This is a post from My Health Journey, an ongoing series where I document my health progress. Follow along to see, month after month, how I implement my recovery protocol, handle stressful situations, eliminate food sensitivities, incrementally train my nervous system to handle more stress, and ultimately, how my method continues to allow me greater and greater freedom, happiness, and health!
This month was quite mixed—a lot of good, followed by not feeling well for an important and obvious reason. I’ll start with the good.
What Went Well
At the risk of sounding like a wonderfully broken record, I felt my best yet during the first three weeks of this month! All of the last few months have been a noticeable upward trend.
I had a fantastic stretch with nerve pain so low that it continually escaped my attention. That is the best four days of my recovery I can remember! This result occurred while I was on a long weekend vacation. I attended a live theater performance for the first time in over twenty years and climbing a mountain for the first time in my life! I scaled the highest peak at Enchanted Rock near Fredericksburg, TX, which is pictured above. If that’s the new standard for how well I feel, I’d happily take it for the rest of my life. I finally felt like my symptoms weren’t interfering with my daily life in any way!
Directly connected with the improvement, I no longer feel like weightlifting causes me nerve pain! In October 2020, I figured out that I was capable of lifting, but only if I took at least a twenty-minute ice bath immediately after to stop the neuropathic pain in my face and shoulders rising above a six out of ten. Even with an ice bath, I would have elevated pain for the next day and sleep very poorly the night after a workout. Now, I’m not sure if I need them anymore.
Because of this new absence of pain, I finally switched to a healthy man’s workout plan of three workouts per week instead of two. I’m still doing the same exercises, just spread across more days, so I have less time invested in recovery between sets. Despite these changes, I made gains with all of my lifts. I also began running a hill outside my residence at least five times per day.
Another important change was with my diet. I have wondered whether the moderate carbohydrate diet I switched to early last year was a causal factor in my dwindling pain, or perhaps only correlative. I’d also planned to make a change to expedite leaning out after ending my bulk-up period. So I switched from that paleo diet to a cyclical ketogenic diet after hitting a goal of 175 pounds. The leaning out is going marvelously. I can already see where some of my body fat has vanished.
I eat low carb six days per week, then have some starchy carbs like sweet potatoes or plantains on the seventh. I’m keeping my calories at 70% fat, 5-10% carbs, and 20-25% protein per a traditional keto diet. To track this, I’m using the app Lose It! But I’m doing this non-traditionally. I’m not indulging in many saturated fats due to my suspicions that doing so with my APoE4-4 SNP could lead to neurodegenerative diseases such as Alzheimer’s or dementia. I’m also eating considerable amounts of low-carb veggies, as pictured in my ribeye, carrots, cauliflower, Brussels sprouts, mushrooms, red cabbage, which you see above. For my protein, I’m emphasizing fish. The core component is a lot of avocado and olive oil. I had a great deal of energy and increased mental clarity during the early parts of this diet change, and if anything, my pain improved more with this switch.
What Went Not So Well
I did not feel nearly as well in the second half of the month for an expected reason.
Back in May, I tried a mimosa pudica seed protocol to kill off parasites when I concluded they could be the explanation for my elevated blood histamine levels. I had exhausted all other histamine treatment options. It appeared I was correct, as I had a flood of worms from doing the protocol for only half of the suggested thirty days. But I needed to move at the end of May and travel a great deal. I put off the rest of the protocol when I had a very uncomfortable herxheimer reaction, detailed here.
I am on day twenty-four of thirty of resuming the mimosa pudica seed protocol at the time of this writing. For information on the protocol, it’s Step 2 minus the Mito Restore product in the article found here. (I don’t think I need the mitochondrial support given several other things I’m doing for myself.) The process has been much more gentle now that I’m using all the appropriate toxin binders and liver support, as evidenced by that great four days mid-month.
However, once the parasites became more plentiful and larger this last week, I began getting daily symptoms. First, I started to have mild headaches, tiredness, mental confusion, and abdominal aches and spasms. Later, I had itchy skin and ringing ears that go with elevated histamine. The symptoms are nowhere near as intense as when I didn’t have the binders in May but are still a drain. I have passed around 20 more worms of at least two types this second time with the protocol. The amount is escalating as the protocol goes on. They’ve shown up daily for more than a week now. I stopped my weightlifting in the last week of the month due to low energy and poor recovery. To stay active I’m doing some calisthenics like pushups, squats, chin-ups, and dips. The daily symptoms have also slowed my productivity.
Due to the continued appearance of worms and how I’m feeling, I’m taking an added precaution. I’m going to have a stool parasite test in case there are many more parasites to come. If I still have any at that point, I will see which parasites I have. Then they could be pinpointed with an anti-parasitic medication, and the process could be sped along. That way, I’ll have a backup plan to feel better as soon as possible and back to my fully productive self where I can push my exercise limits again. From my research, this shouldn’t have much negative effect on my microbiome health. Anti-parasitics are much more tactical weapons, as opposed to the total annihilation approach of antibiotics. Regardless, I’ll keep taking the mimosa pudica seed beyond thirty days until the worms stop showing up. There’s bound to be an end to the worms at some point!
The Hope Going Forward
I was feeling my best yet during my recovery, even during this round of the anti-parasite protocol. I suspect that portends that the future will be grand indeed for me! Hopefully, this infestation will be over soon, and I’ll be feeling even better than I was in the early part of the month. It has to help to be rid of them. I’m curious to see if any other minor aches, pains, and other symptoms disappear when they’re all gone. Even if not, I’ll happily take how I felt mid-month.
I look forward to my next health update.
