Did you see last week’s post? Most of my joint damage healed and my bones got strong. What made this happen? I have no idea! Let’s speculate!

First, a bit of review. 

June 30, 2014, I took the last of my long term opiates. Bye bye drugs. Never liked you anyway.

I was able to do this because my doctor had me inject Vitamin C everyday. That compensated enough for whatever genetic error is causing my hEDS. Not a cure, but an on-going treatment that has made me able to function. Yay!

Long-term opiates are a bad choice for long-term pain. Opiates derange your endocrine system, screw up your GI function, trash your brain and nervous system, decalcify your bones, etc.

I was sick with post acute withdrawal for years after I was off. My body was a mess. Yet it healed? Wow.

My Health Regimen

I have been doing daily intramuscular injections of ascrobic acid for Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome symptom management going on 5 years.

Ascorbic Acid is Vitamin C. I do not benefit from oral C. How curious!

I inject one gram per day in my backside. Shot hurts only sometimes.

I love spending short amounts of time hanging up side down, even swinging a bit to help my spine relax. Dr. Plance thought this might help maintain joint space. Who knows?   

I love icing my painful joints. They love it, too. Did that help healing?

Here I am using a neoprene knee brace to strap an ice pack around my neck. More ice packs tucked under my peach sports bra.

I practice excellent posture so my joints sustain as little wear and tear as possible. No slouching or shoulders rolled forward. Correct standing, sitting and walking.

Because Mr. Pennington uses this book too, he is able to spend all day at his computer with no back pain or repetitive stress injuries.

This book is something. Do yourself a favor and read it.

I take as few supplements as possible because that industry is unregulated. Supplements can be full of toxins and not even have in them what they are supposed to. I buy from companies that care about their reputation and hope they really do have standards.

Glucosamine, chondroitin, and hyaluronic acid everyday.

Vitamin K2 effectively treats osteoporosis. Vitamin K2 keeps the calcium going into my bones and out of my vasculature. Recent ultrasound of my carotid arteries showed they are beautifully clean, no plaque building up. Yay! 

I also take Vitamin D, amount based on blood labs.

Vitamin K2 naturally occurs in fermented soy beans, a Japanese delicacy called natto. I love it. Asians respect me for that because many of them cannot stand it. With a nice runny egg over some sliced cabbage, or just on its own with a tablespoon of soy sauce and some salt, yum! 

Find it in the freezer section of your local Asian grocer. Ask the staff. They will be impressed.

Vitamin K2 is also abundant in goose liver. I ate all I could in Paris, and bought more to bring home. Those Frenchies know how to live. I had to smuggle it back into the US.

You uptight purticanical orthorexic Americans, trying to get back to the Garden of Eden with absurd notions of food purity!!!!!

Only one can got seized, at London Heathrow, for being too liquid inside. I know those airport security guys were really discussing what wine they would enjoy with it later.

I almost cried.

Vitamin K2 is also in stinky cheese. Here I am in Paris, going on a cheese bender. I get euphoric from great cheese, much more than from morphine. 

Cheese this good is illegal in the US.

You uptight purticanical orthorexic Americans, trying to get back to the Garden of Eden with absurd notions of food purity!!!!!

I salt load. It makes me feel so much better.

Would you believe that salt deficiency weakens bones and might even effect cartilage health? 

I Do Real Exercise 

No wasting time lying on a Pilates machine overloading my joints. No increasing my flexibility in yoga. Those modalities have high injury rates. Both yoga and Pilates hyperextend joints, provide minimal strengthening, and are definitely too high risk for me.

Bones, tendons, ligaments and cartilage do not have a direct blood supply. I must do the work to get my blood flowing to nurture my tissues. Not going to happen in yoga or Pilates. Heavy circulation also heals the brain, something else I have needed. 

I need to be strong and stable. So, I do weights, running, coordination, balance, sweating, moving all my joints in a full, healthy and not extreme range-of-motion. Muscles need to be worked out from all around. Bones need impact, so joints must also, no? I have never read that joints need impact, I am only applying logic.

More on my exercise regimen here.  Also, scroll down to the bottom of this page and click the category “Exercise & Posture” for more posts.

My Unhealthy Lifestyle

During the time so much healing happened, I was drinking too much alcohol too often (thanks, long-term opiates!) and eating too much sugar too often (thanks, long-term opiates!). In small amounts, alcohol is anti-inflammatory and health enhancing. Often, I was not sticking to small amounts.

I was also so depressed (thanks, long-term opiates!). I was super stresed out from having night terrors every night for years (thanks, long-term opiates!) for which I was losing my mind from lack of REM sleep. Evidently I healed anyway. Yay!

So much for peace and serenity being part of healing! So much for clean living! Who needs those placebos!

More Powerful Healing Modalities

I did lots of all of these. They are hard to get or hard to do.

• Platelet rich plasma shots - I had them regularly in knees and hips, but not my spine, so something else made my spine heal. Posts coming on this.

• Fasting/severe calorie restricting - Least expensive healing modality. When the human body is at work digesting and storing fat, it cannot devote resources to healing itself. I did not do juice fasting, as that is only a break from chewing. I enjoy chewing, and juicing is yuck. Stop calorie intake, that is when healing surges. Posts coming on this.

• Stimulating my brain and nervous system. After all, the brain is in charge. I did neurofeedback, many different kinds and whatever I could get. Neurofeedback is intense brain exercise. I did tons of it. It was so helpful, I want more. There are anectodal reports of neurofeedback healing arthritis. For me, it wiped out my sleep deprivation, PTSD nightmare phenomenon and TBI from a long ago car accident. My brain no longer got sucked into focusing on pain. My brain became more resilient. I also had protocols specifically for my early childhood trauma. I know, right? How interesting! One particular machine made my nervous system more resilient, less overloaded by sounds, smells, etc. That is a relief. All of that took a big burden of my brain. Did that help my body heal? Who knows. Posts coming on this.

Next post on what I plan to do about remaining joint damage. Of course I have a plan!

I wish you all the healing in the world. 😘