Coach Ana Update

Some of you have been asking how I'm doing, and I finally have some answers to give. Before it's always just been, "neh, good days, bad days."

It's been a learning process, I tell you. For some background to those of you who aren't up on the whole story, it started with the mysterious symptoms -- the rapid heart rate, high blood pressure, shortness of breathe, muscle pain, aching joints, erupting skin, inflamed mouth, weariness, constantly itching skin, etc, etc that forced me out of my Oceanside event and sent me on the long quest to find out what was wrong with me.

My Western Medicine-style doctor sent my blood off for tests and took a chest x-ray. Everything came back fine. She was baffled and asked if I wanted to go on blood pressure medication, but I declined.

There was a cause for all of this. Suppressing the symptoms wasn't going to cure me.

Eventually I sent my blood in for the Alcat test. From that I learned that I had a huge collection of food intolerances. My body reacting to these foods was causing all of my symptoms. Sure enough, when I eliminated all of the foods I have a problem with, I felt good. The symptoms faded and then disappeared. I thought I had found the problem.

But why had my body suddenly started to reject these foods that I've never had a problem with before? Why so many so quickly? I started digging deeper.

Something was causing me to react to these foods. The start of the answer lie in the Alcat test, too. It said I had severe candidiasis. That alone, I learned, can cause all of the symptoms I have been experiencing. I set out to kill the candida in my intestines. I started taking coconut oil and Threelac probiotics. I stopped consuming sugar in all of its various forms, fruits, and all simple starches, too.

I also started to focus on my liver. If it wasn't functioning as well as it could, my whole system is sluggish and I'm not able to clear out the toxins and wastes as quickly as possible. This allows candida to thrive. At my age, with my history of regular wine consumption and enjoyment of gourmet foods, chances were that I had at least some level of fatty liver disease. A huge percentage of Americans do, after all. So I started on liver-cleansing supplements, namely Milk Thistle and B-Complex. I eschewed alcohol in all forms. I strive to eat clean, organic, stress-free foods most of the time to give the liver the best chance to heal and perform well.

So I started to feel better. A lot of the symptoms diminished. The heart rate and blood pressure went down to normal most of the time. The breathing slowed and I could usually climb stairs without dizziness again. My mouth felt better, the pain in my legs subsided, and my joints ached less.

But still, I didn't feel great. I had good days and bad days. I still itched, a lot. Almost every meal resulted in a stomach ache and itchy arms, legs, and face that lasted for hours. I added probiotics and digestive enzymes to the mix.

I figured my candida just wasn't dying, so I kept searching for more ways to kill it off. In doing so, I came across the theory that candida causes leaky gut syndrome. I'd never heard of that before. But it explained a lot.

Basically, the small intestines are permeable, allowing nutrients into the bloodstream as they are extracted from foods. When candida grows, it can put down roots into the intestinal walls that create more and bigger holes there than would be naturally. Larger, not fully-digested food particles can now pass through those holes and get into the bloodstream before they are processed and broken down. The body sees these large, foreign bodies in the bloodstream and reacts as it does to any foreign intruder. It sets off the immune system to attack them.

This was the smoking gun. This is the actual cause of what was wrong with me. I have Leaky Gut Syndrome. While most Western doctors are taught that leaky gut syndrome doesn't exist, the evidence is mounting that it indeed does. It is the likely cause of a whole host of auto-immune diseases. An article in this month's Scientific American discusses it at length. The author, a doctor, expresses his surprise in learning through his research that the intestine isn't a solid pipe after all and that a leaky gut is a very real and very common problem.

Now that I had a cause, I needed a cure. Turns out the gut will heal itself if the things damaging it are removed. Those most damaging things in my life are wine, coffee, and candida.

I'd been off the wine and coffee for a while, so it was time to attack the candida differently. What I was doing obviously wasn't working as well as I'd like. I had not experienced a die-off reaction from any of the cures I had tried.

I came across a yeast, saccharomyces boulardii,that reportedly kills candida albicans in the intestines and does not populate the intestines itself. Perfect. The same day I learned of L-Glutamine, an amino acid that is essential to growth of new intestinal wall tissues. It is big in the bodybuilding community because it is essential to cell growth throughout the body, too. It is readily available. The killer yeast was harder to find but I got it at Mother's Market in the refrigerated supplements section.

I took those two things before I went to bed. The next day, I felt like utter crap. Weak, weary, achy. I felt like I was coming down with the flu. My skin also erupted, getting red spots like adult acne in odd place, like my neck, back, and legs. But this was a good thing. These were die-off symptoms. When candida dies it gives off a massive load of toxins more quickly than the body can eliminate. It takes a while to catch up and clear them all out.

After taking this killer yeast each night for 5 nights, I feel tremendousy better. I know I'm healing.

I'm not fully cured yet. This is a long process. Even when my guts heal and get back to normal my blood will still have the markers to react to the food I'm eating for a good 4 weeks before they fade away. And while my candida is dying, it is a persistent growth. It will take dietary dedication and a long series of supplements before I can stop being so vigilant about it. But I'm thrilled that I think I've found my problem and the cure.

I start my mornings with a tablespoon of coconut oil (kills yeast) and Manuka Honey ( heals wounds, might kill candida) mixed in hot water with a pinch of cayenne pepper and ginger (digestive healing) and lemon juice (liver cleansing). I drink that in lieu of coffee. I also mix an ounce of aloe vera juice (digestive healing) with a packet of Threelac (yeast-killing probiotic) and wash down a Milk Thistle tablet (liver healing) and Zinc (to try to make my hair stop falling out) with that.

Throughout the day I avoid the foods on my bad list as much as possible, especially sugar. I lean towards veggies and eschew grains without going too militant about it. I also have at least one glass of water mixed with Vega powder, a powerhouse of nutritional support including vitamins and probiotics.

At night, I have another dose of aloe vera juice mixed with L-Glutamine powder and take the saccharomyces boulardii yeast pill.

It's not so bad. It's not so hard. And it's working. Slowly I am healing. I can feel it. I'm excited about it.

I'm working out on good days. I still can't run very far without pain, but I can ride slowly and I can swim. I can also walk. Not sure what it is about running that makes it hurt so much, but I'm looking forward to that passing.

Instead I've been hiking. We set our sights on summiting Mt. Whitney and we've been doing training hikes every weekend. Our summit bid is next weekend. I'm not ready for it, I can't march right up it as I'd like, but I think I'll make it if I take it slowly and rest as needed. We're camping halfway up so I'll be able to take the mountain in stages. Sometimes I have really good, strong workout days, too, so I'm hoping summit weekend will be that. I'm going to be very strict on the foods and nutrients all this week to give my body the best chance at being as strong as it can be.

Wish me luck.