9 Signs of a Leaky Gut

The gut is the gateway to health. If your gut is healthy, chances are that you’re in good health. However, there’s a condition called leaky gut that can lead to a host of health problems.

What is leaky gut?

The gut is naturally permeable to very small molecules in order to absorb these vital nutrients. In fact, regulating intestinal permeability is one of the basic functions of the cells that line the intestinal wall. In sensitive people, gluten can cause the gut cells to release zonulin, a protein that can break apart tight junctions in the intestinal lining. Other factors — such as infections, toxins, stress and age — can also cause these tight junctions to break apart. Once these tight junctions get broken apart, you have a leaky gut. 

When your gut is leaky, things like toxins, microbes, undigested food particles, and more can escape from your intestines and travel throughout your body via your bloodstream. Your immune system marks these “foreign invaders” as pathogens and attacks them. The immune response to these invaders can appear in the form of any of the nine signs you have a leaky gut, which are listed below.

What causes leaky gut?

The main culprits are foods, infections, and toxins. Gluten is the number one cause of leaky gut. Other inflammatory foods like dairy or toxic foods, such sugar and excessive alcohol, are suspected as well. The most common infectious causes are candida overgrowth, intestinal parasites, and small intestine bacterial overgrowth (SIBO). Toxins come in the form of medications, including NSAIDS like Motrin and Advil, steroids, antibiotics, and acid-reducing drugs. They can also present in the form of environmental toxins like mercury, pesticides and BPA from plastics. Stress and age also contribute to a leaky gut. If you suffer from any of the following conditions, it’s likely that you have a leaky gut.

9 signs you have leaky gut?

1. Digestive issues such as gas, bloating, diarrhea or irritable bowel syndrome (IBS)
2. Seasonal allergies or asthma
3. Hormonal imbalances such as PMS or PCOS
4. Diagnosis of an autoimmune disease such as rheumatoid arthritis, Hashimoto’s thyroiditis, lupus, psoriasis, or celiac disease
5. Diagnosis of chronic fatigue or fibromyalgia
6. Mood and mind issues such as depression, anxiety, ADD or ADHD
7. Skin issues such as acne, rosacea, or eczema
8. Diagnosis of candida overgrowth
9. Food allergies or food intolerances

How do you heal leaky gut?

In my practice, I have all of my patients follow The Myers Way comprehensive elimination diet, which removes the toxic and inflammatory foods for a certain period of time. In addition, I have them follow a 4R program to heal their gut. The 4R program is as follows.

1. Remove the bad — The goal is to get rid of things that negatively affect the environment of the GI tract, such as inflammatory and toxic foods, and intestinal infections.
2. Replace with good — Add back the essential ingredients for proper digestion and absorption, such as digestive enzymes, hydrochloric acid and bile acids.
3. Restore the balance — It’s critical to restore beneficial bacteria to reestablish a healthy balance of good bacteria.
4. Repair the damage — It’s essential to provide the nutrients necessary to help the gut repair itself. One of my favorite supplements is L-glutamine, an amino acid that helps to rejuvenate the lining of the gut wall. If you still have symptoms after following the above recommendations, I would recommend finding a Functional Medicine physician in your area to work with you and to order a comprehensive stool test.

This article is by Amy Myers, MD, a renowned leader in Functional Medicine.  

Magnesium, an Essential for the Body

Good information on magnesium from the Web MD:

Magnesium is a mineral that is important for normal bone structure in the body. People get magnesium from their diet, but sometimes magnesium supplements are needed if magnesium levels are too low. Dietary intake of magnesium may be low, particularly among women. Magnesium deficiency is also not uncommon among African Americans and the elderly. Low magnesium levels in the body have been linked to diseases such as osteoporosis, high blood pressure, clogged arteries, hereditary heart disease, diabetes, and stroke. 

An easy way to remember foods that are good magnesium sources is to think fiber. Foods that are high in fiber are generally high in magnesium. Dietary sources of magnesium include legumes, whole grains, vegetables (especially broccoli, squash, and green leafy vegetables), seeds, and nuts (especially almonds). Other sources include dairy products, meats, chocolate, and coffee. Water with a high mineral content, or "hard" water, is also a source of magnesium. 

People take magnesium by mouth to prevent magnesium deficiency. It is also used as a laxative for constipation and for preparation of the bowel for surgical or diagnostic procedures. It is also used as an antacid for acid indigestion. 

Some people use magnesium for diseases of the heart and blood vessels including chest pain, irregular heartbeat, high blood pressure, high levels of "bad" cholesterol called low-density lipoprotein (LDL) cholesterol, low levels of "good" cholesterol called high-density lipoprotein (HDL) cholesterol, heart valve disease (mitral valve prolapse), metabolic syndrome, clogged arteries (coronary artery disease), stroke, and heart attack. 

Magnesium is also used for treating attention deficit-hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), anxiety, chronic fatigue syndrome (CFS), Lyme disease, fibromyalgia, cystic fibrosis, alcoholism, mania, recovery after surgery, leg cramps at night and during pregnancy, diabetes, kidney stones, migraine headaches, a long-term pain condition called complex regional pain syndrome, weak bones (osteoporosis), premenstrual syndrome (PMS), altitude sickness, urinary incontinence, a condition that causes burning pain and redness called erythromelalgia, restless leg syndrome, asthma, hayfever, multiple sclerosis, and for preventing hearing loss and cancer. 

Athletes sometimes use magnesium to increase energy and endurance. 

Some people apply magnesium on their skin to treat infected skin ulcers, boils, and carbuncles; and to speed up wound healing. Magnesium is also used as a cold compress in the treatment of a severe skin infection caused by strep bacteria (erysipelas) and as a hot compress for deep-seated skin infections. 

Magnesium is injected into the body for nutritional purposes and to treat magnesium deficiency that occurs in people with pancreas infections, magnesium absorption disorders, and cirrhosis. It is also injected to treat high blood pressure during pregnancy and other pregnancy complications. 

Magnesium is also used as an injection to control seizures, to treat irregular heartbeat, to control irregular heartbeat after a heart attack, and for cardiac arrest. Magnesium is also injected into the body to treat asthma and other lung disease complications, for migraines and cluster headaches, jellyfish stings, poisonings, pain, swelling in the brain, chemotherapy side effects, head trauma and bleeding, sickle cell disease, to prevent cerebral palsy, and for tetanus.

How does it work? 

Magnesium is required for the proper growth and maintenance of bones. Magnesium is also required for the proper function of nerves, muscles, and many other parts of the body. In the stomach, magnesium helps neutralize stomach acid and moves stools through the intestine.

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Slathering the body with magnesium after workouts

Recognizing the Symptoms of Liver Disease

People with candida (as well as cancer) often have a compromised liver from all the toxins that the liver is trying to eliminate from the body, and from all the toxin killers like grapefruit seed extract, oregano oil, colloidal silver, etc that are used for die-off and the die-off itself. The liver needs to be paid attention to and cared for as a slightly compromised liver can be healed with proper diet but once the liver is scarred (e.g. cirrhosis), the liver is too damaged to heal.

Here is an interesting article on identifying symptoms that could reflect damage to the liver or liver disease itself:

Knowing the Symptoms of Liver Disease Could Save your Life

Knowing how to recognize the symptoms of liver disease can save your life. As with so many illnesses and diseases, liver disease, if spotted early enough, can be arrested, and cured (providing the causes have been identified and are avoided in the future), and your liver can fully recover, growing new healthy tissue to replace any that has been damaged, just as long as the disease has not been allowed to progress too far – hence the importance of knowing what the warning signs to look out for.

An organ and a gland

Your liver is the largest internal organ (and also the largest internal gland) that you have in your body. In a healthy adult, a normal liver will weigh somewhere between 3 - 3.5 pounds and it plays a crucial role in a number of body system functions.

The functions of the liver

The key functions of the liver are to detoxify your blood, and to enhance your digestive system by creating bile, which helps to break down the fats that you consume into small pieces, making them easier for your small intestine to absorb. But that’s not all. Here is a quick summary of what your liver does for you:

• detoxes the blood, filtering out any harmful and unwanted substances like drugs and alcohol

• produces bile to aid digestion

• stores some of the body’s vitamins and iron

• stores glucose

• converts glucose into sugar that the body can use when the body’s sugar levels become depleted

• processes hemoglobin, insulin and a variety of other hormones

• converts ammonia into urea, an essential ingredient for healthy metabolism

• eliminates old red blood cells, which produce fecal matter which is normally brown in color. This is why when your stools are discolored (i.e. not brown); it can be an indication there is something wrong with your liver function.

Without a healthy liver, any holistic health lifestyle will become severely compromised, and depending on the nature and severity of disease, could prove fatal, which is why it’s so important to be able to detect and interpret the early symptoms of liver disease.

Hepatic disease

Liver disease is also sometimes referred to as hepatic disease. When any type of hepatic disease affects up to three quarters of your liver tissue, that’s when a significant increase in liver function can be detected.

The causes of liver disease

Liver disease can be brought about in a number of different ways:

• its cells may be inflamed, as with hepatitis

• the passage of bile may become obstructed, as in cholestasis

• a build-up of cholesterol may occur

• the flow of blood to the liver can be damaged

• the tissue of the liver may be attacked and damaged by toxins

Alcohol abuse and cirrhosis of the liver

The most common cause of liver disease in North America is alcohol abuse. The final stage of liver disease (when the liver sustains severe scarring and cannot regenerate replacement tissue) is known as cirrhosis of the liver, and this is responsible for approximately 25,000 deaths per annum here in North America.

The classic symptoms of liver disease

The most frequent and common symptoms of liver disease include:

• bad breath

• black circles beneath the eyes

• bad body odor

• brown blemishes on the skin

• coated tongue

• discolored stools

• flushed facial appearance

• inflamed palms and soles of feet

• swollen eyeballs

• jaundice, the yellowing of the skin which can often also be evidenced in the whites of the eyes

• nausea

• pain, which is felt in the uppermost right hand quadrant of the abdomen

• increased tendency to perspire excessively

Some people also suffer from fatigue and weight loss.

These symptoms of liver disease relate to hepatic disease in general, but there are also many different, specific, illnesses or diseases that affect the liver, and each of these has its own specific symptoms.

Gallstones

The symptoms of liver disease that are associated with gallstones, include pain in the upper right quadrant of the abdomen, vomiting (from having eaten a fatty or greasy meal), and if the gallbladder itself becomes infected, this may also bring about a fever.

Cirrhosis of the liver

As hepatic disease progresses and reaches the stage of cirrhosis, the following symptoms of liver disease may often appear.

• a tendency to bruise more easily - because the liver is no longer able to efficiently clot the blood

• itchiness - the result of bile salts being deposited in the skin can cause itching

• enlarged male breasts - a condition known as gynecomatia and can be brought about by upsetting the balance of sex hormones, and an increase in the hormone estradiol in particular

• erectile dysfunction - the upsetting of the balance of sex hormones can also bring about a reduction in sex drive and cause the testicles to shrink.

• feeling confused - feelings of confusion arise when the levels of ammonia in the bloodstream become too high. This ammonia is normally removed from the bloodstream by a healthy liver, but when liver health is compromised, the sufferer may experience feelings of confusion.

• feelings of lethargy - also potentially brought about by the increase in blood ammonia.

• decrease in muscle tissue - a compromised liver will also reduce its production of proteins, and this can lead to the wasting of muscle.

• swollen stomach veins - because blood pressure becomes increased with a cirrhotic liver, the blood flow to the liver can become compromised, possibly resulting in a swelling to the veins around the stomach area.

The unusual metabolization of fats

Another of the prime symptoms of liver disease is the abnormal metabolization of fats (your metabolism), which can manifest itself in the following ways:

• elevated levels of LDL cholesterol and triglycerides, at the same time as decreased levels of HDL cholesterol.

• hypertension or blood pressure caused by your blood vessels becoming blocked by fatty deposits, potentially leading to stroke and heart attack.

• fatty tumors and lymphomas developing in the skin

• significant weight gain that could lead to obesity

• difficulty in losing weight, even though you may be dieting

• a sluggishly slow metabolism

• bloated stomach

• the appearance of cellulite

• developing a roll of fat around the upper abdomen a.k.a. your own armchair.

Symptoms to look for with your digestive system

The symptoms of liver disease can also be seen in relation to the digestive system and can include things like:

• constipation

• hemorrhoids

• indigestion and/or reflux

• the inability to tolerate alcohol

• the inability to tolerate fatty food

• irritable bowel syndrome

Symptoms relating to blood sugar levels

The symptoms of liver damage that relate to blood sugar include things like:

• developing a craving for sweet things

• unstable levels of sugar in the blood, also known as hypoglycemia

• the onset, in later life, of type II diabetes

Symptoms relating to your immune system

Poor liver health can also affect your immune system in which case the symptoms of liver disease to watch out for include:

• developing new allergies such as asthma, hay fever, and hives

• excessive itching

• developing skin rashes

• an increased incidence of autoimmune disease

• developing fibromyalgia

• an increase in the incidence of viral and bacterial infections

source

Spot the symptoms of liver damage and give your liver the chance to recover

The health of your liver is not only crucial for a continued holistic health lifestyle, but is essential for any type of healthy lifestyle. The power of the liver to heal itself from many diseases brought about by alcoholic or non-alcoholic fatty liver is quite amazing, provided that the disease is spotted early, so knowing what the potential symptoms of liver disease are, as discussed above, and keeping a watchful eye out for them is absolutely crucial.

Leftover "Bibimbap"

Bibimbap [here's a link to a wide variety of bibimbap in Korea] is a mixed rice and vegies meal much loved by the Koreans ... and much loved by myself. However, since I'm ultra sensitive to the seasonings and sauces rich in sesame seed oil, fermented bean paste, hot pepper sauce and vinegar and of course sensitive to the many flavorings in the 영양분, literally translated "nutrition powder" but has all kinds of hidden secrets disguised, I absolutely can't eat Korean food ... or is it coincidence, almost no food that contains citric acid and/or MSG, and that pretty much includes everything (in both Korea and the US) processed on supermarket shelves and packaged in the freezers.

And btw, I've had many discussions with Koreans about what's in the 영양분 and say there must be citric acid and/or MSG in it because I hugely react to both and I hugely react to the seasoning salt. Koreans get so offended when I suggest that their "nutrition powder" - how could it be anything but good "nutrition"? - be non-healthful and that it might contain MSG, especially when there was a craze across Korea a few short years ago following a news broadcast on the dangers of MSG and then with everyone going hypo about it. Even for a time, restaurants to ease their clienteles' minds posted in their windows "No MSG served here". Even though I've tried to tell the Koreans in my discussions that I've located a list of no less than 25 alternative named additives that are simply put just monosodium glutamate with a disguised name, hidden by US marketing strategies, but, there's no reasoning when people have a cherished belief system and Koreans staunchly stick with theirs that "there is NO MSG in their 'nutrition powder'".

For an easy referencing list of disguised MSG additives, I've found a well-researched site on the known-to-be toxic additive. Debbie Angelsey has done intensive research on MSG as her 19-year-old son started having strange and violent reactions to foods. Here's her list link of alternative names for MSG, but her whole web site it dedicated to research on the toxin. Not surprisingly and according to her research (my research strongly points to the same conclusions) MSG is an excitatory neurotransmitter that can affect people with ADD/ADHD, migraine headaches, Parkinson's, fibromyalgia, autism, brain fog and many others. I would even dare to include the gamut of autoimmune diseases as being radically affected by the excitatory neurotransmitter.

Anyway, since I really like bibimbap and it's such an easy meal to eat and easy to put together - just add vegies to rice and dump a sauce on top - making a vegan, candida bibimbap is "easy as pie" ... or should I saw "easy as bibimbap"!


My ingredients are black rice (which I've found I don't digest well at all), chopped celery with leaves, leftover garbanzo bean "mashed potatoes" (hm, I'll have to post a recipe for that later. It's very tasty!) and whole frozen cranberries. Basically just about any vegie can be added to a base of rice and complementary sauce to make the stir-together dish sticky and well flavored.

Letters to a Friend

The first letter to a friend who had alluded to poor health and resulting poor quality of life... She seemed like she wanted to "talk" but was afraid to "open up" about her problems. Being sick is isolating, and causes such confusion, and so I wrote:

Dear R~~ 

...I've been having my own bear of a time. I got dog sick 2 1/2 years ago - systemic candida and the first year it almost wiped me out. I was so sick I couldn't even concentrate, the pain level was horrendous (the whole body but esp the rib cartilage which was breaking apart) and the flaming docs told me to see a psychiatrist cuz the blood work was coming back pretty good ... and not one, and I saw like 35-40 docs, recommended vitamin testing, which eventually proved extremely low vitamins A & D. Osteomalacia, aka adult rickets, fit(s) my bone and muscle syptoms perfectly! And I had seen close to 8 bone doctors and they were so focused on X-rays and non-vitamin testing that they could not give any kind of diagnosis or even a hint! Disgusting!). Long story but now I'm my own doc and am slowly slowly improving. I've learned tons about disease and diet control, and I eat only food that I prepare .... and I feel great! The down-side of all this is that my traveling days are temporarily at a halt cuz I'm so dependent on simple foods that are both gluten free and extremely low glycemic and also only those I prepare. I refuse to let that get me down. I MUST think positive .... and so I just focus on: I feel great! BTW, my favorite word is PROACTIVE :)

My friend responded in a way that I had felt when I was so sick the first year. She was so confused at her symptoms, and so missing her healthy youth. We're the same age and we're both too young to be so sick. She told me she's been diagnosed with fibromyalgia, osteoarthritis and these are complicated by spinal and head injuries from a car accident in which she was seriously rear-ended. All her problems were results of outside forces and she's depressed and feels helpless about the tailspin of her former good health. I do know from experience that pain can be managed by a careful diet. I've been managing my systemic candida difficulties with a strict, strict anti-candida diet. People might deride me for having a very limited food selection and say that "I'm not living", but my answer is to smile cheerfully ... and keep toting my lunch to restaurants to eat with friends (or just sitting with friends but not eating). To eat the wrong food is NOT an option. It just plain makes be sick -- first grumpy, then depressed and then the aches start. And so my reply is, "I AM living, and I'm living very well MY WAY."

Dear R~~

I'm sooo glad I decided to respond to your comment! My studies on health have taught me tons about fibromyalgia and osteoarthritis, which btw are related. Careful eating for those is essential for improvement. (MDs dispute it but they were trained by pharmaceutical companies to believe in pharmaceutics, surgery and other invasive procedures to heal - what a load of crap, excuse my language, but I've heard all sorts of nonsense from them concerning my "problems" and early on I even tried some of their treatments cuz I was desperate but I had some horrible reactions to some of their chemical-drugs ... well, hello, bacteria in general and especially candida love chemicals!).

Anyway, let me explain about what I've discovered to be big causes of fibromyalgia, osteoarthritis, rheumatoid arthritis, multiple sclerosis, Crohn's disease, celiacs disease and the other autoimmune diseases: bacteria. [It seems diff kinds of bacteria or at least bacteria located in diff places in the GI tract are one of the big sources of autoimmune health evils. Nutritional imbalance is another, but then, bacteria overgrowth causes nutritional imbalances, and vice versa ... (I wish someone would do some specific research on this particular disease-bacteria link!) I've only found data on three specific diseases related to three specific bacteria so far: Crohn's disease, a low grade fever caused by a can't-remember bacteria in the lower GI tract, Grave's disease which I was diagnosed with 6 yrs ago & forgot the bacteria also but it's definitely one of many forerunners for systemic candida, and Parkinson's disease which my dad has & is often caused by h.pylori]. The overgrowth of bacteria can come gradually or in my case just explode suddenly within the body.

I'm not totally sure my bacteria IS the much talked about candida albicans (there are about 17 kinds of candida) since it's self-diagnosis and when I've pointedly asked 3 docs in diff fields and who knew my long sick-history, they all told me in quick reply and without any testing "you don't have candida". I knew that doctors don't regard candida as a problem since everyone from about 6 months old has the bacteria (although not out of control). But total disregard to it causing a problem?! Ergh! So much for getting a specific test for diagnosis!!! Docs have been absolutely no help! Many docs also told me I was too food focused and to stop talking about food - hello, that's where my symptoms were coming from!!! So, it took me 1 1/2 years to systematically self-diagnose myself, and when I put myself on the strictest of candida diets b/c any kind of sugar, even small amounts of fruit sugar or root vegie sugar, set me off, within three days my pain was minimized and I could start thinking more clearly!!! Wow, the brain fog was clearing up!!!

Anyway, according to my research bacteria is what's causing the auto-immune disease(s). So to combat the bacteria, you have to stop feeding it, but of course you need to feed yourself or you'll die so you have to nourish yourself on the simplest, lowest-glycemic foods and foods that are not glutinous to your compromised GI track. You have to also eliminate all processed foods - canned, packaged, instant - and eat whole foods and vegetarian foods (meats have hormones out the wahzoo and dairy should never enter the mouth as its a known bacteria carrier).

I hear you when you say you just have no energy to do much and it's easier to go out to eat. I spent about 3 months barely dragging myself home after classes and lying on the floor. Thank goodness for my cat. She knew something was terribly wrong and after I'd lay there for a couple of hours, she'd scream in my face and I had to take care of her ... she was what kept me moving. It was awful cooking during that time and I had almost no ability to plan my classes - 3 hours to plan a lesson that would formerly take me 10 minutes! I got a crock pot and would put beans (only low-glycemic beans: black beans, lentils and chick peas) in it in the a.m. and add some vegies when I got home - eat 1-2 hours later and pack leftovers for lunch the next day. Rice cooker was good for brown rice, 율무 (job's tears), quinoa, sorghum grain, buckwheat and occasionally millet (no barley, oats, wheat, rye or triticale). Breakfast was made in the blender with a massive pile of green vegies (no root vegies cuz of starch, no tomatoes cuz acidic, no peppers cuz of inflammatory capsicum, no squash except zucchini cuz of starch and higher glycemic index ... no fruit for months but 1/2 a green apple later on). Anyway, my kitchen appliances saved me working in the kitchen.

Honestly, R~~, I think you should try the diet for 1 week, and if you feel a difference in the pain level and clearer in the head, you know you're onto something helpful. You have to remember, though, that you have to be strict during that week (no gum, candy, coffee or tea except peppermint tea. It's best not to eat between meals; just give your GI track time to clean out and if you continue with the diet it can heal, at least to some degree.) The first week was hard cuz I didn't really know what I was doing ... had to keep getting stricter and learn by trial and error [not much on the internet for the strict candida diet]. But it's been 10 1/2 months for me ... and like I said: I feel great! BTW, my symptoms before were wild beyond what I mentioned earlier - had bad symptoms for multiple sclerosis (MS) and rheumatoid arthritis (RA). They're closely related among the autoimmune diseases as is fibromyalgia. Those symptoms just niggle a bit, but with the diet, I am in control; without the diet, they are in control.

... Another secret I've discovered is to stay focused on others and not yourself. Wow, cuz other people's probs are HUGE in comparison with mine ... haha, but then you know, I like my word: PROACTIVE!

Restarting the Blog

If I were to rename this blog, I would call it:

"Spit in the Eye of the Dragon: Triumphing over Candida!"

Well, I'm not triumphing in the sense of conquoring, but I am living a normal relatively symptom-free/pain-free life, and that is important! I really try not to focus on my health, particularly hard when I hurt, hurt, hurt and had brain fog so bad that long sentences were sometimes weirdly constructed and I um-ummed a lot trying to recall words. As a linguist, I noticed that nouns were the principal words that I had difficulty remembering, and remembering names got terribly hard. (There's a definite link with memory loss of nouns, including people's names, on days that I eat too many carbs, fruit or nuts that haven't been washed properly so are dusty-moldy.) I've also noticed much to my chagrin that my awesome sense of spelling isn't so spectacular anymore, and my handwriting has changed and gotten rather scratchy at times. There are definite links to behavior change as well as cognitive changes with candida out of control, and recently, because I had gained confidence from several months of feeling pretty good, I added some apple and Asian pear to my diet .... sugar, returning symtoms to the left side of my body, I'm not ready to expand my diet yet, so have to back up before I relapse yet again.

Two nights ago, I started another CandiGone 15-day program (by Renew Life). I did one back in the spring with very good results, but over the summer from my reading I realized I hadn't done the getting-rid-of-candida steps properly, so I started over at ground zero. The proper steps are:

1st - do a parasite cleanse
... - (for me) do a kidney cleanse*
2nd - do a candida cleanse (up to 3 mths then take a healing break)
3rd - do a maintenance GI cleanse at every change of the season, or at least 2 times a year

Why start the blog again?

Ergh, on emoting! Emoting and the whine of the mosquitoes are about one and the same, and so I couldn't bear this blog, even though my intent was that someone in the future could likely benefit by all the research I've done and horrendous experiences I've gone through. My aim was to prevent people from having the huge frustrations that I had. But writing on my negative feelings and aches and pains was contrary to how I was starting to feel, so I dissed the blog and pursued happy thoughts and a steady improvement in the quality of life.

However, a few days ago a friend and I were dialoging on Facebook and come to find out, she's struggling with fibromyalgia, osteoarthritis complicated by a car accident injuries. Not nice. Very not nice! She sounded like me when I was depressed and in my deepest fog ... and so I decided to start up the blog again to maybe help her and so many others like her (and wow, do I know so many people who either have autoimmune disease diagnoses already or are really having unidentifiable health issues ... guess I'm in the age category now that starts to feel the curses of fast living). Ah, but so I blog.

* In the spring and over the summer I did 3 liver cleanses (more on that in a later entry) and after 3, it is important to cleanse the kidneys as they are very delicate and can incur serious harm if not taken care of properly, so I had to do a kidney cleanse before doing any more other types of cleansing.