Flu then Pnumonia then "Recovery"

First my husband came home with the flu and he was absolutley miserable. Then he had a week where he felt well enough, and I developed the flu. Then I started to feel slightly recovered and he developed Pneumonia. I had a week where I felt slightly ok, but had an extra painful endometresosis couple of days. Then a week later I got Pneumonia. X-rays and doctor confirmed Pnumonea. It looked like I had spider webs in my lungs. I was so incredibly sick, unable to lay down to sleep, that I willingly took the antibiotics. It turns out I'm allergic to amoxicillin, so then I had a few days of rashes and hives that left me in tears. I had to take antihistamines and lay in a baking soda bath for hours to feel even slightly comfortable again.

About 2 months of this is way more than I can handle. I'm still coughing up big wads of green from my lungs, and my ears often won't pop. Add to it severe negative windchills (as in we got below -40f several times), followed by a massive snow storm of 10 inches, and now tonight we're due for the next massive snow storm. We're in blizzard warnings right now.

I'm stuck inside of a house that I don't have the strength to clean, and I can't open the windows to air it out.

If I've been very grumpy, distant, selfish, unresponsive, or unsupportive... well I'm not sorry! I have not been well - no, I have not been ok!

My body is weak to begin with, so when put through the flu and Pneumonia back-to-back, you should not expect me to simply recover and get back to my life. My POTS has been strong, my fatigue intense, my sleep is a major chore... but more than anything, talking to people is the worst. I can't break out of my own head, and it's not even a choice - I simply can't listen. I'm trapped in a prison in my own head and everything you say bounces off those prison walls. I can't handle myself, so I cannot take you on.

I've pushed away my friends both online and in person. It got to the point where I almost felt like I resented them, almost hated them. I didn't want to talk, and I didn't want to listen. I hate that I ever felt that way, because I love my friends. But even now I still don't enjoy talking to them because I don't have the energy to engage. I don't even like TV shows because I don't want to listen to the character's problems. I can't take anything else on. I just need to recover myself.

I might need another few days. I might need a few more months. 

Getting sick on top of a chronic illness is very challenging. Pneumonia is no joke. People often get hospitalized from it. People die from it. I wish I was hospitalized. I really wish I had a machine attached to me to help me breathe, a port for regular IVs to keep me stable, a vacuum to go into my lungs and suck it out... at the very least, having trained medical professionals there to help at a moment's notice. That would seriously have been very helpful. But no. I suffered through it from bed without much help since my husband was so busy. I very inefficiently coughed way too much, slept way too little, sweated too much (I was up to 103f fever and the fever lasted just over a week), and ate poorly. Why? Because I was afraid of the cost of seeing a doctor, I didn't want to go on their drugs, I didn't have the energy to explain all my medical issues to them (that they still won't understand because they've never been trained on my issues), and I honestly felt like I didn't care of I died.

And now the most help I've had for my recovery has been acupuncture, but due to the weather I've only been able to go once. Acupuncture helped get more out of my lungs than anything else has, and gave me the strength I needed to rest properly. I'm going back for another appointment in a few hours - hopefully before the blizzard begins!

All I'm trying to say in this blog is that it's critically necessary to be patient with people who are sick on top of having chronic illnesses.

Thank you. 

Norovirus is No Joke

Here's the short version:

I got Norovirus and it lasted for 5 days. It ranked in the top 3 worst pain experiences of my life. I'm too drained to recover easily. My stomach and gut are not back to normal and are very picky about what food and in what amount and when I eat it. I'm emotionally dead and deeply depressed. I finally had my appointment with my new local primary care doctor since I need an MD on my record, and she's sending me to a gynecologist and a cardiologist.

...I feel like this is just leading to a repeat of 2013 all over again. Lots of money getting thrown at doctors who likely will just tell me I'm normal and it's all in my head. I wonder why I bother, then I remember my disability case, and I remember that I'm supposed to be hounding lawyers until someone takes my case. Yeah, well, give me some magic pill to return me to good health if you want me to try harder to get a lawyer. If I want to ever get government assistance then I need MDs, not NDs, to diagnose me. But it's the ND that actually helps me.

Am I being too honest if I say I either want to be able to live without all these health problems or just die? Does that make you uncomfortable? Sorry, my filters are full and can't filter anything else. It's all I can think about. I can't enjoy the things that normally make me happy. I'm pushing my friends away because I don't have any energy at all for them. I'm just blank. I'm emotionally dead. My body feels like an empty shell. There's no energy or life in me. Norovirus took what I had left. 2 days of vomiting, diarrhea, and horrid skin aching and tenderness. 2 more days of just diarrhea and skin pain, Another day of just diarrhea. Any fuel or qi or life energy that I had left is gone. I'm not suicidal, I just don't want to take part in anything in life. Any appointment, commitment, phone call, email... it's too demanding. Wants too much of me. I can feel a pool of anger and resentment somewhere in me, and if that's the only emotion my body will give me then I really need to stay away from people.

I'm going to a gynecologist because I can't stop bleeding in heavy amounts. It's been 2 months of bleeding almost every day. I tried some herbs from my acupuncturist to stop the bleeding. One of them did reduce the bleeding without side effects. The other seemed to stop the bleeding for a few days, but gave me such low blood pressure that I spent the whole day trying to keep my head upside down to manage the headache and painful blurry vision. I know I'm very blood deficient. She gave me herbs to boil and drink to improve my blood, but I haven't yet because of Easter taking over and then getting Norovirus. But seriously, puking my stomach and flushing my guts out when I'm already blood deficient? Why does my body choose to live through these things? Why does it hold on to life? And why don't doctors see that I'm suffering so severely that I'm not able to actually live any sort of life? It's mind blowing. My ND sees it. My acupuncturist sees it. My chiropractor doesn't question it. The neurologist I saw seemed to believe me, but he's so far away and I think he did what he can do within his specialty.

Trying to eat is a major problem. My stomach and gut are so sensitive that I have to figure out exactly the right thing to feed them, and then when I do I can only manage a couple of bites before I get pain and feeling overly full. Yesterday eating a baked sweet potato with just olive oil and salt worked. Today sweet potato is cramping my stomach. Chicken broth the super soft canned chicken is working consistently, but only until my stomach can't take more liquid. It's being just as picky about water. I feel dehydrated, but water feels like a bowling ball in my stomach. Last night I wasn't able to eat for 5 hours before it was bedtime. I knew I'd get pain from hunger if I didn't eat, so I tried to eat some very soft non-greasy sausage. I managed about 3 bites before I got major pain in my stomach. My gut was so inflamed it was giving me a horrid headache. I had to just go to sleep and sleep it off. Enzymes are helping to a certain point. I know that if I could turn my digestive system back on that I might actually be able to get some energy again... I feel like I'm gaining a tiny bit back everyday, but it's not enough. I wouldn't be able to type this right now if not for the green tea I've been sipping on all morning and the tiny bit of energy I'm getting back each day.

I'm going to attempt to go to work today for 3 hours. I'm lucky that I was only scheduled for a 3 hour shift today before I knew this was going to happen. I've missed 3 or 4 shifts already, so I need to try.

Mycotoxins and Mold

My naturopathic doctor recently had me do a mycotoxin test through BiotrekLabs.com. The reason for this is because the lab gave him a test for free, and I got to be the guinea pig and try the test out. If the test was not free, I highly doubt I would have had a mycotoxin test done. As it turns out the test showed I have "alarmingly" high levels of all mycotoxins in my body:



I was given my actual numbers over the phone, and I can tell you they up to 3x higher than the top of the range. This is alarming - I was really surprised. Many thoughts ran through my head: Why isn't the mold killing me? Since aflatoxin is one of the most carcinogenic toxins known to man, why don't I have cancer when my body is full of it? Why am I not suffering a daily bloody nose, which is my typical allergic reaction to mold (I tested very high in allergies to most molds many years ago.) Wouldn't my symptoms be A LOT worse than this? Sure, I can hardly move some days, but I'd expect to be completely bed ridden with results like these!

Let's back up a little bit. The company who makes the test is not the most reputable, and accuracy is a concern here. For a $650 test I would expect highly reliable results. These results could be very accurate, but there's reason to question it. That said, it's no surprise that mold is a major player in my illness, and I do believe I am high in the mycotoxins for several reasons.

I've had some awful mold exposures in my life. I've always been so sensitive that coming into contact with mold would give me an immediate bloody nose with mild flu-like symptoms, while people around me were just fine. I lived on the coast in Oregon for my teenage years, a place that was naturally moldy due to constant high humidity. I could never visit the city of Bend, Oregon without getting very sick. Every single time I stayed the night in Bend, which was at least once a summer, I would end up with the flu after several bloody noses. I think a big part of the problem was that I am also allergic to trees that grow in that area, so it was a double whammy. When we moved to North Dakota from Oregon, we lived in a guest house for 3 months that was not in good condition. My mom and I disrupted a big bush of black mold on a sliding glass door in that house (I call it a bush because it was at least a few inches by a few inches.) Next thing I knew, both nostrils were pouring blood and blood was flowing down my throat. Mom grabbed a mixing bowl to collect all my blood and I filled it at least half full. I wanted to go to the ER, and I was sick with flu like symptoms after that exposure. Years later my husband and I moved into an old house in Boise, Idaho. At first it was hard to tell if there was mold or not - it was old, needed repair work done, but nothing obvious as far as mold. I was getting bloody noses at least weekly, but I tend to get them in Boise anyway due to the dry air. It was in that house that I started gaining weight rapidly, developed arthritis, started to rely on coffee and energy drinks, and felt my physical decline. One day the wall of the shower fell into the tub, revealing lots of mildew. I was very stupid at the time, assuming it was just mildew and as long as the lining of the shower got resealed onto the wall it wouldn't affect us. We lived in that house for 2 years. We moved back to North Dakota into my parent's house (my parents moved out as we moved in.) The skylight in the main bathroom was occasionally leaking, thankfully into the toilet itself, ha! One day it wasn't just a drip, it was an actual stream of water and a larger hole opened up in the ceiling. The repairman said he couldn't find any mold, but when we replaced the skylight we found that the roof board below the skylight was heavily rotted. The bathroom was renovated and sealed up, and the roof was repaired. Shortly after that, we had our windows replaced, and mold was found in the window frames. Thankfully, replacing the windows took care of the mold!

(The mold test kit's results for the main bathroom when the skylight was leaking into our toilet.)

I have a history with mold, as you can read. The question today is this: Am I still living in a moldy environment? My dad hired a company to test our house for mold. The results showed that the upstairs, where my husband and I live, had half the amount of mold as the outside of our house had (which is the base range.) The downstairs, where another family member lives, had double the mold as outside of our house. They called it "slightly elevated." For me personally, "slightly elevated" can mean "not at all safe."

Another clue as my biotoxin illness was taking the VCS Test (Visual Contract Sensitivity Test.) The idea with this test is that mycotoxins build up in our eyes, making it difficult to see contrasting colors. It seems very simplistic, and I'm not going to explain it well, so I encourage you to read about on this site. Dr. Richie Shoemaker (the leader in mold illnesses) highly recommends the test. I tested positive for biotoxins based on this test (the test was free):


We had a new washer and dryer installed this week, and when the guys from Best Buy removed the old washer we saw a couple issues. The backside of the washer looked mildewy, something I couldn't have seen before. The valve for cold water was corroded and leaking, something I couldn't have seen before. They were unable to install our washer because of that valve, so they shut it off so it stopped dripping, at least. We have no way of knowing if it was dripping behind the sheet rock, but it's very possible. But that's when it dawned on me: was I washing my clothes in a moldy washing machine? It was about 30 years old, had a leak, and probably wasn't cleaned properly for years. Are ALL of my clothes contaminated with mold from that machine?

So... knowing my history, you can see why it's no surprise that mold is an issue in my health.

Normal people who get sick from mold tend to get over it and regain their health after leaving the moldy environment. This is probably the least moldy environment I've been in for most of my life. You'd think that I should be improving, but my level was still very high on that test! It was that high after 2 1/2 years of a perfect anti-candida diet (no sugar, no moldy foods, nothing to feed mold), and a 6 month long Candida cleanse (which should have killed mold too.) Either my levels were even higher and they have come down with all this work, or what I'm doing isn't working and isn't killing the mold in my body. (Or the test isn't accurate, but I don't think that's a big factor.)

When I've looked into why my body doesn't recover from mold, I keep seeing research and articles talking about the HLA genes. Apparently, only 25% of the population have these genes, and those that do are highly prone to mycotoxin illness. I've been told that the gene makes it so the body recycles mold back into the body instead of excreting it out like in normal people. I have the genes. *IF* this is true, then how can I possible fight it? I could be recycling mold from when I was a little kid, right? So what hope do I possibly have? If I do mange to kill all the mold in my body, wouldn't I just get sick all over again from new mold accumulation in my body? Mold is impossible to escape!

So I looked at mold treatment options. The first thing that came to my attention is Ozone therapy. Apparently ozone IVs can cause mold in the body to implode, killing the biofilm and the mold itself. It's impossible for mold to survive in ozone. Sounds like a miracle cure that's easy, right? Nope! Ozone is HIGHLY toxic to humans. It's so risky that it's actually illegal, but there are doctors administering it. Strong people can survive ozone IVs, but someone like me? It's extremely risky. You will find many doctors who swear by ozone and its safety, but I am very cautious. Alternatively, I get treatments in a hyperbaric chamber at my Naturopathic Doctor's clinic. This chamber is oxygen therapy, which can do the same thing as ozone, only much much much more safely. The problem is that I don't live near my doctor's clinic, and I'm unable to get treatments more than a few times a year. I have yet to find a hyperbaric chamber anywhere in the city I live in. I've been told to drink food grade 35% hydrogen peroxide, which is essentially the same thing as ozone, but supposedly more gentle. This is not something I'm willing to try without my doctor's support, especially based on what 3% hydrogen peroxide did to my mouth (check out my black hairy tongue post.)

The next option that was made aware of is the Shoemaker Protocol. I had several people tell me it's the ONLY option for treating mold, and all the mold support groups I've looked into treat this protocol like the Holy Bible of mold toxicity. It's so popular you'd think it has a high success rate, but I keep digging and digging through the internet and can't actually find much about the success rate, just people claiming to feel better and people claiming they can't tolerate the protocol. The protocol seems to be a mixed bag. From what I'm reading, there are plenty of people who do not do well on this protocol specifically because of the main prescription medication: Cholestyramine (CSM). It's a cholesterol drug. This raises red flags for me. First and foremost, my cholesterol should not be lowered! Secondly, I don't tolerate medication well - my body readily rejects most medications I've tried. Thirdly, negative reviews of this drug for mold toxicity are very negative. It causes severe constipation, and you must take it with a laxative, causing a great deal of distress for many patients. It also absorbs nutrition from your food and supplements, so you must be really careful about how to take the drug so that you don't malnourish and dehydrate yourself. I hope you can understand my hesitancy to consider this protocol! I understand that when it works for someone it works very well in that it makes them feel better. But what I don't understand is why this prescription drug could possibly be more effective than natural binders like Zeolite, Activated Charcoal, or clay?  Dr. Shoemaker claims that they don't bind to the same toxins, but why not? I plan to do a lot more reading up on this protocol since it's pushed so hard by mold patients, but I think I need to remain skeptical. Listen to or read this really wonderful interview on this protocol by Dr. Shoemaker himself.

The other option I was made aware of is a protocol by Dr. Nick Gonzalez, may he R.I.P., as outlined in Suzanne Sommer's book Tox-Sick. (I will write a separate post on this book once I finish reading it, but so far I highly recommend it.) He advocates for regular coffee enemas and far infrared sauna treatments in addition to taking food-grade bentonite clay daily. He claims that the clay's magnetic charge and honeycomb structure makes it an excellent binder to absorb mold and carry it out of the body. I'm intrigued by this, especially since I know how much better I feel when I take activated charcoal regularly. I also found this study about the effectiveness of clay on aflatoxins in humans. I see problems with this plan, though: dehydration and heavy metal toxicity. Apparently there is less lead in the clay than in some nuts and vegetables, and apparently it's not a bioavailable lead. I'm linking to Wellness Mama on this one simply because I'm having a very difficult time finding actual studies on the risks of the heavy metals in clay - even the FDA approves bentonite clay as a safe food additive. Maybe my hesitation about food grade clay isn't well founded afterall? I have been using bentonite clay on my skin and as a toothpaste for a couple of years now and absolutely love it. As for the coffee enemas, I'm interesting in trying. I get colonic irrigations a few times a year at my doctor's clinic and they are exceptionally helpful! Enemas won't be nearly as good, but I'm curious because I can do them at home. I already use my far infrared sauna many times a week at home (I haven't written a post on this - what's wrong with me!?)

I'm glad my naturopathic doctor had another option for me. He put me on a homeopathic nasal spray with oils designed to kill mold in my sinuses. This is not a full solution, but we just want to see what happens. Mold loves the sinuses because they're a dark humid place, so starting by killing the mold in my sinuses makes sense. The spray is also designed to desensitize me to mold homeopathically.  It's a bit intimidating spraying trace amounts of black mold into my sinuses, but I'm not foreign to the concept and have had good results with this type of treatment in the past. For now, I'm content to address my mold issue with this nasal spray while I work on making my house as mold-free as possible. Ideally I'd be able to do a hyperbaric chamber regularly too, but at least I can stick with my diet and my sauna to continue to kill off and sweat out the mold in my body. I might even consider the food grade bentonite clay, after a lot more research and talking about it with my doctor. I need to go slowly, and I like that this is a very gentle start to killing off the mold in my body.

Product Review: Vog Mask

(Forgive my formatting - a lot of blogger features don't work on my phone.)


I bought a Vog Mask:


http://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/B00KVIWMI4


It's made with organic cotton and features two respirators. The filter is made of carbon. I bought it mainly for flying, but I expect I'll get use out of it at home too.

Did it work?

I was doing well with it on the flights. I wasn't feeling well anyway, but I didn't feel I was getting worse on the planes. Until people used the lavatory. Every time someone came out of the lavatory a tsunami of fragrance filled the cabin. I believe this is Delta's signature fragrance named "Calm." I smelled it through my mask and it made me nauseous. I don't know how much stronger it would have been without the mask, but it was really bothering my non-MCS husband. This was a major issue for me on all 3 flights. I have written Delta about the health problems of their signature fragrance twice and never received a reply.

I wasn't able to wear the mask in the airports because I needed to eat and drink while I wasn't on the plane. I felt perfectly irritated and over exhausted by the end if the day, feeling very polluted and crabby. I only felt instant reactions twice in the airports, but I wasn't well enough to recover. I took extra glutathione and NAC, which helped quite a bit.

Despite wearing a mask, I ended up with a nasty flu-like virus. It made itself known 2 days later after flying, the perfect incubation time, but I was having a lot of stomach distress the first two days.

So, did the mask work? I think it must have to some degree, because I wasn't in too bad of a reaction when the trip was over. I was very uncontrollably irritable and moody, like I always get in a reaction, but I wasn't suffering many of my obvious reaction symptoms. In comparison, a few days later I spent a couple of minutes in the body care aisle at Whole Foods without my mask and spent the rest of the day reacting harshly. It was a very delayed reaction, by about 3-4 hours, but I was also fighting the flu-like virus. (Whole Foods needs to learn to put unscented products in separate aisles!)

 

As for comfort level, the mask is pretty good. The size large fit my face well, and the ear hoops didn't pull on my ears at all. I was able to breathe normally because of the dual respirators (I wouldn't want to try a single respirator kind as I would think it would be too stuffy.)  It did cover my face well, but it wasn't as close of a fit as some might need. If I talked the sides didn't stay snug with my cheeks, but the gaps between my cheek and mask were very small. The metal over the nose was perfectly adjustable and long enough to ensure a good fit.

For $30, yes, it's much much better than nothing. It will not be nearly enough for severe MCS people, but it might be enough for most light- moderate MCS people. I was hoping for more protection, but the real problem wasn't my mask, it was Delta's overpowering extra strong lavatory fragrance.

Checking In. A few thoughts while I'm away.

I'm finding myself away from my computer for an extended period of time. This post is very short because I'm typing it on my phone.


I'd like to share a couple of thoughts. I decided to get them out tonight instead of let them swim in my imagination while I try to settle down to sleep. I tend to develop anxiety when my thoughts get trapped.


1. I have a theory that chlorine in tap water causes eczema and acne. Ever since I installed the chlorine filters at home my skin has been soft, free from eczema, and free from excessive acne. I'm in a place now without chlorine filters, and my skin has been very very broken out. It's also been very dry and itchy. I can smell the chlorine with every shower and it's most unpleasant. My skin habits have been the same as at home, only this time coconut oil and avocado oil aren't enough.


2. My doctor told me to get a latex pillow, so I did. For those of you who like memory foam, but don't want the toxic chemical soup under your head all night, I highly recommend it. It smells like rubber. I won't deny that it's stinky. But it's natural with great support. I will be exploring latex mattresses soon.


3. I'm coming to understand how MCS is really such an important underlying cause of my health problems. It isn't just another issue, it's a root issue. I'll expand on this in a new post later, but I feel way way better in my doctor's clinic, which is deliberately low VOC with great filtration. Today I felt like me again for a while - a very exhausted me, but me, because I finally experienced my body being calm. I'm so used to being trapped and limited by my body feeling constantly on edge. That edginess went away for a while today because I wasn't reacting to anything and acupuncture was very very calming. I'm coming to understand how I'm usually in a constant low level reaction. Couldn't be happier to see my doctor!


4. I'm not my body. The person I am is not my body. My body heavily controls who I am because my gut and brain make up why I act the way I do, yes. But who I am is not my body, it's my soul. My soul has been so hindered by my body, but it isn't sick like my body is. I am not a sick person. I'm a healthy person limited by a sick body. I accept this, for now, at least. I am worth being a member of this society. I have value. Just because my body suffers doesn't mean I'm not able to participate in life. I am very much wanting to be a part of this world. I hope you can see me for the person I am and not for my weak body. I may be sick, but I am so so so much more. I'm a person.


5. I miss my hubby. This isn't health related, but I just wanted to say it. I'm not used to being away from him so long!


6. I just battled a nasty flu-like virus. I'm sure I got it from flying, even wearing a mask. I'll review the mask later. Getting sick when I was already feeling weak was scary. I haven't been that hypoglycemic in a while. I wasn't so sure I was going to survive that one. I highly recommend being careful and keeping your immune system strong. There's a lot of viruses going around right now.

Flu

On December 3rd, the CDC issued a warning that the 2014-2015 flu vaccine is less effective due to drifted influenza A viruses (in other words, the CDC isn't promising that this year's flu shot will work.)  This may come as a shock to many people who rely on the flu vaccine to prevent the flu. Despite this warning, is it still worth getting the flu shot? Many sources still say yes, claiming that the flu shot will make any flu you get more mild.

Why rely on a shot that probably won't protect you from getting the flu, no matter how mild? Does the flu shot even work? Anne Marie Helmenstine, Ph.D. explains why it's innefective. This study also explains that "Vaccination shows no appreciable effect on working days lost or hospitalisation." 
While I normally try to link to scholarly articles and studies, this article also makes a great case against the CDC for not documenting actual results of the flu shot. This is another case against the flu shot by Dr. Mercola.

But, the flu shot still has a chance of working, so it's better than nothing, right? I disagree. The flu shot is full of toxins. The CDC actually lists the ingredients in a flu shot. They're not hiding the fact that there are known toxins in it.

Formaldehyde is in the flu shot. The EPA does a great job of listing the known toxic effects of formaldehyde.

Thimerosal is a type of mercury. The FDA recognizes that it does cause many people to have allergic reactions, but also claims that it's a different type of mercury than the known toxic kind (the kind found in ocean fish.) However, there are still many studies out there about the harmful effects of thimersal. 

There's also the danger of the other preservatives and heavy metals in the flu shot. Rather than explaining all of this, read this. It's overly sensationalized, which is normally a turn-off for me, but it contains a lot of research all on the same page.

My intention for this blog wasn't to re-research the flu shot. Plenty of other people have already done that. My intention is to share my experience with the flu.

I can only remember having the flu once in my life.  That one case was H1N1, and I got it while working at a movie theater during a particularly busy weekend, where I helped to serve more than a thousand customers in my shift. I should note that I got sick very often in my child hood. I was often told I had the flu, but we called every sickness "the flu." I rarely vomited, had the shakes, or the other symptoms associated with the flu. I normally was sick with high fevers, headaches, sinus infections, and seasonal allergies. I also got sick easily from certain objects, like gray crayons, which I now know is part of MCS. More importantly, since my early teenage years I've never had the flu shot. I don't remember if I got the flu shot when I was younger - I assume my schools required it, but I don't remember getting it.

So how is it that I've only had the flu once and I've never had the flu shot? Part of the explanation is going to be guessing, but I'll get into known facts too.

1. I've been allergic to corn my whole life, meaning I've always avoided High Fructose Corn Syrup. This means that I've eaten less sugar than the average person, because I often couldn't eat the pre-packaged foods that most people regularly ate. I also could eat out very easily, so I had to be careful. I ordered salads with oil and vinegar as a dressing, or meat without the marinade with a size of vegetables. I occasionally would get pizza from a local business that read all the ingredients they used to make sure they didn't use any corn. Don't get me wrong, I did eat sugar, but I did not eat it with most of my meals like the average American does (because HFCS is in almost everything.) Read ingredients if you don't believe me. Sugar is an immune system suppressant. It also feeds infections, promotes the growth of yeast in our bodies, and causes our bodies to become very acidic. This single article says enough for the purpose of this blog on how sugar affects whole body health.

2. I've spent a lot of time outdoors as a kid, getting a lot of sunshine. I grew up in Idaho and Oregon, meaning all year round I had access to amazing outdoorsy things to do. I was in girl scouts, soccer, sailing camp, track, and more sports. I also just spent a ton of time on the ocean and went for plenty of bike rides and walks. I got plenty of sun. In my adult years, I've spent less time outside, but I have started taking vitamin D regularly at the request of my chiropractor. Vitamin D is known to prevent the flu. The sun is the best source of vitamin D, and the sun is known to boost immunity.

3. I've been getting chiropractic adjustments regularly for about 6 six years. The trouble with offering a source for how chiropractic adjustments help fight the flu is that most sources are written by chiropractors, well researched or not. I have personally had so much benefit from chiropractic care, that it doesn't surprise me at all that it helps prevent the flu because of what it does for the body. Remember, chiropractors are nervous system doctors, not bone doctors. They manipulate bones in order to free nerves so they can do their jobs. When the nervous system is working well because nerves aren't blocked or pinched, the body can respond well to invasion or harm. I'm going to link you to a chiropractic article anyway.


In conclusion, I hope that my perspective at least raises awareness of how the flu shot is not a guaranteed to prevent you from getting the flu. I hope that my perspective helps raise awareness of the fact that our bodies have a great natural defense system that needs to be nurtured in order to work effectively. If you're afraid of the flu, I highly recommend working on boosting your own immune system by avoiding sugar, getting enough vitamin D, and even going to a chiropractor regularly.