It's been six months since I started doing a detox diet, pretty much to the day. My skin went through some very intense detoxing for a while there. It appears to be slowly clearing, though at this point I still have extremely dry, itchy, scaly skin. It comes and goes over different areas on my body. I'm not sure what is up with it, my naturopath says that I can't still be detoxing after this long. She thinks there is something emotional that I am hanging on to. I think it is also some external influences such as water temperature and in general how difficult it is to not scratch my skin when it is so intensely itchy. My mother thinks I need to go back on my allergy shots that I stopped when I started doing my cleanse (I don't want to be pumped full of toxins anymore) and my boss says "Isn't there a pill or a shot they can give you?" which negates the entire point of all I have been working towards, a natural remedy to my skin problems with long-term health as the goal.
I'm writing this on a pretty bad day, lots of painful spots everywhere made worse by a shower this morning. It's frustrating to still not have super-duper happier skin after six months, and it is so hard to know exactly what I need to do to make it speed up healing. Well, it is obvious that I need to drink lots of water, keep my diet pretty clean, and not stress over things, which makes me itchy and leads to more scratching. It's the unknowns that are confusing: epsom bath versus epsom and baking soda? Sauna, good or bad? (Most people say it's bad for eczema; the general belief is that is is good for those who are on detox diets. I like it but sometimes cannot stand the idea of the stinging showers at the gym that are necessary afterwards. It's really common with skin issues to have such catch-22s, exercise and sweating are good, but having the sweat on sensitive skin is intensely itchy and taking the more frequent showers to get rid of it is torture.) Coconut oil--good or bad? Cotton clothes are supposed to be good for inflamed skin, but cotton, as every outdoorsperson knows, hold in moisture when the weather is as damp and rainy as it has been here recently. This type of healing is full of questions and doubts and it's hard not to get totally crazy in my diet and routine. I am prone to obsessive compulsive behaviors, so telling me not to scratch an itch is not as easy as it sounds. Anyone who says "Just don't scratch it" has never had to deal with skin like this! I wish it were so simple.
I've been struggling a bit and I think that keeping this blog can be helpful. I have had so little contact with anyone else who has issues like mine that I was hoping that this blog could help me branch out. Very few people I know are seriously into alternative health (I know people who are vegetarians, who work out, who once in a while give up drinking for an entire weekend) and very few have serious skin issues like I do. What are some good support resources for me, and how can I help others with similar issues? On that note, I have to find a way to deal with the resentment I have for people who do not practice healthy habits, who eat ice cream like it's a food group, and can drink alcohol and coffee and eat pastries, shower with hot water, use toxic body products and still have great skin. I must admit to being very resentful at times. I sometimes think I work so hard and am still suffering. It's hard for me to admit to this because I think the whole "victim" mindset is hugely egotistical and very damaging. But as summer weather arrives, and girls everywhere are baring skin, I want to be able to do it too! Hell, I just want to be able to get into a shower without first having to psych myself up to deal with the pain it will cause.
Monday, July 6, 2009
Sunday, July 5, 2009
Sweet Potato Pancakes
I need to update more about my cleansing process, but I had to interject with a story of the delicious dinner I just made. It was sweet potato pancakes topped with sliced onion and avocado, fresh steamed beet greens with cider vinegar and olive oil, sliced avocado with tamari and pickled ginger, and then a tasty treat of this dairy-free dessert (very ice-cream-like) made from coconut milk and agave syrup. Super delicious!
For the sweet potato pancakes I followed a recipe in a Moosewood Cookbook, but it was basically shredded sweet potato, onion, sea salt, black pepper, garlic, a small amount of flour (I used gluten-free) and eggs. Pan-fried in coconut oil, then I put them in the oven for a few minutes with onion and avocado slices on top to warm up.
Friday, June 19, 2009
Naturopathic Medicine
In February, I also began to see a Naturopathic Doctor. I got her name from my Pilates instructor, who has battled health issues and is into alternative health as well. I had to travel over an hour each way to meet with my new naturopath, but it was a really great experience.
Terry's expertise is in Naturopathic medicine, Chinese medicine, and acupuncture. She works with her patients to figure out the reasons behind their symptoms and then to figure out how to solve their health problems. This whole approach is so different from Western Medicine because the focus in Naturopathy is wellness and it is important that the patient is very involved in their treatment. In Western Medicine, the focus is on disease and drugs, and patients participate very little in their own treatment. I was ready to get involved in my healing.
Meeting with Terry is great because it's not that nervous feeling of "Going to the Doctor". You don't have to wait in a gross sterile waiting room full of unhealthy-looking, obese or old people who look like they're going to cough up lungs or keel over at any minute. You don't have to put on a paper gown and then try to remember all your questions in the meager 15 minutes your Western doc has allocated for you in order to make enough money.
Her office is in her home, and she has chickens roaming outside, glass jars full of beans and whole grains in her kitchen, and peppermint soap in her bathroom. She asks a lot of questions about mood, sleep, digestion, menstrual cycles, and similar, to try to see what needs to be worked on. I've been seeing her about every three weeks now, and going to visit the Naturopath is sort of like an appointment at a spa.
It's not for those who just want to pop a pill. You have to be ready to be really involved in your own treatment, and be ready to cut things out of your diet (which I was already doing) and just in general be open to a new way of health. Unfortunately, my health insurance doesn't pay for "alternative health" costs or acupuncture, but her office visits are very reasonably priced, considering that I usually spend about 2+ hours there each time.
In general, she thinks that my digestive (and therefore, my skin) issues are related to what is referred to in Chinese medicine as "blood stasis". This means that the energy (qi) in my body gets stagnant and that I need to get it moving in order to bring the energy to the places where it needs to be. For those unfamiliar with Chinese medicine, this probably sounds pretty weird, but if you look at it as a circulatory issue, just think that getting blood moving can help with everything--better digestion, sleep, mood, sex drive, etc. Since skin problems are a reflection of what is wrong with the gut, it's very important to get the digestive issues handled first. It can take a long time to get skin to its optimal health, many months is not unusual. But like anything worth doing, the time has to be invested.
I'll definitely be posting more about naturopathy and acupuncture, this is just the beginning. I am not really sure yet how detailed I want to get in this blog, as some of the things are rather personal. However, I would love to hopefully help other people who are going through similar changes as I am so I may want to be more open. Time will tell!
Terry's expertise is in Naturopathic medicine, Chinese medicine, and acupuncture. She works with her patients to figure out the reasons behind their symptoms and then to figure out how to solve their health problems. This whole approach is so different from Western Medicine because the focus in Naturopathy is wellness and it is important that the patient is very involved in their treatment. In Western Medicine, the focus is on disease and drugs, and patients participate very little in their own treatment. I was ready to get involved in my healing.
Meeting with Terry is great because it's not that nervous feeling of "Going to the Doctor". You don't have to wait in a gross sterile waiting room full of unhealthy-looking, obese or old people who look like they're going to cough up lungs or keel over at any minute. You don't have to put on a paper gown and then try to remember all your questions in the meager 15 minutes your Western doc has allocated for you in order to make enough money.
Her office is in her home, and she has chickens roaming outside, glass jars full of beans and whole grains in her kitchen, and peppermint soap in her bathroom. She asks a lot of questions about mood, sleep, digestion, menstrual cycles, and similar, to try to see what needs to be worked on. I've been seeing her about every three weeks now, and going to visit the Naturopath is sort of like an appointment at a spa.
It's not for those who just want to pop a pill. You have to be ready to be really involved in your own treatment, and be ready to cut things out of your diet (which I was already doing) and just in general be open to a new way of health. Unfortunately, my health insurance doesn't pay for "alternative health" costs or acupuncture, but her office visits are very reasonably priced, considering that I usually spend about 2+ hours there each time.
In general, she thinks that my digestive (and therefore, my skin) issues are related to what is referred to in Chinese medicine as "blood stasis". This means that the energy (qi) in my body gets stagnant and that I need to get it moving in order to bring the energy to the places where it needs to be. For those unfamiliar with Chinese medicine, this probably sounds pretty weird, but if you look at it as a circulatory issue, just think that getting blood moving can help with everything--better digestion, sleep, mood, sex drive, etc. Since skin problems are a reflection of what is wrong with the gut, it's very important to get the digestive issues handled first. It can take a long time to get skin to its optimal health, many months is not unusual. But like anything worth doing, the time has to be invested.
I'll definitely be posting more about naturopathy and acupuncture, this is just the beginning. I am not really sure yet how detailed I want to get in this blog, as some of the things are rather personal. However, I would love to hopefully help other people who are going through similar changes as I am so I may want to be more open. Time will tell!
February & March: Detoxing Begins
Scott's Program involves kicking the old anti-inflammatory diet up a few notches. There's a strong emphasis on eliminating dairy, processed sugars and fats, flour, and generally all processed foods. Also, no animal products were allowed. It also stresses fresh vegetables juices every day, as well as naturally-fermented foods such as sauerkraut or miso.
On this diet, I had to cook nearly everything myself. This is what I could eat at the average restaurant: herbal tea. Not kidding! The diet recommends ever the elimination of nighsthade vegetables, which have been thought to be tied to many inflammatory problems, so I was avoiding white potatoes, tomatoes, all peppers except black, and eggplant. At Sugarloaf, where my boyfriend and I spent most weekends in the winter, I found refuge in a salad that had a generous amount of homemade hummus on it. Not very seasonal, but I had to not worry about that. We left a restaurant once when the waitress refused to ask if the kitchen could sautee me some squash in olive oil. Luckily I am quite a cook and my boyfriend enjoyed the challenge of this healthier eating. (He's the one who gave me the Ohlgren book in the first place.) We became total soup aficionados and discovered interesting recipes and ingredients.
The food part became less of a worry as my body began to detox itself. In my case, it was mostly an angry red rash over the majority of my body. This, coupled with living in Maine in the winter, working full time plus taking two graduate courses, traveling to Sugarloaf every weekend (and learning to ski, which is hard at 28 years old) made me really a little crazy.
Thinking back over this past winter I have to shudder. People who didn't understand were sometimes really rude. They didn't understand why I didn't just use a cortisone cream. The reason is that after years of pushing my skin problems back into my body with horrible cortisones and allergy medicines, I was finally letting it all come out. This is hard for most people to understand because Western Medicine is based upon on idea of drugs, which may fix a symptom but not really solve the underlying problem. A symptom such as a rash is the body's indicator that something is wrong on the inside. If you just patch up the problem on the outside, you are really only hiding from the true issue. Detoxing allows you to see what your body has been holding in all this time. I won't lie, it is gross. There is a lot of "stuff" that comes out: physically and emotionally.
It is really wild, though. At the same time that I would break down crying in frustration about my painful rash or the frustration that I would never get better, I would get these epiphanies about how exciting it was to really take control of my problem. Not to mention the very basic fact that a detox of any kind is spiritually powerful stuff. The things that you learn about yourself are very meaningful while your body is detoxing. It's quite difficult to explain.
On this diet, I had to cook nearly everything myself. This is what I could eat at the average restaurant: herbal tea. Not kidding! The diet recommends ever the elimination of nighsthade vegetables, which have been thought to be tied to many inflammatory problems, so I was avoiding white potatoes, tomatoes, all peppers except black, and eggplant. At Sugarloaf, where my boyfriend and I spent most weekends in the winter, I found refuge in a salad that had a generous amount of homemade hummus on it. Not very seasonal, but I had to not worry about that. We left a restaurant once when the waitress refused to ask if the kitchen could sautee me some squash in olive oil. Luckily I am quite a cook and my boyfriend enjoyed the challenge of this healthier eating. (He's the one who gave me the Ohlgren book in the first place.) We became total soup aficionados and discovered interesting recipes and ingredients.
The food part became less of a worry as my body began to detox itself. In my case, it was mostly an angry red rash over the majority of my body. This, coupled with living in Maine in the winter, working full time plus taking two graduate courses, traveling to Sugarloaf every weekend (and learning to ski, which is hard at 28 years old) made me really a little crazy.
Thinking back over this past winter I have to shudder. People who didn't understand were sometimes really rude. They didn't understand why I didn't just use a cortisone cream. The reason is that after years of pushing my skin problems back into my body with horrible cortisones and allergy medicines, I was finally letting it all come out. This is hard for most people to understand because Western Medicine is based upon on idea of drugs, which may fix a symptom but not really solve the underlying problem. A symptom such as a rash is the body's indicator that something is wrong on the inside. If you just patch up the problem on the outside, you are really only hiding from the true issue. Detoxing allows you to see what your body has been holding in all this time. I won't lie, it is gross. There is a lot of "stuff" that comes out: physically and emotionally.
It is really wild, though. At the same time that I would break down crying in frustration about my painful rash or the frustration that I would never get better, I would get these epiphanies about how exciting it was to really take control of my problem. Not to mention the very basic fact that a detox of any kind is spiritually powerful stuff. The things that you learn about yourself are very meaningful while your body is detoxing. It's quite difficult to explain.
January: A New Start
I should start by saying that this first entry is a bit late. About five months late. But I am trying to get over my own obsessions with waiting until things are perfect in order to start something new (because it means it never gets started) and just go with the lateness of my creation and revel in it.
The background is that I have had health issues with allergies, eczema, and any number of digestive problems since I was about 12 years old. Some recent reading that I had been doing led me to think that these things could all be connected. In January of this year I decided to take control of my health and try to heal myself through food and natural medicine. I began with about three weeks of a basic anti-inflammatory diet: cutting out dairy, processed sugars and fats, caffeine, alcohol, and upping my omega 3 intake (I love stinky fish).
In the beginning of February I started a great cleanse. You can look it up online, it is a wonderful experience. The book that I used is "The 28 Day Cleansing Program" by Scott Ohlgren. I knew that I wanted to do a month-long program instead of the more intense Master Cleanse or any other short-term cleanse because I knew enough that starting a cleanse means that you will have detox symptoms, some of which can be very unpleasant. With my sensitive system, I wanted to avoid shocking my body too quickly.
The background is that I have had health issues with allergies, eczema, and any number of digestive problems since I was about 12 years old. Some recent reading that I had been doing led me to think that these things could all be connected. In January of this year I decided to take control of my health and try to heal myself through food and natural medicine. I began with about three weeks of a basic anti-inflammatory diet: cutting out dairy, processed sugars and fats, caffeine, alcohol, and upping my omega 3 intake (I love stinky fish).
In the beginning of February I started a great cleanse. You can look it up online, it is a wonderful experience. The book that I used is "The 28 Day Cleansing Program" by Scott Ohlgren. I knew that I wanted to do a month-long program instead of the more intense Master Cleanse or any other short-term cleanse because I knew enough that starting a cleanse means that you will have detox symptoms, some of which can be very unpleasant. With my sensitive system, I wanted to avoid shocking my body too quickly.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)