Minerals are known as the spark plugs of life.
Photo above: Marya McCormick, author of the THE SIMPLY WELL PROTOCOL
This year, Zahra experienced the sudden onset of debilitating migraines.
It is easy to think of something as “sudden,” implying that we have no idea where it came from, that we are surprised.
However, awareness is a liberator and knowledge is power.
Putting what you have learned into action, is the game changer.
When looking at Zahra’s life from a bird’s-eye-view, we see that she began an accelerated nursing degree in January (the first onset of migraine activity), a program that will condense three years of nursing school into a year. (January 2019 - December 2019.)
As the months went by, she found herself in a whirlwind of lectures, homework, at home quizzes, homework, in class quizzes, tests, papers, lab classes, and clinical rotations. Talk about stress.
So we do our best to eat healthy; all the things we assume are perfectly benign: spinach in our smoothies, lots of watermelon, cayenne in our food, hard cheeses, probiotics, kombucha, etc… Yay!
But then...
Second, persistent, no-end-in-sight migraine onset this past June.
Little did we realize that we were pushing Zahra over the tipping point of histamine overload by “eating well.”
You see, all these foods really are great for you, and this is not even the argument about moderation versus excess.
This is about gut health and about how each individual must discover what works for their microbiome. Your gut is now being called “the second brain,” giving new meaning to the idea of “listening to your gut” and “butterflies in your stomach (Johns Hopkins Health, 2019).
We had no idea that the excessive use of probiotics, usually based on fermentation processes, cause a build up of stuff bad bacteria love to eat in different parts of your digestive tract. The lack of utilizing pre-biotics (INULIN in the form of carrot juice, for example) leaves your good gut bacteria hungry for nourishment. Pairing this with excessive stress, lack of the lovely sleeps, and other histamine contributing factors, the complaining whispers of the body are bound to turn into screams!
And what about spinach, chili peppers, and watermelon? (Don’t you dare take away my spinach pies, nihari stew, or melon salad!). Well, these foods (amongst many others) contribute to a histamine response in the body: we talk’in inflammation.
This article is not going to be an exhaustive exploration of the science of migraines, remedies, or anything like that (*cough* organic raw potato starch and inulin pre-biotics *cough cough*), in fact, it isn’t even an introduction.
I’m here to redirect you to Marya McCormick at https://mineralsformigraines.com
(Btw, this is not a paid promotion. This article is the best way I thought I could give back to this incredible woman, who supplies her book online free, after you get on her email list.)
She is someone who suffered horrible migraines after a C-section birth that messed her up. It took her years, but she gathered the data, experimented on herself, and found her way out of the labyrinthian hell of pharmaceutical treatment.
I am happy to say that this wellness protocol has also stabilized Zahra. Thank god, we were only given a preview of what the cycle of pharmaceutical drug taking for migraines looks like, and we only did the bare minimum of what was recommended in Marya’s book The Simply Well Protocol, due to our poverty and the lack of funds to do much else :)
I want to make it clear that, for those whom these drugs work and for those who need immediate relief, should not be ashamed to take what their doctor prescribes. Medical intervention is important, that is why I am working my way towards Medical School, and in many ways I have the sensibility of a traditional doc: following the
science of how life is a chemical experience.
That being said, most of these drugs are an experiment; a short, flawed, rudimentary human experiment with chemicals. Mama Nature on the other hand, has developed chemicals that have been developed over millions, if not billions of years. And instead of isolated chemicals, complex organisms like plants, contain phytotherapeutic benefit because their chemicals are complex, work in tandem, and elicit the benefits brewed in their complex ecosystems. (Save the Trees!)
^This is what I will be studying most vehemently, what I will be then prescribing to patients. (E.g. Rx: GARLIC.)
I write it again, Zahra has been feeling much better. No migraines. We have even reintroduced some of those histamine causing foods (in moderation), after a month of doing a pre-biotic gut health protocol. And no drugs are being taken. She is still stressed in school, and not always getting the amount of sleep she needs, but she’s free of debilitating migraines, migraine auras, nausea, and all the rest of it.
I experimented with the protocol on myself too. Bloating of my stomach vanished, bowel movements improved, and the abs began reappearing ;)
For those of you who suffer from migraines: I have witnessed the hope-eradicating side effects of prescription drugs, I have witnessed the emergency room visits, lumbar punctures, blood draws, the scans, the I.V. Drugs, and the return of the migraine just after the drugs wear off, on a loved one.
I’m pretty shook by it all.
Also, I personally know what it is like to be on a downward spiral of health. I was twelve years old with aseptic meningitis caused by lymes disease, discovered uncomfortably close to its late stages.
In both cases, after interventional treatment (I owe my life to the antibiotic doxycycline. I love you doxy <3), the path to better health came from awareness, knowledge, and then applying all that was learned about wellness.
Don’t give up hope. Research, take action, be patient.
You have nothing to lose by learning more.
Works cited:
Johns Hopkins Health. 2019. “The Brain-Gut Connection.” Online Article:
https://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/health/wellness-and-prevention/the-brain-gut-connection
McCormick, Marya. 2019. The Simply Well Protocol. PDF Text.
Contact Marya McCormick:
Marya@migrainesforminerals.com
802.281.2948
https://mineralsformigraines.com
It is easy to think of something as “sudden,” implying that we have no idea where it came from, that we are surprised.
However, awareness is a liberator and knowledge is power.
Putting what you have learned into action, is the game changer.
When looking at Zahra’s life from a bird’s-eye-view, we see that she began an accelerated nursing degree in January (the first onset of migraine activity), a program that will condense three years of nursing school into a year. (January 2019 - December 2019.)
As the months went by, she found herself in a whirlwind of lectures, homework, at home quizzes, homework, in class quizzes, tests, papers, lab classes, and clinical rotations. Talk about stress.
So we do our best to eat healthy; all the things we assume are perfectly benign: spinach in our smoothies, lots of watermelon, cayenne in our food, hard cheeses, probiotics, kombucha, etc… Yay!
But then...
Second, persistent, no-end-in-sight migraine onset this past June.
Little did we realize that we were pushing Zahra over the tipping point of histamine overload by “eating well.”
You see, all these foods really are great for you, and this is not even the argument about moderation versus excess.
This is about gut health and about how each individual must discover what works for their microbiome. Your gut is now being called “the second brain,” giving new meaning to the idea of “listening to your gut” and “butterflies in your stomach (Johns Hopkins Health, 2019).
We had no idea that the excessive use of probiotics, usually based on fermentation processes, cause a build up of stuff bad bacteria love to eat in different parts of your digestive tract. The lack of utilizing pre-biotics (INULIN in the form of carrot juice, for example) leaves your good gut bacteria hungry for nourishment. Pairing this with excessive stress, lack of the lovely sleeps, and other histamine contributing factors, the complaining whispers of the body are bound to turn into screams!
And what about spinach, chili peppers, and watermelon? (Don’t you dare take away my spinach pies, nihari stew, or melon salad!). Well, these foods (amongst many others) contribute to a histamine response in the body: we talk’in inflammation.
This article is not going to be an exhaustive exploration of the science of migraines, remedies, or anything like that (*cough* organic raw potato starch and inulin pre-biotics *cough cough*), in fact, it isn’t even an introduction.
I’m here to redirect you to Marya McCormick at https://mineralsformigraines.com
(Btw, this is not a paid promotion. This article is the best way I thought I could give back to this incredible woman, who supplies her book online free, after you get on her email list.)
She is someone who suffered horrible migraines after a C-section birth that messed her up. It took her years, but she gathered the data, experimented on herself, and found her way out of the labyrinthian hell of pharmaceutical treatment.
I am happy to say that this wellness protocol has also stabilized Zahra. Thank god, we were only given a preview of what the cycle of pharmaceutical drug taking for migraines looks like, and we only did the bare minimum of what was recommended in Marya’s book The Simply Well Protocol, due to our poverty and the lack of funds to do much else :)
I want to make it clear that, for those whom these drugs work and for those who need immediate relief, should not be ashamed to take what their doctor prescribes. Medical intervention is important, that is why I am working my way towards Medical School, and in many ways I have the sensibility of a traditional doc: following the
science of how life is a chemical experience.
That being said, most of these drugs are an experiment; a short, flawed, rudimentary human experiment with chemicals. Mama Nature on the other hand, has developed chemicals that have been developed over millions, if not billions of years. And instead of isolated chemicals, complex organisms like plants, contain phytotherapeutic benefit because their chemicals are complex, work in tandem, and elicit the benefits brewed in their complex ecosystems. (Save the Trees!)
^This is what I will be studying most vehemently, what I will be then prescribing to patients. (E.g. Rx: GARLIC.)
I write it again, Zahra has been feeling much better. No migraines. We have even reintroduced some of those histamine causing foods (in moderation), after a month of doing a pre-biotic gut health protocol. And no drugs are being taken. She is still stressed in school, and not always getting the amount of sleep she needs, but she’s free of debilitating migraines, migraine auras, nausea, and all the rest of it.
I experimented with the protocol on myself too. Bloating of my stomach vanished, bowel movements improved, and the abs began reappearing ;)
For those of you who suffer from migraines: I have witnessed the hope-eradicating side effects of prescription drugs, I have witnessed the emergency room visits, lumbar punctures, blood draws, the scans, the I.V. Drugs, and the return of the migraine just after the drugs wear off, on a loved one.
I’m pretty shook by it all.
Also, I personally know what it is like to be on a downward spiral of health. I was twelve years old with aseptic meningitis caused by lymes disease, discovered uncomfortably close to its late stages.
In both cases, after interventional treatment (I owe my life to the antibiotic doxycycline. I love you doxy <3), the path to better health came from awareness, knowledge, and then applying all that was learned about wellness.
Don’t give up hope. Research, take action, be patient.
You have nothing to lose by learning more.
Works cited:
Johns Hopkins Health. 2019. “The Brain-Gut Connection.” Online Article:
https://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/health/wellness-and-prevention/the-brain-gut-connection
McCormick, Marya. 2019. The Simply Well Protocol. PDF Text.
Contact Marya McCormick:
Marya@migrainesforminerals.com
802.281.2948
https://mineralsformigraines.com
