Pain, Pain, Go Away!

A common ingredient in many cold medicines has been shown so ineffective that the FDA recently proposed taking it off the market. The ingredient, phenylephrine, "failed to outperform placebo pills in patients with cold and allergy congestion," say researchers from the University of Florida. "The same researchers also challenged the drug's effectiveness in 2007, but the FDA allowed the products to remain on the market pending additional research," according to CNBC .  Mostly placebos. Photo from Pixabay . I can attest that phenylephrine doesn't work. Before I stopped eating wheat, I constantly had nasal and sinus congestion. I helped keep Sudafed in business when the active ingredient was pseudoephedrine, but I noticed the PE (phenylephrine) variety didn't work at all. The only other decongestants I've found helpful are guaifenesin (Mucinex) and spicy food. Mucinex is expensive because it works! (The cheaper store brands work just as well, though.) Su...

The past few months have found me shuffling out of bed in the morning with stiff, painful achilles tendons. I've never experience anything like it, even when I was lindy hopping a couple of nights a week for twelve years.  I also started getting muscle strain last spring after doing normal chores around the house and yard--so much so that I added a chiropractor's YouTube channel to my feed on this site. I have muscle pain in my lower back and sternum that have improved but haven't gone away despite going to a chiropractor IRL.  Be careful of medicines, even if they're topical. Photo from Pexels . All of this happened after taking Cipro antibiotic drops for an eye infection . Cipro is a fluoroquinolone (a type of antibiotic) with a black box warning about tendonitis and tendon rupture, and another warning about "mental health side effects and serious blood sugar disturbances," according to the FDA. The side effects involving tendons, muscles, joints, nerves an...

Diabetes Down Despite Dietitians' Directions Last Sunday when I wrote about the grifters over at EatThis.com, which calls itself "Eat This, Not That," I was worked up enough to tweet to their medical expert board members if they stood by the site's article flogging sugary drinks and fast food for St. Patrick's Day. The site has over 1,300 articles, mostly puff pieces, on McDonald's and a news feed full of "the most important breaking news" on Doritos, burger joints and Chips Ahoy! I asked a dietitian who responded to me what exactly the "not that" part was in "Eat This, Not That." Important news about what you should eat! I was worked up until I remembered the saying, "You can't cheat an honest man." Meaning that this con, like a lot of others, requires some dishonesty on the part of the mark. Every Joe Six-Pack knows that cookies, chips and coffee-flavored milkshakes from Starbucks aren't health food. It takes s...

I just had the fastest recovery from a muscle injury EVER. Two days ago, I twisted the wrong way while playing with my dog and hurt my back. It felt like an oblique muscle was pulled. It hurt every time I moved, even in bed. The next day after I took a shower, it was gone. Not better, but gone.  Yogurt: stronger than it looks! Photo from Pixabay . A few months ago, working for a few hours on my garage left me feeling like I'd been run over .  The only thing I'm doing differently is eating yogurt made with Bacillus Coagulans Unique IS-2. I ate my normal amount of it, maybe even less, over the past few days. I started making and eating it around mid-November. I've had a number of muscle injuries over the years (including turf toe, which was nearly as painful as an infected tooth, and a couple of bad sprains that took a year to completely heal). I'm blown away at how fast I mended this time. Dr. Davis says his daughter, who plays competitive tennis, uses B. coagulans GBI...

This past month or so, I've had TMJ headaches in the morning, along with some mild stomach issues and acne the past week or so. I think it's muscle memory from years ago, back when I wore a night guard for TMJ pain. Since getting my braces off and getting dental implant in early June, I've been wearing an upper retainer at night. When I wear it to bed, it reminds me of the old upper retainer I used to wear when I was grinding my teeth some years ago after a car wreck. I think I've started grinding my teeth at night again. I wasn't grinding my teeth just before I got my implant, when I was wearing a retainer during the day. I'm not grinding my teeth now, wearing my retainer after dinner and before bed, as my orthodontist recommended. Since I haven't worn my retainer for a few nights, my headaches and neck pain are gone. My skin is clearing up, too. (Inflammation can become systemic and affect other parts of the body.) ***** The toe I stubbed a month ...

A recent injury left my toe pink and black. I called the color palette "Step into Danger," but Too Faced calls it "Romantic Eye." In fairness, my toe is much brighter. Really, I slathered on the eye shadow. Sometimes a mishap shakes us out of a routine and inspires something new. Viva antifragility !

It's a bummer when bad things happen to good dieters: weight gain, acne, need for naps, and indigestion in my case. You can go bananas trying to figure what you ate to make things go wrong. I recently had all the things I just mentioned, and I know it wasn't diet. The same diet I normally feel good on hasn't changed recently (except for subtracting dairy). The only thing that has been different over the past month is that my TMJ was acting up from my taking my big, strong, sled-dog wannabe for walks every night. I think the continual muscle strain led to systemic inflammation. Inflammation indicates a mobilization of your immune system; it's a call to arms. Whether the damaged tissue is a result of infection from bacterial invaders, overuse, or physical trauma, the purpose of the inflammation that ensues is to prevent additional damage and repair the damage already done. But what starts out as a healthy response can have adverse effects if it persists for too lo...

We know that foods you can't tolerate can cause inflammation in parts of the body outside the GI tract. But can inflammation in other parts of the body cause inflammation in the GI tract? I'm starting to think it's possible. This morning, I was walking my dog when the cause of my recent TMJ problems and headaches struck me: it was from walking my dog. Molly's so strong that she pulled my mother around in a wheelchair when Mom was in rehab a few years ago. I've tried to get her to walk without pulling, to no avail. When she pulls, I have to pull back and it makes me tense my neck and jaw. Molly has her own treadmill, which I bought when I had this problem before, and henceforth she'll just have to stay on it if she wants to walk. Molly on her treadmill, not the Iditarod. She could have been a contender. What does this have to do with stomach aches? Lately, my stomach has hurt and nothing seems to digest well. I haven't tried any new foods lately; in ...

Horses sweat, people perspire. Miss Hayworth glows." -Orson Welles Sign at a local cardio corral*: Nobody ever drowned in sweat. There's information posted in the windows about their classes, but I don't think they make any claims about weight loss. If that's the best they can come up with, I'll stay in bed while they have their 6 AM classes and avoid injuries .** *Origin of Corral: Spanish, from Vulgar Latin *currale enclosure for vehicles, from Latin currus cart, from currere to run — more at car First Known Use: 1582 Source: merriam-webster.com **The conclusion of the article is priceless: "As physical activity continues to be promoted as part of a healthy lifestyle, [sports related] injuries are becoming an important public health concern for both children and adults." Source: "Sports and recreation related injury episodes in the US population, 1997-99" by Conn JM, Annest JL, Gilchrist J. Injury Prevention, June ...

Since injuring my teeth, I haven't been eating as much vegetable food as I used to. (I'd already given up fruit, since it's one of the worst things for giving me acid reflux.) Why? I have a hard time chewing them--just like my mother, who has several bad teeth and a partial. Bad teeth are a sign of bad health and are associated with diabetes and low socioeconomic status. And they make it hard to chew certain foods. Sure, you can go to the trouble and expense of juicing, but people who do that are outliers who are probably doing several good things for their health. And V-8 is a bit like oatmeal for most people: the only reason they consume it is because they think it's good for them. For most people with bad teeth, it's just easier to eat tuna casserole and mashed potatoes or a hamburger and fries. Someone who's being funny might look at my case and say, "Aha! She became tired and weak and had several medical appointments around the time she stopped ea...

If I haven't posted much lately, it's because I've been resuming a normal life after a month spent getting well and getting by. I've weeded the yard, filed all my papers and amended my state tax return. I took my computer in for repairs and having lost all my data, reloaded my music and found a free home accounting program (mint.com) to replace Microsoft Money. My lindy partners have given my right arm some exercise (dance partners in lindy use one another's weight), my favorite stock screener brought up a promising company to research (Global Payments Network), and fold.it came out with a streptococcus puzzle and a "quick frozen" puzzle that have kept me busy.  My best effort at the new quick frozen puzzle folding proteins. I'm sheerbliss at #17, and my team is Go Science.  Something that seemed to help push me back into feeling well was resuming my GNC Hair, Skin & Nails vitamins. I always felt good taking those, but got nervous about ...

Falling off a bike, falling on your face, fracturing and spraining an arm, breaking a tooth and knocking two others loose sounds terribly painful. I certainly looked bad afterward: a lot of strangers in stores, on the bus and even on the street saw my black and blue face and arm in a sling and asked me what happened. At the urgent care center; I rated my pain a 4 out of 10 as long as I held my arm still. But 4 out of 10 isn't horrible pain. The bottle of Vicodin I got that day is still in the bag, unopened. My arm wasn't that badly injured--not as bad as my cousin's when she tripped over her dachshund and broke both of her wrists. And my jaw, despite landing on it and still having a bump on my chin, wasn't fractured or broken. Could be I'm a tough old bird--I'm descended from bull riders, homesteaders and blacksmiths. But I think diet has helped. I know that changing my diet to low-carb, taking vitamin D and later adopting the cavity healing diet made my t...

Tuesday I was back at the orthopedic doctor's office looking at x-rays of my arm. You know how a typical bone is slender in the middle, then comes up to a head? The head on my radius (lower arm bone) looks like a mushroom. It got smooshed in the accident--yes, the doctor agreed it was smooshed. "If you're going to have a fracture," he said, "that's the kind to have." It's better than the bone being cracked through its head, which sometimes happens. Mine was fractured because I'm double-jointed: instead of my elbow bending in the right way when I fell, it bent the other direction. "When will my arm straighten out?" "Hopefully never. Come back in a month if it isn't feeling better." The doctor also looked at my shoulder, hand and wrist, which still hurt from time to time, but that was about it. I've regained most of the use of my arm: I can unlock a door, open my purse and take the lid off the deodorant without ...

Best conversation yet: Cashier: How did you get hurt? Me: I fell off my bike. Cashier: Are you going to ride a bike again? Me: Nope. Cashier: So you didn't lose your common sense. That was Sunday. It's Friday, and strangers have stopped asking what happened to me since I'm a lot less black and blue now. I'm washing my own hair, putting on makeup and getting through a day at work without exhaustion. I don't do much at home besides cooking and dishes, and out-eating a teenage boy. Two eggs or a quarter pound of beef is a snack; either one used to be a meal. Rebuilding flesh and replenishing blood (I bled for a day when I fell) must take a lot of nutrients. I'm not wearing the extra calories--I've lost weight. The braces are working. My front teeth are straighter than they've been since I was a kid, and I can chew a little bit, very carefully. Since the tooth that broke was narrower than an implant, I'll have to have my top teeth re-aligned t...

A gift from my neighbor. I'd cite the source if I knew it. ETA 10/9/2012: Using a Google image search, I see that this photo is from the collection of Robert Flynn Johnson, a collector of old, anonymous photographs.

Never again do I want to hear how hard it is to do an elimination diet. If you think you have a natural right to happy and content and eat whatever you want without consequence, of course it will be hard. If you see life as a series of challenges to be met, and see that every food has consequences, it will be easier. And in fact, I find eliminating certain foods easier than eating them in moderation. My recent bike accident has left me unable to chew and with limited use of my right arm. (I'm right handed.) I can't eat wheat or carrageenan, can't tolerate more than a little dairy, and can't tolerate a high-carb diet. That leaves me with a low-carb, high fat (LCHF) diet of soft foods. So far, it's been a minor challenge. No, that's not an understatement, and no, I haven't had any protein shakes. I'm snooty as a Frenchman about food. To live on a soft LCHF diet of real food, you'll need a food processor with a motor powerful enough to puree meat. ...

My bike accident a few days ago left me with bad road rash. To help keep it from getting infected, I've been applying coconut oil to my scrapes and rinsing my mouth with it. In my last post , I linked to a couple of papers about coconut oil's ability to kill certain bacteria, and in some cases, its superiority over traditional antibiotics. So far, I don't have any infection. What has surprised me is how fast my scrapes are healing. I don't have a photo of myself from four days ago, but the pink spot on my chin was a bad scrape, so red the nurse called it a cherry. She put two bandages on it. Here's how it looks today: This isn't Photoshopped--there's just a rosy pink spot of intact skin and no scar. Same story with my knee. Look very closely above my kneecap and you can see the thin brown outline of where a large bandage was. I didn't bother applying coconut oil to a scrape on my foot. It was small, so I figured it would be fine on its own. A...

Monday morning found me in the dentist's chair for the fourth time this year. "You look like one of those Tour de France guys," said Dr. Michelangelo. It wasn't a compliment on my cycling ability. The day before, I was riding my bike and went to enter the driveway of the grocery store. The next thing I knew, my face hit the pavement. I'm still wearing cement in a few of my teeth. A little girl and her father asked me if I was OK. We talked for a moment, and the little girl said, "Just walk your bike home. I fall down on my bike all the time, and that's what I do." I took her advice. I have a minor radial fracture in my arm and a fractured tooth. The arm should heal in a few weeks. Meantime, friends and neighbors are opening cans, bringing me things I need, and offering to water the yard. Strangers helped me pull a movie out of the Redbox machine and open a bottle of children's Alleve. A cosmetology student washed my hair, which wasn't da...

The second most painful thing that ever happened to me was turf toe. (The worst was an infected tooth.) It's a common injury in football, wrestling and rugby; I managed to get it while dancing in my dining room. I was practicing a Charleston move called hacksaws when my right foot didn't clear the floor. It was like pounding my fist into the floor, except it was my foot. Basically, I sprained the metatarsophalangeal (MTP) joint of my big toe. For the next few weeks that winter, I shuffled around in my sandals, the only shoes I could get on my swollen foot. At least it wasn't snowing. A few things helped my foot feel better. My doctor gave me a shot in my foot and put a dressing on it. (The dressing was another reason I could wear nothing but sandals that adjusted across the toes.) The shot took away some of the pain and swelling. Another thing that helped was acupressure. After a few minutes pressing points K3 and K6, especially, I could walk without pain. (I used the book ...