Medical Health

So your grandparents passed down one or two genetic vulnerabilities and you have become ill with a genetic disease (maybe arthritis, psoriasis, inflammatory bowel disease, or breast cancer). And you know that you did not bring on your condition, you know that it is not your fault, and your doctors and friends know that much, too. Yet all the neurotic busybodies are saying, “It serves you right.”

Well, think of the bright side: the mean-spirited gossips (particularly those living in rainy climates) have once again shown off their ignorance. They live in the dark, like rodents. Because what they have really said is that you are the blame for your grandparents’ genes, that you got what you deserved the day you were born.

What a bunch of arrogant, greedy, thoughtless fools.

Back during the 1980s, when I was busy fulfilling the requirements of a Ph.D. degree, I performed quite a bit of dangerous field work. In my line of study, field workers and their associates suffered severe injuries, including decapitation, and died in small-plane crashes. Some of them drowned.

The university gave me a temporary position as a graduate research assistant, and the rest of my funding was drawn from research grants and sholarships. But years later I discovered that neither my graduate research assistantship nor my grants provided disability insurance and/or health insurance (never mind life insurance).

Therefore, I am advising all students to refrain from risking their lives and limbs during their course of studies, and I am saying that you must insist that the university provide you with disability and/or health benefits or allow you to use part of your grant money to buy the necessary insurance.

Universities think of themselves as absolutely benevolent, but when all is said and done, you can not trust them, and you must force them to keep up their end of the deal.

A staff member at a local hospital recommended these medical sites as good, reliable and reputable sources of information pertaining to ulcerative colitis and IBD:

http://digestive.niddk.nih.gov/ddiseases/pubs/colitis/

http://www.ccfa.org/info/about/ucp

http://mayoclinic.com

Obviously, there are many, many rather excellent psychiatrists practicing in Europe, Canada, and the United States. But having witnessed a good friend’s experiences with the mental-health establishment, I am certain that there are great numbers of sloppy, mean-spirited psychiatrists, mental-health nurses, and social workers making good livings while subtly abusing their power and their patients.

Therefore, it is imperative that you, the patient, obtain access to your medical records so that you can make written additions that both refute and correct the doctors’ mistakes and their slanderous attempts to justify the fact that they incarcerated you. Sometimes they even get mixed up about their patients’ identities and then report one patient’s problems (and crimes?) as another’s. Suddenly, and without your knowledge, you are accused of purposely getting crazed, of drinking pints of mouthwash on Christmas day.

And don’t kid yourself, except for top top-secret government intelligence, no written or electronic record is really confidential.

Mental-health professionals are constantly making assumptions (their’s is most often not a hard science), and medical assumptions are very often proved wrong. For example, here is a quote from Proteomics Weekly via NewsRx.com & NewsRx.net regarding inflammation (and brain disease). The italics are mine:

“In previous studies, the researchers found that the IL-27 cytokine limits the duration and intensity of white blood activation, an “off switch” to the cascade of messenger proteins that serve to further activate the immune system. Prior to their research, the general assumption among scientists was that IL-27 promoted inflammation.”

In other words, they thought IL-27 was a “bad guy,” but now, after quite some time, they are saying that IL-27 is a “good guy.”

I have never experienced suicide firsthand (and I have never attempted it), but I have been hospitalized due to blood loss, and the funny thing is that the whole time I was bleeding to death, the whole time my health was getting worse, I thought I was getting better.

If you are looking for dietary methods for toning down the symptoms of ulcerative colitis, read Dr. Barry Sears’ book The Anti-Inflammation Zone, where he explains how to remove grains from your meals and how to balance protein, good fat, and favorable carbohydrate.

If you are to the point of recovery where you can again tolerate spices, be sure to try adding organic tumeric and organic ginger to your meals. Both spices fight inflammation and ginger alleviates gas and diarrhea. (But don’t go overboard: these spices can thin your blood and increase bleeding. SEE the “Colitis, fish oil, chocolate, tea, and spices” post.)

You might have a problem finding organic fresh ginger, but Frontier brand organic ground ginger root works just fine. Their Web site is www.frontiercoop.com.