In "Part 1" and "Part 2," I mentioned 6 rules and a comment on Root Canals and Cavitation surgery. Since we are all a little different from each other, we don't always respond to a treatment the way another individual may respond, though the treatment may be identical. I cannot know what will work for any other individuals. I only know what worked for me. Therefore I hope the following illustration will emphasize how important I consider those rules, including information about the health of an individuals mouth were in my own application. Thus believing they will be significant for others following the same path.
Imagine driving off road with your friends and getting stuck. If you had a 20 foot chain, one of your friends could pull you out. Your in luck. A passer by has almost 20 feet of chain. The problem is that two links in the chain are missing. Therefore one piece happens to be about 3 foot long. One piece happens to be about 7 foot long and the other piece is 10 foot long. While there is indeed nearly 20 foot of chain, there are no couplers to attach the pieces of chain together. Therefore in reality the chain is of little value. Why? A couple of pieces were missing.
This is how strongly I feel about the different points I have tried to bring to everyone's attention in "Part 1 and Part 2." Its great if your following some of those points. However each point you don't follow, or follow half heartedly minimizes your chance of either minimizing or eliminating your pain. Furthermore, this same urgency applies to the thoughts I am sharing here in Part 3.
I have been asked several times if I am in remission from TN pain or if I really believe the supplements have helped me. It is important to note that I have already had the Gamma Knife procedure. It brought the pain down a little and in less than a year it was worse than before the procedure. From what I've read, this appears to work for some people. It did not work for me. After considerable reading, I decided to try Dr. Jannetta's microvascular decompression procedure. Cedar Sinai performed the MVD procedure on me. After the surgery and while I was still sedated, the doctor claimed the blood vein was running right across the ganglion of verves. He said the problem was clearly obvious and that they were able to enclose the vein completely. I should have no more pain. I have read several articles where they say this works for some people. Unfortunately for me, I was in worse shape after that operation. Death would have been my friend.
After reading several articles, I started focusing on what may be wrong inside my mouth other than a dental procedure gone wrong. Those articles were a strong motivation for turning my attention toward Cavitation surgery. The very first operation that brought any substantial relief to me was indeed the Cavitation surgery. Over the years I have had a number of individuals recommend "Striking Back" as the book to read. If you know nothing about Trigeminal Neuralgia, then I suppose you will find some value in the book. In my opinion the book to read is Dr. Meinig's "Root Canal Cover Up." It may be that the title is somewhat misleading. The experiments, photographs, statistics, all the information they bring together is some of the greatest knowledge I've had access to. I have given copies of Dr. Meinig's book to several practitioners in the dental and medical field. I have yet to give the book to anyone who knew anything about the information contained therein.
My initial experience with foods and supplements.
The following is not all inclusive of my experiences with foods and supplements. I just wanted to share experiences that made me focus on what I was consuming. As anyone with TN knows, this curse puts you a world apart from normal people.
In my case, I could not eat anything at first unless I was heavily sedated. Until the last few years working with supplements, I couldn't eat anything that was hard to chew. Over the years I learned that lemons, red wine vinegar, sometimes salt and a number of other foods didn't work for me. I had read that Vitamin B supplements helped individuals with TN. Any kind of B supplement immediately raised my pain. Additionally, other vitamins and one antibiotic in particular caused my pain to jump considerably higher.
I learned that I could not eat Chinese food any more. Within hours of a meal, the pain would immediately skyrocket. Some restaurants were worse than others until I finally quit trying. Eating Mustard was out of the question. Black pepper and coffee caused my pain to go up. I could not eat Pecan nuts or Walnuts. There are several other foods and spices I can't eat.
One article on TN said that large doses of Sarrapeptease (incorrect spelling I think) would eliminate the pain. I tried it and the pain went way down for about one week. Then It came right back up. About a year after my cavitation surgery, I read an article that said coconut extract was good for chronic limes disease. I ordered Monolaurin and started taking it. From that 900 to 1,300 mg of medication a day, my dose dropped to 400 mg. I thought I was really on to something for about two weeks. Then my pain went right back up.
I tried different diets and I learned that if I ate one hundred percent organic, my pain level would be at its lowest. I even tried fasting for a couple of weeks. I hate going without food. Drinking only water is not fun. My pain was way down, but I could not get rid of it. As soon as I started eating after the fast, my pain went up. Whenever I ate meals that were what I would call junk food, especially if a few meals followed each other, the pain really went up. 17 years is a long time to experiment with different food groups and supplements.
THERE WAS ABSOLUTELY NO QUESTION IN MY MIND THAT
DIFFERENT FOODS AND SUPPLEMENTS MADE A DIFFERENCE.
The question was, what food or supplements do I take. I read fast and I read a lot. I have collected a lot of books and many binders full of information on TN, supplements and a variety of other related issues. Simply put, there was no one to tell me what to eat or take as a supplement. For the most part, everything I learned was by trial and error. In the back of my mind I kept thinking about Dr. Hussar practicing Kinesiology on me to determine medications and some supplements to recommend. I read some on Kinesiology but really, I just could not grasp exactly what it was that I was suppose to do. As I recall it was about five years after my surgeries with Dr. Hussar that I heard about Dr. Pearts practice here in Fresno.
Nutritional Response Testing
As I have already written, companies like Standard Process, HVS Laboratories and others have developed supplements that either help strengthen the different organs in the body so they function more efficiently, or in other cases help eliminate toxic metals, chemicals, fungus, yeast, bacteria, viruses, etc., that a person may have through some means contracted or ingested into the body. I had spent nearly a decade and a half searching for a cure so I thought I might as well give this a go.
It was an interesting experiment with great results. Read my posts listed here in this site and in Part 4 for more information on "Nutritional Response Testing." Citing my own experience when I started NRT, the first three months the only thing I could notice was that I had more energy. Then my pain started going down. I believe it was the fourth month that I went five days without taking any medication. I hurt a lot the whole time, but I could actually go without medicine.
DO YOU HAVE ANY IDEA WHAT THAT IS LIKE. AFTER A DECADE AND A HALF OF TAKING DRUGS EVERY DAY, I COULD ACTUALLY GO FIVE DAYS WITHOUT ANY MEDICATION. THAT WAS A MIRACLE.
My medication level dropped from 900 --- 1,300 mg per day to 100 --- 300 mg per day. It all happened with supplements. My problem was that we were using everything Dr. Peart had in his arsenal and that was the best we could get. Which was better than anyone else had ever done. It wasn't until my friend turned my attention to a site called Z--Natural Foods that a new chapter started.
It took me from October of 2015 until the second week in January 2016 to learn the proper amount of supplements to take. Since then I have not had any more TN pain. What I have experienced is truly the result of the supplements I have taken. Will the pain come back tomorrow, next month or next year. I don't know. Time will tell. For now though, I am enjoying every moment I have that is pain free.
The one thing I have learned is that for every thing positive someone says, there is another person saying something opposite. For more positive information including videos on NRT by Dr. Freddie Ulan, you might try this site, http://www.holistichealingandnutrition.com. ; For negative information on NRT, you might try this site; https://en.wikipedia.org.
I always take the time to read both the negative and positive press on any topic in an effort to be better informed. After digesting negative information about NRT, my conclusion was that if they were accurate, it would not have worked on me. Through my experience with NRT, I have come to know several other individuals it has helped though none of them have TN. In my opinion NRT would not be helping the people I know if the negative press was true. Some-where along the line they missed something. What I have learned though, is that it has to be done the right way to get the results. As it turned out, while I was using the basic NRT process I learned from Dr. Hussar and Dr. Peart, the final step it took to get my specific results was not something we had done before. I learned that through trial and error.
At my last count I have tried 49 different supplements from Z--Natural Foods. It is reasonably expensive and time consuming. I learned that a 1/4 measuring teaspoon used for baking is about the same as a "00 gel" cap. I have filled gel caps with all the supplements I have purchased so I can use them for testing. I will list all those supplements in Part 4.
The simple question I was asked by knowpain was, What are the supplements you are using? I could have answered the question and let it go at that. I did not feel I was doing any justice or adding any credibility to the journey it took to get here. If you jump to the supplements and forgo the various points I have commented on, I'm not sure you'll get the results. As far as I can tell, the only result we are all looking for is the "No Pain" result.
In Part 4 my emphasis will focus on the fact that we are all different. That no one knows exactly what supplements our bodies are lacking. The part NRT plays in helping us find those supplements we need. Therefore logically leading to the conclusion that the more supplements you are able to test with, the more success you may have in finding those nutrients your body is lacking. Additionally, I am going to list the supplements I started with and explain how to use them as I have come to learn.