Nina Lois Turtledove

New Daily Regimen

Well, I have to do one more blood test, a Prometheus test to confirm 100% that it’s Crohn’s Disease. They are not too sure what exactly brings it on but they say genetics, immune system, and environmental factors are the causes. The immune system gets kicked on, and doesn’t know when to properly turn itself off. It is an auto-immune thing that probably got kicked on for me by some things that don’t seem to jive with me too well, like coffee, hormone-type birth control, a few too many sleepless nights, and maybe a little cold. My overactive immune system, after it should have shut itself off began attacking my gut, and my bowel became inflamed and then ulcerated and thus all the symptoms I’ve described in previous posts. Loss of appetite, weight loss, fatigue included.

This is what else I am doing to induce remission:

The big blue pills are Pentasa, the two smaller pinky ones are Prednisone. Pentasa to make the inflammation go away, the steroid Prednisone to calm down my immune system. I am glad of these Western things, drastic times call for drastic measures.

Plus: I am staying away from things that have inflammatory properties, such as those two I already mentioned. Obviously no more of my old style of drinking, (but I may have a glass of wine with dinner again one day…) I cut way back on sugar. No more smoking. A new relationship with stress as well. I was forced a lifestyle change… I knew in my gut was coming (pun intended) and it is now. Yogi-me has won out.

My yoga book B.K.S. Iyengar’s Path to Holistic Health has a sequence for ulcerative colitis, which is something very similar to my condition: it also an auto-immune disease. I’ve been doing this sequence, and pranayama at least once daily, too. I do not intend to have a relapse. I am going to shake this, I am going another way. I am fully aware of how beautifully possible this is. My intention is to have a well-functioning immune system and a healthy and happy body.

I heard a quote from Deepak Chopra, Indian medical doctor-ayurvedic practitioner-writer on spirituality today. He said something that struck me in a profound way. It goes something like this: Our bodies reflect our thoughts of ten years ago. Wow, ain’t that the truth, I think as I reflect back ten years and recall the pictures of the inside of my colon. If we want to know how our bodies will look like ten years from now, look at your thoughts today. When I am forty, I will that which I just mentioned. I am healing.

I am happy that I have been forced to become a healthier individual, NOW. I am now someone healing beyond all the debauchery I got into to deal with the fall-out from events of my younger years. I am letting go of worries and negative ways causing self-harm. I am becoming again more of who I truly am.

Health | 1.09.2007 17:40 |