Hi Dad,
Mom seemed to be doing pretty well while we were down there. What happened? Does she need the stimulation of more people being around her to keep her energized? Are her unstable fluctuations of blood sugar levels -- and/or the remnants of her stroke -- still robbing her of all necessary mobility and energy?
I wonder if she may simply be kayoed by trying to balance too many medications? Obviously the fear of taking her off of any of these medications is huge.
Regarding prostate problems -- and particularly the threat and/or reality of cancer -- it is very hard if you are a man these days to decide which way you choose to fight it based on conflicting advice from two entirely different paradigms of medicine. I know if it was me, I would go down fighting with vitamins and herbs. I will simply never resort to radiation and chemotherapy. Radiation and chemotherapy is the end -- either they destroy your life, period, and/or they destroy your quality of life while they destroy your quantity of life. I guess, on this, we will perhaps always disagree. The one thing I have been able to protect so far is my prostate. So maybe that is one place where my knowledge is good. Obviously, once BPH turns to cancer, you are talking about a different kettle of a fish which is why it is so important not to get to this point. I stand by the formula of mixing both testosterone and thermogenic enhancing herbs, vitamins, minerals, herbs, foods -- specifically, A,C,E, selenium, zinc, pumpkin seed, saw palmetto, netttle, ginger, cayenne, garlic, tumeric (curcimen), radishes, horse radish, gingko biloba, tribulus... -- with phytoestrogens (soya milk) and cruciferous veggies (broccoli, brussel sprouts, cauliflower...) and the usual trumpeted veggies -- carrots, beets, spinach, and seaweed (kelp, spirulina, chlorella...)
I know that I have overdone it in some of my herb taking -- as i experiment with different things -- looking back at things now, I say that it is just important not to go overboard on herb taking as it is not to get into double digit medications....otherwise one's liver will start to collapse under the stress of trying to make sense of all these different things it is getting hit with. The best intentioned medications and herbs can quickly turn toxic and rob the body of all health and energy if the sum total of them is too much for the liver/body to handle.
I think I may have OD'd on hawthorne which is an herb designed to improve circulation but which can -- like any herb or medication -- become toxic if taken too much of. This is my theoretical conclusion at this time -- I have no empirical grounds of proof. Combine 4 capsules of hawthorne (and/or gingko biloba) with alcohol, no liver support -- and i might have invited what happened to me a couple of years ago. Two ERCP operations might have only exasperated and prolonged what the original problem was -- a toxified liver that needed better nutritional support and less herbal overload. And no alcohol. Why did i do it? A better sexual night that evening with my girlfriend. How many people out there have done -- or continue to do -- something potentially self-destructive in the name of sex. David Carradine is possibly -- I repeat possibly -- the latest and most extreme example of this type of human behavior. There are, I pretty strongly believe, many aging males out there -- and females -- who want to hold on to their sex lives for as long as possible even if the path they choose for doing this might ultimately lead to, or speed up, their self-destruction and death. Like everywhere else in life -- balance is needed. People are probably more likely to go 'out of balance' relative to their sexual behavior than any other type of human behavior. Or maybe sex and work might jointly hold this title together.
I don't have time to get sick. I don't have the money to afford to get sick. I can't afford to lose either my brain power or my physical energy and mobility. I would sooner die working and eating responsibly -- nutritionally -- than experience the faster and more immobilizing toxic, death spiral of radiation and/or chemotherapy. Even surgery, I will avoid at all costs.
I either look after my body nutritionally -- the right way -- or I will go down trying. Personally, I will take my chances with soya milk, dark green foods, green tea, beet juice, carrot juice, berry juice, organic apple cider and lemon juice, digestive enzymes, fibre, and protein -- mixed with the right fats such as uncooked extra virgin oil, flaxseed oil -- than experience the death spiral of radiation and chemotherapy.
My 'anti-cancer' agents are soya milk, cruciferous veggies, carrots and carrot juice, berry juice, red clover, green tea -- if this doesn't work then I will simply let cancer and/or cirrhosis destroy me over its time -- I need 3 years to finish Hegel's Hotel, and I need to help you, mom, and my kids as much as possible in that time....There can be no fast death spirals, I need to be as healthy as possible during this time. I will hold on to my quality of life for as long as i can -- even if it may or may not be at the expense of my 'quantity of life'. What quality of life is there left in the toxic bombardment of radiation and chemotherapy? That is a living death where all mind and body functions come crashing down to a bed-ridden and toilet clinging nausea. The cancer is bad enough in itself -- why add two more carcinogenic agents in the name of a theorized return to health. This may be the right decision for some people it; it is not the right decision for me.
I will defend my right to make the best perceived choices that I possibly can to keep myself alive and healthy and mobile and able to carry on an informed, intelligent conversation, able to write an intelligent essay, with whoever the person is who I am with -- and i will defend this right to make my own decisions -- again til the day I die. I would sooner die making my own choices to the end than have this choice taken out of my hands in the name of someone who claims to know better than I. That person is not in my mind, not in my body, not living the life I want to live -- and may have been taught according to a paradigm that may or may not one day come crashing down -- or at least partly down -- under the weight of its own imperfections. Wherever and whenever there is serious money involved -- whether it be in the sphere of surgery and prescription medication or in the sphere of the herbal business -- one needs to remain seriously skeptical and aware of the potential conflict of interest of the person -- and/or industry -- who/that is giving you the supposedly 'best advice'.
I want to keep all herbs on the health store shelves -- unless there is clear and significance evidence relative to a clear and significant danger relative to the use of the particular herb. To be sure, more and more intelligent and reasonable knowledge is important and needed -- in the herbal industry, in the government health inspection agencies, and in the minds of individual users.
I can understand -- and support -- the reason for ephedra being taken off health stores shelves. There have been too many 'accidents' associated with it. Ephedra is like a super dose of caffeine that constricts the arteries -- which in the case of additional stress to the body such as extreme exercise and/or plaque-filled arteries could/can be deadly.
Hawthorne and gingko biloba -- to my knowledge -- work in a different way as 'thermogenic agents'. They open the arteries up as opposed to constricting them like ephedra and caffeine. Thus, logically speaking, it would seem that ephedra and caffeine could/can pose a serious health risk to any 'artery-and-circulation-challenged person' (high bad cholesterol in the arteries, high blood pressure, diabetics) whereas hawthorne and gingko biloba offer the potential therapeutic benefit of 'opening the arteries up'. Thus, it is no coincidence that hawthorne and gingko biloba would be -- and are being -- used to improve circulation in the name of improved sexual functioning whereas ephedra and caffeince could/can be expected to do the opposite.
However, in the case of hawthorne and gingko biloba -- as with such prescription drugs as Viagra and Cialis -- one has to be aware of the potentially dangerous complications of impaired liver function.
It is in this last regard that I plead guilty of my own health negligence -- taking too many hawthorne and/or gingko biloba capsules on a night when I had been drinking and wanted everything to end on the right note with my girlfriend. The next day -- or shortly afterwards -- I was admitted into the hospital with serious liver problems -- bad jaundice, outrageously high liver enzyme levels, and I would be in and out of the hospital for most of that summer -- from May to August -- trying to get my liver back to normal again. I walked away from a liver biopsy that I perhaps shouldn't have but I was sick of being sick, and I was sick of being in the hospital. I nursed my liver back to workable standards and my skin colour back to normal colour. But a few months later, thinking i was healthy and on top of things again, I started up social drinking again which was probably a big mistake. A year and a half later -- this past April 1st -- I was diagnosed with cirrhosis of the liver. March 27th of this year was the last day I had a drink. Whether this -- and my choice of primarily self-treatment -- is putting me on the path to self-recovery or the continuation of a self-destructive and death spiral remains to be seen. I have been avoiding blood-tests which I need to do. I have been avoiding an MRI (don't want any more bad news) which I need to get it together and get it done. I see the same liver specialist in July that I walked away from two years ago. I need to get those two tests done before I see him. I don't know how long in advance you need to book an MRI. I still don't want a liver biopsy.
Right now I feel reasonably healthy. Or at least I go to work each day, function reasonably normal -- even if I am functioning mainly on half a liver. I was told that my 'left lobe' is my good lobe -- and is compensating for some of the work that my 'right lobe' is not doing. Hang in there left lobe! Don't desert me!
All of this is to say that the 'dialectic power struggle and/or integrative synthesis' between Orthodox Western Medicine and Alternative, Natural Health Medicine has real consequences with real people. Like me and you -- and mom.
What is happening in the scientific laboratories and in the editorial health and medical magazines -- in terms of a dialectic Post-Hegelian struggle for power, money, and/or a more idealistic integration -- is also being waged in the minds of every day, non-medical people. Like me and you -- and mom.
As long as I have enough life and energy in this aging mind and body of mine, as long as I can write to my readers, as long as i can embrace and encounter the people who are most important to me, as long as I can go to work each day, pay my bills, help you, mom, and my children, as long as I can live long enough to finish Hegel's Hotel, as long as I have enough strength and exuberance to meet each and every day with reason and passion -- to appreciate each and every day for each and every new experience that it brings me...to see you and mom continuing to smile...
Life is good.
The opposite must be avoided at all costs.
-- love Dave
-- dgbn, June 10th, 2009.
-- David Gordon Bain
