Category Archives: GAPS

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(PERSONAL BLOG)

Hey all,  I should be laying there like a slug with a migraine today….and here I am…

I was feeling pretty puny yesterday, with a migraine coming on–generally feeling that awful headache in the morning.  I stayed in my jammies just laying low and waiting for the worse to come…

…and my headache went away in the evening!

I know this is probably pretty boring to you folks, but I feel like I’ve won the lottery!  The health lottery, that is!  ::does happy dance::

I just can’t get over that gluten was causing these awful headaches.  I feel so blessed to have found the cause and the recovery.

Gluten Free Watchdog

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…because companies will label their products “Gluten-Free” when they’re really not.  It’s either conscious deception so they can get the $$$ gluten free market dollars, or they’re not really testing their product to be sure that it is gluten free.  As I’ve posted before,  even a little gluten for someone who is Celiac can mean a serious reaction. (hat tip to this blog.)

Watchdog mentions this organization that helps certify food.   This makes food shopping sooo much easier–all you have to do is look for the logo and you are reasonably comfortable buying the product.   There is this, too, which also has a logo to help shoppers identify gluten free food.  There is a link to GF recipes on the main page.

Here is a webpage of the National Foundation for Celiac Awareness.  They, too, help to certify GF foods.  They use a third party to help certify products, which is a bonus. Here is a list of GF manufacturers.  I always want to add a caution that everything can change in a moment’s notice and if a food affects one, whether it’s labeled GF or not, one should be cautious about eating it again.  As they say on the support group–something may be gluten free, but it perhaps is an allergen for a particular person.  Allergies can show up with the typical runny nose, or rash or headache or someone may just feel extra tired after eating a particular food.  Your body will tell you what it needs and doesn’t need–one just has to pay attention.

 

Boycott Kellogg’s

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Organic Consumers posted this a while back (I’m sooo far behind in emails).  Financially supporting the companies that truly have the best interests of their consumers at heart is the best way to go.  Well, that and labeling our food.

Read the note on Kashi’s using genetically engineered soy in their “organic” products.  It is such a cop-out to claim pollination was the reason the soy was GMO–an easy way to escape accountability.  Instead of fighting GMO labeling, they should be fighting against Monsanto and the others involved in genetically modified food.  This food is highly likely involved in leaky gut, as the body cannot recognize the grain anymore, and treats it as a foreign substance and that leads to gut inflammation and eventually leaky gut.

A link here to eye problems and leaky gut and GMO’s.  Very interesting.  My eyes have begun to improve–I was using 1.50 readers and now am able to use the 1.25 magnification.  I’m also able to distinguish fine degrees of color, and I had lost some of my ability to determine colors.  I know this by my embroidery thread that I used for counted cross-stitch–the thread is numbered and has very minute distinctions, and it was difficult for me to separate them by color.  I grew so frustrated at it that I just put them all in one bag, unable to organize them.  This began to change when I started to detox.

Here’s a good opinion on the GMO’s.

More here on the global effort to get GMO’s labeled.

A debate between a professor and a neoliberal. (hat tip to organic consumers).

Lastly, I really wonder about the exposure even if you’re not eating GMO foods (or at least trying not to by buying organic).  I say this because every year, around late July, I begin to have more severe allergy symptoms, culminating in September, when I usually have headaches several days out of the month (this has been after mercury poisoning–at least, that’s when I first noticed it).  I found a link here on the increase in allergies and GMO’s.

Here is a paper that must have been written by a Monsanto toadie, it is so slanted towards GMO’s and gives very little attention or support for research towards health concerns.  This is what I was seeing when I was a student in college and I took a class in science writing:  they had a forum at this strongly agricultural school on GMO’s when they were first being introduced in 1997-98 (only we found out later that they had been unleashed onto the unsuspecting public earlier.)

A good blog here on GMO.

 

 

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Related to this is an stunning affirmation of those in power that amalgams are safe.  Just stunning. Absolutely stunning.  (hat tip to organic consumers).  It just goes to show that Washington is bought by those whose interests don’t include the health and well being of the public, but of who has the $$$ to fund their campaigns.

And my previous blog  with this on how not only mercury affects us, but the animals, as well.  My other blogs on it here and here.

And I’m finished.  So much for catching up on my emails. 😛

 

 

North Haven, Connecticut

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I came back to look at the Cluster link…and North Haven, Connecticut caught my eye.  I wondered how close it was to Newtown.

From the Cluster website:

Researchers have doubled the scope of their investigation into brain cancer cases at a jet-engine manufacturing company and are requesting another two years and an additional $4 million to complete the work. This study was prompted by the deaths of at least several dozen workers from the same rare, very fast-growing form of brain cancer. The study initially had been expected to look at the medical and work records of about 100,000 current and former workers. But that number increased to 200,000 during routine searches of company records, said a biostatistician at the University of Pittsburgh who is conducting a portion of the research. The due-date for the study is 2008, but researchers now want to push back the completion deadline to 2010.

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I looked at the distance between the two cities: about 42 miles…close enough to possibly affect them?

When I looked up Newtown contamination, I found this. <sigh>

These piles are contaminated with high levels of metals including cadmium, lead, tin, chromium, copper, zinc, and nickel, as well as PCBs.

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…the only one missing is mercury, but the article does mention that it was a site of aluminum smelting.

So…you have poisons giving people brain cancer and 40 miles away, you have the toxic soup further messing with brain function, if they were lucky enough not to become sick (at least noticeably sick, i.e., cancer).  But many others will likely suffer from chronic fatigue, low thyroid/adrenal function, ADD, memory loss, and on…and they won’t likely be counted.  It’s sooo much easier to ignore a problem when you only count those most severely affected, and not the overall decline of health of many others….and if someone commits a horrible crime because of those toxins…

The susceptibility to disease

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I was thinking about my post here over the weekend, and thought I should expand on it.  I write what I know (which is what they tell you), but perhaps I was being myopic.

I did a search on susceptibility and African Americans, but had very few articles to choose from.  I found this. 

Here are some of the issues I have with this article–

One is that pollution stays in one place, so it affects just the nearest geographical area.   It spreads all over.  Articles on it here and here and here.

Air pollution in FW is particularly bad–there were many, many ozone days last summer where I could not go outside for any length of time.  I thought I could at least jog in the morning of an ozone day, but was sadly mistaken when I started wheezing as I climbed the stairs to my apartment afterward.

The lung disease thing I am confused about because in my building, the only folks with oxygen tanks are whites–several of them.  And nearly all the ones in wheelchairs are white.  At one time, there have been seven whites in wheelchairs, several more using walkers  but only one black gentleman in a wheelchair.  Just my own little world….

I suspect that heavy metals are affecting African Americans, but like whites, are not being noticed or investigated.  The information may be out there, but I didn’t see it in my research.  I would love to explore this more.

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And no, I don’t think that nuclear energy is the answer (if one wants to reduce coal production to lessen the impact of lead, arsenic and mercury in the environment).  Nuclear has many, many problems, one of which is thyroid cancer levels go up around nuclear power plants.  I think one of the first things that has to occur is for Americans to stop wasting so much energy and going off grid would be the first step–one has to be more conscious of the energy they use if they are responsible for that energy. Another step would be to build sustainable housing, like earth ships. Gotta love that name.  And I love the design on this page—Isn’t that cool? Who would think such an artsy design is also sustainable?

A paper here by Joseph Mangano on the rising thyroid cancer rates and nuclear energy. (PDF)

A map on disease clusters here.

Yep, the evidence is out there that we are killing ourselves with the toxic environment.  I’d rather sacrifice a little and be able to breathe than have the conveniences of modern life that are killing us, slowly.

More adventures in Gluten free cooking

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(PERSONAL BLOG)

I haven’t had pancakes in a long while–mainly because I had to watch the carbs because of the mercury’s interference with maintaining sugar levels.  That is, I would react strongly to any carb or high glycemic food, possibly bringing on a migraine.

With the admonition from the Celiac.com members stating that I couldn’t cheat, I had to have something akin to a treat, and decided to try gluten free mixes.  One I tried is by Gluten Free Pantry.  I bought their pancake mix, which has some dairy, but I seem to be able to tolerate small amounts.  I made it using one-half of the recipe amounts, with the exception of using two small eggs (that I needed to use up because they somehow got forgotten in the frig and were almost expired…ahem.)– this made them even more fluffy.

Anyway, I tried it the past couple of mornings….and it’s w-o-n-d-e-r-f-u-l!  A big red flag for anyone who thinks they may be gluten intolerant–when I ate wheat pancakes, they would just lay there in my stomach…for days.  Okay, I’m exaggerating, but yeah, that should be a clue that perhaps my body couldn’t digest it if it feels like a rock.  (They always felt like a rock.  This was “normal” for me–nothing to compare it to until now.)

Of course, Dr. Natasha Campbell-McBride is against mixes (processed food).

This page also decries the mixes. Oy.  I guess I’ll have to see how it affects me.  I can tell pretty quickly by my face whether something I ate doesn’t agree with me–my skin looks blotchy and loses its glow when I’ve eaten something I shouldn’t.   It’s amazing how our bodies “tell” us when something is wrong…albeit very subtly.

I didn’t have a migraine this month (woot!)…and feel pretty darn good right now…so I know that I’m on the right track.  It seems the migraines are going to be every other month, for now. Hopefully, they’ll eventually disappear altogether.   🙂

 

 

Genetic tests on Lanza?

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Oh.My.God.

I am just stunned.  Eugenics, anyone??

Nothing in this article about him having amalgams or mercury exposure or diet (if he is gluten intolerant, leading to schizophrenia).

No…we can’t have scientists looking at stuff like that, because that’s too simple an answer and the ways to fix it make us uncomfortable.   It means we have to give up some things that pollute our environment and we have to make more of an effort to understand the diet and immune system and how they affect our brains.

I mean, really, “science” has taught us that amalgams are safe, right??

…and “science” has brought us pesticides, herbicides, chemical fertilizers, and genetically modified organisms.

So, yeah, scientists with biases and prejudices should *absolutely* assign a value to a gene and making sweeping generalizations with those biases. /snark

More here. Be sure to note the Americans funding this garbage.

More on celiac…

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Having support of one’s family and spouse after diagnosis would seem to be a no-brainer, but no, as this post illustrates. Such ignorance and indifference–encouraging someone to sabotage themselves…and as one poster said, they really don’t want to hear about it. <sigh>

I forgot to mention the other day about the confirmation of my suspicions that I had become even more sensitive to wheat and other foods that set off the immune system allergic response–others on the forum remarked that it is a phenomenon that the system, while trying to heal itself, suddenly kicks into overdrive at the offending substance and the reaction is more severe.  Just thought I’d throw that out there for anyone else struggling with this.

 

Celiac

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I can’t remember if I’ve blogged on this website or not, so forgive the repeat if I did~

Celiac.com is a wonderful resource for those with gluten intolerance/celiac.

I was reading the forums from others and it really helps especially during the holidays.  One of the posters has family that don’t understand how serious the condition is and that they can’t eat the normal foods associated with the holidays.  The family member took offense that she would want to fix food for her family (husband and child are affected) separately.

In another post, it really struck home for me–a new member asked if she could cheat a little, as long as she was eating right most of the time.  I have to admit that I’ve cheated, too, and was thinking that as long as I was eating the right foods 90% of the time, that a little bit of cheating wouldn’t hurt.

Wrong.

The other members were quick to tell her in no uncertain terms not to do it.  For one, even if you’re diligent about eating the right foods, you never know when you’ll be exposed to cross contamination (eating food prepared in a facility that also prepares wheat products or even breathing the wheat dust while someone else is baking can affect one, as well).  One member related that she got fed up with the gluten-free diet and for a year or so ate whatever she wanted….she was at a pizzeria when she doubled over in pain and had to be taken to the hospital.  They rushed her into emergency surgery and removed part of her bowel that had literally exploded.  She now has a colostomy and hopes to heal enough to get it removed in the near future.

And on the support group (GAPS), a member posted about her child that had been given crackers by the teacher.  When the parent raised alarm at this, and how this was not allowed, the teacher made some comment that it was *only* six crackers (or something like that).

Incredible!

If the child had a peanut allergy, and this teacher had given him/her peanuts, it would be considered a serious breach of duty.

Even a doctors have told their Celiac patients that they can cheat *a little*.  Wow.

And trying to tell my family about this disease and warning them that it’s inherited and pointing out signs of it has fallen on deaf ears….some even get a little perturbed at me….<sigh>