Migraines, Food Allergies, Salt, and Honey

For the past week-and-a-half my hubby, Jeff, has suffered from crippling cluster migraines. The last time he went through an episode like this was 13 years ago, he had just started a new job, and he was under a tremendous amount of self-induced stress trying to make a good impression on his new co-workers. Needless to say, having to miss two days of work was a bit counterproductive to what he was trying to achieve. Back in 2000, he went to a neurologist who prescribed Imitrex and Prednisone to treat the migraine; both treatments worked really well, and he was back to work with a new-found appreciation for how the mind can wreak havoc on the body.

This migraine episode was different. He went to his Primary Care physician, an internal medicine specialist, and he wasn't under any more stress than he normally has been. The doctor took a sample of his blood to see if he had an inflammation - which would warrant Prednisone - but his sediment rate was low, indicating no inflammation. She prescribed a few Imitrex pills, and then explained to him about food allergies in relation to migraines. Jeff took all the Imitrex and was still in agony. We both tracked what he ate, how he felt afterwards, and tried to narrow down what was triggering the migraine. But he had lapses of judgment: the doctor told him that among other foods, sugar, red wine, and aged cheese were culprits, so on Friday night instead of having his nightly glass of sherry, Jeff bought some rum and ordered pizza for dinner (wait, what? I was stunned, but I thought he'd have to find out on his own that that was not a good idea; rum is loaded with sugar, and cheese comes with pizza - I'm pretty certain almost all cheeses are aged to some extent). Sure enough, the next morning his migraine was back in droves, and he told me he probably would have to go to the emergency room by that evening if he couldn't get relief.

I searched the internet to see what it is about the foods that could trigger a migraine, and found out that the body gets overloaded in histamine: the arteries dilate, become overloaded and inflamed, then contract, then dilate again releasing all that histamine. Now, I know that allergies are caused when too much histamine is produced by the body in response to the allergen, but I never equated a migraine with histamine. I don't know why, just never occurred to me, and all the websites, both medical and holistic, never once mentioned taking allergy medicine, like Benadryl or Clarinex, when suffering from a migraine. To me an allergy, even a food type allergy like with peanuts or shell-fish, triggers hives, swelling, shortness of breath, etc., but rarely a migraine. So I had an eureka moment when I figured maybe taking some Benadryl might help his migraine since migraines cause such a big buildup of histamine, and Benadryl is an anti-histamine. I keep a supply of Benadryl on hand since I'm so allergic to poison ivy and insect bites, and I gave him two pills and said, "Let's see if Benadryl works." Wonder of wonders, it did, thank goodness! By Saturday night his migraine was almost completely gone, and a few more doses of Benadryl on Sunday wiped it out totally. He's keeping a bottle of Benadryl at his office now in case he feels a migraine coming on, and he swore to me that he's cognizant of what all he eats (uh huh, sure he is - this is the same man who doesn't think twice about eating a hotdog or ham sandwich from a gas station's food section).

So for anyone out there who suffers from migraines that are most likely triggered by certain foods, try taking Benadryl (we use the Benadryl in the pink box). Just follow the package instructions, and see if it helps. If you suffer often from food migraines, you probably should keep a food diary to see what exactly is triggering them as well. As we age we become less and less tolerant of foods and environmental concerns than we used to be - I didn't become intolerant to poison ivy or bugs until just a few years ago! And if your migraines aren't helped by using an anti-histamine, by all means please go to a doctor; you never know what other conditions might be setting them off! NOTE/UPDATE: It's Monday evening and about an hour ago Jeff's migraine came back in full force. I asked him what he ate, he told me, and then added, "Oh, and some crab." I know that shellfish can trigger food allergies because they often contain preservatives and additives, and sure enough, I looked at the "fresh" crabmeat label and it's FULL of chemicals! GOOD GRIEF JEFF! Oy vey and pass the Benadryl, please. I'll send him an e-mail tomorrow (when he no longer has the migraine) and remind him to read the damn labels!

In addition to a list of foods given to Jeff by the doctor, she also told him to avoid salt and sugar. Jeff told her that we haven't used regular table salt in years, that we use Celtic Grey Sea Salt. She replied, "salt is salt." While this is certainly true, regular table salt - the white, finely ground stuff - is mined from salt pits in the earth, stripped of any and all minerals it may have once contained, preservatives and unnecessary fillers/additives are mixed into it, and refined to what you see in those shakers. Celtic Grey Sea Salt is unrefined with no chemicals, preservatives or any other additives. Here is a list of its benefits: http://www.waterbenefitshealth.com/celtic-sea-salt.html. So, while the doctor is partly correct, there are a lot of health benefits from using Celtic Grey (even above other sea salts). I'm sure regular, refined table salt not only is a factor in migraines but also high blood pressure; anything that's refined should be eaten with an abundance of caution! But since we only use the Celtic Grey, we knew that wasn't causing his migraines, and indeed, he's had several meals using the Celtic Grey since the migraine stopped, and he hasn't had a recurrence. I order all of our salts (I use an Hawaiian Red for skincare preparations) through Salt Works, based in Seattle: http://www.saltworks.us/shop/product.asp?idProduct=348. This salt comes in several different grinds: fine to coarse. Note: I'm not paid to endorse Salt Works; I just thought some of y'all might wonder where I get my own supply! 

Another thing the doctor told Jeff when he told her we usually used raw honey as a sweetner: "sugar is sugar." Again, true enough; honey definitely is a sugar. But raw, unfiltered, unprocessed honey is an anti-inflammatory, probiotic, anti-microbial powerhouse. With an upset stomach, cold, or just about anything that's ailing you, take a spoonful of raw, unfiltered honey and that "bug" that's causing so much havoc will be vanquished! Diabetics should use caution when using honey because it is, after all, a sugar, and infants less than a year old should not be given honey. But it's a true miracle food for just about everyone else, and I cannot recommend it enough. It's also one of the best topical wound-healers available since it kills germs on contact, seals the wound from any more bacteria entering, and keeps the wound moisturized (vital for no scarring!) while the skin is recovering. The best type of raw honey for skin care/wound care is the dark buckwheat honey. It's also an excellent remedy when ingested but many people don't like the strong flavor (I LOVE it!), so any type of raw honey is good. Just make sure you get your honey from a reputable beekeeper; many U.S. honey companies use a mixture of U.S. and China (yep, China) produced honey, and China has a tendency to add all sorts of awful additives to its products. I personally get all of our raw honey from The Mohawk Valley Trading Company, located in New York; it's simply the best honey I've ever tasted. You order through company e-mail (instructions are on their website), and they ship the same day payment is received - can't beat that for customer service! Here's their website, and you're more than welcome to tell them that Kerry Murphy referred you (again, I don't make a penny for referrals, but it might please them to no end that a happy, happy customer is recommending them!): http://www.tenonanatche.com/raw-buckwheat-honey.htm

The Meteor over Russia

I have a metaphysical tale to tell re this: Yesterday evening I was outside star and moon gazing when I heard a far-off siren that sounded like a higher pitched air raid siren without a dip in tone. I listened and listened, thought about getting my recorder but sat on the deck straining to see if I could discern where the sound was coming from (couldn't tell but it sounded north east). When it ended a minute or so later, I ran inside to see if there were any news flashes. Nada. I told Jeff about what I heard and that I thought it was a case of clairaudience* as opposed to an actual air raid siren going off in D.C. Since my gift seems to be changing on a rather monumental scale - at least for me! - and I can no longer tell if what I'm hearing (and smelling re petroleum spills!) is an actual presently-occurring event or a future event, I gotta tell you I had major goose bumps with this one! The sound alone caused my skin to crawl and every hair to stand up on end; truly, truly freaky. I was going to blog about this last night, not only to have a written record of what I had heard, but as a prompt to keep googling "air raid sirens D.C. 2/14/13." As I've mentioned in several past blog posts, my short term memory is pretty much non-existent - the events themselves are always remembered, but a reminder to blog or write down what I witnessed are often forgotten, with the reminder hitting me at some future point (and then while I'm on my way to write it down or blog about it, I get distracted and forget again! oy vey). Luckily I was on the internet at about 1:00 am this morning when the first news reports came out about the meteor, and I immediately wrote about what I had heard on my Facebook Wall. But again, I'm writing this now, 17 hours or so after I wrote about it on Facebook, because Jeff asked me a few minutes ago, "Did you blog about hearing the sirens?" Extremely frustrating (but still makes me laugh because it's such an old lady cliche' to have "senior moments"). I think what is important to emphasize, though, is that according to the current news' reports on this meteor, I heard the sirens at the same time the meteor was falling and exploding over Russia. Truly, truly freaky, indeed.

If anyone reads of any event that happened in D.C. that would warrant a high pitched air raid siren, please let me know. Otherwise, I'm guessing what I heard was a case of clairaudience* of this meteor and the Russian emergency warning system being activated.

*"Clairaudience is the gift of hearing voices, music and sounds that are not audible to the normal ear and may not be of a physical form. "Clairaudience" comes from the French word meaning "clear hearing" and is often intermingled with other basic psychic phenomena such as clairvoyance and clairsentience. Yoga describes this as the siddhi and is experienced when the fifth chakra is acted with is located in the throat. Clairaudience is normally experienced in dreamtime and related states of consciousness.... Shaman, prophets, priests and so forth have been documented to have had clairaudience which would lead to certain events." Best definition of clairaudience that relates to what happened to me last night, from the website: http://www.psychic.com.au/psychic-clairaudience.htm#.UR7a46VQEXA

Here's a recent article about the meteor: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/02/15/meteorite-streaks-across-russian-urals_n_2691904.html

UPDATE 2/28/13: CNN just published an article titled, "Planet of Sound: Meteor Blast Resonated Around Earth" about the sound waves caused by the meteor. So, I reckon what I heard was the meteor, instead of an actual air raid siren with no dips in tone. http://www.cnn.com/2013/02/27/world/europe/russia-meteor/index.html?fb_action_ids=10151452583743827&fb_action_types=og.recommends&fb_source=aggregation&fb_aggregation_id=288381481237582

Message from Beyond, Smudging, Dreamtime, A Celestial Event

Message from Beyond: A woman appeared before me in dreamtime and said, "Confirm for your Aunt Andrea Lowery that you've [lost weight? stopped smoking?]" The reason I'm confused about this is because I believe she said both of those - I wrote both phrases down, however I don't remember the inflection used to emphasize one over the other. AND, I actually googled "Andrea Lowery obituary" and came up with nothing. So now I'm thinking that there should be a comma after Aunt, as in "Confirm for your Aunt, Andrea Lowery...." Therefore (hahaha - clear as mud?) this message is either from an Aunt named Andrea Lowery OR for Andrea Lowery whose sternish, kind of judgmental aunt is doubting from the Otherworld your claims that you've lost weight and stopped smoking! Although it IS unusual to receive visitations from loved ones who cling to this world's judgments, opinions, and so on - in the Otherworld, everything JUST IS since, although we each have our own individual journey to experience, once we're in the Otherworld it all becomes part of the whole, the Universal One Energy - it does happen from time to time. My suggestion for anyone who receives these types of visits, which to me are more harmful than good (don't we get enough negativity in THIS world? Just don't need to hear it from the Otherworld, too!), is to smudge* their home. The sage will keep the negativity and negative beings from reaching you. You know what your vices are and are in charge of your own well-being and journey; I don't think you need one more voice, even if it is from beyond, passing judgment!

*To smudge: get a sage (called "smudge") stick, light the stick then blow it out so that it's smoking (like incense), begin at the right corner of your front door, and in a clockwise manner hold the stick to each corner you encounter as you smudge the entire home. As you hold the stick in the corners, talk to the negative beings saying something like, "You are not welcome here. Anyone who doesn't have my best interest and wellness at heart must leave. Everyone else is welcome!" End the smudging at the left corner of your front door. If the stick goes out while you're in the middle of smudging, just re-light it, blow it out, and continue smudging. This has not happened to me, I think it's because I let the stick burn for quite a few seconds before I blow it out. When you're finished smudging, dunk the stick in a bowl of water, shake it out and let air dry. When thoroughly dried, place in glass container to use again. Some practitioners won't use the same stick twice; I think that's a waste of sage, after all we're here to protect Mother Earth and her resources and use each resource sparingly. An object or being only has power if you allow it so; you're giving the sage new power during every use, regardless of whether it was used previously or not.

Dreamtime: I had a dream, and I thought it was "just a dream" as I was seeing it played before me (when I have visions, I almost always know that it's a vision and I need to pay attention), that I was speaking to some men in hazmat suits. I did not feel the least bit alarmed nor any sense of urgency, and instead of a chemical warfare attack - which is where my waking mind goes when I see hazmat suits - these guys were wearing the suits because of pesticides, herbicides and chemical spills. I asked one of the gentlemen, "Well, shouldn't we all have our own chem gear?" He answered affirmatively, and I started doing the math in my head: 330 million people times whatever amount each hazmat suit cost. As I was mentally multiplying, I awoke with a start and realized, "330 million people? The entire United States?" So my "just a dream" in that moment became another vision. One of pollution, toxicity and  chemical-filled nightmare. My heart broke right at that moment. We've gone past the point of no return, y'all. This is not an alarmist post, I promise! The U.S. has reached levels of toxicity as we saw by the 1950s/60s. We passed numerous laws and regulations and deployed countless numbers of workers and volunteers to clean up the toxic waterways and dump sites, and we can do it again. But this time is different in that Big Energy and Chem companies and Big Business have bought our politicians lock, stock and barrel. Instead of strengthening those laws and regulations ensuring clean air and water that were passed 50 years ago, our Republican-majority Congress, with the help of some Democrats, has slowly but surely disassembled much of which was giving us some sense of safety and protection from corporate greed and waste and pollution. As an example, this morning I found out that my U.S. Senator, Mark Warner, had signed a joint letter to the President urging he approve the Keystone XL Pipeline. I almost fainted; this was my confirmation that my "dream" was actually a vision. In case you don't know anything about Keystone (except it's controversial!), here is a good overview of what it's all about (hint: it won't benefit anyone except Transcanada and the Koch Brothers, and indeed will harm aquifers and pristine ecosystems): http://thehill.com/blogs/congress-blog/energy-a-environment/211733-bill-mckibben-founder-350org. And here's an insightful piece: http://seniorsforademocraticsociety.wordpress.com/2013/02/07/the-xl-pipeline-lie/

So, I know you're asking, "but why do you think it's too late?" And the short answer is that we are entering an Earth cycle change. This is a cycle that happens every so often, but now it has a curve ball thrown into the mix: our precious Earth can't defend and repair itself against the onslaught of extreme weather that is happening now and is to be when she is already weakened, damaged and poisoned. It would be the same thing if you were to have cancer and then catch a cold: your immune system can't fight off those little bitty cold bacteria that any other person could handle with no problem. We're entering an age of great change, great upheaval, and that flows directly into:

A Celestial Event: My Navajo grandfather visited me several months ago (and continues to visit intermittently) and told me to "look to the night sky." As a note re my grandfather for those unfamiliar with him: he first visited me back in 2006 and was a Navajo medicine man in his life on Earth. We speak in the Navajo language (which I have to write down phonetically when I awaken and then translate using the Navajo Code Talkers website). He's shown me many future events, some of which have since occurred, and is my primary guide in the Otherworld. I'm uncertain whether or not he was actually my grandfather in a past life, but it seems as if he was since that's the sort of loving, familial relationship we have in dreamtime. Anyway, he told me to keep watching the night sky, that a great "celestial event" will occur that will give me proof that the new time is beginning. Now, unlike many seers and New Agers who think we are entering into a time of enlightenment, I disagree completely. There are millions of people right here in the U.S. who cling desperately to their present way of being and refuse to change, adapt or even consider the possibility that great harm is being done to them at the same time that great harm is happening to Mother Earth and Grandmother Ocean and all their inhabitants. Our hatred, fear and loathing toward our fellow man and all other beings is palpable. Go to any conservative website, read the comments, and you'll get a good idea of what I'm talking about. Grandfather told me: This hatred must stop. This hatred toward all, including ourselves, must end. We cannot survive while harboring so much hate and greed. We cannot survive while killing Mother Earth and Grandmother Ocean. We cannot survive massive greed to pervert Mother's gifts of minerals for our own selfish ends. Mother and Grandmother need healing. Mother and Grandmother are crying for help, and their tears are like salt in the wound of a gangrenous sore called humanity. It's imperative that we become a community again, y'all! I am not saying that I was shown the end of the world; quite the contrary, the world will not end in the near future. But our present way of living will end. We will see fire, drought and flooding (more earthquakes! larger storms!) unlike any we have seen in the past, and it will affect millions of people. We will see coastlines going under water, and a shift in population centers. We must come together as a community to help each other through the Earth changes: neighbor helping neighbor. We must insist that Congress strengthen and pass new environmental protection laws. We must stop the reckless use of throw-away objects that we never even gave a second thought to in the past. And first and foremost we must prevent further toxicity of our land, water and air. Mother and Grandmother need to heal; we cannot survive in future time unless they heal, it really is just that simple.

NOTE: Last week as I was reminding myself to write my visitations down in this blog, I was quite shocked to read that a comet - Comet ISON (http://www.universetoday.com/99777/deep-impact-images-spectacular-incoming-comet-ison-curiosity-nasa-armada-will-try/) - is approaching the sun, is now being watched by astronomers and will be best viewed from November 2013-January 2014. I had no idea this comet was approaching, so that in itself proved to me that Grandfather was accurate (not that I ever doubt his teachings, but I like to have "proof" for all of you!).

Two Messages from Beyond

While meditating this afternoon, I had two visits from the Otherworld.

The first was a dog, a brownish color. He wasn't dark brown but rather a rich medium brown that could look a little gray in certain lighting. He showed me his profile, and I saw that he was wrinkled which probably meant that he was old when he passed. Short hair, brown, with a wide head, much like a male lab or bulldog breed. His eyes were light in color - perhaps he had cataracts? His eyes also reminded me of an elephant's eyes - maybe signifying he had an excellent memory? Anyway, he's very, very calm and restful in the Otherworld but wants his family to know that he's still watching over them!

The second visit was with an older gentleman who was insistent that I tell his family that he's doing well and anticipating seeing his wife in person again, but that he's visiting her in spirit form. He spoke these words, "HGV giant." So I googled those exact words and found several news obituaries in Wales detailing an "HGB boss described as 'gentle giant' by his wife." His name is Brian Williams, and he died in a traffic accident in 2010, crossed over, and continues to lovingly pop in on his family. Here's one of the articles: http://www.thefreelibrary.com/HGV+boss+Killed+in+horrific+lorry+smash%3B+TRIBUTES+TO+'GENTLE+GIANT'%3A...-a0216255795