Making Like a Tree

Oh, dear, some of you are thinking. "Making Like a Tree" was a saying quite a number of years ago. It meant "leaving."

Alarmists will be thinking in absolute terms. Pragmatics will be wondering exactly what I mean by "leaving" and who or what I'm "leaving."

I came to another of many "eureka" [not the tent . . . joke] moments in my long life yesterday. I probably knew this from some class I took "in the dark ages" but it just registered and I'll explain why.

I started taking Protandim over three months ago and I stopped taking my amitriptyline. The first few days, I felt SO great and for six weeks I was on top of the world. I didn't have 'Fibro-fog' and I could think clearly . . . well, crazy-quilt clearly for those who don't know me . . . and I had energy like I hadn't had in years and years . . . and then, it all slowly slipped away. Just . . . day by day, I got so tired, so lethargic, so "depressed" . . . my energy was depressed. I supplemented the Protandim with Glutathione [the organic chemical that Protandim creates using my own DNA].

I went to a new doctor in another County. He's an Internal Medicine doctor. I had my Medicare Physical. I'm in GREAT [though overweight] shape. My blood pressure, my heart, my thyroid, my cholesterol, my blood is healthy. And the Doctor [Jabaley] looked at my Effexor XP and said "you're depressed." Well, no, I'm taking that for the FMS, but I do notice that it keeps me from wanting to shoot "certain political types." [THAT IS A JOKE although there is truth in most jokes, including that one.] He prescribed all my meds including the amitrip, which I did NOT refill.

So, I stopped the Protandim and picked up Kyolic and Kyolic-greens and Krill Oil [sorry Whales, I hope there's still enough in the ocean for your diminishing numbers] and Glutathione. I'm also taking an "Active Senior" vitamin and Magnesium. But the ENERGY doesn't show up. [No matter what people say, the caffeine in black tea is NOT the same as the caffeine in coffee.]

The only time I notice that I do have a burst of energy is when I drink a "Red Bull." But that's like three cups of coffee and 90 mg of caffeine. NOT a habit anyone should get into as it taxes the heart muscle. I usually drink one when I'm driving to visit my children/grandchildren. After four or five hours on the road, I'm ready for a nap. The Red Bull is a great pick me up and wakes me up. [Brushing my teeth with a peppermint toothpaste used to work to wake me up.] But I'm not so uneducated in the physiology of my body that I'd make a habit of drinking Red Bull. It's for what I deem "emergency" use, only.

Well, Saturday, I ate out for breakfast . . . at a favorite breakfast restaurant owned and run by some friends. I had a bacon, egg, and cheese English muffin and three cups of coffee. I was about half way through the BEC when I noticed my body responding positively to the food.

Eureka . . . [not the vacuum cleaner]. My body needs not just a "balanced diet" whatever that really means; it needs a certain percentage of the nutrients in different foods. Not just protein, but also carbohydrates, fat, calcium, sodium, potassium, sugar, and vitamins and minerals and probably a lot of 'other' nutrients in small unnoticeable quantities. Energy. E=mc2. One of Einstein's great insights was to realize that matter and energy are really different forms of the same thing. Matter can be turned into energy, and energy into matter.



What does this have to do with me? Matter, or food, enters my body, is met "with the same amount of 'anti-matter' in my digestive tract" . . . starting with my mouth . . . and produces energy . . . that body chemistry that tells my brain "I feel great! I can conquer the world . . . or at least my part of my world." The energy that rejuvenates my body has to be the correct "formula" in order for it to be equal to the formula of the "anti-matter" needs of my body so that it can produce the energy I need to function and live.

Eureka . . . and I don't mean Archimedes' exclamation upon discovering how to measure the volume of an irregular solid to be able to determine the purity of a gold object.

So, I went to the grocery store and decided on a menu that I hope will give me the quality and quantity of nutrients my body needs to continue to produce the energy I need . . . and a side effect is that I'm "leaving" some of the groups I belong to . . . they DEPRESS me! All the politics and the stupidity and uncaring attitude by the person who sits in the Oval Office in DC . . . AND the Congress AND the Republicans in the House and Senate . . . not all of them . . . MOST of them . . . and the tiresome negative comments about the few Conservative Republicans who are DOING something . . . I've had it. I am leaving!

And my brain and body tell me I am doing the best thing for my own sanity.

Thanks Archimedes and if I may use your term: ηὕρηκα