We discuss how:
– Julie developed rheumatoid arthritis a couple of years ago
– She had her first manifestation while on a trip, after going back home her blood values were all messed up
– She went on ibuprofen, panadine and cortisone injections for 5 weeks
– She started researching anti-inflammatory foods before being diagnosed in January 2017
– She switched to eating fruit and vegetables only, and after a week her pain was reduced by 60%
– After that, she was able to cut back on panadine and ibuprofen but went back to her normal diet
– The return of the symptoms made elastic supports necessary for walking
– Further research aimed at avoiding Methotrexate led her to the Paddison Program
– Within a week Julie got rid of the supports and her CRP dropped from 24 to 16 in 3 months
Clint: Good day it’s Clint here, and I’ve got a guest with me today who’s been in intensive care nurse throughout her career. She developed rheumatoid arthritis a couple of years back and has a great story of success to share with us today. It’s Julie from Adelaide. How are you doing Julie?
Julie: I’m good thanks.
Clint: Now Give us a snapshot of what we’re in for, we like to do this at the start of each episode. Just give us a little before and then after, so that we get an idea of how far you’ve come.
Julie: So I’ll start with them in September, when my husband and 2 kids were on holiday in Alice Springs camping. Just before we left, I had stiffness in my fingers, and it felt really unusual, and I thought that doesn’t feel right. So I went to the doctor who suspected there was something wrong with my joints, and he referred me to rheumatology. But then so then we travelled to Alice in the car, with a trailer, with camping tent on the back. And over those days I started to feel stiff, and pain in my joints, and I noticed it was taking me a lot longer to get in and out of the car. And I didn’t feel well myself, anyway so we end up in Alice and we’re camping, and we’re on a bed on the blowup mattress on the floor. And the pain was getting worse, and all my joints were hurting, and moving was really difficult. It was taking me five minutes to get off of the floor when normally it would take me 10-20 seconds. It was taking me a long time, I had to get things to support me to be able to get up.
Clint: This is all throughout the joints? Was it mostly your fingers, wrists, elbows?
Julie: It was everywhere. It was my elbows, my shoulders in particular, my ankles, I could feel it my knees more so when I was kneeling on the floor and trying to get up and they were really painful. And over those few days it just got really really bad, I ended up in accident-emergency in Alice Springs Hospital they were really good. My husband was really concerned that on our travels, that he might have had to get the helicopter to send me back. So in the middle of the desert he didn’t want that to happen, so I said look I’ll be alright, we’ll go to Ayer’s Rock (inaudible).
Clint: Yes quite the adventure.
Julie: We’ll go to the doctor will see what he says. .
Clint: Yeah Can I just help for those international viewers, and listeners who aren’t familiar with where you currently are describing, what’s going on. Alice Springs is as much outback as you could possibly imagine. It is a very very remote town, that exists in the middle of the outback in the center of Australia, with blistering desert like conditions. And it’s a touristy town with a lot of local Aboriginals, and also people who make their local businesses there and so forth. And they service Ayer’s Rock or Uluru. And from there it’s a tourist hub to go and visit that huge monolith, the biggest monolith in the world. Uluru which is a fascinating incredible thing to see. .
Clint: So here you are, camping in the desert in this remote area, and you’re crippled, you can’t get off the floor. So I mean this makes for a documentary. Okay what happened next?
Julie: I’ve been in accident-emergency in the beginning of the week and seen the doctors, but it got really bad. So my husband took me back there when we were arguing about whether I was going to go to Ayer’s Rock or not. And I said we’ll see what the doctors say. So but the intern that saw me got the head doctor in, he said to my husband is this lady your wife? And he said yes, well if she was my wife, I’d have her on the next plane back to Adelaide, she’s really sick. We’re not sure what’s going on. It’s no point in taking bloods here because she’s just travelling again after, she’d be better off getting all these tests done back in Adelaide. Then he had to book me a flight back to Adelaide and dropped me off there the next day. We’d only been married 18 months, and I had to leave him with my two children which I’ve never done before. And they got to see Ayer’s rock, but I’d missed out. So I’m still gonna do that trip again and another time. I ended up here, my other son picked me up in the airport and he couldn’t believe I was walking like an 80-year-old. He said, oh mum. And I was so glad I came back because I took really really ill, and I cried all night in pain. And I went to the accident-emergency, and it was busy I waited all day. And then the rheumatologist came to see me, and she wasn’t sure what was going on but she was pretty sure that’s what it was. And she wanted to send me home and I said, look you can’t send me home. I can hardly keep my balance, I’m a (inaudible) risk, so I insisted they admit me, so she did.
Julie: And Then over the next two or three nights, I experienced such severe pain in my body. When I woke up in the middle of the night that I couldn’t move, this happened three nights in a row. You could imagine now, I’m the next nurse from ICU and I’m wondering what is going on. It took me, I had to start moving my fingers a little then bit my whole hand. It took me five minutes to ring the bell, the help. Then it took me another five minutes to get off the bed, and then another five minutes to walk to the toilet. So I was really bad and I ended up having to have, they thought it could be rheumatoid arthritis but it takes a while to diagnose that.
Clint: Did anyone draw your blood, and then run the blood test to examine it?
Julie: Yes.
Clint: So you were waiting on those results while you’re in agony at the hospital?
Julie: Yes, and my ESR was over 100. So I thought something was really wrong. And my CRP was, and I had rheumatoid factor, I can’t remember what it was then. And so they had to give me intra-muscular injections into both shoulders.
Clint: So I’m surprised they didn’t go ahead and just give you like.
Julie: They were giving me ibuprofen.
Clint: Right, giving your ibuprofen.
Julie: Double the dosage, I was a mess (inaudible) ibuprofen and I didn’t have so much to stop my stomach from bleeding.
Clint: Wow, (inaudible) your stomach bleeding from all of those painkillers, because it’s so bad for the gastrointestinal.
Julie: Yeah Exactly.
Clint: Wow. Okay so, what were they giving you to prevent that? Were they giving you like proton pump inhibitors? like these drugs to try and prevent.
Julie: They had me on like a painkiller, I can’t remember what it was now. But they ended up a few days later putting me on panadine 4 times a day for the pain. Which yeah you shouldn’t be on. But I had intramuscular injection of cortisone in both shoulders, one each. And that increased my symptoms a little bit. Then 3 days later I had to have another cortisone injection into my backside. .
Clint: Yeah Well that’s the one I was expecting, that’s the one that I thought they might give to you right away just to get you functioning again. Okay so talk about your 7 days in the hospital, and then you’ve left they’re pumped up with prednisone, painkillers, injections into your shoulders, and walked out. So obviously those interventions are all very temporary. So what happened next? I mean you’ve got enough to this tragic start like it’s very fascinating at this point. So how did things develop? .
Julie: Well I was on panadine forte 4 times a day, for 5 weeks. And I was having problems going to the toilet for this stage. And I was still on the ibuprofen which I was then finding out was I needed to get off because it’s really bad for my gut. But I was taking the other medication to stop the bleeding. My husband said to me, Julie you’re turning into a drug addict, you can’t stay on that. I said well I have to, I’m in too much pain. And so I started researching anti-inflammatory foods. And I didn’t know what was wrong with me at this stage, because this happened in September, I wasn’t actually diagnosed until January of 2017. So I did my own research and I thought I had Fibromyalgia and I came across this YouTube video with these people that had years just had fruit vegetables, and their pain got better. So I thought, It could be that. So you know what happened? And this is the start of my getting off the drugs. Right? 60% of my pain had gone within a week.
Clint: Just by eating fruits and veggies?
Julie: Just eating fruit and vegetables.
Clint: And You would’ve lost quite a lot of weight as well during that week. .
Julie: Actually I was so full inflammation. You wouldn’t believe this, I lost 5 kilos in 3 days. Because I was just so full of inflammation as I was on my normal diet, dairy, and everything then. And then the following week I kept doing just fruit and veg and my pain had reduced by 80%. Then I was able to cut back on the panadine, I stopped gradually over few days having the panadine and just having Panadol. I cut back on ibuprofen, through looking at the anti-inflammatory foods I found that garlic, ginger, turmeric. I started having heafs of that in my food, and I started to get better. Then I came across Paleo, so I gave that a go. And I started to get better, but it was still there, it was still there. And then the symptoms even doing that, the symptoms started to get worse until finally in January I was diagnosed with rheumatoid arthritis. But I had managed to get off all the panadine forte by them.
Clint: Yes, huge effort which I put down to the fruits and vegetables stage which is fantastic. I wouldn’t say even doing the AIP approach that symptoms continued to come back after you introduced those. Because let’s face it like almost nothing can compete with just fruits and vegetables, it’s actually not enough calories to get you to sustain you, and it’s probably not completely nutritionally sufficient. However, it’s fantastic for inflammation reduction, and so that was obviously a little bit of genius on your own part. You’ve been resourceful and gone and found other people who’ve done something and gotten success. We know that success leaves clues, you’ve taken those clues, you’ve implemented them yourself, you’ve got the same results as those folks. And then you’ve been able to get off some of the real nasty stuff for your gut. And then you’ve experimented with a meat inclusion diet that’s high in fat that we know is not successful long term. You’ve some challenges.
Julie: I can’t be meat and dairy after I stop that fruit and veg. So I went back to my normal diet basically, more fruit and veg. And not as much bread.
Clint: And then you got diagnosed, and so when you got diagnosed what did the rheumatologist want to do?
Julie: The Rheumatologists at that point, I remember my ESR was 56, my CRP was 24, and I still had the rheumatoid factor at 14 I think it was. She said well you need to go on Methotrexate you’re pretty bad by this stage, it had got quite worse over a few weeks. And I had, you know those elastic supports that you can get tubular supports? Well I had them on my ankles, my elbows, my knees, and I was finding it a bit difficult to walk again then. So the doctor said I need to put you on methotrexate and I heard alarm bells I said, really? I said well hang on a minute, she said Well you’d need to take this because your symptoms are really bad. And you were really sick in the hospital, it was the same rheumatologist at Samian hospital when I was really sick. She said you’ve got to take this because, you can lose function, and your joints and can get attacked quite quickly, and I’m really worried about you. You must take this methotrexate. I said, well Okay just give me the script.
Julie: And so I Went home, and I went into panic mode. I thought I looked at methotrexate and I thought there’s no way I’m going to take this. So because of all the side effects I had asthma really badly, and before I ended up in Alice. And I’ve just been put on a preventer, which I stopped taking because I thought that was causing my joint inflammation. And I thought, I don’t want any more damage happening to my lungs, so I had whooping cough, when I was pregnant 11 years ago. I was really sick and that damaged my lungs a bit. So anyway, I came across your program when I was doing all my research, I saw you on YouTube and I came across your program, and I started doing that. So I did the celery and the cucumber juice for a couple of days, and pain eased off. Once I saw you doing a YouTube video where you’re explaining how rheumatoid arthritis starts, and once I understood that starts and the gut, and big proteins end up in the blood your immune system attacks that it attacks the end of your joints because it looks just like the protein in the blood. Once I understood that there was no way I was eating meat of any sort ever again.
Clint: Wonderful. Okay, now that’s profound. Okay good. So you’ve sort of identified with the explanation because of your nursing background. This made sense to you and you liked that explanation, and so now that was sort of the penny dropped moment. Okay so you’ve done the first two days of the juice cleanse, and then you’ve moved on to the basic foods over the coming months. Were you able to avoid the methotrexate, and were able to get all your symptoms suppressed? .
Julie: I never went on the methotrexate, because my symptoms got better as quickly as I got sick, back in September I’ve made a very quick improvement. So within a week I’ve not eating meat, dairy anything from an animal at all, I was able to get rid of those supports, and I was able to run with no pain, and climb stairs with no pain, I’m serious. I was just blown away. I couldn’t believe it. And 3 months later I went back to that doctor, and she said how you going with the methotrexate? I said I’m not taking up, I know you said I should but I’m much better. And so she tested my joints and all, you know my wrists, my elbows, and she said, you’re going into remission and she told me that couldn’t happen. I had asked her about diet early, and she said diet has little to do with it, you could lose function, everything you must take this methotrexate. And I thought, I’m sure there’s another way. And so she couldn’t believe it, and checked my blood she said wow. Because then, in 3 months my ESR had dropped to 18.
Clint: Normal.
Julie: My C-Reactive Protein has dropped 24 to 16. She didn’t test my rheumatoid factor that time, but she knew that I was getting better. So I kept doing that, and then I was able to work as I had been working. I worked part time-casual. I actually (inaudible) Aboriginal men with complex needs, and I’m also a nanny. So yeah, I was able to keep working, because at that point when I saw the rheumatologist she said you need to take methotrexate. I was about to resign, because I was finding it so difficult to walk and get in and out a car.
Clint: I’m Sure a lot of people following along right now can relate to that. Okay so it seems to me like you’ve had, you know across the spectrum of ways in which we respond to dietary changes. It seems that your body was extremely sensitive to the either the animal fats or the animal proteins or both. And you may not have necessarily been particularly susceptible to food sensitivities as such, it might have just been just generic animal fat, animal protein.
Julie: I was actually sensitive to dairy. Because I’d had problems with my gut for years before this happened, and it just got worse, and in the end I couldn’t have a teaspoon of (inaudible) on the toilet for two days with diarrhea. So I couldn’t have milk, I could have a little bit of cheese back then but not now. Yes I had a lot of gut issues, I wasn’t sure why.
Clint: I Mean it’s a prerequisite of developing these diseases to have a gut issue, it’s a prerequisite.
Clint: Now let’s talk about this a little bit more. You mentioned in a moment or two that we spoke just before we started recording, that you just like me took a whole bunch of antibiotics leading up to your inflammation commencement. Can you share with us how long you took antibiotics for, and what the period was between the antibiotics and when you got symptoms?
Julie: Yes, I started the antibiotics in January of 2016, and it sort of went away for a couple of weeks and I was back on antibiotics. Then it went away for a couple of weeks, that put me back on antibiotics. I think it was amoxycillin most the time, then they put me on a different one. So I for about 5 months, I’d been on lots of antibiotics and then when they did the doctor decided to actually swab, found out it was fungal.
Clint: We’re talking about the ear infection.
Julie: There was no need for me to had been on all of those antibiotics. My child was upset about.
Clint: Yeah most definitely. Because if you’re eating foods that aren’t compatible with your body, the body’s got digestive issues as a result. We’ve got a bad microbiome, and then on top of that unstable environment we throw down the antibiotics which then obliterate good and bad bacteria. And then we do it again, and then again, it’s just the final straw and snaps everything and the body gets completely out of whack. And then stuff starts entering the blood that shouldn’t be there, and we can’t stop it because we’ve lost the mucosal lining, and we’ve got these holes in our epithelium and all hell breaks loose and then it becomes permanently confused. So I just want to do include that because, we see this time and time and time again. These are these consecutive or multi use of antibiotics leading up to the symptoms commencing almost as a trigger or a causative mechanism. .
Clint: Okay. So now. .
Julie: It was September when I got really sick. .
Clint: So it was like 6, 7 months later something like that. .
Julie: Well I think the last lot was in May, 4 months later.
Clint: Interesting. So my antibiotics I took whereas as a teenager and into my early 20’s, I took five years of consecutive doxycycline. like that’s got to be some kind of stupidity record. Anyway so that’s what I did, and then of course throughout the 20’s probably our worst dietary years. I was at the university where I’m drinking casually, and also eating lots of 2-minute noodles for late night snacks when I’m up studying late and that kind of silly stuff. And then.
Julie: Getting adequate nutrients.
Clint: Yeah that’s right. Flooding my body with purity, and then I had what you described earlier. I would always be sensitive to dairy so I’d notice that if I had one spoon of ice cream, the first spoon of ice cream that I would have, I would immediately feel my nasal cavity block up. So I could read through my nose, so I’d eat it and I couldn’t get air. And I was told that’s the weirdest thing, and I started seeing naturopaths before, years before I got diagnosed rheumatoid. I was seeing naturopaths trying to work out what’s wrong, why do I react to dairy? And it’s actually like mind blowing that I kept eating dairy, at mind blowing. But it does give me this empathy, to have these conversations with others and with clients who say well I was doing this and then I was still eating the dairy and stuff. Because I despite the most powerful evidence continued to eat things then were having a negative impact on me because I could. .
Julie: Because you like them.
Clint: Yeah, and I Couldn’t believe that the whole of western society could be all wrong. How could we all be wrong? And all eating the wrong thing together like fools and yet we are, well I was.
Julie: My kids, has started to change their eating as well. My 21 and 17-year-old sons live together, and I was quite surprised when I went around in their flat and they had (inaudible). And then my 17-year-old son was a fantastic cook, he’s got all these kinds of chickpeas, and lentils, he was cooking a big curry. I also did explain to them that lentils is a lot cheaper than meat. A can make lentils (inaudible) is like 75 cents. So 2 cans for that for a family. And you pay at least eight or ten dollars for your meat, imagine the savings. .
Clint: Exactly. And you know, that’s fantastic, and I mean that’s a global sustainability argument right there. I mean if we want to seriously, if we only look at the economics about it. Then if everyone just went with plant-based sources of high protein foods like lentils, which by the way are linked. They are the strongest linked to longevity, the longest living people on earth are linked to eating the highest consumption of lentils. So we know that there are healthy food in more ways than just being a good plant based source of high protein content.
Julie: And the other amazing thing is Clint, since I changed my diet radically, and after getting scared from the rheumatologist. I was only sick 1 day in the whole last year. I just had a little bit of a headache and had a bit of a head cold and it went away the next day. Whereas the year before, I was sick all the time.
Clint: Here’s what I observe now with kids, I observe this all the time. I see a kid drinking milk, and as they’re drinking the milk that’s snot starts. It’s like there’s leaking like drink, drink, snot, snot, snot, and it’s like hang on.
Julie: It’s Not good for you.
Clint: It’s not good for you. And the connection to me, it’s like you’d light a match, you’ll start a fire. While they drink the milk, the snot starts coming out. Green, gross, horrible snot and coughing. Why? Get off that garbage.
Clint: Okay so, that’s great you weren’t sick. And last year it was actually quite famous around the world in the news stories that there was this Aussie flu going around that went through Europe, and really caused a lot of problems throughout Europe. And you were going through that, you are here in Australia without experiencing or catching that sickness. That’s fantastic.
Julie: And I don’t take the flu vaccine, I refuse to have the flu vaccine.
Clint: Yeah. That’s a controversial one I personally don’t take it either, and I don’t recommend that people get it. Most of the time without knowing specifics but normally I say look I don’t ever get it. I noticed that you know.
Julie: That’s because you’re too healthy.
Clint: I’ve got my own personal reasons for it but I think that I’ve got a good chance of beating that thing. I’m not on any immunosuppressants, I’m not on any medications, and I eat in a way that maximizes my microbiome which is my immune defense. So I reckon my guys are going to have a good chance of battling whatever comes at it.
Julie: Well If I was on the methotrexate, that would suppress my immune system. And that’s the rheumatologist said to me you must make sure you have all your vaccines up to date and everything (inaudible). I don’t want to get sick all the time.
Clint: That’s Right. So basically, the drug stops you from being able to naturally fight stuff. So then you gotta take all of these other things to try all these other medical interventions. To try and stop you from getting all the things that your body would have naturally prevented you from anyway. And then, we reveal the truth about the whole situation and all it’s doing is suppressing symptoms anyway. The methotrexate is not even addressing the underlying cause, and you go and you get rid of the underlying cause and everything goes away. The madness, it’s madness. Isn’t the world crazy?
Julie: Yes. Am I allowed to say that group that I joined in Adelaide to help me stay on track? .
Clint: Yes.
Julie: I joined plant powered Adelaide, which is actually run by a lovely doctor. And these people, a lot of them have auto immune diseases or coronary artery disease, and diseases that can be reversed by a plant-based diet. So all these people follow a plant based diet, that’s why it’s called plant powered Adelaide, we’re powered by plants. So I found that group’s got to join because I actually find this way of eating difficult. And I need encouragement and support to stay on track. I’m about to do a (inaudible) to life course, so Dr. Helene runs and that’s going to teach me more how to cook vegan cooking and not using oil.
Clint: Yeah Fantastic.
Julie: I don’t use oil now, but I was still using a little bit of oil and cooking. And this course will teach me how to cook better. You know how to stir fry and do things without using oil so things don’t stick to the pan. Yeah I realize oil was a really bad thing to have.
Clint: Dr. Klaper’s got some really simple wisdom around this when people have asked him at our events together in a live format. They put up the hand, how do you do a stir fry if you don’t use oil? And Dr. Klapper says, use anything that becomes wet. He said you can simply use water or use something that has water content that quickly releases onto the pan. Like onions are a good one, so they immediately release some water content. Spinach releases water content, and you can use that to begin the stir fry. But Melissa my wife, she just uses water and you just have to stay close to the pan. You can’t go walking off, and change and TV channels, and watch the news, and come back because it will be gone when the water evaporates quickly.
Julie: So my family mostly follow this now, and my husband is more vegetarian because he works a lot now and I do most of the cooking so I refuse to cook two meals. So I think it’s healthier to eat vegan so they just have to eat what I cook.
Clint: Great. I know you’ve said you’ve only been into the marriage less than 2 years.
Julie: 3 years now.
Clint: Okay. Has this brought you closer together or put strain on your relationship?
Julie: On eating vegan?. You can see that it’s really help me. So he’s supporting me in this way of eating, but he does argue with me about cheese. Cheese is okay, I know Cheese is not okay, and no oil. Oil is good for you, just use coconut oil. No, no, you can’t have any oil at all. .
Clint: Yeah. Good. .
Julie: So after we had this argument about it, he ended up making me a pastry but it was out of polenta, and hot water with veggie stock in it. So there’s no oil in it, so I can now make luck pastry pies with no oil in it. So we made that, and did like a vegetable slices and it was quite nice. So he got the message, no oil. .
Clint: Yeah. Good. .
Julie: He’s really a good cook, so he knows other ways to do things. .
Clint: Yeah, well there’s a bonus there because you haven’t got the sort of meat head guy who just only wants to eat meat. Who doesn’t know how to cook, and just says woman put my meat on the table. .
Julie: I’m not even buyig it, so good luck with it. .
Clint: That’s the Last kind of dude you want your life. Okay great. Well all this is great just to back up a little bit. I just want to add a little bit more encouragement to anyone who is in the South Australian region or particularly in Adelaide. Helene who is running that group you mentioned before, Plant powered Adelaide or plant-based Adelaide. She’s a wonderful lady who’s well-connected throughout the plant-based world, and in an event organizer friend of mine called Lucy based out of Melbourne. The 2 of them and some other of their colleagues are organizing the first plant-based conference for doctors in February 2019, and I’m going to be hosting that. And we’re going to have some very big profile guests who I almost said but I’m not allowed to say who they are, but internationally some of the highest profile plant-based doctors in the world very famous I’m going to be presenting at that. So it’s very exciting that’s coming up 2019. I think is going to be held in Melbourne.
Julie: Maybe they can include ex-nurses.
Clint: If You want to be involved in events, perhaps you want to speak at one of my events one time if I come to Adelaide you come as a guest. I’ll give you an open mic session for a 5 minute as you can tell you story.
Julie: I just really interested in hearing the research, because I often share my story with other people. And I explain to them how my bloods have got better. I actually want to go and study a plant based nutrition, I’ve actually got the facts and the research behind me that I can share with other people when I meet them. .
Clint: Yeah This is good. And so when you’re enthusiastic like that, I recommend the T. Colin Campbell’s online course, you can do it. Yep it’s the best. So go and do that. I think it’s like.
Julie: What’s It called plant based nutrition?
Clint: It’s is, it’s called plant-based nutrition. So it’s Dr. Colin Campbell, as long as it’s the one that’s associated with his work then that’s what you’re after. It’s the no oils, plant-based nutrition. So that’s what I recommend. So it’s a little bit of investment. I think it’s like a round about a thousand dollars, it might be a little bit more U.S. dollars. You know it could be more than that, but I’m just going off the top of my head. And yes that would be the thing that I would recommend. Yeah.
Julie: I’ve Just completed a course in Chaplaincy, a certificate for (inaudible) pastoral care. And I did my pastoral care education 2 years before that. So I’m just about ready to go and start being a chaplain at the Royal Adelaide hospital where I used to be a nurse.
Clint: Oh That’s lovely.
Julie: So yes, so yeah good thing that’s also come out of this is when I got really sick, I thought what am I supposed to do with the rest of my life. And I’d always wanted to be a chaplain, and support people in that way so now I’m going to actually be doing that. .
Clint: Well Think of how much you can affect them in so many not just a spiritual way, but also you get connected with them and they’re in you know some kind of physical pain. You can also give them some guidance around ways that they can easily make some adjustments to their lifestyle as well. So this is a great opportunity to serve.
Julie: I’d have to be careful with that though, not to tread on any (inaudible).
Clint: You would, but when you when you’re telling your own story. All I do is tell my story.
Julie: That’s Right.
Clint: No one can get upset, argue, criticize, or condemn, if you’re just telling your story, this is what happened to me, this is what I did. Look, that’s as simple as that right? This is how it went down.
Julie: Yeah. Well I’m 56 years young now so.
Clint: Well it’s great chance to put in some wonderful decades ahead of some great contribution, contribution feels good. As a nurse you’d have seen helping people feels really good. .
Julie: I just absolutely love nursing. But the other thing I didn’t mention is that I had a bit of a back injury from my nursing, and my 2 lower discs. But with the kind of diet, my backs got a lot better as well. I think I must’ve had some arthritis in my lower back without injury was, and now I just jump out of bed.
Clint: Could Be.
Julie: I used to take me a while with a stiff back, but my back is not stiff anymore.
Clint: Fantastic. Side benefits are endless, aren’t they?
Julie: The Other thing is also, that after the death of my 1st husband 7 years ago. I suffered a bit of depression, and about 4 years later was diagnosed bipolar. But another thing that’s happened is my mental health has got a lot better. And now with the help of my doctor, I’ve been able to completely come off all of that medication as well.
Clint: Congratulations.
Julie: Because I think the way that you eat, when you eat all the wrong foods and that it can cause some inflammation in your brain. So I do think that following this diet has also helped my mental health. .
Clint: Wow, no doubt.
Julie: That’s an amazing thing to do, because when I was first diagnosed I was sorry I’ll be on this for the rest of my life. Well hey, I haven’t been on any medication for 4 months now. .
Clint: Congratulations again, that’s just fantastic.
Julie: I Wrestled in the hospital with all that medication plus my bipolar medication, now (inaudible) on one little tablet to treat my Hashimoto’s.
Clint: Yes which will wrap up on, because we actually haven’t covered it since we started recording here. But you’ve had Hashimoto’s for you told me prior to the recording 18 years. Tell us, you’ve said that that has also improved in the last dietary change period.
Julie: Yes, I realized that I probably shouldn’t be having gluten. I spoke to a naturopath online, on Facebook. Who said I should probably be having Brazil nuts or have selenium, and vitamin B12 to help support my thyroid. So I did that, so no gluten. I had one or two Brazil nuts a day for the high selenium content and hi-potency vitamin B12. And within three weeks I had my blood tested which I was supposed to anyway, and my thyroid started to improve. So the doctor said, I’m going to have to reduce your medication. So I’ve finally, I’ve been reduced from 150 to 100 of thyroxine, which has not happened in 18 years. So I’m going to keep doing that.
Clint: I mean this sort of stuff is considered like medically impossible, so for me it’s like watching fireworks go off every time I hear things like that, just like boom boom was just continually mesmerizing me. Awesome. 18 years, you’re at one dose, you go plant based, you make some tweaks, and some B12, and a little bit more selenium, and you can reduce your medications for your thyroid from one 150 to 100. I mean this sort of stuff is like, so phenomenal and if you’ve got Hashimoto’s of course the body’s attacking the thyroid. The prognosis for that is that it may continue throughout your life and you might need more and more medications. You’re reducing medications, it’s not like even that you’re working against gravity in a way and you’ve successfully done it. So it’s just deserves and a big exclamation mark at the end of this little section of our chat. .
Julie: And I realize gluten is really bad.
Clint: And Glutamate.
Julie: (inaudible) Hashimoto’s, and I had been having gluten. And I noticed now after not having gluten that when I kneel on the floor, my knees don’t hurt anymore. Though I did have a fall a couple of years ago and hurt my knees. Anyway, I’m feeling so much better. And I’ve got a lot more energy which I used to like to sleep in. Now I’m up, ready to go. .
Clint: Awesome. So the way that I like to view gluten is, think of it as a heavy barbell at the gym. So we go to the gym and we’re lifting all the different proteins, and which is the metaphor for digestion. So our digestive process goes in. It lifts the little barbell, it lifts the next barbell, and it keeps working. But the big heavy weight on the bar is gluten, it’s the hardest to break down in that it’s a long chain. So it’s a long amino acid chain that just, it requires more effort to break down. So if we can lift the bar, then it means our digestion is very robust, effective, and strong. But if we can’t break down the gluten or we can’t lift that gluten, it just means that we haven’t really built up our digestive system to the point at which it can handle it. And so I don’t see gluten as particularly an enemy or something that we should be avoiding. I take the lead out of Dr. Douillard’s book which is Eat Wheat, and the guidance that he provides in there which is that. Once we develop a strength and power to our digestive system, then wheat can be enjoyed. But not just wheat, but gluten foods can be enjoyed. And in fact have a lot of clinical benefits for health once we’re able to have them back into our diet. And so it’s just like, if you’re at the gym and you walk over and you try and lift the heaviest bar you can’t do it yet. Well you put it aside for a couple of months, you go and you keep eating all these healthy foods, and lift all the other weights, and break down those proteins, and you go and try and lift the weight again.
Clint: And I found, that for me that after a couple of years of being away from gluten I was then able to enjoy it again and eat foods (inaudible). So it’s not the sort of thing that, like oils we need to avoid forever.
Julie: You can have it occasionally.
Clint: Well I would say avoid it until you can have it regularly, and then you can have it regularly if you find that you’re here and there then do it here and there. But certainly, don’t think of it as evil or an enemy, it’s a guideline or a litmus test as to how good your digestion is.
Julie: But the other good thing that’s happened was having to brazil nuts for the selenium, the B12, and cutting out gluten. I’ve actually been able to lose weight again, because my thyroid is improved. So I’ve managed, whereas I couldn’t lose hardly any. Now I’m back to losing weight.
Clint: Congratulations. This is also great. Fabulous. And then just to compare how you mentioned when you were first talking, and you struggling at the start, and you were in Alice Springs. I mean what’s it feel like now for Julie waking up in the morning?
Julie: I Actually feel like a new woman, I actually feel like I’ve got a different body. I remember sometimes when I was really sick I’d come out of the hospital, I was walking like an 80-year-old. I was walking hunched over, I was so stiff and sore. It was almost like I was about to need a walking plane, with all my supports. It’s just so painful just to move, and now I can run, and walk, I can do anything. I do love swimming, swimming really helps my joints.
Clint: Absolutely. Yeah. Any exercise that we can add to our day more, and more, and more. I just think exercise is so underutilized and crucial.
Clint: So Well done Julie. Well thank you for joining me today, it’s been fun. I’ve enjoyed listening to your story, and you got such a fun personality, so it’s been really enjoyable to chat. Congratulations on everything that you’ve achieved, and it’s really exciting that your part of a group so that you can inspire others in that Adelaide group. And if you go and get your course and become educated formally via those that sort of format. Then you’ll feel that extra degree of confidence and have that extra sort of string in your bow to be able to speak about these things more often if people ask you. What should I do? And what about this? And what about that? You’ll be able to cover all the answers confidently.
Julie: Yes.
Clint: So Awesome. So thank you very much today. And I look forward to keeping in contact with you down the track.
Julie: Thank You.