The Journey Begins

“There is a voice that doesn’t use words. Listen”.  -Rumi

Every body has a voice. Mine is angry. Nearly eight years ago I was diagnosed with Rheumatoid Arthritis. And about that same time I was diagnosed with Hashimoto’s Thyroiditis. Both auto immune dis-ease within my body. It felt like it was a diagnosis from nowhere but I knew better. Auto immune issues aren’t a virus that land fast and run their course and move on… they stay and set up camp.

I’d been living a very high stress existence at that point for thirteen years. An emotionally stressful relationship, challenges at work, financial demands (a result of ending the relationship). I’d navigated through weight loss that had developed during the relationship. I’d seen rapid weight gain and issues of depression. And I’d been diagnosed with adrenal fatigue and Hashimoto’s Thyroiditis. And although I was attentive to follow the directive of the medical practitioners I was not seeing effects of healing…. I became aware that there was a “management” of my health that was going on and I felt the first twinges of irritation. So I began to look for information for how I could have an impact on my own health.

I took up yoga. I deleted some foods and drink that would undermine my health. I did the first things everyone does when they have something that resists healing.

And then I chose to attend yoga teacher training over the course of 6 months which had me working Monday – Friday, going to yoga studio 4 nights each week and then attending classes all day both Saturday and Sunday for 10 hours each day. And then there was the studying….And the office I worked in during that time was such a hostile environment..Shortly after the program began and through the duration of the 6 months of teacher training (which I never used) I began to experience RA flares. I didn’t know what it was at the time- no time to see a doctor. But it made the hours of yoga practice painful and compromised. My wrists were braced nearly every day. I was not able to raise my arms from shoulder pain and my knees would swell. The physical stress upended my emotional state something terrible which undermined all aspects of my life. It was the most awful experience.

Once the program ended and I had graduated I saw a Rheumatologist. Learned what had been the cause of all the pain and was prescribed Methotrexate. I found relief. Not healing…but to not have pain was a blessing. I managed to roll on for a good while before I began to see symptoms arise again. I did a little research and discovered gluten was inflammatory so I took it out of my diet. That worked well for a good while too. Until it didn’t.

More research.

AIP elimination diet…. Auto Immune Protocol… I jumped in. I had already been gluten free at this time for about 1 1/2 years. I have always been able to adjust the way I eat easily and stick to it. Rare I know, but true. So I began to eat the cleanest I ever have… No dairy, corn, soy, coffee, tea, yeast, vinegar, eggs, nightshades (and all the spices I adore that are derived from them), nuts, seeds, sugar, citrus. People asked me what on earth I ate… and surprisingly I ate a lot. It was just single ingredient items… veggies and fish and protein and lots of water. Lots and lots of water. And wow…. I had a full elimination of symptoms from the RA and I dropped 35 pounds in less than 2 months. It was a miracle manifest. And although the elimination ended 45 days in when I added foods back; the weight stayed off for 18 months. And then it was over. The fairy dust I sprinkled had finally all blown away and the weight returned quite rapidly and the flares became more regular.

I added meds and supplements…lots of supplements and although my efforts plugged the holes of the dis-ease it was offering no real healing.

And this past spring the symptoms grew worse and by August I was experiencing such dramatic pain deep within my muscles that I added Prednisone to my daily regimen. It’s only a patch too…. I still have swelling.

I began the AIP again and this time..no weight drop. Frustrating. Infuriating. But I’m committed. I understand now that I have a lot to heal and that takes time. And I am partnered with a functional medicine practitioner. And have been working to heal the leaky gut which will assist in reducing inflammation. I’ve learned a better way to reintroduce foods when the time comes. I’ll share details on that later. But the gut permeability has to show itself as healed before I can add back any foods if I want truth of information from my body.

I’ve learned through functional testing that I have measurable heavy metals in my system (inflammatory issue).  I’ve learned that I have the MTHFR gene mutation which disables my body from naturally detoxing properly on it’s own and processing B vitamins…I’ve learned I have a sensitivity to gluten and histamines. I do not metabolize fats into the energy they are well. (Hello….Keto is high fat…maybe that’s inhibiting the weight dropping even though I’m in consistent nutritional ketosis). I also don’t create glutathione as I should (liver support and thus detox weakness). Toxins such as metals and pesticides hang out in my body….and to top it off I have a higher sensitivity to EMF’s. So to add to the AIP I’m doing a 4 week metals cleanse this November…. and THEN we’ll see where I’m at.

I’ll discuss in more detail my discoveries of how my body works as I live this healing journey. And I’ll share my efforts. But for now I wanted to give a solid backstory so anyone who comes upon this is clear on where my travels to health originated. I believe believe we have predispositions to illness but I dis-ease develops. Life choices, actions and dismissals of what our bodies are working to convey. I was discussing this recently when I said that my body was screaming at me… and had been for some time much like a loud intercom system and I had earplugs in. It’s voice heard but muffled. Our relationship thus dysfunctional…me attempting to show it I care by throwing back supplements and taking a lunch and it yelling back (in the form of pain) that it was not happy with that… it wasn’t enough. And as I discussed this and how I had learned that with RA my muscles never really relax… they are always “active” I said I needed to find my way to heal so my body could have calm… inner calm. Now it’s important here to know that I’m a southerner…. intercom has  a silent “t”. It’s spoken as inercom….. inercom… inner calm… And I knew that’s what I wanted to share…. how to listen, really listen to the intercom of our body to find our inner calm of health.

Our bodies are that voice without words. And I am finally listening to mine.

I hope you keep reading. I hope I hear from you. And I look forward to the abundance of health and happiness… true wealth without measure.