THE CURE FOR CONCUSSION AND POST CONCUSSION SYNDROME

When I saw my son, 17, walk through the door, I knew something wasn't right. His eyes were red and glossy. He was moving slowly. "I got a concussion," he said. My heart sank. But little did I know what he--and we--were in for at that moment. He'd had bumps on the head before--clunking heads with a friend while playing basketball in the driveway, hitting his head on a seat at a stadium, even falling backwards on the snow while snowboarding (he had a helmet on). These were all considered mild concussions as he had a slight headache the next day. But in all of these instances, he was completely symptom-free in a couple of days. 

This was different. He'd been throwing a football back and forth inside the gym that day for fun, and when it was his turn to jump up and catch it, another kid jumped up as well for the ball, and sent him reeling backwards onto the gym floor head first.  They heard his head hit the floor in the hall outside the gym. 

We saw his pediatrician right away, who, after examination, said it was probably just a mild concussion, if that. I was there and can attest that my son did the tests fine at that point. However, days later, my son's symptoms worsened. Terrible brain fog. Complete inability to concentrate. Headaches. And he needed to sleep constantly. We cocooned him right away. No school, no tv/phone/computer. He got anxious. He didn't want to see his friends because he felt so "off." We tried all the natural remedies out there--fish oil, turmeric, epsom salt baths, chiropractic, cranial sacral work and acupuncture. Of all of those the acupuncture helped more than the others, but it still did not get him anywhere near "normal." To top it off, this was his junior year of high school and he had AP classes to study for as well as the SAT and ACT to take. But at that point none of us even cared about school responsibilities. We just wanted our son back. Weeks turned into a month, then more. 

He now had "post concussion syndrome."

So after two months of this hell, I got really desperate. I knew our naturopath had a hyperbaric oxygen chamber. He'd mentioned that it was really good for concussions. But since nothing else had worked so far, I was skeptical. The other part of the puzzle was that hyperbaric is really expensive. Done through a naturopath, or other private entity, means you can't get your health insurance to pay for it, and you can't ask your MD for a prescription to do it at a hospital because insurance companies don't recognize the use of hyperbaric for concussion as a medically approved use. 

But by this time, my desperation, as well as my trust in my naturopath, won out. So we started my son on the hyperbaric oxygen regardless of our worries. We knew it would be a real commitment, both in time and money. You need to do 4-5 sessions a week for 3 or 4 weeks for it to be helpful. Or so my naturopath said. He didn't want to promise any miraculous outcome right away. We had to be patient, he said. So after the first "dive" (the tank is pressurized like you're doing an actual dive down into the ocean to "push" the oxygen into your cells), nothing was different. Nothing the second day as well. I hunkered down for the long haul and was hoping to see something in a week or two. But after the third day, wammo! My son noted a huge lifting of the brain fog! We were all so encouraged! He still had a ways to go to "normal" though.

But after each successive session, he got better and better. Every day, more energy, concentration, and personality came back. We saw our son become himself again. He did 12 sessions in all, (he was scheduled for 15 but he ended up not doing the last 3 as he felt he didn't need them), until he was completely and utterly cured from any symptoms of his concussion. It was nothing short of a miracle for us. 

One other bit of information: our naturopath also had my son do something called ACT, or Altitude Contrast Training, before going into the tank. This therapy entails riding a stationary bike with an oxygen mask on. You ride the bike intensely for 20 minutes as the oxygen is alternately increased, then decreased to imitate training at high altitude.  This makes your cells extra "hungry" for oxygen when you go into the hyperbaric chamber. I'm sure this also helped my son's recovery, but he didn't do this every day. I attribute his recovery mostly to the hyperbaric chamber.

Hyperbaric oxygen has often been called a treatment in search of a disease. Our naturopath uses it for a myriad of conditions, traumatic brain injury (concussion) being only one of them. It's also used for Lyme's disease, autism and an array of neurological disorders, with apparently very positive results. 

The travesty is that this incredibly helpful therapy is not being offered to concussion sufferers by mainstream medicine, when it is possibly the only true cure. I can't imagine the amount of people who are sitting around, out of school, out of work, out of reach, while hyperbaric oxygen chambers are sitting empty at their local hospitals, waiting for the odd burn or stroke victim to utilize them. I know they sit empty because I called all our local hospitals to ask if we could come in and use the chamber, and they said no, because concussion is not a medically approved use, and that hardly anyone uses them. 

WALK LIKE A CHINAMAN

First off, as requested, I've received thousands of photos of readers doing their naked snow-shoveling and other winter activities, so it must be more common than I thought. To the right is one of the few I could actually publish. But I'm so glad people are making an effort to get their Vitamin D even in the winter months.

Okay back to business. So, Larry, my husband—used to waddle when he walked—enough to be in the Ministry of Silly Walks. Although the reason wasn’t silly at all--he had really really painful arthritis in his hips. He popped Aleve and Tylenol every freakin day. Just to get by. Could barely do anything anymore. We were in the Adirondacks this summer and he couldn’t even go on hikes with us. Really felt badly for him. And he’s like 53. Way too young for this to be happening. But what was really scaring me were the visions I had of me pushing him around in a wheel chair with a blanket over his legs like he was FDR and I was that happy-go-lucky side-kick Eleanor. We had to so something. Like what? A double hip operation?? Insane. Or what about something even more drastic? A juice fast.

That’s what I wanted him to do. Go to Kripalu—the hippy dippy yoga center in the Berkshires—and do a supervised juice fast for four days. This, I knew would clean everything out including liver, kidney , colon and his joints and start the healing process. And I suggested he do a vegan diet (no animal products) afterwards . Because my Chinese doctor told me that arthritis is related to eating animal products. Oh yeah, that went over big. This was one beef-eatin, milk-swillin son-of –a –gun who was havin none of that new-fangled diet hokus pokus. I told him that Chinese medicine was hardly new-fangled, being only about 5000 years old, and.... Didn’t matter.

Then Larry’s dad got prostate cancer. And George (Larry’s dad), was given the China Study to read. The China Study (I got it at Barnes and Noble), is a nineteen year study of the eating habits of 6500 Chinese people—chosen by the researchers because they are a genetically homogeneous group. And in this study they found, that in certain areas, particularly the cities, where the Chinese eat a lot of animal protein, they got significantly more degenerative diseases, including cancer, heart disease, diabetes, etc. than people in rural China, where they eat an almost entirely plant –based diet. And through this study, they determined it was the type of protein, not the fat, that was doing it.

But anyway, back to George. So he goes on the vegan diet—in order to lower his PSA. And man, he did it. No cheating. And with a gusto you could hardly imagine, knowing his previous eating habits. And in maybe two or three months, he tells Larry on the phone....Yeah, I feel fine and I’m doing well, and, oh yeah, btw, my arthritis is gone. And Larry’s like, Wha--? And then Larry tells me. And says he’s gonna go on a vegan diet. And I’m like, great/oh boy.

So cut to a month later. And we’re doin some mad shoppin and cookin and choppin...(cuz that’s what you do--you boil a lot of brown rice, millet, pasta, and chop a LOT of vegetables—and people always ask this—where do you get your protein? Beans, nuts, seeds, whole grains, tofu, seitan). So anyway, a month later of this business. And... nothing. No change. And I’m losing the enthusiasm a little for this cuz now I have to make two kinds of dinners in the house—the kids wanting nothing to do with this stuff. But he keeps it up. Month two—a little change—definitely some improvement, but not like he’s kicking up his heels. But I’m telling him to keep it up because it’s going the right direction—instead of getting progressively worse. Now by month three—he’s off all his pain meds, his walk is back to normal. He’s starting to do some regular exercise. And now, after six months, it’s astounding how much better he is.

Now why did this occur? The author of this study goes into great detail about the physiological aspects of protein and its effect on the immune system. Depending on the disease, whether it be cancer, Mulitple Sclerosis, diabetes or arthritis, he explains the mechanism—and it was different for each. But I’m not gonna go into it because it’s just too damn lengthy.

Although I do want to add one thing—and this has to do with animal protein and cancer. In a previous study this same researcher compared two groups of rats—one was given a major carcinogen (aflatoxin) and then a 20% animal protein diet—the other was given the carcinogen and a 5% animal protein diet. ALL the rats in the 20% protein group got liver cancer, vs. NONE of the rats in the 5% protein group. That’s amazing, huh? He also found that when the rats were given plant-based protein, even up to the 20% amount, they still didn’t get cancer. High animal protein diets are really not lookin too good here.

Bottom line is, we all eat way too much animal protein. Used to be a couple of generations ago, people ate it a couple of times a week. Now it's twice a day for many. It's just wrong. And my advice, if you want to do something about it, is try switching to more plant based meals slowly, if you don't have any major health issues right now. Try a lentil soup instead for dinner once a week. And rice and beans another day. Don't try to change everything overnight. But it gets easier and easier as you go.

And read the China Study. There’s so much great information there and I've really only skimmed the surface here. And like I said, it’s at Barnes and Noble and it’s a very easy, interesting read. It’s also fascinating to hear about all the politics that occurred in the medical establishment regarding the author’s findings and how a lot of his work almost didn’t see the light of day because of how threatening it was to Big Pharma (curing disease with diet= no profits for pharmaceutical co’s) and the meat industries.

I mean, what a concept. We can actually cure a lot of what ails us with the food on our plate. Just like Hippocrates said. Radical.

SOAK IT ON UP

So I got a pair of cross-country skis for Christmas--so happy--because since we've gotten dumped on continually this winter I can now walk to the end of my street, slap those babies on and do a beautiful four mile trek around the golf course.

There are so many things I love about these outings--the visual of the snow's gleaming plumpness, the feeling of my heart pumping rhythmically in tandem with my breath, and last but not least, being able to soak up the sun for a good long time, even in temps made more for polar bears.

And that leads me to my point--Vitamin D, peeps. The one we get from the sun. It's a vitamin that's been totally dissed compared to the others--C, for colds, B's for stress and energy, etc. etc. But lemme tell you something, D's time has come. New research has shown that Vitamin D is involved in many more physiological processes than scientists realized. Yeah yeah, we all know it enables us to absorb calcium for strong bones and teeth, but now they've found it's responsible for the regulation of over 2000 of our 30,000 genes. Which is one reason why lower levels of Vitamin D have been associated with a much higher risk of cancer, diabetes, arthritis, heart disease, etc.

You gettin' this? Check it out--A ten year study involving 18,225 men, aged 40-75 and initially free of heart disease, showed that those with the lowest levels of Vitamin D were twice as likely to experience a heart attack as men with the highest levels. The study also showed that low levels of Vitamin D increased the risk of heart attack as much as high blood pressure or smoking (Arch Intern Med 08:168:1174-1180). And cancer? Listen to this--the first large scale, randomized placebo-controlled study showed that Vitamin D can cut cancer risk by as much as 60% (American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, 85(6):1586-91 June 2007). This is like, amazing news. So you see what I'm sayin'? Get your butt outside, bundle up, do whatever you have to do, just get out and get some sunshine.

And D's near miracle properties don't end there--it's also a potent antibiotic--it increases anti-microbial peptides--which we need to fight off cold and flu germs. Ever wonder why people always get sick in the winter? Hmm. Could it be the lower levels of Vitamin D? There's strong evidence to suggest that.

It's also been found that Vitamin D helps insomnia and depression and even enhances athletic performance.

So you're probably wondering how much do you need? Well 15 minutes a day with at least 40% of your body exposed (without sunscreen) is the minimum amount we need. And this way of getting D--as opposed to supplementing with a capsule--is best. It's the way nature intended. In winter, however, you most likely won't have 40% of your body exposed when you're outside unless you're into snow-shoveling in your Speedo (and if you are--right on--and please send photos which I'll post). So either go for more time outside, or supplement with D3--NOT D2. D2 is a synthetic version and is inferior to D3. 

And as for dosage--there's a big debate now on that--the FDA recommends 400 IU's a day for an adult. But many researchers now believe this is far too low. In Canada, for instance, the Canadian Pediatric Society recommends that pregnant women take 2000 IU's a day because low levels in mothers has been associated with a number of problems--including autism--in their babies. For general health, you can easily take 1000 IU's a day--I take 2000 IU's a day.

(And btw, the fear about getting too much Vitamin D is based on a minimum of 40,000 IU's a day.)

So like I said--get outside--walk the dog--do some snow-shoeing or extreme snow-angel making. I mean, if Nature intended for us to be inside and not get sun, we'd be like those little blind Mexican fish or we'd fly around at night by sonar and go "eeek"--stuff like that. Personally, I prefer the Speedo snow-blowing.