Day: July 10, 2013

When Nurse Practitioner Karen Bruce told me in no uncertain terms that I had done a great job of controlling my Diabetes 2 through diet, exercise and lifestyle changes but that the time had come for some additional help in the form of medication, two things went through my mind: she was right, and this was yet another opportunity to get healthy, as my first diagnosis was. When I learned I had Diabetes 2, I changed my life, lost weight, studied nutrition, ate differently.

It’s time to do the same thing again, insofar as it is necessary. Next chapter.

I have always been active, if you have a farm you will be very active, and taken walks and hikes daily, but now I have to do some other things to keep healthy. I will continue seeing a naturopath, continue holistic approaches and medicines and now also take prescription medications to keep my blood sugar stable. When you are open about an in illness like Diabetes in America, you have to navigate an insane world of hype, greed, hysteria, insurance, a messed-up health care system, the evil manipulations of pharmaceutical companies pretending to be our angels and the nightmare that are the messages of the Internet.

There are three things to contend with right away. Medical “experts” on the Internet who trawl websites and believe they know more than doctors, hysterics who line up to tell you about the horrible deaths family members have suffered through pain, dismemberment, amputations and slow and painful declines, and the passionate advocates of home remedies no one has heard of or tested. I don’t know why people love to share amputation stories, but trust me, they do. Reading my e-mail and Facebook Pages is like sitting in a Civil War Battlefield hospital, I will be lucky to have fingers to type these words in just a few months.

It is interesting, people are fierce advocates for their own remedies from radio signal machines to home brewed concoctions.  No matter that they know nothing my anyone else’s health or medical history, if dried prunes worked for them, it will work for me. There is a generous quality to these offerings, I know, but also a narcissistic streak. What about the idea of making up our own minds?

People love to warn you to death, not because they are evil, but because that is what has been done to them. Just go to any doctor’s office and watch the scare medical news on the monitor. Pity-me stories are the currency of the country.

The trick is to get the wheat from all of this chaff, and in the Information Age, chaff blots out the sun. You need to know that people who have Diabetes 2 and take care of themselves rarely lose their legs or hands, and live long and healthy lives, despite the scary signs in doctor’s offices and the breathless testimonies online. You need to know that pharmaceutical companies love Diabetes, the meters, strips, lancets and tablets you will be buying for the rest of your life, their diaries and pamphlets suggest taking your blood at least a half-dozen times a day (so the insurance companies can refuse to pay for strips if you do). And then there is the medicine, the pills long tested and established, but something that might be in your medicine cabinet for life. Good news for lots of companies, tens of millions of people have Diabetes 2, it is epidemic among children. Buy stock now.

The pharmaceutical chains also love diabetes, you can’t buy a thing without talking to a pharmaceutical counselor who wants to be your friend and will be, 24/7. I’ve gone into my local pharmacy for years and never been counseled, and I am suddenly everybody’s best friend, everyone knows my name and waves to me. My pharmacist too me aside and told me there are classes twice a week right in the pharmacy for people with Diabetes, they are free, get your lancets here, we can re-fill your prescriptions automatically. I am no longer an occasional customer, but a gold mine.

When you get Diabetes, who you listen to is as important as what you do. And sadly, most of what you hear is loopy. Some of it isn’t.  I am making discoveries that are worth sharing. Metformin takes a bit to get used to, but it does bring blood sugar down. Exercise is very helpful, in addition to my farm work, I am also riding my bike again for the first time in four or five years. I like it a lot. Something to do in the morning after meditation, before writing, before putting photos up. I’ve already got a good diet, I don’t need to change much there but I am trying a couple of things  people I trust have recommended: two tablespoons of organic Apple Vinegar Cider twice a day in  8 0z of water, and cinnamon tablets (two) twice a day at mealtimes. Both are believed to bring blood sugar levels down. Meditation helps, it often blood sugar levels down. Stress is a critical element in Diabetes, as it is in blood pressure.

Diabetes treatment is not one thing but many things, it is an organic, complex disease.  Many things affect it, and blood sugar levels change all the time. I have already sharply reduced my blood sugar levels with these efforts in less than a week by about a third, I will keep at it. Diabetes 2, in fact, an opportunity to stay healthy, get healthier.  It is not reversible, but unlike many other diseases, it is most often controllable. My grandparents both had Diabetes – he lived to be 92 with all of his limbs –  and it did not come as a surprise to me, the doctors always believed it was genetic, I have always been active and eaten well.

As with other things, I see that Diabetes 2 is personal. Every body is different, we have different weight, genetics, eating habits, lifestyles, stress levels. All of these things matter.  As much as people love to tell horror stories and tales of suffering and woe, it is clear to me that people who do their own research, make their own decisions, experiment with their own choices do well with this disease for long periods of time. Those stories of affirmation are not the ones you will  hear, not from doctors, insurance companies, e-mailers, even friends. They system feeds off of fear and sales and blood tests and machines.  And the system can really help, that is the irony.

The health care system knows how to treat diabetes in many cases. And it is, in fact, sometimes very useful to get on medications, and to understand how the blood sugar levels are affected by food and weather and movement. It is also possible in some cases to get off of it.

I don’t give advice to people, I do share my experience. So far, the big thing I have learned is this: take responsibility for your health and your decisions. Good decisions are rarely made by other people, and their stories are not my story, one way or the other. On the Internet, the idea of individual experience is lost. I will keep sharing mine.

It was a happy day for Mizuno sneakers when Texas State Rep. Wendy Davis stood up on the floor of the Texas Legislature to filibuster for many hours against a bill she thought was unfair to women. The pink sneakers she wore became a symbol for many women of their need to stand in their truth as Wendy Davis did and the sneaker reviews on Amazon became the best-selling shoe reviews in the history of the sneaker industry. Rep. Davis lit up the Internet and Maria was mesmerized by this idea of standing in your truth, in this case, quite literally.

So I bought her a pair of the Pink Sneakers, I went on Amazon right away, as soon as I saw the stories about Wendy Davis and was told I bought the last one. The sneakers are expensive, and Maria doesn’t wear sneakers, and she doesn’t spent a lot of money on anything, so when the sneakers came, I caught the expected flak but saw she really liked them. She liked the shoes, but she identified with the symbolism even more. Like me, Maria avoids politics but she even wrote about Wendy Davis on her blog.

Maria is very interested in the notion of standing in one’s truth, she has learned how to do it in painful and often frightening steps, and I can tell you as one who lives with her, she has no issues about standing in her truth when I’m around.  If I tick her off, I get an earful, quickly and directly. As my friend Mary Kellogg told me when Maria and I got together, “good for you, Jon, Maria will keep you in line.” A prophesy, even if I never have any clean socks.

Abortion is an issue that has split the country, and there is very little real dialogue about, most people digging into entrenched positions and staying there. I identified with Wendy Davis also, but for me, the real issue here has always been allowing women to control their own lives, decisions and bodies. All across the country I see what seem to me to be angry older white men passing all kinds of laws telling women what they can and can’t do. I know many women feel strongly on this issue also, but when I saw those men in Texas saying a lot of dumb things about women and their health, I knew I had to stand in my former girlfriend’s shoes too.  Freedom is freedom, it isn’t what some grumpy old men decide it is. So I went back on Amazon, and fortunately, there are no pink sneakers available for men, as that would cause some serious eye-brow raising in my neighborhood, but they did have some Navy Blue sneakers in my size, so I ordered them and they came today.

I am happy to wear these shoes, it is probably obvious how I feel about the abortion issue, but that is not the point for me. I believe women like my wife are ascending, I believe they are a great hope and promise for the world. I believe they will gain political power in this country and elsewhere, their time has come, and they can make their own decisions about abortion and other issues. I believe it is time for men to step aside, they are ruining the world, warring endlessly, committing violence, rape and genocide all over the globe, destroying economics in their greed and aggressiveness and ruining the planet in their corporate greed and arrogance. Beyond that, their sorry history of aggression and domination disqualifies men to tell women anything, except they will be supported in their time, which is coming.

I am happy to stand in my wife’s shoes, walk for women like Wendy Davis, who have overcome great hardship to lead meaningful lives, and I am happy to put my new sneakers on and stand in the new truth of women and their chance to make the world a better, safe and more loving place. My wife is one of those women, and she filibusters every day for love, connection and the best parts of the human spirit.

Something new: Starting today, and every other Wednesday, you can ask the nutritionists at Fromm Family Food questions about nutrition issues involving your dogs and cats directly. This topic will appear on Facebook – the blog doesn’t permit me to post questions here – and Fromm nutritionists will look at the questions and answer the ones they can respond do. Fromm has perhaps the best reputation in the animal food business, they are the oldest family-owned holistic pet food company in America, they do not outsource their food, use the freshest ingredients,  have never had a recall. I agreed to have Fromm as a sponsor because it is the food I have been feeding Red, Lenore and Frieda.

Almost all of the corporate dog food companies are experiencing recalls, they simply don’t seem to care as much about your pets. I believe Fromm does.

All of my dogs were having food related issues. Red’s coat was dry and coarse, he needed a high calorie food for his work, Frieda was suffering from allergies, itching and dry coat, and Lenore was getting older, needed a good food to keep her weight even and her energy high. She was also scratching almost continuously. I was researching “Going Home: Finding Peace When Pets Die” and talking to a lot of vets and a lot of them urged me to try Fromm, they said it was the best dog and cat food available.

I did, and the results were quite impressive. Red’s coat turned into a darker, glossy brown, his energy was and is high, all of the allergy issues and dry skin and itching problems disappeared. Freida is on senior food, and her coat is still glossy, shedding is way down, her scratching and Lenore’s has stopped. Lenore’s weight dropped a bit and has remain steady. My vet is very happy with these changes, and I hate to talk about it and not in detail but dog lovers know that solid stool is important, and that has also improved dramatically.

So Fromm is a sponsor of Bedlam Farm and of my podcasts and I am happy to invite them to answer questions on nutrition. I’ll post a separate topic on Facebook and this will be a regular Wednesday feature on my Facebook Page. They won’t be able to answer all of your questions, they will respond to the ones that are appropriate. Thanks, this will be fun to follow. Nutritional information is also available on Fromm’s website and through their customer service department.