These are the sticky notes on my bathroom mirror…
- Only start a new supplement or round when you are feeling relatively rested. This is tricky because fatigue is my old friend, but there are degrees. I found the hard way that if I start a round without a couple nights of relatively better sleep under my belt, the round won’t go well.
- Order tinctures or small dose supplement / chelator capsules to avoid increasing your doses based on convenience. I made a 25% increase of ALA from 60 mg to 75 mg because those were the sizes I had available – not smart. You can get small increment doses of chelators from Livingnetwork and avoid a heaping dose of pain and suffering. Oils, powders and tinctures all share this benefit of allowing you to do very small dose increases.
- Wait until after redistribution/herxing is over to make any risky supplement changes. This one has hurt me a couple times, once when I increased folate on a redistribution day and another time when I increased lecithin. Wrong move!
- Forget about exercising if you can’t make it work. Everyone wants you to exercise and we don’t want to gain weight, but I have found it terribly difficult to manage chelation and exercise together. I’ve ruined many days with 90 seconds of exercise. Until my body starts responding better to it, I’m confident I’m better off without it. Or maybe I just need to try 30 seconds instead of 90…
- Review the supplement list every couple months because something might’ve dropped off accidentally. if you’re taking a lot of supplements like I am, it’s a big logistics project. I noticed recently that I had stopped taking molybdenum. It feels like maybe two months without it but honestly I can’t remember when I stopped because it happened accidentally…
- When you’re feeling like garbage, remember it’s part of the game plan. This is not supposed to be fun. Stop worrying and trying to attach meaning to it or trying to figure it out. Just feel lucky that you’ve identified the source your problems and there’s a cure! If chelation and methylation didn’t make you feel shitty, something would be wrong. Just do your time, one foot in front of the other.
- Plan for clumsy mistakes. I’ve stumbled as many as three times going up the stairs, I’ve bitten my cheek and tongue and made silly mistakes in my work. I tend to forget very easily that I’m going to make mistakes. It’s a little like being high without the fun. Often can’t remember what I just said a minute ago and can’t remember how impaired I am….
- Get help. When you’ve got cognitive impairment, you really need help from professionals, so get it if you can afford it. Naturopaths, MDs, Chiroprators, Homeopathics, massage and bodywork therapists, etc, can all play an important part in your recovery. Even a health coach could have saved me from quite a few errors. I keep a daily log and fill in calendars with key changes, but with so many different therapies going on at different times, I have missed connections that in hindsight seemed very obvious now. Part of the trouble is that my memory is so poor!
What do your sticky notes say?