Natural Health

 

Our GP first introduced us to homeopathy in 1988, when our eldest offspring, Sal was born. Our family doctor was not only a general practitioner, but a midwife (or should that be mid-husband?) and a homeopath. He enthusiastically attended the home birth of our second born as an observer, along with our usual midwife and a student midwife. It was the first planned home birth in our town in 13 years, so there was much excitement and it was wonderful! As our little Rosie Matilda was born, her beautiful big eyes opened wide as we all sang happy birthday...much to the delight of her big sis, who was two at the time. Six years later, when our third born, Hugo came along – we were very happy to discover that the student nurse from Rose’s birth was to be our midwife and she was thrilled to be on duty that night - delivering not just another baby at home, but to be sharing another birth experience with us.

The health system had changed though...the midwives were no longer attached to a GP surgery, but were part of one big team overseeing the whole town. It was pure chance that we got the lovely woman from years before and her colleague was equally warm and supportive, she had actually requested to come along as she had not been to a home birth before. The GP had moved on and his surgery had now become a medical centre with several doctors. We are not fans of this bigger impersonal system, which is why we decided to take responsibility for our own health.

You can read on this blog about my journey with Graves Disease and how conventional treatment isn’t always the best option. I refused the radioactive iodine and instead researched my condition; it took 7 years and I had 2 thyroid storms during that time, but now my autoimmune disorder is under control or cured...something that so many endocrinologists said was impossible! Well, I did it and have steered clear of pharmaceutical sales reps NHS doctors and practitioners ever since. We both had letters a few years ago from the NHS saying we were randomly picked to be deregistered from our GP unless we gave more personal information. We chose to ignore the letters and have moved a few times, so as we see it – we do not have a doctor. A scary prospect for many, but we both would prefer to choose to see a herbalist or homeopath if we couldn’t help ourselves.

If we want to live healthy, happy and joyful lives, we must endeavour to re-establish the proper relationship between ourselves – the whole body and mind – and nature. There is no other way to lead a happy and satisfied life. If we violate nature, its harmony is destroyed, for we are part of nature. In the same way, all medical research is a waste of time if these holistic interrelationships are not taken into consideration. Today’s orthodox medical opinion in the main still holds to the fundamentally wrong view that it is the illness or disease itself, the symptom, that has to be treated and if possible combatted or suppressed by strong drugs. Finding the balance between nature, body and mind is the holistic approach - to work in harmony with nature, never against it.

~Dr H.C. Alfred Vogel~

Graves Disease was my wakeup call, I already knew all this and had studied vegan nutritional therapy and holistic diagnosis, but I still ended up getting sick. Once I took time to look at all aspects of my life, I discovered that it was a combination of things making me ill and I set about making changes. I looked at removing as much stress as possible from my life. Severed some difficult relationships, quit working for social services and became mindful. I read lots of Buddhist literature, started meditating and visualising. Then I looked into diet...We had been veggie for a very long time and some of those years we had been vegan, but had relaxed the rules when out and about and travelling. After reading Caldwell Esselstyn’s book “Prevent and Reverse Heart Disease” we decided that we should definitely be vegan; in our hearts we were and we also stopped using processed oil. Taking care of our bodies is the best medicine ever and we believe a vegan, organic and oil free diet is the way to good health. Spending time in nature too - growing food, getting your hands in organic soil, being amongst wildlife, trees, mountains, sea and rivers...breathing in deeply the fresh air...our life force.

The more we live in harmony with nature – the stronger and happier we become.

If your health isn’t good – look at what you can do to make it better, simplify your life, rest, eat well and laugh...lots!!!

Love Kay (and Sime) xx