PANDAS, Parasites and Problems

For every problem, there is a solution.  So what's the solution??

It was a full moon yesterday so many of you are probably devouring everything you can find on parasites, where do they come from, why do we have them and most importantly, how do we get RID of them?  Right?

You may have seen my blog entry in "You are what you eat" ions ago, about PANDAS and parasites.  Are parasites a problem? Heck yeah!!  But what is the solution you ask?  This is much more complicated than one would think.

Doctors who treat PANDAS/PANS use the machine gun approach.  I even fell into this trap, because they make you believe that if we kill the parasites, then they are gone, right?  Wrong!!  Parasites (and yeast, and bacteria and viruses) are a symptom of the problem, they aren't THE problem.  What we have come to call "chronic" is merely just a battle we keep fighting and fighting, and...loosing.  If we kill the microbe, why can't we gain that clean slate again?  What are we missing?  What's the solution?

The whole picture!!

What we have is a pile of garbage building up over time.  Not just from this lifetime either.  The energetic imprint of many illnesses and thought patterns have been passed down to us from our parents, and their parents (and so forth) and we continue to pass them on, to our children.  Everything we see currently manifesting in our physical body is at the end of it's rope.  It is our body yelling at us, screaming at us, to change something and change it fast.  When we see the physical manifestation resulting in any sort of "symptom", it's not the symptom that is the problem, it's the cause which is holding us back from healing.  What doctors don't tell you (because they don't know mainly, because they are not trained holistically) is that it's the energetic imprints of days passed, haunting us today.  

Genetics....the new trend is to point our fingers at genetics as the cause.  Why?  Well, because nothing else is making sense, so it must be genetics!  After all, they do sometimes appear to be a mirror image of our ailments....sometimes, errrrr maybe?  Wrong again.  Our genes may or may not be expressed.  Just because you have a gene that is linked to a specific cancer, does not mean you will have or manifest that cancer in your physical body.  Yes, genes do impart "susceptibility" to certain illnesses, but this is because our ancestors passed down their expressed genes to us.  It doesn't mean we WILL express them.  What is more important is to understand the triggers causing these genes to be expressed, or turned on.  There is now an entire branch of research focused on epigenetics, which is exactly that, the study of how gene expression is triggered to turn those genes on and off.  So is it enough to just know that you have a particular gene mutation?  This, my friend, is just the tip of the iceberg.

Of course, the next question on your mind is, "what are epigentic triggers?".  If it's not, it should be!!

Our environment contains our triggers.  Everything in our environment including: physical, emotional and spiritual factors.  That would mean that what you eat, put on or in your body, breath in, and even what you think, feel and believe will become a potential trigger for gene expression.  Is there too much mercury in your food, do you use chemicals on your skin, do you eat the SAD (Standard American Diet), do you pray or meditate (if not you should), do you take medications, do you vaccinate, are you active, do you suppress or express emotions....I could go on and on and on and on.  What I am getting at here is that everything that surrounds your life has an effect on your cellular structure and ultimately, your genes!  How you live your life, how your parents lived theirs and even how grandparents and great grandparents lived their lives, all ends up in the expression of your genes which then is passed on to your children.  Any wonder why we have growing numbers of autism, PANDAS, cancer and autoimmune diseases?  

The good news is that knowledge is power!  With knowledge, we can make change.  If we choose to stick our heads in the sand, it's like saying "whatever" and we lose power, we lose the ability to influence the outcome.  But when we embrace this information, we can choose to surround ourselves and our families with the kind of choices that will fuel the waves of healing. 


Our own mindset is a HUGE factor in the solution. We can easily make the mistake of falling down a rabbit hole that starts with a diagnosis, then we get on the path of thinking our kids (or ourselves) are "sick"....and what does this do to us? We carry and emit "sick" energy, then we put this energy on our kids and they believe it, they live it. We are energetic beings with so much more to us than the physical symptoms we see. This is the end of the rope....our physical body reacts to our emotional, mental and spiritual state. Once the symptoms manifest, we have already damaged the mental, emotional and spiritual states of our body.  Repair and recovery must include them too.

My solution is likely to be different from yours, so I would encourage you to tap into your spiritual belief system and use your gut instincts to drive your passion in a healing direction.  Some things you can consider revisiting or looking into are:

• Dietary considerations - eat organic produce and grass-fed meats, avoid pesticides and hormones whenever possible, remove inflammatory or problematic foods, choose foods that are healing and/or nutritionally dense and now-a-days even the source of these foods matters!  And always avoid GMO foods!  Not only does the body not even recognize what to do with these foods, but they are imprinted with insects (which are hosts to parasites and viruses) among other things!  Anytime there is a chronic inflammatory health condition like PANS/PANDAS, I would say gluten and dairy should also be omitted, not just reduced, omitted without infractions.
• Toxins in your environment - mattresses, cleaners, soaps, toothpaste, lotions, pesticides, lawn care products, you will even want to consider products like tea and spices, since they can be sprayed with pesticides and irradiated.  Look at some of the studies about Roundup and how it effects gut flora.  Anytime PANS/PANDAS is a diagnosis, consider the possibility of mold in the environment. 
• Music can be very healing, look at the work from Dr. Emoto about the effects of music even on water!  Considering our body is 70% water, this is worth consideration.
• Energy healing - homeopathy, Reiki, Qigong, acupuncture, acupressure, cranial sacral therapy, etc, etc, etc.  There are SO many methods of bringing the physical body into alignment with it's subtle bodies. 
• Spiritual connections - whatever this means to YOU!  It is essential to connect with your spiritual self in order to reach your full healing potential.  This DOES impact those around you.

Of course, this is not an all-inclusive list, but it can most certainly provide you with a jump start.

If I had one thing to say to parents of children with autism, PANDAS or high needs...

Look beyond the physical, beyond the symptoms, beyond your interpretation of what is wrong to see what is right.  This child is trying to tell you something.  Your journey is about de-tangling that message.  Could it be a painful one? Maybe.  Could it be an eye-opening one? Maybe.  Could it put you on a new path? Most definitely.

Regardless of your physical journey, your spiritual journey lies somewhere in the mass of symptoms you view every day.  Where did they begin, why are they part of YOUR life? 

Perspective. 
n.noun

1. A view or vista.
2. A mental view or outlook.
3. The appearance of objects in depth as perceived by normal binocular vision.
4. The relationship of aspects of a subject to each other and to a whole.
a perspective of history; a need to view the problem in the proper perspective.
5. Subjective evaluation of relative significance; a point of view.
the perspective of the displaced homemaker.
6. The ability to perceive things in their actual interrelations or comparative importance.
tried to keep my perspective throughout the crisis.
7. The technique of representing three-dimensional objects and depth relationships on a two-dimensional surface.

I feel particularly drawn to #4.  The relationship of aspects of a subject to each other and to a whole.

Our children are part of a whole.  They are part of a family, part of a community, part of a universe.  Let’s keep that in mind when we are scaling the depths of the earth to “fix” them.  They aren’t who they are without us.  And what part of us are they?  That is your journey to uncover.  But don’t forget the depth and breadth of that possibility.  Leave no stones unturned, open your heart, open your mind and most of all, open your spirit to ALL possibilities.  When we narrow our searches, we limit ourselves.  You may not find your car keys if you only look in the family room.  Silly association, I know, but it’s just as silly to single out your child as “ill” without considering the source.  When we single out one part of our family for “recovery” we are saying they are alone, they aren’t a part of us. 

They ARE interconnected with us, ALL of us.  We are just as much a part of their recovery, as the air we breath is a part of our survival.

Do you see your child “recovered”?  Or do you see your child as “sick”?  These are questions we MUST ask ourselves, because we attract what we give off.  We must see our children the way we expect to see them, as healthy, whole and unique.  Only then can our views begin to take in the big picture.  Your child is in your life for a reason.  Don’t underestimate the power of his/her purpose on this earth.

I have my children to thank for my gift of intuition.  Their mere existence gave me reason to push myself harder than anything else has ever pushed me.  Their passion for life drove me to look at my own passions.  Their challenges became my challenges.  And thankfully, their journeys intersect with mine.

Put the magnifying glass down and pick up the globe.  Look around you and take it all in.  I’m not here to tell you where to look or how to find your answers, but if you feel like something is missing in your own tale, it’s time to actively seek out that happy ending.  It’s there for the taking, all you have to do is believe in fairy tales.

Do over

I am often asked, if I could do it all over, would I start with homeopathy and energy healing or do I believe bio-medicine set us up for success with energy healing? 

This is a mighty loaded question.

I can tell you this...if it weren't for our journey, I wouldn't have come to this place where I am right now.  I believe I am where I am supposed to be.  I also believe I came to this place based on my own personal path.  Would I have made it to this point, if I chose another path?  Well, I don't know, because I think I am always where I am supposed to be.  Every step of the way, I learned something new.  Without the first IgG food sensitivity panel, we wouldn't have known to cut problematic foods and to eat healthier.  Without the use of natural anti-microbials, we wouldn't have learned the signs of microbial overgrowth.  Without A/C chelation, we wouldn't have known the toxicity of heavy metals are such a problem in our world.  Without the SBOs, we wouldn't have dropped all of the anti-microbials we were using daily.  Without the experience of Homotoxicology, we wouldn't have eliminated dozens of supplements, and without homeopathy, we wouldn't have the permanent healing we are now experiencing.  Most importantly, I wouldn't have crossed paths with some of the most important people in my life.  I am not implying that you should do exactly what I did in order to find healing.  This was our journey.

We all have a story of our own.  We have lessons to learn and we are placed in situations that could take us down one road or another.  Following our intuition brings us full circle, with purpose.  Lessons can be painful and they can be challenging, but this is how we grow.  No pain, no gain, right? Just kidding!

I am not suggesting that we are destined for something specific necessarily, instead, as we make our choices when sitting at that proverbial fork in the road, we are bringing all of who we are into that decision.  And sometimes we will make what we will later perceive as the wrong one...but is it really?  Have you learned from making "mistakes"?  Well let's think about that.  Even if just from a purely physical point of view, the first day you took a step as a toddler, it was preceded by many falls, and did you get on your bike and ride it effortlessly the first time?  Maybe you did, maybe you are physically gifted...or maybe you didn't, but you did eventually learn to ride that bike, didn't you?  We fall and we get up again, it's the nature of life.  Remember dating?  Who could forget!  We are in a constant state of change.

What if we begin to see each "mistake" as the next step in our evolution rather than something that wasn't supposed to happen?  Consider the conscious shift that will take place when we begin to welcome these lessons.   To go from thinking "I was wrong and I failed" to thinking "it's time for a change"!  Is your glass half empty or half full?  The potential for growth is endless!  What about our potential for happiness, where does that fit in here?  When we feel confident and we trust the road ahead, we can truly enjoy happiness. 

My journey is not the same as yours. 

It may seem like common sense or it may even seem silly.  Could we be at the same place, at the same time?  Absolutely!  Could you even be PART of my story, or vice versa?  Heck yeah!  I KNOW that there are certain people in my life with a very specific place in who I am meant to be.  When these sort of lessons reveal themselves, there is nothing more rewarding than recognizing a friendship or a connection with a deeper purpose.

Life is definitely what we make of it, don't underestimate the power of your journey.  So would I do it all over again?  I would have to say yes, but that was my story.  What is yours meant to be?

The question is, does what you are doing feel right?  Perhaps my path is intersecting with yours for a reason.

Conscious parenting

When does it begin?  When do we start developing our sub- and un-conscious mind?  Many would guess this begins at birth, however, Dr. Bruce H. Lipton Ph.D a leading cellular biologist, would disagree and has gone on to prove that our cells hold memory.  If our cells hold memory which is influenced by not only our thoughts and experiences but the thoughts and experiences of those around us, it would be safe to say that this begins at conception.  After all, we are a ball of cells!

Think back to conception.  Not yours, silly, your child's.  Although, if you think about your own conception, much of who you are was developed then.  Back to the conception of your child(ren).  Where you excited or where you scared, did you receive any bad news during your pregnancy, was there financial stress, any stress?  We all have some stress and having a baby brings about SO many anticipated changes, I would guess that many of us have stressed over bringing a new life into the world.  I know I did!!  I wish I knew then, what I know now.  I would have started meditating much earlier. 

From Dr. Lipton's book "The Biology of Belief"

To quote Dr. Thomas Verny, a pioneer in the field of prenatal and perinatal psychiatry: "Findings in the peer-reviewed literature over the course of decades establish, beyond any doubt, that parents have overwhelming influence on the mental and physical attributes of the children they raise." (Verny and Kelly 1981)  And that influence starts, says Verny, not after children are born, but BEFORE children are born. 

Another pioneer in pre- and perinatal psychology, David Chamberlain writes in his book The Mind of Your Newborn Baby: "The truth is, much of what we have traditionally believed about babies is false.  They are not simple beings but complex and ageless-small creatures with unexpectedly large thoughts." (Chamberlain 1998)  These complex, small creatures have a pre-birth life in the womb that profoundly influences their long-term health and behavior.  "The quality of life in the womb, our temporary home before we were born, programs our susceptibility to coronary artery disease, stroke, diabetes, obesity and a multitude of other conditions in later life," writes Dr. Peter W. Nathanielsz in Life in the Womb: The Origin of Health and Disease.  (Nathanielssz 1999)  

The responsiveness of individuals to the environmental conditions perceived by their mothers before birth allows them to optimize their genetic and phsiologic development as they adapt to the environmental forecast.  The same life-enhancing epigenetic plasticity of human development can go awry and lead to an array of chronic diseases in older age if an individual experences adverse nutritional and environmental circumstances during fetal and neonatal periods of development.  (Bateson, et al, 2004)

The same epigenetic influences also continue after the child is born.  In particular, fascinating new research is emphasizing the importance of good parenting in the development of the brain.  "For the growing brain of a young child, the social world supplies the most important experiences influencing the expression of genes, which determines how neurons connect to one another in creating the neuronal pathways which give rise to mental activity," writes Dr. Daniel J. Siegel in The Developing Mind (Siegel 199) In other words, infants need a nurturing environment to activate the genes that develop healthy brains.  Parents, the latest science reveals, continue to act as genetic engineers even after the birth of their children.

Well crap!  I wish I read this before conception.  So what now?

Dr. Lipton tells us of new scientific discoveries about the biochemical effects of the brain's functioning showing that all the cells of our body are affected by our thoughts.  He shows us how genes and DNA do not control our biology, instead, DNA is controlled by signals from outside the cell, including energetic messages from our positive and negative thoughts.

I'm not one to dwell on the past, so it's great news to learn that we can still manage change.  I am a glass half-full kind of gal.  Moving on...

What steps can we take to change the course of old thought patterns?

The Healing Code - Dr. Lipton is a fan of The Healing Code and is quoted throughout Dr. Lloyd's book.   You will learn how to apply the Universal Healing Code which is capable of re-programing damaging thought patterns.  It only takes minutes each day and can have a profound impact on a multitude of ailments.

Meditation - There is nothing easier than changing a grumpy mood with a few minutes of meditation! Other than maybe winning the lottery. (wink)  Just fifteen minutes a day can change your life.  I find meditation to be the single most effective tool in our energy shifting toolbox at home.

Meditation taps into four different brainwaves: Beta, Alpha, Theta, and lastly Delta. These groups are each associated with specific states of your mind.

Beta Wave: Your current brain wave stage, where your conscious mind is awake and alert.  
Alpha Wave: The beginning stages of meditation. Your brain is relaxed at this state, this is where all fears vanish and creativity flourishes.  
Theta Wave: At this stage you are in a dream like state of mind where inspiration can occur. It’s also known to give you a sensation of “floating.”  
Delta Wave: The Delta brain wave is the slowest activity of all waves. Achieved by the most experienced meditators. They experience a dreamless sleep.

A simple article in The Huffington Post says it well

Studies show that meditation is associated with improvement in a variety of psychological areas, including stress, anxiety, addiction, depression, eating disorders and cognitive function, among others. There's also research to suggest that meditation can reduce blood pressure, pain response, stress hormone levels and even cellular health. But what does it actually do to the body?
For one thing, it changes our brain. The cells and neurons in the brain are constantly making new connections and disrupting old ones based on response to stimuli, a quality that researchers call experience-based neuroplasticity. This affects the neural circuits of the brain, which in turn affects how we respond to situations. It also affects the actual structure of our brains -- thickening some areas and making others less dense. 

"Think of the end of a neuron as a hand, with thousands of 'fingers,'" said Dr. Sara Lazar, a neuroscientist at Massachusetts General Hospital who studies mindfulness meditation. "The number of fingers relates to the number of interconnections between neurons and that number can change -- one reason it can change is due to stress."

If meditation is new to you, or it just doesn't come as second nature, there are many methods of practice you can try.  There are guided meditation CDs which really help you tune out the chatter, there are classes where you can learn in person or you can just continue to practice adding a little time to each meditation session you experience. The internet can be your best friend on these topics!

To teach young children about mindful breathing techniques and meditation, I love the MindUP! curriculum which even teaches them where in the brain we are effecting by practicing mindful breathing.

Frequency/vibrational healing - It comes in all shapes and sizes from homeopathic medicine to psychic readings.  There is likely to be at least one modality that will work for you.  Each one of these methods can require it's own library, so to save on time I will just provide you with a list of the more common methods worth looking into.  If you find that you resonate with any one of these, take that cue as a sign to educate yourself about it, or better yet, make an appointment with a practitioner!

Homeopathy
Reiki
Qigong
Chakra balancing
EFT
Body Talk
Quantum Touch
Polarity Therapy
Radionics
Biofeedback
Pranic Healing
Acupressure
Acupuncture

When all else fails, get moving - Yoga, Qigong, cardio, weights, a bike ride, swimming, whatever floats your boat, just get moving.  It will give you a serotonin boost while taking your mind off of everything else. 

Get inspired!!  There is no time like the present to start a new pattern and since children learn best from modelling, what better way to teach your kids how to manage their emotions than to do it WITH them?!  Change starts with YOU!

The birth of this blog is actually the end of another.  It's not sad, quite contrary actually.  "You are what you eat!" has become, "You are what you...BELIEVE!"  My, how my views have changed.

What better place to start, but at the end...huh?  Yes, welcome to my world!  I even read magazines backwards.  =)  

I am ready for a new chapter in our lives, are you ready to join us?  The last blog I posted in "You are what you eat!" is going to be my first blog here.

Introducing Jessica...aka-me =), mom to two fabulous boys and wife to my best friend of 14 years, the rest you will have to learn by joining me on this journey.

Dated September 24, 2013, my graceful ending to "You are what you eat!"

I have a small confession to make, I have been contemplating starting a new blog.  One that reflects my new being.  There is just no easy way to say this, so I will just spit it out.  I am no longer the mom you read about in these entries behind me.  I am still a fuss about food, that will never change.  I am evolving though.  It's as if I entered my chrysalis stage and am awaiting my wings.  I feel renewed in such a way that our future never looked brighter.

Autism?  A distant memory.

Even PANDAS is only visible in my rear view mirror now.  It isn't gone, but it isn't here either. 

The evolution I have been part of is almost mind-blowing.  I wouldn't believe any of it, even if I were reading it in a memoir only 6 months ago.  It would appear like a character in a fictional novel, someone else's life, certainly not mine.  How incredibly wild it was to wake up one day and realize this IS me!  This WAS me all along, how did I not know sooner??

Well, you are probably thoroughly intrigued by now, lol.  I may lose readers here, but I hope to gain others, in fact, what I hope most is to retain all of my current readers and gain others, so we can all merge into this realm together.  What I am referring to is energy medicine.

This means something different to each person who participates or practices energy medicine.  To me, it simply means being totally in tune with my gut feelings.  Even writing this is hard for me, because I have spent years squashing the real me, without even realizing it.  I may sound "crazy".  I know I am not though, because I am living the ultimate....the results of accepting it.  More importantly, so are my kids!

Over the past year or two, as I have been helping parents trust their gut instincts to guide them in healing their children, one thing became very clear....I just know things.  I have been asked so many times, "How did you know to....?"  I repeatedly heard myself saying, "I don't know, I just know".  

What I have finally learned about myself during an insightful transformation is that I am in the early stages of uncovering my potential as a clairsentient.  Meaning, I have a gift of "knowing".  I am not a fan of labels, so I don't even like labeling myself with this somewhat intriguing label, haha.  It does, however, provide some form of description though, and it provided me with a description of something I realized I could relate to.  I have always been an extreme empath, to the point of embarrassment, because I can't always control it.  It isn't cool to cry in front of someone, because I have taken on their emotions....even when they haven't shared them with me!  This is one of the reasons I had shut it off previously.  But it didn't leave me completely, in fact, it was the underlying force of all of my decisions for my children.  Clairsentience is one of the most overlooked psychic abilities and requires one to clear their own energies in order to become a clear channel.

There are two ways that clairsentience works.

1. Clairsentience works by allowing an intuitive to receive signals from the spirit realm. A clairsentient will be able to sense the messages, where as a clairvoyant will see the messages, and a clairaudient will hear the messages. The clairsentient will feel what a spirit is trying to say, and interpret the message by using their intuition.
2. The second way that clairsentience works, is by allowing an intuitive to understand the feelings of the people around them, (empathy). Clairsentients often use their abilities to share and heal the pain of others. By sensing what someone feels, a healing clairsentient will know exactly what remedies someone needs

When an event out of my control spiraled me into a situation requiring a lot of self-analysis, I saw this side of me that I never acknowledged.  I took some time to just be.  Something I never did, I was always researching, creating, fixing something or someone, and planning the next step.  For once, I just took time to BE!!  I didn't research, I didn't fix things, I wasn't onto the next best treatment or practitioner.  I just waited for communication from the universe.  It was in this calm that I found myself.  Suddenly, I got ME.  I mean, I really got who I am, who I have been all along.  Everything began to make sense, including what was going on with my kids.  And how interesting to find out (after the fact) that my solar plexus chakra which was blocked and needed some attention, as I began going through this transformation, is the chakra that is most linked to clairsentience. 

I decided things were going to change.  And change, they have!  I am now using my intuition to guide our health decisions.  Not that this is very different from my past, although now I am doing it more consciously, with intent.  We use only homeopathy and soil based organisms.  Remedies are chosen based on intuition.  I also clear our energy regularly.  It's amazing what dealing with the chakras, meridians and aura can do for detox!!  I can't believe we survived biomed without this knowledge!  I see instant changes in us, when we acquire non-beneicial frequencies and likewise, when I remove them.  We have been able to move through high potency remedies with ease since participating in energy healing.  Our past was riddled with significant detox symptoms, something I thought just came with the territory.  How wrong I was!

What I find most important about metaphysical powers is that we all have them.  We are born intimately connected to the universe.  We can choose to shut them off or we can choose to actively embrace them.   None of what I have experienced is extraordinary, the only difference between myself and others is that I am now recognizing these events and learning to use them to my advantage.

In retrospect, this isn't really a new me, but merely the next progression of me.

So my whole point in this entry is that I would love to continue writing, but this is a new realm for me and I am not sure exactly how much I plan to share.  Like anything else though, it will come to me, when the time is right.  I hope you will find yourself wanting to follow along as I find my wings.

Welcome to the beginning of the rest of our lives and remember - You are what you...BELIEVE!  Quite literally.