine all of them. Probiotic pills, live cultured vegetables (homemade sauerkraut), culture beverages (coconut Kefir, yogurt, lacto-fermented beverages), and prebiotics are all essential. The Body Ecology Diet book talks a lot about culturing vegetables and beverages. You can find probiotics at your local health food store. Prebiotics are things that probiotics like to eat (green supperfood supplements, FOS, which usually comes with the probiotics in the pill, and others).


I have only tried the Candida diet. I am on the diet right now and it's not bad. Last summer when I went on this diet it took me out of my symptoms within a month. I have never tried the BED, so I can't say whether it is effective for RA or not. But it is powerful enough to recover kids with autism. Anyway, you will feel much better no matter which diet you try. The candida diet is outlined very successfully in this book: The Complete Candida Yeast Guidebook by Jeanne Marie Martin. There is a less comprehensive guide in this book: The Yeast Connection by Dr. Crook. Or, you can go with The Body Ecology Diet by Donna Gates.

Ok, that was my super-quick Candida Recovery Plan outline! There is so much more information to give you, but the books do a much better job. That is why I am giving away a copy of The Complete Candida Yeast Guidebook tomorrow! Come back for your chance to win it!

I also plan on posting more candida diet recipes in the near future, since I am on the diet right now. I also know that it is a difficult time of year to start a new diet, so maybe you can just learn about it now, and plan to start after New Years if that is easier for you.