How to tell your doctor about Fenugreek use for Diabetes

Western Medicine, in my opinion has become very corrupt with doctors who are owned by the pharmaceutical companies. How many times have you heard a doctor say to an elderly person (or yourself for that matter) " here, try this new pill."

Over the years the doctors have been pushing pills that the handsome pharmaceutical sales reps have been totting for the suits in executive offices in the ivory towers. If you ask me, it's a bit of a scam on people, especially those cholesterol lowering drugs which cause more harm and illness that you end up on a pharma-go-wheel, taking more drugs.

I know this for a fact because I watched my little old mom take "new pills" for something that was ailing her. My family and I watched our mom (and Gram) become demented and sicker. It was a hard time of my life when my mom was really sick and I was working full time traveling around the country on planes going to sales meetings. Looking back, I can't believe that I left my mother alone in the house every week when I'd leave on Monday and return on Friday.

Personally, I lived through having her screaming through the house about a baby falling or people in her room. She'd sleep walk (or I should say scream!) My husband (before we were married) experienced the episodes and several times we were woken in the middle of the night to rush Jo to the emergency room. It got to the point where I knew everyone in the ER at our little hospital. Regular every day life doesn't require that you get to know the entire staff in an Emergency Room... I knew something was wrong.

Our mom's heart was slowing down, it was stopping. She had stopped taking Toprol because it was causing her to hallucinate and scream through the night. She would dream about jumping over a river when she was on this drug and instead she'd jump out of bed, hurting herself in the process. Jo didn't want to live like this so I told her that if she didn't want to take the drugs she didn't have to. I called her cardiologist and told him that she wanted to stop taking Toprol. The doctor freaked out. I told him it was what my mother wanted. I was warned that her heart would stop. I told my mom the warning and she didn't care, she wanted to stop taking Toprol because it made her feel worse than ever. She did.

Within a week she had a problem breathing and was very light headed and faint. She had no energy. That's when we took her to the ER.

Like everything in life that you don't take care of, things snow balled to the point where my mom believed that she was dying so she said her goodbye's to Brian and me. It totally freaked me out so I threw myself on her and begged her to live.

I wanted her to see Brian and me get married. I also began to give her alternative healing (Reiki and Prema Healing) that I had learned over the years. We rushed her to the ER once more... only this time it was her last ER visit.

The story for my mom has a happy ending - she got a pacemaker and soon began feeling stronger.

Brian even proposed to me in front of my mom on my 47th birthday. It was sunset and Brian had asked me to come and sit on the deck. He looked so worried and scared I immediately got scared. I thought he was going to tell me that he had a terminal illness or something. Then he got down on his knee and showed me this beautiful classic diamond ring as he asked me to marry him. Of course I said yes. My mom was watching through the back slider to the deck. I turned around and saw her crying... we were all crying. It was such an awesome proposal. I'm grateful that my mom was there to witness Brian proposing to me, it was a beautiful moment in time for all of us.

All of this drama occurred 2 years ago.

My mom began to cut out her meds. She was on so many drugs that made her feel sick and messed up her thinking.

In my opinion, my mother had drug induced dementia. Because she had a new lease on life I began to pay more attention to my mother's diet (mine too.) We cut out all "sugar free" products. Here's an article about the sugar substitute Splenda (poison!)

The more I studied and read about nutrition and the junk we are all being fed in pretty bright boxes, I began to realize that the shit in the pretty bright boxes could be killing us all!

In the mix of everything over the last 2 years, I was fortunate enough to get laid off from my job. At the time it didn't seem like a good thing but now I know that because of this life altering event, other things were able to take place in my life that allowed me to focus on health.

I found the secret to curing my mom is to look at her health from a 360 view - mind, body and spirit. For her mind training, I use hypnosis on her. I make sure that she is calm and relaxed so that her mind doesn't create scary illusions when she's half way between wake and sleep.

Body, we looked at every medicine that she was on and asked why am I on this to her doctors. Some of the drugs she should have stopped taking years before a doctor told her that she didn't need to take the med any longer.

She was on hydralazine for her heart. It was supposed to help chest pains. She hadn't had chest pains for 3 years! After her pacemaker she didn't have any pains but was still taking the drug. My mom was complaining of lightheadedness so I looked at the side effects of the drug, yup, it was the culprit to her ailments. She stopped taking it and she began to feel better. An added bonus is her hair is growing back! She was becoming bald from this drug and didn't feel pretty at all.

Gradually we got her off the meds that were making her sick. We also began to take her off insulin because the doses she was on were way to high. She was eating so that she could take her insulin. She was gaining more weight and not very happy.

Those who live with insulin dependent diabetics know that they can be very grouchy and irritable. The diabetic can't really help themselves, it just comes with the disease. Diabetics also tend to withdraw socially which leads to depression.

Dementia sets in eventually where the person becomes depressed and paranoid. They begin to believe that they are seeing people and things. It's frustrating for the demented mind to know that no one can see what they are seeing. In my mom's case, she was freaked out and worried that she had "the crazy gene."

(My entire life she told me about the 'crazy gene' in her family, now I know it must have been dementia.)

Lastly, there's spirit - feeding ones soul with music and positive imagery through hypnosis and alternative energy healing lifts ones spirit. When our soul is happy we have a good sense of well-being that carries throughout the entire body. Having a happy spirit is like having a good mixture of super glue holding everything together.

How we got my mom off the insulin needle

Doctors are not very receptive to natural cures, the doctors that are into natural cures are like finding a needle in a hay stack.

My mother didn't want to take insulin so I told her that I'd help her get off the needle. Here's how we did it.

Rule 1: No Bread, No Pasta, No Preservatives. Stop eating anything in a box with preservatives.

Rule 2: Eat fish 3 or more times per week

Rule 3: Load up with dark green leafy vegetables. They lower the acidity of your blood making it more alkaline. When the blood is alkaline it can remove waste and pass oxygen to the cells more easily. Lower alkalinity also seems to help my mom keep her blood sugar lower and her mind is more sharp (less dementia symptoms.)

Rule 4: Sleep. Make sure you get at least 8 hours of sleep a night. Go to bed at the same time.

Rule 5: Shut off the lights and the TV (or set a timer to shut it off for you after you fall asleep.) The light seems to effect the pineal gland which is responsible for producing melatonin, the natural sleep hormone. When we get older we produce less of it so taking 1 tablet of melatonin (my mom takes 3mg) helps to keep your internal lights out for the night. Because melatonin is a natural hormone that our bodies produce, there are no ill side effects.

Rule 6: Exercise your mind and body every day

Rule 7: Socialize. Get out and be with people. Laugh.

Rule 8: Take Fenugreek every day. Just 3-4 drops of extract in oatmeal in the morning with a cup of tea with lunch and dinner (with 2-3 drops depending on the blood sugar reading - each drop lowers sugar levels by 15 points.

Rule 9: Keep good records. Keep a food diary and make notes on your blood sugar before and after meals.

Once my mom and I incorporated these nine rules into our lives a miracle occurred. My mom's blood sugar appears to be stable. Every morning at fasting her blood sugar is between 90 and 120. Before lunch and dinner it's about 100 - 115, usually it's 105. By using Fenugreek extract every day, her blood sugar is under control.

Why is this so amazing? Glad you asked.

My mom, during her days of being on 10 different pharmaceuticals and 2 different types of insulin, Humilin 70/30 in the morning - 32 units and Humilin N in the evening, 42 units. This is a lot of insulin. Her blood sugar readings were always high. 165 used to be "good."

She'd take insulin and her blood sugar would plummet. She'd get the shakes and become totally disoriented. (and she was driving at the time!) She'd begin to eat everything in sight to raise her sugar levels. The only problem, she wouldn't stop eating and then her sugar would go way high. The roller coaster of high and low blood sugar seemed to effect her thinking. She was becoming more and more demented.

My mom should have been admitted to a nursing home. I couldn't send her to one because when I was 8 they took us to see her mom in a nursing home/mental institution (our Gram had the crazy gene.) I swore to God that I'd never put my parents in a place like that because it was so damn scary.

Looking back I have no idea how we got through the crazy times. I suppose I just did what I felt that I needed to do and did it.

The nice thing about naturally lowering your blood sugar with fenugreek is that it also seems to help other ailments, blood pressure.

My mom always had high blood pressure. Again, 160 something over 90 was considered "good." She was on 2 different HB meds and still got these high readings. After losing 60 pounds, exercising every day with Wii Fit or walking in the mall, cutting out breads, pasta and preservatives and eating organically grown produce, her blood pressure now averages 130/60.

She also had high cholesterol. Doctors were freaking out that she wasn't on any Cholesterol lowering meds. The drugs caused her muscle pains and aches, they made her feel lousy. I also read studies that the drug wastes muscle and in my opinion the last thing you want for an elderly person is for a drug to waste their muscles.

I did have this argument with my mom's new cardiologist. He pretty much called me a wacko. That's when I asked him what special deals the pharmaceutical sales rep is providing him by having him push the "newest" cholesterol med? I haven't seen this doctor in several months, we see him next week. It should prove interesting now that my mom is healthier than she's been in 30 years.

Last week my mom and I visited her Vascular doctor. He is the one doctor of hers that seem progressive and would be open to hearing about an alternative to treating my mom's conditions. I printed out a bunch of articles and medical abstracts to bring to the doctor. I also brought him a bottle of the extract so that he could see what it looked like. I also told him where I bought it.

I didn't have to tell him much about the results of her taking Fenugreek. He read one extract and was intrigued. He kept the papers that I had given to him. He was going to do more research on his own and pick up some at his local Whole Foods because he has an issue with high cholesterol.

I absolutely love this doctor. He really cares about the health of his patients and he doesn't push pharma meds. He also ordered a whole bunch of blood tests so that he can compare her numbers in January of '09 (before Fenugreek) with the results from now (after Fenugreek.)

On the exterior, my mother looks awesome. She feels great. Her mind is sharpening. She doesn't get lost. Never has low blood sugar episodes. Is sleeping through the night and is actually going to the local Senior Center to socialize.

All of this was possible because we got her off the pharma-go-wheel and back into a happy and healthy life where she can once again enjoy her family, especially her new great grand son.

Here is the new Jo with 2 of her grandsons and her great grandson.