I really hate living in a neighborhood with an HOA (Home Owners' Association). I look forward to the day when we can sell this stupid place and get out from under the $300/ month fees we pay, which are used for half-million dollar unnecessary paving projects and annoying landscapers who use leafblowers every tuesday from 7am to 4pm, and random jackhammer projects also starting at the crack of dawn. Then, when I have a valid concern, such as the fact that my gutters drain into my driveway instead of the garden, turning my driveway into a sheet of ice every time it snows/ melts/ refreezes (which was pretty much 3 solid months this year), and I bring it up, the answer, before I even finish stating the problem is "NO, we can't change it, can't afford it, can't change things from the original plans, don't even bother asking, not gonna happen."
Every time I go to the car it's a serious challenge not to fall and break my neck. And what would a project like re-routing gutters from the driveway to the garden on the front side of one unit cost? A helluva lot less than a half million dollar paving project, which, by the way, no one in the community wanted, except the people on the board and the lawyers who shouted us down in the meeting. I will never go to another homeowners' meeting again, because they are not interested in the voices of the homeowners. It was so one-sided, us against them, the people who actually own the homes being shouted down by the board who supposedly represents us, and the lawyer and management company who are paid for by our fees, that the entire group of homeowners, during this meeting were muttering about moving out. If we all could have sold our homes right there on the spot, there would have been a mass exodus. But we are all powerless, and they know it.
What has this got to do with anything? It's exactly like being a patient in the so-called health "care" system. We pay tons of money and instead of getting cared for, we are abused, ignored, not listened to, and when we have valid concerns, they are often not addressed. (I realize there are a few good doctors out there, but I'm talking about the general experience, the majority of what's going on out there). And just like the stupid HOA, there is nowhere else to go. It's not like you can choose to not be sick and poof, you're not, anymore than I can just unload my house (like everyone else, we can't sell until and unless it goes back up- WAY back up in value. we're trapped, just like anyone with a chronic illness).
I'm rambling, and that's because I'm really mad.
But bottom line what makes me mad about both health care and the stupid HOA, who can kiss my septic tank (i'm not letting them near my butt- I don't trust them!), is that these people are PROBLEM-FOCUSED! They refuse to even look for solutions. I have a problem, they say too bad, stuff it. But when it's their problem, every bit of everyone's resources goes towards dealing with it- without even thinking maybe there's a cheaper way to deal with this, so there's some resources left over when someone else has issues that need to be addressed. everything goes toa few, nothing to everyone else, despite the fact that everyone contributes. Both the HOA and health care.
Concrete example from health care: chelation therapy. Cheaper, by 10-fold, and far far safer than open-heart surgery. Chelation therapy removes plaque from arteries by a safe IV drip treatment given about 2 times a week, for about 20-40 treatments. cost, around $5000. No one dies from chelation therapy. No one. Heart surgery is $50,000 plus. The death rate for open-heart surgery are 2-5%. If the death rate for chelation therapy was that high, it would be shut down. Meanwhile, cardiologists get chelation therapy for themselves, but refuse to tell their patients about it.
The only way out of these corrupt, unjust systems is to not participate. And in order to do that, you have to take charge, be solution oriented, think beyond the obvious worn-out solutions, (not all diseases are caused by genetics are viruses, and drugs are surgeries are not the only solutions; not only that, they are not very good solutions in most cases- come on research people, use your brains! If the Easter egg wasn't behind the tree the last 10 times you looked, maybe it's time to look somewhere else! Of course, if drug companies are funding the research, the research is only going to be on drugs. Until the broccoli foundation starts funding some trials, we're not going to learn about the effects of diet on well-being. No real money to be made in broccoli, it seems).
Unlike some people who shall remain nameless (and faceless, and obnoxious and in control of the homeowners' association), in order to deal with my problems, whether they be my household or my health, my first reflex is not to throw a ton of money at the problem. In most cases, you can't buy solutions to your problems. You ask other people how they dealt with it, or a similar problem. You picture what a solution would look like. You educate yourself. You try things, even when people call you crazy. You keep trying things. You keep what works, and ditch what doesn't. You surround yourself with people who believe there is hope. You never give up, and you never accept "there is no answer" as an answer. That wasn't acceptable in 8th grade algebra, and it's not acceptable now.
One day I will escape the tyranny of the HOA, and I will never look back, lest I too turn into a pillar of bureaucratic BS. And one day, too, I will escape the tyranny of lupus, fibro, and all the other related syndromes that have attached themselves to what should be my well-being. I will be happy, I will be whole, I will be free. Mark my words. I am looking for and working towards solutions every day. I will not be oppressed!
Thursday, March 11, 2010
keep looking
Thought for the day:
"Never must the physician say, the disease is incurable. By that admission he denies God,
our Creator; he doubts Nature with her profuseness of hidden powers and mysteries."
Quoted from the last page of the book "THE MEDICAL FOLLIES" printed
in 1925 and written by Morris Fishbein, M.D.
Editor of the Journal of the American Medical Association
Seriously- JAMA!
"Never must the physician say, the disease is incurable. By that admission he denies God,
our Creator; he doubts Nature with her profuseness of hidden powers and mysteries."
Quoted from the last page of the book "THE MEDICAL FOLLIES" printed
in 1925 and written by Morris Fishbein, M.D.
Editor of the Journal of the American Medical Association
Seriously- JAMA!
sun, tanning, lupus
Like all the rest of you with lupus, I had to give up sun-worship.
This makes me incredibly sad for several reasons.
I love being outside in warm weather. I love the beach. I love to swim. I love lying in the sun like a lizard and getting all hot, then diving into cold water. And now when I'm outside in the sun for any amount of time, I can't enjoy myself because I'm filled with anxiety about whether my enjoyment is going to cost me my kidneys. I miss the doses of natural vitamin D and the smile a sunny day puts on my face. I feel like a vampire.
Aside from eradicating lupus from my life, which I'm always working on, I don't have any solution to all this.
But I do have a tiny temporary occasional solution to the one other reason I grieve my sun-worshipping days (I also miss how great I look with a tan, sun-kissed hair). I met someone in an acting class I was taking who does spray-tanning in NY city, and she uses all natural ingredients.
http://gothamglow.com/
So, I think I might, for a special occasion (friend's wedding in July) treat myself to a "tan" just once, so I can feel like myself.
Meanwhile, I have found that when my lupus is under control, I can spend small amounts of time in the sun (not long enough to get a burn- like 10-15 minutes) and have no ill effects. Obviously, we have to be very careful with this, but FYI, some of us do become less sun-sensitive when the disease goes into remission.
Carla
Carla Ulbrich
The Singing Patient: Author, Survivor, Humorous Songwriter and Entertainer
www.thesingingpatient.com
www.facebook.com/TheSingingPatient
www.twitter.com/singingpatient
www.youtube.com/user/carlaulbrich
www.linkedin.com/in/carlaulbrich
http://tinyurl.com/348hroc - Carla's book "How Can You NOT Laugh at a Time Like This?"
This makes me incredibly sad for several reasons.
I love being outside in warm weather. I love the beach. I love to swim. I love lying in the sun like a lizard and getting all hot, then diving into cold water. And now when I'm outside in the sun for any amount of time, I can't enjoy myself because I'm filled with anxiety about whether my enjoyment is going to cost me my kidneys. I miss the doses of natural vitamin D and the smile a sunny day puts on my face. I feel like a vampire.
Aside from eradicating lupus from my life, which I'm always working on, I don't have any solution to all this.
But I do have a tiny temporary occasional solution to the one other reason I grieve my sun-worshipping days (I also miss how great I look with a tan, sun-kissed hair). I met someone in an acting class I was taking who does spray-tanning in NY city, and she uses all natural ingredients.
http://gothamglow.com/
So, I think I might, for a special occasion (friend's wedding in July) treat myself to a "tan" just once, so I can feel like myself.
Meanwhile, I have found that when my lupus is under control, I can spend small amounts of time in the sun (not long enough to get a burn- like 10-15 minutes) and have no ill effects. Obviously, we have to be very careful with this, but FYI, some of us do become less sun-sensitive when the disease goes into remission.
Carla
Carla Ulbrich
The Singing Patient: Author, Survivor, Humorous Songwriter and Entertainer
www.thesingingpatient.com
www.facebook.com/TheSingingPatient
www.twitter.com/singingpatient
www.youtube.com/user/carlaulbrich
www.linkedin.com/in/carlaulbrich
http://tinyurl.com/348hroc - Carla's book "How Can You NOT Laugh at a Time Like This?"
Friday, February 26, 2010
Another Lupus ebook
Hey friends
In my never-ending quest for better answers (better than drugs, side effects, more drugs, more side effects, ad nauseum and add nausea), I just purchased another ebook claiming to have some ideas of where lupus comes from and how we can get rid of it.
It was overpriced and didn't tell me anything i hadn't heard before, but it did remind fo some things I'd forgotten, and it did introduce me to a really neat idea for how to "brainwash" myself into achieving my goals, both health and otherwise.
Now the guy who wrote this thing is not a doctor, and does not have nor did he ever have lupus. And all his info was gleaned from 500+ websites and other people's e books, and listening to Tony Robbins. So there's your pretty big grain of salt. But hey, it's worth $47 to have someone sift through 500 websites and give me the summation.
He claims that most fo the diseases that are rampant in our society are lifestyle-caused. Caused by what we eat, mroe than anything. Despite the fact that this goes against what we're told by our doctors and by all those commercials for drugs on TV, this is not that radical of an idea, and lines up with everything I read in Eat To Live, which was written by an actual doctor who actually read 2000 medical studies.
In short, this author's (Mark Anastasi's) approach to ridding yourself of lupus (and pretty much any disease is this:
1) read his e book (I consider that optional, unless you don't know anything about lupus and have never heard the idea that poor diet and an acidic environment in your body cause disease)
2) do a detox (pick a program and follow it, probably best to be supervised)
3) take supergreens
4) take glyconutrients
5) buy his subliminal power software, which flashes positive subliminal messages randomly on your comptuer screen (you write the messages). this program is $39 http://www.mark-anastasi.com/products.html (I am not paid to endorse this)
For me, it was a reminder about supergreens, the first time I'd heard about taking glyconutrients as a supplement (as opposed to just eating more fruits and vegetables), and an introduction to an interesting software program, which I might buy. After I recover from spending $47 on his book.
I had getting some contradictory information that disease thrives in acidic environments and yeast thrives in alkaline. It seems it may be possible, to have both acidic and alkaline conditions in one body; different systems can have different pH.
Found some good answers on pH here:
http://www.candidasupport.org/RESOURCES/candida-and-ph/
In my never-ending quest for better answers (better than drugs, side effects, more drugs, more side effects, ad nauseum and add nausea), I just purchased another ebook claiming to have some ideas of where lupus comes from and how we can get rid of it.
It was overpriced and didn't tell me anything i hadn't heard before, but it did remind fo some things I'd forgotten, and it did introduce me to a really neat idea for how to "brainwash" myself into achieving my goals, both health and otherwise.
Now the guy who wrote this thing is not a doctor, and does not have nor did he ever have lupus. And all his info was gleaned from 500+ websites and other people's e books, and listening to Tony Robbins. So there's your pretty big grain of salt. But hey, it's worth $47 to have someone sift through 500 websites and give me the summation.
He claims that most fo the diseases that are rampant in our society are lifestyle-caused. Caused by what we eat, mroe than anything. Despite the fact that this goes against what we're told by our doctors and by all those commercials for drugs on TV, this is not that radical of an idea, and lines up with everything I read in Eat To Live, which was written by an actual doctor who actually read 2000 medical studies.
In short, this author's (Mark Anastasi's) approach to ridding yourself of lupus (and pretty much any disease is this:
1) read his e book (I consider that optional, unless you don't know anything about lupus and have never heard the idea that poor diet and an acidic environment in your body cause disease)
2) do a detox (pick a program and follow it, probably best to be supervised)
3) take supergreens
4) take glyconutrients
5) buy his subliminal power software, which flashes positive subliminal messages randomly on your comptuer screen (you write the messages). this program is $39 http://www.mark-anastasi.com/products.html (I am not paid to endorse this)
For me, it was a reminder about supergreens, the first time I'd heard about taking glyconutrients as a supplement (as opposed to just eating more fruits and vegetables), and an introduction to an interesting software program, which I might buy. After I recover from spending $47 on his book.
I had getting some contradictory information that disease thrives in acidic environments and yeast thrives in alkaline. It seems it may be possible, to have both acidic and alkaline conditions in one body; different systems can have different pH.
Found some good answers on pH here:
http://www.candidasupport.org/RESOURCES/candida-and-ph/
Monday, February 15, 2010
back to what worked before: acupuncture
Some of you have been following my recent struggles, fighting off a lupus flare while trying to avoid going on prednisone and losing my hair, gaining weight, and turning into a raving lunatic (gee, what's so bad about that?)
For the last 3 months I was on LDN (Low dose naltrexone), which has worked wonders for a number of people, particularly those with autoimmune conditions, and especially those with lupus. But for whatever reason, it was not helping me. In fact, my test results got worse. There are those who say I didn't stay on it long enough, and those who say I might have a thyroid problem, and those who say it's a candida (yeast) problem (that interferes with the LDN's effectiveness). But bottom line, as long as I was on LDN, I could not take any narcotics for pain, and since I don't have anything over the counter that I'm allowed to take that actually works for pain, I figured 3 months of constant pain with not relief constituted me giving it a pretty good chance to work.
Now, I'm not saying LDN doesn't work, or even that it wouldn't work for me, but it isn't working for me right now, so I had to change course. Maybe once I finally clear up all the yeast, I'll go back on it. Meanwhile, I figured, I created a remission last year using just chi gung, gluten-free diet, no nutrasweet, and acupuncture. I got discouraged because my remission only lasted 6 weeks due to a combination of stress and a black mold exposure. So, I guess I wanted an easy answer- just take this non-toxic drug every night for the rest of your life, eat and do whatever you want, and never have another flare. I wanted a magic pill (or in this case, liquid).
Well, as I've stated before, thankfully there are plenty of choices out there for paths to healing, and I'm going back to the one that worked for me before: acupuncture & chi gung. i've added some herbs I read about in "Cure Your lupus naturally," and I'm still gluten-free and nutrasweet-free. And it only took one acupuncture treatment for me to feel a little better. And now that I've had 4, I feel a lot better.
A word about acupuncture: some MDs also do acupuncture, but the only training they've had is a weekend clinic. "Real" acupuncturists have 4 *years* of training. Sadly, insurance will pay for the MD acupuncture but not the more effective real acupuncturists. So, good acupuncture is an out-of-pocket expense. Which is why I also do chi gung; it has the effect of very gentle acupuncture and you can do it yourself for free, and maintain your level of wellness between acupuncture visits.
A good acupuncturist is Chinese-trained and board approved by the NCCAOM. Go here to find one near you: http://www.nccaom.org/
So, between the acupuncture and being able to take a narcotic when I'm in pain and can't otherwise sleep, I feel like myself again. I was really in a pit of despair after months of non-stop pain, and was losing my sense of humor, and becoming hopeless and defeated. That is so not me, but it goes to show you, a person can only take so much. Why suffer? My goal is to again get all my tests to turn around to "negative" (in this case negative is a good thing), to feel energetic, and to maintain the remission indefinitely.
There are 2 other elements I also want to deal with: emotional and diet. Although I avoid a lot of nasty things like gluten and sugar and nutrasweet, I need to eat a lot more fruits and veggies. Which is why I may be purchasing Montel Williams' healthmaster (an industrial blender basically)... Secondly, I'm trying to get into a reevaluation counseling group. If I do either/both , I'll keep you all posted.
For the last 3 months I was on LDN (Low dose naltrexone), which has worked wonders for a number of people, particularly those with autoimmune conditions, and especially those with lupus. But for whatever reason, it was not helping me. In fact, my test results got worse. There are those who say I didn't stay on it long enough, and those who say I might have a thyroid problem, and those who say it's a candida (yeast) problem (that interferes with the LDN's effectiveness). But bottom line, as long as I was on LDN, I could not take any narcotics for pain, and since I don't have anything over the counter that I'm allowed to take that actually works for pain, I figured 3 months of constant pain with not relief constituted me giving it a pretty good chance to work.
Now, I'm not saying LDN doesn't work, or even that it wouldn't work for me, but it isn't working for me right now, so I had to change course. Maybe once I finally clear up all the yeast, I'll go back on it. Meanwhile, I figured, I created a remission last year using just chi gung, gluten-free diet, no nutrasweet, and acupuncture. I got discouraged because my remission only lasted 6 weeks due to a combination of stress and a black mold exposure. So, I guess I wanted an easy answer- just take this non-toxic drug every night for the rest of your life, eat and do whatever you want, and never have another flare. I wanted a magic pill (or in this case, liquid).
Well, as I've stated before, thankfully there are plenty of choices out there for paths to healing, and I'm going back to the one that worked for me before: acupuncture & chi gung. i've added some herbs I read about in "Cure Your lupus naturally," and I'm still gluten-free and nutrasweet-free. And it only took one acupuncture treatment for me to feel a little better. And now that I've had 4, I feel a lot better.
A word about acupuncture: some MDs also do acupuncture, but the only training they've had is a weekend clinic. "Real" acupuncturists have 4 *years* of training. Sadly, insurance will pay for the MD acupuncture but not the more effective real acupuncturists. So, good acupuncture is an out-of-pocket expense. Which is why I also do chi gung; it has the effect of very gentle acupuncture and you can do it yourself for free, and maintain your level of wellness between acupuncture visits.
A good acupuncturist is Chinese-trained and board approved by the NCCAOM. Go here to find one near you: http://www.nccaom.org/
So, between the acupuncture and being able to take a narcotic when I'm in pain and can't otherwise sleep, I feel like myself again. I was really in a pit of despair after months of non-stop pain, and was losing my sense of humor, and becoming hopeless and defeated. That is so not me, but it goes to show you, a person can only take so much. Why suffer? My goal is to again get all my tests to turn around to "negative" (in this case negative is a good thing), to feel energetic, and to maintain the remission indefinitely.
There are 2 other elements I also want to deal with: emotional and diet. Although I avoid a lot of nasty things like gluten and sugar and nutrasweet, I need to eat a lot more fruits and veggies. Which is why I may be purchasing Montel Williams' healthmaster (an industrial blender basically)... Secondly, I'm trying to get into a reevaluation counseling group. If I do either/both , I'll keep you all posted.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)