My Own JOURNEY to Wellness

So about 10 years ago, I was a super health nut! I typically ran 60-80 miles per week. I ran marathons, ran road races competitively, did weight training, was a coach, had a coach, was a vegetarian, etc. The highlight of my week was my long run! Can you imagine?! It blows my mind when I think about it now. Needless to say, those days are long gone...

God has since blessed me beyond my imagination with the incredible gift of raising 4 small children (ages 8, 7, 2, and 14 months) and one with a major medical condition. Anyone would agree that as a mom, your kiddies come first. Of course! However after a year of having Silas on the Gerson Therapy (and within that year I also was pregnant, had a baby, and then later miscarried another), I realized that I was living my life so "sacrificially" that I almost became a martyr to the therapy. I'll post one of these days about the typical day in the life of a Gerson Person. It's fascinating... Anyway, I was recently talking with Jordan and realized that I had pretty much forgotten who I was. That runner that I used to be and who my identity was tied up in, no longer existed. For the first time in my life, I was terribly out of shape--and I mean terribly! I wasn't quite sure what I enjoyed anymore... I realized that I've somewhat isolated myself in the past 16 months which is virtually necessary to get the day's work done, but I've missed out on many social events and even surprisingly some friendships have changed. It's been at times lonely doing this therapy... It's no one's fault, but some people don't tend to understand and often don't seem to validate the work of the therapy because it's not through conventional medical methods. It's okay, but it doesn't take away from the seriousness of Sy's disease and how imperative the therapy is to his health. I always knew and rejoiced in the fact that I was God's Beloved... but for the first time, I wasn't sure how much I was loving myself.

Anyway during this past year, I had some blood work completed a couple of times because I was having a few medical issues and in general, not feeling great. Finally my doctor sat down with me and said that as much as I want to be there for my husband, kids and others, I needed to make some radical lifestyle changes or I may not be around for them. Whoa... What?! So here I am busting my chops to do this amazing therapy for my kid and ironically, my own health is starting to deteriorate. How many times do we do that as moms? We give our all to our family and leave nothing or at best, the leftovers for ourselves. It took a little while to sink in but the reality finally hit that it was really time to turn my life around. I had the head knowledge since I'd been studying natural therapies for almost 10 years. I had implemented loads of what I learned but definitely still had my own vices and used some of them as a crutch to get through this last year. After spending hours and hours in the kitchen prepping for Sy, the last thing I usually want to do is to cook a healthy dinner for myself!

So I found this amazing kickstart for my life--ironically from a person who healed herself from cancer through the Gerson Therapy! When I find out more about her own story, I see so much of my own. Jordan and I both decided to challenge ourselves and felt that if we're going to speak publicly about Gerson and Sy, then we needed to understand exactly what it was like for ourselves and to better understand how Sy feels each day. We want to be the real deal. And Wow! All I can say is that it completely changed my life! In those 10 days, I found freedom! I realized that we give food--whether it be specific foods or sugar or caffeine, such power in our lives. I don't want food to empower me... I want God to empower me! There is such freedom in letting go and truly eating to live and not merely living to eat. It's amazing how quickly even my taste buds have changed when you take out salt and sugar. Not only did I cleanse through the liquids but I also started cleansing through a new morning regime for ME! Not in a selfish way but in a loving way... I've been convicted that I need to serve others, including my family, out of an overflow of what the Holy Spirit is doing in my own life. If we constantly give to others out of chaos and depleted reservoirs, then over time we will feel the effects of that on our bodies... So I've been really challenging myself these days and constantly asking myself, "What do I love to do?" and "What will bring me the joy I once knew?"

So that leads me to my new morning routine... It includes quiet time with God, prayer time through meditation, oil pulling, coffee breaks (not what you're thinking!), dry brushing, listening to beautiful music, and juicing. I no longer resent the therapy and think about what I'm missing out on but instead focus on the life and healing that God is doing through the therapy for Sy. Instead of thinking of restrictions, I'm focusing on the great things I do have and enjoy! It's all about perspective. I've found the gift in Gerson... It's more than just healing our boy... It's healing ourselves and reconnecting our spirit to our ultimate Healer. As moms, we absolutely have to take time for ourselves--quiet retreats for our own soul care. It's so important. So as I mentioned before, this is a journey for me. I'm not there yet but I'm learning and implementing all that I can. I'm even starting a course to bring about even more transformation and I'm pretty stoked about it. My life sure looks different than it did 10 years ago and I'm sure it will look even more so 10 years from now. So who knows?! Maybe, I'll even be back to running... :)

What about you? What things do you implement in your life for your own soul care?

So What Is The Gerson Therapy?

Over our past year of Sy being on the Gerson Therapy (and making a miraculous turnaround in this health), several people have asked questions regarding his therapy and how it can help so many chronic conditions. The therapy has plenty of years behind it and even more documentation, but we thought we'd at least give you a brief overview.

Dr. Max Gerson began his medical career with a great ability to observe and learn how living things were affected by their environments and the quality of their consumption. Because he was often incapicated by severe migranes when beginning his medical career, Dr. Gerson was forced to desperately seek answers to find relief from his serious condition. He sought out answers from experts and medical professionals who told him that he would just have to deal with it (sound familiar to you?). Unsatisified with accepting a lower quality of life, Dr. Gerson began searching for answers outside the traditional circles. After reading about another migrane sufferer who improved through a change in diet, Dr. Gerson began to look into this option.

To make a really long story short (you can read in more detail here), Dr. Gerson found that by including some foods and excluding others, he was able to cure himself. Keep that in mind...cure! As a person who accepted a role in helping others to the best of his ability, Dr. Gerson prescribed his "migraine diet" to another patient who needed help. Not only did his diet stop the migraines, but it also cured a then-incurable disease that the patient also had--skin tuberculosis. Because TB was a major problem at the time, this required a closer look. The bottom line came that during an controlled study, Dr. Gerson's diet cured 446 out of 450 tuberculosis sufferers. This was absolutely unheard of at the time. Because these same patients carried other disorders and conditions, cures were also seen in those areas.

Over a period of 30 years, Dr. Gerson continued to clincially study diseases and the impact of his diet on them, namely multiple types of cancers. He published these results and sought hard to share this amazing information with anyone who would listen. In 1946, Dr. Gerson also had the opportunity to sit before a Congressional Subcommittee about his advancements (and seek funding for future cancer research), but it was not accepted that diet could have a significant impact on health. Um, wait a second...

Because there are countless people who have been cured through this therapy (just ask Sy and see this post), it has continued to be researched and developed in accordance to our ever changing environment and food harvesting practices. There are so many great hearts continuing to push this information out, especially to those who have exhausted all their options.

Before I get into the details of the therapy, I would like to point out that the Gerson Institute is a non-profit organization that focuses on education, not selling you some product with their name slapped on it. Because Gerson has helped and supported putting the power of healing our son in our own hands, I have come to find that every person in that organization has a great heart for serving others. I have done plenty of examining of this therapy and it's proponents and have found nothing that seeks anything other than true health and healing for all mankind.

The Gerson Therapy today is based on two pillars: hypernutrition and detoxification. Because our bodies are wonderfully made, they can do amazing things when it comes to healing itself. If you give cells exactly what they need to efficiently work, in most cases, they will do the job they were intended to do. Also, because the list of toxins in this world gets longer every day, we have to support our body and find a healthy way to get the stuff out that doesn't belong there.

The first of the two factors of the Gerson Therapy are exercised by giving the body specific organic fruits and veggies, especially in the form of fresh juice. If you understand how our digestive system works and how the body can more easily absorb the nutrients from something it doesn't have to break down, this makes total sense. You would also be suprised how sufficient a vegetarian diet can be for the human body...and yes, even protein. For added nutrients, there are also a few supplements added to the regimen to fill in any gaps that exist and to support the body's normal function. Again, the point is giving the body exactly what it needs to do it's job, which is needed even more if your body is in crisis.

The detoxification part of the therapy requires one to really open their eyes to the world around them. Do you have any idea how many toxins you come in contact with in one day? In the air, water, food, chemicals, etc., there are just too many to count. This is not a fear-mongering tactic, but one of reality that must be realized. The point is that the body doesn't need toxins and they mostly just lead to more serious issues. Decreasing or eliminating these toxins takes time and work, so it must be taken seriously.

The part that most people love to talk about are the detoxifying coffee enemas. Yep, you read it right. I used to think that hole was strictly for exporting, but I was wrong. By looking at the history of the enema, you will see that this was a practice used by doctors and nurses without restraint. You will also see that this practice is used to support our natural detoxifying organ...the liver. I can bore you with a lot of scientific mumbo jumbo on why exactly it works, but you can research this yourself. We will work on posting some more info on this soon.

There are a few other small pieces that are added for additional support or comfort for those undergoing the therapy, but you can read all about it in their books here.

My personal experience has been that every stone I have turned over in this process has a reliable answer underneath. The part about this that you must remember is that it is a therapy...not a fad diet. There are many people who have recovered their lives through this therapy and refuse to deviate far from it because they already know where that led them before. The other thing I would like to say is that most people aren't at a place yet where they are willing to do the research and work it takes to embrace what's actually best for their body. Sometimes this takes driving people to the point of death. Sometimes it's too late before people get there. All of it is hard to watch, but doesn't mean we throw in the towel.

There are several lessons we've had to learn the hard way through our journey with Sy and his health. Don't ignore things that you know you should consider, don't believe everything you hear, ask LOTS of questions, look at things from a totally different perspective, ask difficult questions. Don't accept something less when you even have a miniscule hint that there may be more!

And most importantly...don't give up.

P.S. If you have some time, check out these documentaries...if you look on Netflix, Hulu, or YouTube, you will probably have some luck:

Dying to Have Known

The Beautiful Truth

The Gerson Miracle

Jiggle Another Handle?!!

Life is fun for sure! When I picture the doors that we've knocked on or opened in our time, they're never plain ol' doors...

When we diverted our journey to missions 10 years ago, we always knew that the road with the brightly lit signs would be waiting for us to jump on again. There's no doubt that we were created for a life called away from the ordinary. It's just that getting back to that road has been a bigger task than we thought.

We've had many people asking about our status, so here's the current update:

Recently, a door opened to help serve within our community to start building the base we needed to launch ourselves out for wherever God needed us to go. Since we had more juicing in our lives than we wanted, we looked to share the knowledge and healing power with others. There are so many people in our lives now who need some serious healing. I don't mean superficial healing, I mean deep-rooted, death-is-on-your-radar kind of healing. From this, we developed a business plan for starting a juicing cooperative effort where people could get quality nutrition and the workload was evenly distributed. Since we are overwhelmed in our own lives with the work of Sy's therapy, this seemed to be an answer where we could both serve and have some weight taken off our shoulders. Not only would this be an opportunity to help people heal physically, but to really focus on asking people questions about their spiritual health as well. Again, super amounts of encouragement and enthusiasm from others, but when it came to gather people together, it was not the response we needed. Ok God, you can see that we are trying here. We asked the question and you gave an answer on this one. We will move on.

Do we give up now? No way.

As you probably know from our previous post, the door before us has pointed us to look at the need in Dominican Republic and see if we can find a spot for our hearts to be poured out there. As you know, we took the trip and whoa, baby! God showed up and revealed the need for help there. Our skills lined up, we were received with open arms, and there were endless possibilities to live the life the Bible clearly speaks about. Both our hearts leapt as we saw a spot we could easily (relatively speaking) fill. Back in business, right? All doors were wide open, except for one.

Organic produce is something that we certainly take for granted here in States. We asked and looked in the local DR town for produce that would fit Sy's needs. No luck. We spoke to workers in the local hospital about where to get it. Bummer there. We have contacted friends in another DR town to get their knowledge. Another dead end. I've contacted an organic farm on the north coast to look at visiting there to get the information we need. No response. I've been in communication with the country's Department Of Agriculture with a list of Sy's needs. How about a no. We've contacted missionaries in the same organization to get information on the produce. Not looking good there either. We are looking into aquaponically growing what we need, but root veggies are still an obstacle (considering that carrots are the bulk of what we need, that could be an issue since we run through about 75 lbs per week).

Do we give up now? No way.

There are voices that are whispering to just give up and to live a normal, quiet life until we die. I'm sure many of you are thinking, "Why don't you just stay where you are for right now?" Honestly, we would love it! We live in sunny paradise... We dearly love our family, friends and church here... This is home and this is comfortable. But for us, we wrestle between our flesh and spirit every time we open the Bible because of the personal convictions that God has placed on our hearts. When we hear His voice in our lives, we know He is calling us out for more. It's hard because often times we'd rather just stick our head in the sand and ignore it. However, the call to go out and seek who we were really created to be is way too strong.

I can also see that not being willing to radically shake things up is exactly what the enemy wants. We live in a great community where a great song has been written and those that are here are singing it with excellence. However, it has been laid on our hearts that there is a new song that God wants to write and that He wants us to play a part in that. Maybe a small one, but a crucial one. The second issue is that staying where we are isn't working either. It's embarrassing to say this as a man, but the truth is that a firefighter salary doesn't work well when supporting a family of six. I firmly believe that God opened doors for my career and has given me crucial medical knowledge that I will continue to use for His glory--I've even had the priviledge to take part in saving lives. I also have a side business that is small and growing, but it's hard to develop a business with no capital and risk taking the focus off Sy's healing. We will juice in a box on the side of the road if that's what it means to keep our boy healthy.

All of this typing finally gets me to a point. Whenever doors start closing on us, we hear the creaking of another one swinging open. This post is too long already, so that's for another day.

So as another door possibly opens, please pray for clarity and wisdom. We have stood before God and said that we are truly willing to do anything and go/not go anywhere. We just want to live in obedience however scary that may be. I look at Heather and each of the kids and I want to help encourage them to bring the Christ out of their hearts for the world.

Cloth Nappies

Can I just say that I am borderline obsessed these days with being as green and non-toxic as possible but on an el cheapo budget! I'm all about saving $$ and nothing makes me happier than seeing my cloth diaper stash (Bum Genius 4.0s) all clean and tidy ready for the next day! 

I also must add that I have finally perfected the washing routine, diaper rash creams (CJs Butter rocks, not only for rashes but for a whole host of other things--holla!), wet bags (the one here is purchased from Planet Wise) & everything else cloth diaper. It's a bit of a learning curve especially if you have used disposables before, but that's what I'm here for. If you're new to cloth diapering (and scared to death), I can guide you step-by-step through any questions you may have... Just post them in the comments. I'm super particular so when I figure out a good routine I'm pretty stoked! And the best part is all of the money you'll save!!!! Yahoo! :)