Returning to the Clinic
A middle-aged gentleman revisited the clinic. He was very keen on improving his health and for many years had been reading health articles and consulting with our clinic. Until recently, we had not seen him for about three years – he had been consulting with other practitioners and become very interested in Ayurveda as a dietary approach. He was single and still lived with his ageing mother.
Symptoms and Background
His recurring health problems were a persistent cough and digestive issues and he had noticed these seemed to be a problem in tandem – when his digestion deteriorated, so did his cough. The gut-lung axis is much written about so this is not unusual. Not surprisingly, both have similar embryonic origins.
He had been following an Ayurvedic diet for the last two years and, while some things had improved, others had deteriorated. His digestion was deteriorating. He was nauseous, had increasing (although intermittent) abdominal pain and diarrhoea, including faecal incontinence – all of which was seriously affecting his lifestyle – and had become very low in energy.
On testing, he was anaemic and his liver enzymes had risen (particularly the AST). He was experiencing increased cravings for sugar and his gut tests showed lowered ability to metabolise oxalates in foods.
Assessing Diet, Lifestyle, and Curcumin
He was type A blood so was following a vegetarian diet with lots of green leafy vegetables, legumes (no grains) and adding spices to all his meals – mainly cumin, cinnamon and turmeric. Some years earlier, he had been given my recipe to activate turmeric (curcumin is not readily bioavailable unless processed), so was doing this regularly.
He had been taking supplements for many years including curcumin in two forms to reduce inflammation, vitamins C and E, N-acetyl cysteine for liver detoxification and an adrenal formula, and protein-digesting enzymes after meals. Since commencing an Ayurvedic diet, he had stopped his vitamins and NAC and was drinking liquorice-root tea daily and had recently added in triphala (a digestive herbal mix).
He was not exercising regularly, being very busy at his computer job, and rarely went outside, so his vitamin D levels were very low. While he was trying to protect himself from electromagnetic fields (EMFs), these were still having an impact, mainly in difficulty sleeping.
Identifying the Cause
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