My health problems began as an infant, starting with the DPT shot (otherwise known as Diptheria-Pertussis-Tetanus) I received as part of the usual childhood round of vaccinations. My parents tell me I was immediately rushed to the ER with breathing problems. They didn’t know if I’d survive.
Fortunately, here I am, but not without a history of physical problems along the way, such as allergies and asthma, acne, and migraines.
When the migraines started, I contacted my doctor, who gave me a prescription and told me to “take it for the rest of your life.” That was a turning point. On the way home I tore up the prescription and decided that I’d search for a cure. Back then we didn’t have computers or iPhones or Google search, so it took some time buying books and reading them to give me a few clues about how to proceed.
I started reading about what foods were the healthiest to eat and which supplements could enhance our well-being. At a local health food store I struck up a friendship with the manager, a woman named Alice. After learning about my problems, she suggested I try homeopathy, an alternative approach to treating disease based on the administration of minute doses of a substance that in massive amounts produces, in healthy individuals, symptoms similar to those of the disease itself. (For more information on homeopathy, go here.)
“There’s a homeopathic M.D. in New York City,” Alice said. “He’s not only treating patients, but lecturing on homeopathy. His name is Dr. Bhagat Singh.” Since we lived only 30 miles outside of the city, it wasn’t hard for me to hop on a train and visit this doctor. Intrigued, I ended up taking one of his year-long courses in homeopathy. During that period of study, I went to him for treatment, and the results were pretty remarkable: my migraines diminished and then disappeared. I still had allergies, but those, too, were tapering off.
Then, just before Buzz and I and our daughter went to Europe for a year, Dr. Singh died. I’d learned a lot from him, but his loss was a blow. I kept on treating myself, Buzz, and Keri with homeopathic remedies, but I only knew the basics of this alternative science. For a few years, after returning from Europe, we searched for another good, classical homeopath. I’m sure they’re out there, but we never found one.
While we were living in France for 8 months, Buzz and I – still interested in the topic of health – wrote a screenplay titled “Cure,” about a woman doctor who had discovered a natural cure for cancer and was being silenced by the medical/pharmaceutical establishment. Little did we know then the extent of the silencing that was really going on – and continues today. Our literary agent sent it around to various film companies, but no one was willing to produce such a movie.
Fast forward to our move into New York City, to an apartment on Jane Street in the West Village, where Buzz and I, still seeking optimal health, decided to try a macrobiotic diet. A concept first introduced in 4th century B.C. by Hippocrates, the diet was then, as it mostly is today, a way of eating seasonal, local foods, mainly plants, as well as exercising outside, sleeping well, and balancing life to the best of one’s ability. In the 1970s it was tailored a bit and popularized by Michio Kushi, founder of Erewhom Foods. To learn more about what this diet consists of, go here.
Ultimately we discontinued the macrobiotic lifestyle as it became too restrictive for us – maintaining the diet was almost impossible when trying to socialize with friends. It also eschewed protein and fats, two things we began to see were necessary for overall good health.
So our search for the perfect diet continued…