The Feet Have It – Part I – Chilblains

I think this is the oddest of my foot entries. This was also not my problem, but my teenage daughter's. At first, we thought it was a rash, or topical affliction. But, it really didn’t ever blister. Her toes just kept looking redder, bothering her more – pain and itching – and then started to swell and turn purplish. It actually looked pretty disgusting.

I knew it wasn’t fungal, since we tried Grapefruit Seed Extract dilution on it to no avail. She actually soaked in the dilution and said it made them itch more. So, somehow the heat was affecting it.

I got online and started looking. It was an interesting search that ended at Chilblains. It was because her feet got cold I guess. But not just her feet needed to be warm, her whole body. Though her ever-helpful parents had constantly reminded to put socks and long sleeve shirts on in the winter house, she would rather complain about the cold than do that. When she got her diagnosis from mom, along with several web pages to peruse, she took great interest in putting on more clothes to keep warm.

The treatment I decided looked most effective was actually to keep the whole body warm. Being adventurous though, I added a warm Epsom salt foot bath to the list of do’s. I had her sit a couple hours with her feet in the Epsom salt bath, and keep herself very warmly clothed. I did my part by stocking the wood stove hotter so the temperature in the house was around 75 or higher. She spent most of the day in her room, at the end of the house, doing school work though. It was harder to keep her room warm with the wood stove, so I suggested she move to the room the wood stove was in.

Her brother and I dressed more lightly, and it took a few days, but eventually the Chilblains disappeared almost as suddenly as it showed. The color in her toes went back to normal, but the stretched skin still looked odd and grotesque. Most of the improvement was, oddly enough, after soaking her feet. I didn’t use very hot water, mostly just lukewarm. I think that helped. From the reading I did on several different sites, it sounded like a circulation issue and extreme temperatures aggravated.

Therefore, the feet have it on this one. My “odd foot affliction” award goes to the Chilblains. Surprisingly, it wasn’t my feet that had it either.

I believe this is probably the final installment in the Feet Have It series. I hope you found our oddities amusing and a bit informative.

Good luck with your feet and your health!

The Feet Have It – Part 2 – Vaso-Spastic Disorder

I can’t even begin to tell you about the discomfort of this one. It felt like 1,000 needles sticking into each individual nerve in my toes and upper foot. The heat was extreme also, like a fever localized to just the toes and ends of my feet. I rarely seek medical advice or diagnosis, but this was one time I did.

Since it was the feet, and obviously not fungal or anything I could figure out, I headed to the Podiatrist. This was 24 years ago now, shortly after my first child I believe, though time slips from my memory banks. I was doing work overnights taking inventory for stores all over the state, and spent quite a few hours on my feet and driving to remote locations. The drive is when it seemed to bother most.

The podiatrist was stumped, but suspected nerve problems, so referred me to a neurologist 3 hours away. Great, another long drive. I saw the neurologist, don’t remember any tests, just an office visit. At the office visit he confidently announced “Vasospastic disorder.” Then, as if reading from a copy of his medical school text, rambled off, “It affects mostly young women in their early 20s, bla, bla, bla, and has no known cure. We also do not know the cause. We can prescribe a drug to keep them calm and relieve the discomfort. You will take it for life. It does cause birth defects, so you can’t become pregnant while on it.” Well, if you know me, you know what I said as I ran screaming from the office!! NO THANK YOU.

It was nice to know what they didn’t know, though, you know? I didn’t bother trying to find any more out. I just limited long drives, put my feet up more, etc. Then a few months later I noticed that I was no longer having symptoms. I thought about changes I’d made – diet, exercise, work, etc. Nothing there. But, then I went to put on my size 12s. They were new. I was so excited to find them too. They were the first pair of women’s size 12s I’d ever seen in a store. It was so nice to not have my toes crammed into the end of my shoe. . . . .hmmmmmm. . . I think I’m on to something here. This was the first pair of shoes I’d purchased that actually fit in about 5 years, since my feet had reached their size 12 proportion. I had also mostly gone barefooted since I didn’t work outside the home, until I got that job doing inventory which required me to be in shoes for hours on end – including long drives through the state. Now, we know why mostly young women are affected with this I thought. You ever try to find a nice fitting pair of women's shoes in the 1980s?

Mystery solved. Did I contact the neurologist and podiatrist and let them know the mystery was solved? No. I didn’t even think of it. Probably should have though. Well, maybe they will stumble upon this blog and find out that I’m doing fine, and so are my feet. . .for now.

The Feet Have It – Part I – Ganglion Cysts

Well, yes, if my feet can, they will – Have it. And, if my feet don’t get it, surely, on of my family members’ feet will. In doing my part to keep the world on its feet, I’m doing a multi-part series on odd foot ailments and what we have done for them. Part I – Ganglion Cysts is about thinking outside the box, or boot as it were.

A ganglion cyst can be very annoying. It is a weakness in membrane walls that causes lubricating fluid to fill it like a balloon. While not at all life threatening, it is indeed a pain in the foot, though it can manifest in the hand area also. Not only can you not get this knot on the top of your foot into your usual shoes, it also aches. It is a dull ache, not an earth shattering, ear splintering ouch. But, it is that kind of pain that just lingers and says “Here I am!”

One of these creatures showed up on my left foot after I had been painting at my daughter’s new house. I noticed the step stool I was using was rather uncomfortable for my size 12s, so I swapped with someone else, not that they had any smaller feet to put on it, but I am the elder after all. I did not think anything else about the foot pain using the more narrow stool had caused until the next day. Hmmmm. . . .why was my foot so sore, I thought. Well, figured it was the painting, ignored it and moved on.

You see, I don’t usually wear shoes, and examining a sore foot I guessed was beyond me, so I didn’t. It was still sore the next day, so I got out my Topricin (if you decide to buy some, use code KES097 at checkout for $5 off) and put some on. While rubbing, I may have noticed my foot was a bit swollen. Due to the estrogen dominance I was yet to know I was dealing with, swollen feet and water retention wasn’t abnormal, so I just wrote it off. Wow, that felt nice, the Topricin, massaging, pain relieving and all. Over the next day, we would do the reminder pain – Topricin application. After another 48 hours I really thought no more about it for a day or two.

Then, I noticed a dull ache, and instead of just reaching for the Topricin, I happened to actually look at my foot. I will admit a bit of shock flooded me, but not really panic. What I saw, I hadn’t witnessed before. There was a BUMP on my foot, just back of my smaller toes, where normally the bones show. I felt it, thought about it, put some more Topricin on, and figured like all things it would go away.

Next day, it was still there, so was the dull throb, and now a new friend, a second bump. Okay, if my foot is going to start looking like a mountain range, I guess I should figure out why, I thought. Online I went, to many sites, checking symptoms, stories, people blogging about foot bumps, etc. Finally, I found a name – Ganglion Cyst. We all know cysts can be naughty, nice or just irrelevant. I started looking to see which bugger this was. Well, it was mostly irrelevant other than the disturbance it caused shoe wearing.

Treatment: Ah, lovely treatment lists. They are never correct. For ganglion cyst there were two proposed treatments. The first, you guessed, was surgery, which according to all sites was mostly helpful in the short term yet very ineffective in the long run. The other treatment was called the “Bible Thump.” This is why another name for this ailment is “Bible Cyst.” Just like it implies, you smash the cyst with a Bible or other large book. That sounded a bit painful and ineffective to me. But, it did explain why massaging the foot made it feel better. The idea behind the Bible thump is to push the fluid back out of the weakened area. Massaging was a kinder, gentler method of doing so.

A strange thing happened on the way to treatment though. I decided that since the Topricin made it feel better, I’d continue that approach. It had to be as effective as the two medically proposed options, and certainly was less barbaric. So, for about a month I continued. I discovered my estrogen dominance in this time, started USP progesterone treatment, and now, 8 months later have no sign of swelling, pain or Ganglion Cysts.

Stay tuned for the next installment of “The Feet Have It” when I tell you about my experience with the mysterious vaso-spastic disorder which strikes women in their early 20s and is totally incurable . . . right.

Dr. Mercola and The Town Of Allopath Video

Hate mail to Dr. Mercola? Okay, yes I can believe it. He doesn't really seem to follow the party line. I remember reading that this video generated more hate mail. I can't imagine it. My husband and I love it. Every once in a while I pop in to view it again. I decided today that I really should share it. The Town of Allopath

I also thought of it today because I have noticed a new buzz-phrase that the "modern medicine" quackbusters clan is trying to get us to adopt - Evidence Based Medicine. HUH? What could be more evidence based than thousands of years of real life success with herbs, manipulations, massage, etc. Sure homeopathy is a fairly new thing, but I have heard more successes coming out of homeopathy than I have "modern medicine."

Now about calling it "allopathic." I hadn't heard that term until about 10 years ago. I looked into that some, and it would seem that may be where the friction between "allopathic medicine" and homeopathy began. I guess the MD crowd doesn't like being called allopathic, so they want to be called "evidence based" now. Allopathic medicine defined on Wikipedia (bastion of reliability it is) says that the founder of homeopathics actually coined the term from Greek meaning "other than the disease" since MDs don't treat based on symptoms of the disease. I won't try to explain it all here, but it does seem that the MDs might have been a bit upset with the attitude that they were harming patients. Okay, we know they are; they still don't like it when we say that.

Suffice it to say, at our house, the new terminology for those MDs who are a bit touchy is "skidmarks disease." Hope you enjoy/enjoyed the video!

Qualification: Just FYI - I don't hate allopathic medicine, just don't like it much. Have had little reason to use it since evidence based medicine usually helps us much more quickly, effectively and with fewer side effects. We do visit the MDs if a bone is broken or there is an immediate life threatening situation. Once stabilized, we then look into mean of evidence based medicine to help us recover.

In Honor of Jenny

Devastating news when I signed into my blog today and read those I was following. Jenny has passed away.

Jenny's Journey
I've been following this blog for about as long as it has been up. I too have a daughter this age, yet did not get the Gardasil vaccine for her (or others). I understand the family's reluctance to blame the vaccine, but do honor their attempt to get the VAERS repaired. Please, take time to learn about Jenny's brave stuggle, give thanks to the Lord for your children, and then head to the website indicated in the next to the last post to add your name to the list.

We will miss you Jenny, and we will hug our own children more tightly today in memory of you. Thank-you for being brave and happy throughout adversity. I know I shouldn't be angry, but it is hard to fight back as you were so full of life and happy and healthy not so long ago. I always mourn not only the child, but the contribution we will miss because they are no longer with us. It could be, though, that the contribution of awareness is the gift we have been given by Jenny. Rest in Peace Jenny.

Estrogen Dominance and Homemade Laundry Detergent

One of our current adventures has to do with my own health. For many years, I've been watching over the health of my husband, children and animals, as with most busy moms, and forgetting to really pay much attention to mine. When the signs of estrogen dominance (allopathically known as menopause) started to get beyond the point of annoyance, I had to do something. The first thing was to start avoiding estrogenic compounds both natural and synthetic. Estrogen dominant or not, the great money saving idea I found thanks to it, will help everyone.

My research led me to many good resources including Dr. Lee, author of such books as "What your Doctor May not Tell You About Menopause," "Dr. Lee's Hormone Balance Made Simple," and other relevant books. All of which can be found on this Books For Sale page. More good resources were from Dr. William Eckhart, and the USP Progesterone product "Progestelle" site. There are some other good sources out there, like Yahoo Groups message boards dedicated to the cause, Neways progesterone cream distributors, etc. But, those two are my favorites.

In Dr. Eckhart's reply to my medical form, he mentioned that there really is no good, safe, estrogenic compound free laundry detergent with the exception of one he has found that is just too expensive for my budget. So, I decided to research the option of making my own.

I found a recipe, actually several recipes, on the internet. I took the plunge, bought the three required ingredients and whipped up a batch of my own. (Recipe below along with my notes on preparation) I will say I was very happy with the results. After 4 weeks, I've used about 1/2 of my $3 - $4 laundry detergent. A big savings compared to the $12 laundry detergent I bought at the store. The clothes are clean and fresh smelling, and I'm wondering why I didn't do this sooner. The first few loads of laundry the water was absolutely disgusting. I'm guessing the dirt was what my commercial laundry detergent didn't get out. ICK!!!! I rinsed all loads 2 times for probably the first 10 loads. My husband suspects that maybe the new laundry soap was cleaning the washing machine as well. That is possible, since I used to occasionally get grime at the bottom of the tub, and no longer do.

So, for your consideration, here is my first batch notes. I will make the next batch a bit thinner, and am trying to find a perfect container to store it in, so I don't have to use a pail. Didn't take pictures, but when I remake it in a month I will post pictures with an update.

Laundry Soap Recipe – 1^st Batch 1/31/09

2 full bars Kirk’s Castile Soap – shredded (what didn’t shred, I cut into small pieces)

1 Cup Borax

1 Cup A & H Super Washing Soda

8 Cups water

25 drops Grapefruit Seed Extract (a.k.a. GSE -preservative, antibacterial)

(Castile soap can be found in the Health and Beauty section of your local store. Most any pure, bar soap will do. FelsNaptha is the recommended so, but not available near me. Borax and Washing Soda are available in the laundry aisle of your store. They are in boxes, powdered. And the GSE is available at the health food store or at http://www.iherb.com The brand is Nutribiotic, you want the liquid. If you get it from iHerb it is much cheaper, and new customers can use the code KES097 at checkout for $5 of their first order)

First, put shredded soap into 6 cups of water and heated, stirring occasionally until most of the soap had dissolved.

Add soda and borax, stir until dissolved, add two cups water. Continue to heat and stir for another 30 minutes on very low heat.

Removed from heat, added GSE, and let cool, stirring occasionally to mix foam back in.

As soap started to cool, it actually started to solidify instead of just gel as online instructions indicated it should. I had not added as much water as recipe suggested, since I wondered if you could make it more concentrated to take up less space in laundry room. Well, you can’t. Therefore, I added another 8 cups of water and put back on the stove on low heat to reliquify.

Let it reliquify, then added another 8 cups of water after using some of the still warm mixture in cold water wash only to watch it turn into solids in the water. Need to keep it liquid, or dissolve in warm water before switching to cold water for cold water washes.

Still semi solid gel. Will wait until completely cooled to decide whether to add more water or not. It has now been about 6 hours since I started the process.

Finally packaged it up and called it good.

I don't have the perfect packaging system, just a couple of old, plastic ice cream containers. I'll be on the hunt for better packaging, hopefully not plastic!

UPDATE: 3/14/2009 made my second batch and took notes. The first batch lasted our family of 4 on the farm for a little over 1.5 months.

Second Batch notes:

2^nd Batch – 3/14/2009

Basically followed same steps. This time I added more water than before. As liquid would start to steam, I would add 4 more cups. Dissolved initial soap mixture in 8 cups of water, then as it heated, added 4 cups at a time until I got to 24 cups of water. (previous batch was 22 cups of water.) Then started the cooling process.

As it cooled, it started to solidify, so added 4 more cups of water and reheated to combine. Went to check again after 15 minutes and top had solidified, so stirred it up and added 4 more cups of water. Will combine and let cool again.

In the end, I had 32 cups of water. Top hardened, but I stirred it all up when cool and had a loose gel soap.

Source for Supplements, Vitamins, Organics and a Coupon - iHerb

The chickens are wandering about in the yard, wishing it was spring and
the bugs were out. I can tell by the way they are scratching up the lawn
in various locations without any satisfied looks. None of the usual
clucking, "I've got one," which leads to the inevitable chase around the
yard by the other birds hoping to steal the bug from the silly bird who
didn't know when to keep quiet.

Well, I was just musing today about not telling my friends and family
about a great online site I've found for purchasing my supplements and
even some of our organic food items. So, I think I've kept my quiet too
long!!! I placed an order today and patted myself on the back for my
great savings, then thought, "I should share this site so others can get
some great deals too." The roosters are good at this. When they find a
good source for bugs in the yard, they actually stand up tall and start
a special cackling to call all the ladies to the treasure.

So, here goes my cackling and calling my friends to the treasure:

The site is http://www.iherb.com <http://www.iherb.com/> a.k.a iHerb.
I've been ordering from them for over a year now and love their
discounts and fast service. I've never had a problem with wrong orders,
missing items, or anything. I actually messed up an order and was able
to call and get it fixed before they shipped it too!

The way iHerb works, you get incremental discounts based on the size of
your order. So, if the Vit E that you usually get downtown has an iHerb
price 10% cheaper before you put it in the cart, it will be an even
cheaper price when you put it in the cart. Right now, as a VIP customer,
my first level discount is 10%. So, if my Vit E was 9.00 instead of the
downtown price of 13.00, I know it will be another .90 cheaper when
added to the cart. Many of my items are $2-$10 cheaper here. Plus, if
you order over $60 BEFORE THE DISCOUNTS, the UPS shipping is FREE!!!
Gotta love that. Even if you don't get to $60, the shipping is $4 (with
other options available at a higher price). I can't drive to the health
food store for $4. They also offer many options in sizes and brands.
Almost everything I can get at the health food store, I can get at iHerb
cheaper.

Another benefit of iHerb is the information. They have very detailed
info about each item they sell, including the full list of ingredients
and potency. They also give info about uses, benefits and warnings. I
use the iHerb site to check different supplement uses even if not
purchasing them. A nice, concise encyclopedia of supplements, which was
very important when we were trying to find fluoride free toothpaste, as
well as many other items. They recently added food items to their
offerings. I now get my Periobrite toothpaste, Arrowhead Mills peanut
butter through them, as well as Braggs organic vinegar and other food
items I used to buy at the store. New items are being added all the time.

I order many things online, but this is a site that I've really come to
rely on for our budget and health. So, it is time I shared it. There was
also a nice nudge from the company to share when they provided me with a
coupon code to give my friends and family a gift of $5 off their first
order as part of a new referral program they have started. If you use
this coupon code - KES097 - at the checkout, you will get $5 off your
first order from iHerb (not valid if you are already a customer). The
person who told me about iHerb just had free shipping to lure me to try
the site. Of course, if you don't have a first order that is $60 or
more, this coupon code will more than cover the shipping.

While at iHerb, check out the links at the top of the page for specials
and even FREE sample items. These are full size samples. This month I
have 2 types of cereal, a new Vit E to try and a Green Tea drink coming
as samples. I'm excited to get them and try them.

Now, my conscience is clear. I am no longer hoarding or keeping the
goods secret for myself, but sharing willingly with friends. And none of
us have to play chase around the yard. :-) I hope you get the
opportunity to try iHerb and enjoy it as much as I have. So, before
someone sticks there head out the door and tells me to keep it down
(like I do for the over zealous chickens), I'll put my head back down
and go back to work.

Have a great, blessed day and stay warm!

PS - if you can't use the coupon code, feel free to pass it on to
friends. I do get referral bonuses that decrease the price of my items
even more. If you do order from iHerb, you will get your own coupon code
to share with friends, and earn your own referral bonuses.