Back in the 1970’s my parents had a tough decision to make. I was having problems maintaining bladder continence that a 5 year old shouldn’t have. As they sat in the office at Memorial Hospital in Long Beach they were told by my surgeon that I would be on dialysis by the time I was 40 and that course of action would only be good for about 10 years if they didn’t consent to a new procedure they were pioneering. So we moved forward.
The problem was/is called vesicoureteral reflux. Vesicoureteral reflux is when the flow of urine goes the wrong way. This condition is more common among infants and young children. Urine, which is the liquid waste product from your body, normally flows one way. It travels down from the kidneys, then into tubes called the ureters and gets stored in your bladder.
No surgery meant I would only see 50 years of life on the long end and the last 10 years would be challenging.
The results from the first surgery weren’t as expected and the same surgery was attempted again a few years later.
My cousin had the same problem. Her problems included both kidneys where mine was only my left kidney. I was luckier I guess. Not only did she have the surgery on her bladder and both kidneys but she had to have it done 3 times. After the third try for her she was told to never let anyone ever do surgery on her kidneys again. Both of her kidneys are functioning just below 50%.
As I look back I am beginning to wonder if the success of my second surgery was actually lasting or if it failed again after the 2 years of followups were completed. As I remember my cousins second surgery didn’t end up with the results they were hoping for and then again the third time. Maybe that too happened to me, but just a little further down the road.
I was so creeped out by the place I never wanted to go back. Makes me wonder if I didn’t simply will myself into not presenting any relapses to simply end up at the same fate at 40.
Here is why. Going back to my younger years after my second surgery I always had this pain in my left kidney if I didn’t void my bladder at first notice. It would start out as a dull ache and progress to outright painful. Some mornings when I would wake up it felt like I had an icepick stuck in me. This continued on until late fall 2017 after beginning my recovery back to a better state of health and wellness.
I was very surprised to see this problem dissipate. Frankly I am glad that problem is no longer presenting. What a pain that was…8)
These changes started taking place in September of 2017 after I removed most sugars from my diet. Candy, sugar and even all fruits. I was still consuming a bunch of dairy not thinking about the sugars in the dairy. Whoopsie. But I was still making what I thought was good progress.
In the Spring of 2019 I found myself fasting for an extended period of time. When I came back from that fast some 20 days later my body would no longer process dairy. And that is when I started to see more drastic changes, an acceleration of healing if you will.
Fast forward to Fall 2020. I’ve now been about 18 months without any milk, butter or cheese and I don’t think I’ve had any beef in a year or more. And I feel much less like a cow. I feel more human. And my body does a whole lot less weird things that I just thought was normal. Nope.
My diet has shifted though. My thoughts are that it needed one thing, lots of protein and fats for a time. But as the process of my healing matured the nutrients needed changed as well. Today my diet looks about 80% vegan. I still allow for about 20% of my diet from fish and fowl. I have a feeling I will end up about 90/10 where I only eat meat twice a week separated by 72 hours. The idea being that only one piece of meat is in my body at a time to lighten the processing load.
And the best part is I think all of those kidney/bladder problems from the first 45 years of my life have been resolved.
Funny thing about this journey some three years in. It’s all about the blood.
Leviticus 17:11 – For the life of the flesh is in the blood, and I have given it to you upon the altar to make atonement for your souls; for it is the blood that makes atonement for the soul.’
And this verse just won’t stop running through my head. Because it is true. The life of our body/flesh is in the blood. And if it is not clean neither will your body be. But what if it is your body that is making your blood dirty? How would we clean that, or better yet how would we not make it dirty in the first place?
Well our body has two filters for that. We call those kidneys. So how do we go about maximizing their throughput and ability to filter?
In a way this boils down to this. How do we make the perfect waste? The perfect end product from our body’s refining process.
We start with the best raw materials possible. Sounds like the beginning of an infomercial doesn’t it…8)
So what ultimately is the dirt that makes it’s way into our blood that we don’t want there and is there anything we can do from the very first step in the supply chain that could eliminate the need for dialysis?
I want dialysis to go away. And I want to find out what natural means of behavior we can put in place that eliminates dialysis from the equation altogether.
I truly believe that the universe has kept me around for just this purpose. I believe that this body of mine with all that it has been through, especially in the last few years was to solve this equation for the rest of humanity.
Michael J Loomis
#enddialysis