HOLIDAYS are sweet days. They provide an escape and rest from the daily routine, and, if well spent, may re-invigorate body, soul and spirit. Last April, socially accepted as the right time to observe the Easter anniversary, provided one such opportunity to relax the muscles and nerves, soothe the bones and deepen the mind. For some people, however, the end of May is the peak of the Pentecost season. And looking forward to another escape at the end of this month.
Back from the April holiday, I found invitations to two health events on my desk. One was from the CANCER TEAM. The other came from the Natural Integrative Medicine Practitioners Association inrespect of a training seminar on hypertension for its members yesterday. The CANCER TEAM last Sunday began exhibition of THE PHOTOGRAPHY OF MRS. ADEFUNKE SOFOWOTE to raise funds for her treatment abroad. There were, also, about endometriosis, systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE) and brain tumour.
Adefunke Sofowote
I met with this ever-smiling, simple, well-mannered and humble woman in Lagos in the late 1970s. Unlike many women who do not concern themselves about the deep life, she was restless in her search for the meaning of Life.
I had just graduated from National Youth Service in Calabar, where such questions agitated my mind, and returned to Lagos to discover that there was a growing number of people who, dissatisfied with surface life, were sharing experiences and company. Adefunke Sofowote brought her husband along. They were like inseparable twins. They walked everywhere hand-in-hand, and, often, wore clothes made from the same fabric. Theirs was like a marriage made in heaven. It must have been in the 1980s that Mrs. Sofowote mentioned something to me about cancer. I had just gone through the funeral of my maternal grandmother who died of breast cancer, a traumatic event which introduced me to Alternative Medicine. One of the books I bought then, to help understand this disease and obtain healing ideas which may help my grandmother’s condition was Johannah Brandt’s THE GRAPE CURE. Johannah suffered from a cancer which had devastated more than half of her stomach. On a red grape fast, the cancer cleared, and she documented her experiences in that book. Joyfully, I gave this book to Mrs. Sofowote, and I believed it served whatever purpose she needed it for. So, I was surprised a few months ago to learn that she was receiving treatment in a German hospital about 35 years after.
In the search for funds to finance her treatment, her friends put together THE CANCER TEAM, at the helm of which I believe is her husband, Olusegun. The message of the CANCER TEAM to their friends and well wishers is:
“You are invited to a fund-raising exhibition of Mrs. Adefunke Sofowote’s photography holding at freedom Park, No 2 Broad Street from 4th – 11th May, 2014. She is undergoing treatment for cancer. Guest of Honour is the First Lady of Lagos State, exhibition opens 4th May. RSVP 08028043785 Let’s give to the Giver. Support Mrs. Adefunke Sofowote’s fight against cancer at her fund-raising exhibition… For more information on how you can also make a donation, please see www.funkesofowotecancerfund.com.
An exhibition of Mrs. Sofowote’s photographs is a thoughtful way to raise funds for her. For many years before she fell ill, she and her husband were into a special kind of photography. Every Christmas or Easter season, I looked forward to buying that season’s greetings cards which either came plain, for you to couch your own feelings into the message space, or with deep messages that are not to be found in regular cards. The photographs themselves were not “anyhow” photographs, as we describe run-of-the mill things in this part of the world. They expressed the beauty of Mother Nature, and helped you to think deeper. It is most probably because the proceeds of this venture were donated to motherless babies’ homes that the CANCER TEAM has chosen to request that, in her hour of need, we “give” to the “giver”.
For Adefunke and her husband, their journey together has been a long and interesting one blessed with four children. They met when Mr. Sofowote was editing a photoplay magazine called HONEY DROPS. On that journal, he was a co-director with one of my former bosses, Mr. Olatunde Odesanya. He was the Chief Sub-Editor of the Daily Times when I returned from youth service to rejoin the news paper in 1978 as a senior Sub-editor. Adefunke joined Honey Drops later as the Editor’s Assistant. Segun, who would later become her lover and husband, was the Editor. But they did not discover their liking for each other until Funke had left for a technical college to further her education. He must miss her far, far away in Germany. She, too, must be dreaming of the day she would rejoin him. As for their friends, our hearts should know joy when we see them again holding hands in the street, dressed in clothes sewn from the same fabric, a spectacle which rubs on, and adds value to our romantic lives and marriages. While wishing the CANCER TEAM success, I would like to suggest that the fund raising be expanded beyond one-off donations to networking funding till Adefunke rejoins us, hale and hearty. The proposal is that about 1,000 of astute donors be found who can donate N1,000 every month through bank Standing Order into the fund account. The core of the 1,000 donors can be 10 people. If every-one of these 10 brings 10 each months to add to the persons on board, that makes 100 people. If each of the 100 brings 10 person each, that makes 1,000 people. 1,000 persons donating N1,000 every month unfailingly, will give the fund N1,000,000 (one million naira) every month. This scope can be enlarged or widened.
The horror of endometriosis
When I went through the mail on endometriosis this week, I remembered the plight of a mother and her daughter I met a few years ago. The young woman had to quit her lucrative job to take care of her health. Her husband, unable to cope with her, left home. But she was lucky to have a caring mother who had retired from the civil service and, so, had enough time to look after her three grandchildren and fund medical expenses. The woman’s condition was so bad that, if she as little tried to cough, she could discharge a large amount of blood from the vagina. Her mother was always around to tidy the floor, and she was transfused with blood regularly. Also upsetting to her were chronic pain that drugs seemed to have no power over. I do not remember the type of endometriosis she suffered from. But is there any one, any woman would wish to be her lot? Endometriosis reminds me, also, of the Law of Homogeneous Species. By thisnatural law or Law of Nature, only things that are of the same nature or consistency are meant to stay together for beauty and peace to abide among them. To illustrate this law, in the forest, we find that lions live with lions, not with hyenas or elephants. In the deep sea, salmon and whales do not co-habit in the same territory. When soldier ants are on a march in a file, no other ant adulterates their homogeneity. As the sun sets and the birds fly home, one can observe the uniformity of the various groups which fly past. And this should easily remind us of the popular saying… birds of a feather flock together. It is only man who breaks this law in the constitution of the nation-state, which is why, as we shall find in endometriosis, there is always one upheaval or the other in whose countries constituent peoples are not homogeneous.
Endometriosis is a condition in which cells of the endometrium is growing outside its own territory. The endometriums are the lining of the womb which is meant to support the growth of the foetus after the egg has been fertilised in the fallopian tube. If fertilisation does not occur, this lining is broken down by the body and shed along with the unfertilised egg in the monthly menstrual cycle of menstruation. The cells of the endometrium are among the 100 trillion or so cells in an adult female body. These 100 trillion cells grew out of one cell, the female egg, which was fertilised by one male cell, the spermatozoa. In one of the several wonders of Mother Nature, this fertilised egg soon differentiates into several groups of cells, each group with a specific function and location. Thus skin cells do not grow among brain cells. Similarly, sperm cells are not to be found among eye cells. Lung and liver cells do not intermingle. Each group keeps to its own allotted space.
In endometriosis, some cells of the endometrium escape from the womb to other regions of the body and begin to grow there as strange bed fellows among the host cells. As their chemistry differs from that of these cells, tension occurs in the region which presents as inflammation, pain and any other discomfort.
Doctors, like researchers, differ on the causes of endometriosis. Some believe incomplete menstrual discharge, which leads to back up menstrual flow to the fallopian tubes, is the origin. This sounds reasonable. For if the endometrium is detached from the womb but cannot be wholly evacuated with the ensuing menstruation through the vagina, retrograde flow or backward flow may take endometrial cells to the unlucky, fallopian tube.
Other researchers believe migrant flat worms may drag these cells anywhere they migrate to from the uterus. These worms, faciolopsis in particular, originate from their eggs which are consumed with animal intestinal tissue not well cleaned and cooked. This is one reason I stopped eating animal intestine, a Nigerian culinary delicacy popularly called round about. If the enzymes of the digestive system are weak and do not destroy these eggs, they may survive and grow to adult stage worms. These adult flat worms migrate to comfortable zones of the body. They may reside in the liver, pancreas, prostate or uterus, causing irritation, poisoning and organ dysfunctions. For this reason, it is advisable to periodically clean the body of them with herbal parasite formulas. Among the ones I often suggest are Amazon A-P, Parasite Cleanse, NG4 Parasite Formula, Wormwood, and Pau d’Arco. NG4 Parasite Formula is a combination of some anti-parasite herbs, including wormwood. Mrs. Folake Sanusi-Kuku, an acquaintance, told me of an orthodox doctor acquaintance of hers who was treating a patient with tummy problems with Swedish bitters. The pains persisted. But when he added wormwood to the bitters, the patient, a lawyer, vomited two long worms almost immediately and, surprisingly, the pains subsided almost immediately as well. This doctor also gives Horsetail to his cancer patients.
Another school of thought suggests genetic inheritance of predisposition to endometriosis. Somehow, while I do not discountenance these postulations, I have more confidence in the retrograde menstruation hypothesis. Only hours ago, I shared my thoughts with, a girl, a virgin, aged 18 who hasn’t menstruated in two months, whose cycle never went beyond three days and, even then, came in blackened clots of blood. This girl suffers from vaginal infection with foul yellow discharge and severe pelvic floor pain. Retrograde menstruation may very well be one of her problems. And her therapy will include herbs that will tone the reproductive organs, oxygenate her blood, bring back her menstruation and support complete menstrual discharge.
Symptoms
The signs depend on the location of the problem. When endometrial cells settle among the wrong cells, they begin to grow normally as though they were in the uterus, especially during high tides of hormones, especially estrogen, in the menstrual cycle. The occurrence may be on the ovaries, the intestine, the colon, the lungs, within the muscle walls of the uterus, the pelvis, the tummy, liver or skin. On these organs the endometrial cells grow as patches or adhesions and bleed during menstruation. That is why, in the affected women, it is possible to find blood in the stool or urine. The lesions cause inflammation and pain although they are not cancerous. Research suggests this condition may dispose the sufferers to cancer. About one-third of the women with this condition do not know they are afflicted because they experience no symptoms. Yet for other women the endometriosis nightmare may include pelvic pain during menstruation, vaginal bleeding during sexual intercourse, pain during bowel movement, sensitivity to certain foods, yeast overgrowth, emotional disturbance, paranoia, low blood count, iron deficiency, anaemia and lots more.
NATURAL THERAPY
Many sufferers want a magic bullet quick-fix. But this is not possible. All the symptoms have to be addressed. As inflammation causes pain, they are both better treated with anti-inflammatories such as Jobelyn, Curcumin 2000x, Fish oil, Bromelain, plentiful in pineapple peel, Wheatgrass and chanka Piedra, which is also an anodyne (anti-pain) among many others.
Bleeding causes loss of electrolytes and iron. This iron deficiency may so drastically reduce the blood count that it may cause the heart to collapse or the patients to faint. Jobelyn should provide iron to rebuild the blood. So should Blackstrap molasses, rich in iron and electrolyte, vitamins and minerals. One teaspoon is said to provide about 40 percent of an adult’s daily iron requirement. Spirulina powder, too, is iron rich. Besides, it supplies lots of easily digested and absorbable protein.
As hormonal imbalance is a foundation stock which drives endometriosis, especially excess estrogen, it is necessary to balance the hormones NG4. Progesterone cream massaged on the skin may help to bring up progesterone level with estrogen. Dynapharm has a product named Maharani, which supports this effort. Traditionally, Vitex and Dong Quai are used to normalise the female hormones. Upgrading liver capacity to break down excess estrogen and to produce enough bile to move the debris out of the body and in the stool is equally important. This is the province of food supplements such as Liver balance, Carqueja, Licorice DMG, Milk Thistle, NGE Liver Health Formula (Milk Thistle with Artichoke), Maria Trebena Bitters e.t.c what I may consider the main onslaught of this therapy is how to eliminate endometrial, in foreign tissue. The thought of this backs the suggestion that many women have endometriosis but do not experience the symptoms, perhaps because their bodies are routinely dealing with it, as our bodies routinely destroy cancer cells before they develop anchorages. It would appear women who suffer from endometriosis have partially or wholly lost this capacity. This capacity is built around systemic enzymes. We know the value of enzyme from the digestion of food. Ptyalin in the saliva breaks polysaccharides ( complex carbonhydrates) into intermediate ones called disaccharides, while another enzymes in the intestine converts disachardes to monosacharides or glucose. Similarly Pepsin converts long chain of proteins to peptones in the stomach while renin cuddles fat in the stomach to make it easy to digest to fatty acids in the intestine where an enzyme turns peptones to amino acids. Thus, without enzymes, our bodies cannot convert complex foods to their simplest forms for their use. Systemic enzymes belong to another class of enzymes. The immune system uses them to fight and destroy foreign and abnormal bodies such as floaters in the eyes, uterine fibroids, endometrial lesions, and even tumours. There are many brands of them on the shelf. I am familiar with NG4 NS Fibrin and Neprinol among others. Neprinol is composed of at least four major elements… Curcumin, Serepaptase, Papain and Bromelain. These may be used individually or collectively for greater effects. Curcumin is a powerful anti-inflammartory. Papain can be derived from sap of urine pawpaw or the leaves or trunk. It chemically resembles Papain and digests or dissolves proteins of all bodies foreign to our bodies. Serapaptase comes from the silk worm. When it is mature to breakout of its cocoon, it produces this enzyme to dissolve the cocoon. Bromelain comes from the pineapple peel. It is anti-inflammatory and anti-pain in addition to its systemic enzymes value. NG4 NS Fibrin breaks down anomalous fibrin growths. Fibrin is a protein. Too much of it in a tissue can distort that tissue as is evident in uterine fibroids for example. NG4 NS Fibrin can be a good ally in therapies to support the immune system to break them down for excretion through the urine. This suggests that the kidney be fortified to carry out effective filtration and expulsion. Kidney herbs include Kidney Nesue, Kidney Cleanse and Function Tea, Common Club Moss, Horsetait, Yarrow, Dandelian and Nettle, among others.
Women should not make light of pelvic pain, in or out of menstruation. For the signal could be coming from something other than PID (Pelvic Inflammatory Disease) usually thought to be caused by infections. This PID signal may be endometriosis! It should be better still if the monthly budget routinely comes along with new dresses, shoes, bags, cosmetics and hair attachments for nutritional supplements which keep their bodies out of harm’s way.
