There are so many things I wish I knew back when I was battling autoimmune ITP. I wish I had someone to hold my hand and clue me in to the things I had to figure out for myself.
I hope I can be *that* person for you…
I’m going to be dedicating some blog posts to “The Things I Wish I Knew”!
What I wish I knew #1 - I'm the boss of me!
All joking aside...it is REALLY important that we realize our Doctor (GP, hematologist, etc) is our *partner*....not our boss!
I apologize in advance if I'm offending anyone here! I know some people feel *most* comfortable following *all* of their doctors "orders". I believe that western medicine conditions us to desire being told what to do. When we agree (without question or concern) to do something someone in “authority” tells us, we are giving away our empowerment and our responsibility to ourselves.
Please don’t misunderstand…I am in NO way suggesting that you don’t take your doctor’s advice. What I AM saying is that we DO need to take charge of our health and advocate for ourselves. We need to get comfortable asking questions, voicing our concerns, and making decisions together with our health care providers.
Personally, I might not be here if I had taken my doctor's recommendation to take 3 chemotherapy medications without having a spleen! I kept searching for other options and asking questions until I was comfortable with a treatment. It happened to be an alternative treatment.
I had an excellent relationship with my hematologist. He listened to me. I would go to my appointments with a pad of paper full of questions! He would answer all of them with compassion and grace. He knew my feelings about side effects from certain treatments (things that messed with my hormones & fertility). Together, we put them "at the bottom of the list". He partnered with me. When I chose alternative treatments, he respected me & kept monitoring my blood work even though Traditional Chinese Medicine was completely outside his scope!
It can feel scary at first, but it is so important that we advocate for ourselves!! Your doctor works for YOU! Don't be afraid to get a 2nd opinion or change doctors if you need someone who is more in alignment with your individual needs!
I would love to invite you to join my free "Wellness Warriors" group. It is a place where we can gather and offer encouragement to each other during our journey. Click on the link below for a personal invitation!
If you have been diagnosed with an autoimmune disease, it is very likely you’ve been told by a doctor that there is no known cause. That is what happened to me. In 2003, I was diagnosed with Idiopathic Thrombocytopenia Purpura. (A rare condition where your immune system attacks the platelets in your blood). The very word “Idiopathic” literally means, “We have no idea why this happened.”
But I knew….I knew in my heart exactly what had happened. STRESS! Toxic Levels of Stress! At the time, I was going through a divorce. To say it was a “difficult time” would be an understatement. I was in therapy. My counselor said I was “depressed”. The truth is every time my phone would ring, my heart would race, my stomach would drop, and I couldn’t bring myself to answer it or check the messages. I was so filled with constant anxiety, I had a hard time eating and I lost a significant amount of weight. My family was worried about me. Just as I was finally putting the pieces back together, BAM! Autoimmune disease struck me!
I didn’t realize it then, but I had undergone a traumatic experience. I began to wonder if there was a link between trauma and autoimmune disease. Of course, not everyone who experiences a traumatic event will end up with an autoimmune disease. However, the more people I talked to who had been diagnosed with autoimmune illnesses also seemed to have experienced some sort of trauma….a sexual assault…loss of a spouse…loss of a child… I knew people who had suffered these traumas and struggled with various autoimmune conditions.
It turns out, I was on to something. Although current research doesn’t prove that trauma is a direct cause of autoimmune disease, it can be shown that extreme stress does cause physical changes in the body. Severe stress can raise the body’s cortisol levels which can cause inflammation and impair the immune system. The immune system can be so out of balance, it can be both underactive in some ways and overactive in other ways at the same time! It could potentially trigger the onset of an autoimmune condition you may be genetically predisposed to.
My ponderings cause me to wonder: If the domino effect of stress and trauma could be the root cause of an autoimmune disease…. Is it possible to reverse the physical condition by healing the trauma and managing our body’s response to the stress?
I’d love to hear your thoughts!
Are you in need of a budget friendly way to get chemicals out of your laundry and household cleaning routine?
Are you struggling with your health and you would like to make some small changes that will make a large impact?
I’ve got an amazing hack for you!
I’ve shared this recipe with so many people recently, I wanted to put it here in the blog for you, too! The truth is, there are so many carcinogenic and endocrine disrupting chemicals in laundry soap, fabric softener, and dryer sheets. These chemicals cause cancer, mess with our hormones, and other body system functions. Think about it….if we wash our clothes and our sheets in chemicals…and wear our clothes on our body all day…and sleep on our sheets all night…we are exposed to those chemicals 24/7!
If our goal is to use less chemicals in our home, laundry is a great place to start! Also…the hack I’m going to share is also going to take care of all of your other household cleaning too!
One bottle of my favorite laundry soap, plus one bottle of my favorite household cleaner will take care of ALL of your laundry and household cleaning needs for over 6 months! Of course, that is relative, depending on how many loads of laundry you do each week. For the sake of numbers, I do approximately 5-6 loads of wash each week. (I also use extra soap because I have extremely hard well water…country living can be a blog post for another time…lol!)
Here's the hack:
- Take that bottle of laundry soap and split it into three 32oz pump bottles. (Amazon link for the bottles below.)
- Next, add 3 capfuls of the Household Cleaning concentrate to each pump bottle.
- (Save the rest of your Thieves cleaner for your household cleaning…you’ll have plenty left over!)
- Fill each bottle with warm water and mix.
- For each load of laundry, add 3-5 pumps of your homemade solution.
- Don’t forget to SWAP your fabric softener and dryer sheets for some wool dryer balls!!
I could bore you with numbers, but here’s the condensed version:
One bottle of Thieves Laundry soap $33.25 (@ discounted price)
One bottle of Thieves Household Cleaner $25.50 (@ discounted price)
(Check below for links to purchase)
TOTAL INVESTMENT FOR 6+ MONTHS OF CLEANING & LAUNDRY = $58.75
EACH LOAD OF LAUNDRY WILL COST YOU APPROXIMATELY - $0.34
After making your laundry solution, use your household cleaner for the rest of your cleaning needs! Yup...that includes: bathrooms, kitchen, counters, floors, even the cutting board! One capful of cleaning concentrate will make a 16 oz spray bottle when filled with water.
Want another math equation? When diluted, that 16oz bottle only cost you approximately $0.85! That’s cheaper than shopping at the Dollar Store (which isn’t even $1 anymore…lol!)
It is easy to look at the cost of any one premium product and worry about what “seems” like a high price tag. These specific products are so concentrated, you get MUCH more value for your money than shopping at the store. And, I promise you, your health is worth it!
I would be honored to come alongside you and be your “wellness warrior coach”. When you make a purchase using my ordering link, you get me by your side to answer all your questions, hold your hand, and take those baby steps together!
This bundle includes everything you need to make a clean sweep of your cleaning products!
**Make it a Loyalty Rewards order and you will receive points on your purchase and a FREE diffuser in your 2nd order!
*As an Amazon affiliate, I earn from qualifying purchases.
There is a saying that goes, “The journey of one thousand miles begins with one step.” -Lau Tzu
If you know me, you know I'm all about being healthy....
But here's the truth: I wasn't always this way!
Even when I was diagnosed with autoimmune disease in 2003, I had no intention of changing my lifestyle! I was so blessed to have found the Chinese herbs that brought me into remission. But, it would be another 10 years before I started the journey to clean living!
What sparked it for me? Tana Amen's book, "The Omni Diet". Gary & I were familiar with the work of her husband (Dr. Daniel Amen), who had spoken at special education symposiums & addiction medicine conferences. When we learned his wife was in charge of the nutrition for all of his patients, we were all in! So we started eating clean, cutting out gluten, dairy, refined sugar, corn, & soy. I began to feel better than I had I years! I actually wrote a longer blog post about this and you can check it out here: Gluten Free Blog Post
Then, I wanted to add essential oils into my life! I found essential oils that could support my immune system, balance my hormones, manage stress, and release sore muscles. Again, I began to feel even better! Best decision ever!!
Not too much later, I started to learn how the chemicals in my home & personal care products were harming my health (disrupting the endocrine system, etc). I felt like it had come full circle. When I struggled with autoimmune disease, I believed we were living with environmental toxins that were a contributing factor, but I didn't believe I had any control! I finally realized that I can control what is in my home & I began to switch for healthier options a little at a time (cleaning supplies, shampoo, lotion, makeup, etc.) It definitely was a journey that took many months….baby steps were the key!
I'm fierce about my health because I know what it feels like to NOT be healthy! I'm compelled to share because I HATE disease & if I can help one person feel better, it's all worth it!
I would love to connect with you…are you on a health journey? Have you been diagnosed with ITP or a chronic illness?? Have you taken baby steps to reclaiming your health? Click the LET'S CONNECT button below so we can continue the conversation!
It was by chance, really! Here’s the whole story…
Have you heard of Dr. Daniel Amen? His name is becoming more popular and you may even have come across some of his information through social media. Ten years ago, the neither the mainstream (nor alternative) health community had really heard of him! As a special education teacher, I had heard him speak at a special education symposium. He talked about special needs learners and brain development. I purchased one of his books and ran home to tell my husband who this “brain doctor” was! Not too much later, my husband (whose field of expertise is addiction medicine), heard Dr. Amen speak at an addiction conference. Dr. Amen is a neuro-psychiatrist who uses functional SPECT scan imaging to diagnose brain issues. (My inner nerd LOVES learning about brain science!)
One day, my husband tells me, “You know that Dr. Amen? His wife was a trauma nurse and now designs nutritional plans for his brain patients. She wrote a book.” The words, “She wrote a book!” were music to my nerd-y ears! I wanted to know everything she had to say! At the time, we believed our son was struggling with ADHD and the fact that we may be able to help him with changes in nutrition was something I was immediately on board with. I immediately jumped on Amazon and grabbed her book, “The Omni Diet” by Tana Amen. She walks through the science behind gluten, sugar, dairy, corn, and soy and teaches what each of these foods does to our body and brain. The second half of the book is filled with recipes that became like a Bible to me!
HOW DID WE SUCCESSFULLY MAKE SUCH A MAJOR SHIFT IN OUR DIET?
Here’s what I DID NOT do:
- Cheese: I can’t eat that
- Pasta: I can’t eat that
- Corn: I can’t eat that
- Milk: I can’t drink that (not even in my coffee)
- Bread: I can’t eat that (no more sandwiches)
- OMG!!! WHAT AM I GOING TO EAT!??
Here is what I DID do that made it work for us!
I meal planned before each grocery shopping trip. I chose a few recipes from “The Omni Diet” book. I put the ingredients on my shopping list. I started small….a couple new recipes each week…while we went through and finished the other pantry items I would no longer use. After all, I’m too frugal to do a clean sweep and THROW AWAY all of my bread, pasta, hamburger helper, etc. Each week, I chose a few more recipes. Some recipes called for ingredients I had never even heard of! (Have you ever actually used fenugreek? Lol!) I realized the recipes I was making were so delicious, that I didn’t miss spaghetti, tacos with flour tortillas and shredded cheese, or some of the other “staple” meals I had been used to. We were eating beef stroganoff, Asian Fusion salad, salmon burgers with a gluten free bun, hearty chicken soup, etc.
MY AHA! MOMENT….
A few months after shifting our nutrition and being free of the gluten, dairy, sugar, corn, and soy, I realized something. Prior to the nutrition shift, I had often experienced feeling like my immune system was fighting “something”. I often felt like I was fighting a virus with a low-grade fever and body aches. Since I don’t have a spleen (I lost it in my autoimmune disease battle), I was trained to be aware of fevers that could indicate infection. These fevers never turned into anything…they would go away and I was left to believe that I had “gotten over” whatever I was fighting. After the nutrition shift, the fevers and body aches STOPPED! I felt excellent and full of energy! The next time I ate gluten…fever and body aches! LIGHT BULB MOMENT!! The gluten actually causes systemic inflammation in me that results in a fever and flu-like symptoms!
It has been almost ten years since our family changed our eating habits. It has been beneficial for all of us in different ways. What about the dairy? After eliminating dairy, I stopped having unexplained stomach cramping and digestive discomfort (I'll spare you the bathroom details...lol!) I can have small amounts of dairy (a scoop of ice cream, a piece of cheese...) and be ok. But I can tell if I've had too much.
I have other cookbooks and recipes I love. I find many online resources. I often recommend Danielle Walker’s “Against All Grain” cookbook because it is also home to some of my favorite meals!
Last year, I found an anti-inflammatory protocol I have come to LOVE! It combines anti-inflammatory foods and a powerhouse supplement. I'd love to share some more information:
Grab your copy of "The Omni Diet" by Tana Amen: The Omni Diet
My other favorite cookbook is "Meals Made Simple" by Danielle Walker: Meals Made Simple
*As an Amazon affiliate, I earn from qualifying purchases*
