Book Review

I love to read. Some of what I read is really good, and unfortunately, some of it really isn't. But I just finished a book that really made me think about some things that hubby and I have been talking about.

Hubby and I have decided that we would like to do some things for our bodies that we have never really thought about before.In fact, I have some friends that do this, but for many years I have discounted the effects. We are trying to get our bodies more healthy and rely more on natural cures and supplements. He has been listening to a radio program that promotes healthy living and a healthy life style.

Of course we know that when some one is promoting a product that they produce, there is an inflated positive overview of the products. So I went to a friend of mine that has no special interest in the products to ask her opinion. She was very positive about the changes we wanted to make and about the products that we wanted to try. She agreed that we should take things slowly until we are comfortable and happy about the results. Hubby got a multivitamin and I got a B vitamin combo that is supposed to help with your energy levels. Hubby says he's scared to see me with more energy. I am too, to tell you the truth.

On to the book review.

I just finished "Against Medical Advise" written by James Patterson and a friend of his. The friend has a son that fought a 13 year battle with Tourettes, OCD, and a severe anxiety disorder. It was very moving and thought provoking and it brought up some questions that I have already been having about mass produced pharmaceuticals.

The boy in the story, whose name is Cory, had an urge at four, almost five, to shake his head. And he didn't have the urge to stop for a very long time. Over the next few years, he saw countless doctors and was put on over 60 medications. They tried meds for Parkinson's, Alzheimers, anxiety, allergies, and who knows what else. His mother had to quit her job to manage the number of pills and MD visits that Cory had. In the end, the only medication that worked for him was alcohol.

He was a chain smoker. He fell asleep in a drunken stupor one night and almost set his house on fire when a cigarette fell out of his mouth and onto the couch cushions. His attendance at school was almost nothing because he couldn't cope with his conditions and his meds. His body would decide that it needed to make certain movements or gestures and he would do them. Whether they were appropriate for the situation or not, he would flip people off, or even just raise his hand. When he went through door ways he had to do a shuffling skip hop move before he could actually enter a room.

Cory made his mother wreck her car pretty badly and could have been killed when he grabbed the steering wheel one day and turned into the path of an oncoming vehicle. He was riding in the car with his father one day and had the urge to tap the steering wheel. His father made him sit in the back seat. He would touch people whether they wanted to be touched or not. He had almost no friends, and although he had an almost genius IQ, he was relegated to remedial classes because of his behavior.

He had no real friends to speak of. The people that he hung out with were the ones that had issues of their own, but only wanted to be around him when they wanted something from him. He excelled at baseball and later football, but had to quit both because of the fog the meds put him in. He couldn't function or control some of the worst of his body tics. The worse he got, the higher his anxiety. The meds did horrible things for him and to him. At one point he weighed almost 300 pounds because he couldn't stop eating. He had no control over his body or his emotions.

His parents had done everything they could do for him and were going to put him in rehab. The rehab place scared him so bad, he refused to go. His parents finally relented and checked him out AMA- against medical advise. And then he did something for himself. He quit all the meds and the alcohol and went to Wilderness Camp.

It was the camp that teens go to to clean themselves up. Sometimes his body would start ticcing and he couldn't do anything about it. Several times he fell behind the rest of the group and had to fight to catch up. He went without meals because he was unable to prepare them. If you don't help, you don't eat. He realized after several days that he no longer wanted or needed a cigarette or a drink. He worked his butt off, literally and figuratively, and got to come home.

His parents put him in a very advanced prep school that focused primarily on academics and working hard. He would stay up well into the night trying to catch up all the work and keep up. He finally ran away and went home. His parents were relieved, saddened, and angry all at the same time.

I am not doing this story justice in my description, but he eventually made it. And his Tourettes, OCD, and anxiety issues became a mute point and disappeared almost entirely. It is a fantastic story about perseverance and love and doing what is best for you.

So here's how all of this ties together. I am not a health nut. I have switched from regular white, empty carbs to healthier whole grain and whole wheat carbs. I have added more fresh veggies into our diet and have tried to cut down the sugar and the junk. My next big accomplishment would be the elimination of high fructose corn syrup, but that is a slow process, since it is in everything that is packaged and processed.

I wish that more MDs would look at healthier alternatives than just a pill. Watching the ads for some of the meds that are out there now, I cannot imagine why anyone would even attempt to take some of the meds that are out there. The side effects are scary. Why do I want to take a pill that gives me both diarrhea and constipation? How does that work exactly? Is it putting in a plug, and blowing it out? Eeewww!

Looking at some of the healthier alternatives and listening to people that have no vested interest in a certain product, I think I would rather take the alternative route. Native Americans and indigenous people all over the world have used alternative medicine for centuries. With great results I might add. I would rather take a pill that had nothing but naturally occuring plants than take one that has man made things in it. Seeing all of the recalls from the FDA makes me extremely leary of any medication that had been approved. There are no long term studies to see the significant effects over a period of time. And yes, I know that every body is different and reacts to meds differently, but I don't care.

I wonder if Cory could have been helped all those years ago by a doctor that believed in alternatives to a magic pill. None of the pills did anything for him except drug him up. He still had his tics, he still had horrible mental thoughts, and he still did things that he could not control. His mother at one point had to give him several doses of Benadryl to help him sleep through the horrible side effects of some of the medicines. I find myself leaning more and more to the "healthy alternative" lifestyle than the "please give me a pill". I do like my Oxycodone, but that's for the buzz. Don't judge, just read and respond.

I'll wrap this up by saying that we will no longer immunize our children. It is not your place to tell me I'm wrong. I have no confidence in the drug companies or the major pharmaceutical companies. I am more scared of the side effects of the immunization than not immunizing. We are trying to keep as many positives in our lives and in our bodies as we can. A freind of hubby's made a comment one day about his preference for a certain herb that shall remain nameless than drinking alcohol: God made ---, man made beer. Who do you trust?

This is a decison that we have given considerable thought to and was not made overnight. We are looking into alternatives for the boy's allergies and the big girl's headaches, as well as our own aches and pains. We have done the research and know where we want to go and where we want our bodies to be. We are choosing a healthy alternative to the same old, same old.