Today was inspirational.
I spent 4 hours sitting in a very hot pavilion-style cafe listening to 3 amazing women between the ages of 24 and 40 share their personal life stories of how they triumphed chronic ill-health, one even cheating death.
When doctors couldn't help them, they took control of their own well being, doing their own research, changed the way they ate and created a whole new lifestyle for themselves.
Between them, they've had chronic asthma (she was actually in a coma for 6 months because of it), type 2 diabetes, liver cancer, polycystic ovaries, eczema, chronic fatigue, anxiety, depression, morbid obesity, candida, aspergers and more that I can't remember off the top of my head.
All of these women either cured some of their conditions (type 2 diabetes, eczema, polycystic ovaries, depression, anxiety, chronic fatigue, candida) or controlled it (liver cancer, chronic asthma, aspergers) and between two of these women, they lost approximately 140kgs (that is NOT a typo), all by changing the way they ate.
There was an X-scientist now Naturopath who gave a talk about acidity vs alkalinity and buffers in the body.
There was a Nutritionist (with many other qualifications) talking about nutrition, healing the gut, good and bad bacteria in the body, how the body processes and digests different nutrients, new research into various foods that have been listed as unhealthy in the past, probiotics, enzymes etc etc.
My very favourite speaker of the day was Jessie Reimers. She is the young lady who has put together a petition to force the Heart Foundation to cancel their tick of approval rating, because they are funded by the food companies who bear the tick of approval on their food. None of the food is healthy or deserves any health recommendation.
Jessie is 24 yrs old, married, with two beautiful boys, the youngest of whom she gave birth to at home in a birthing pool and he weighed 9lb 8oz!! I estimate that she weights about 53kgs, but at her sickest, just a few years ago, she was only 38kgs. She is from Brisbane and drove here today with her family, including her husband, who reminded me so much of the Bare-chested Chef!
She announced that she is high functioning aspergers.
She was even more passionate about health, nutrition, toxins, doctors, medications, chemicals, vaccinations, pharmaceutical companies, the food industry .. EVERYTHING .. than me, and as she began to speak, I had a lot of trouble controlling my emotions.
I felt like I had found my soul mate!
She was repeating so many things that I have talked about in here and she was so passionate that she had trouble controlling her language lol.
Her health, during her short life, was filled with horror stories beginning with the meningococcal virus at age two. Her health issues were many and varied and all very, very serious.
I can't even say that her story was the most inspirational because all three women moved me to tears and I am even more motivated to continue my journey to optimum health after hearing them all today.
You can go to Jessie Reimers's blog
here. (but be warned she swears a LOT)
Telaine was born a heroin addict, because her mother was a heroin addict. She was immediately placed into foster care and spent the first few years of her life in various care situations. This affected her mental state and health and at a young age, she was wrongly diagnosed as bi-polar and given medication for two years that made her worse because she didn't have bi-polar at all. She was later diagnosed with a different mental disorder and given the correct medication.
The medications, along with a bad diet, sent her weight soaring to 169kgs. She suffered from Type 2 diabetes, anxiety, chronic fatigue, panic attacks, eczema, depression and liver cancer (she was on the list for a liver transplant until recently).
She changed her eating habits (under sufferance because her husband was the cook in the family) about 3 months after her husband started a low carb, high fat way of eating.
That was two years ago and all of those diseases (except the liver cancer) have now gone, she has lost 73kgs and she has been taken off the liver transplant list because the tumours have stabilised.
You can go to Telaine's and her husband Derek's website
here
The third woman, Beccy, is a chronic asthmatic. She was so bad that she had to take a concoction of drugs every day (she had the empty packages there of each drug that she took and made a 3 foot tower from them) and she spent around 10 months every year of her life in hospital.
About 7 years ago, she fell into a coma and was put on life support. After 6 months her husband and her father made the decision to turn off the machines. She miraculously woke up from her coma and the doctors still don't know how she survived because they couldn't find any brain activity.
She couldn't do anything for herself when she woke up and took 3 years to rehabilitate.
All of those medications made her gain weight until she reached 146 kgs.
When she was well enough, she began to do her own research and discovered 'clean eating'. In just one year, she lost 69 kgs and is off all the medication except her puffer which she needs occasionally and she carries it with her religiously. She is still classified as a chronic asthmatic and takes her illness very seriously, but she hasn't been in hospital for three years.
She doesn't have a website to share with you.
Here are a couple of photos from the day ...
... I have spent the afternoon and evening devouring as much of their information online that I can and it's now after 1am!
I am so happy that I attended today's session and even though I knew almost everything that was talked about, it was wonderful to have it confirmed and acknowledged by people who live this way and have experienced improved health because of it.
Now I'd best call it a day.
Nite all.
