HEALTH & WELLNESS
MY LONG ROAD
TO WHOLESOME
WELLNESS
By Enid Sibajene
The call came in the middle of the night,
across an eight-hour time zone in Zambia,
Africa. My daughter was in the United States.
“Mommy, can I make a big request?” my
twenty-eight-year-old baby girl said after the
preliminary greetings.
I paused a bit before responding. My daughter
is not known for moderation, and some of her
childhood requests would leave her dad and me
scratching our heads.
“Fourteen years later,
my health is better than
it has ever been. I have
not taken another pain
reliever in all that time.”
“Go ahead…..what is it?” I asked.
She chuckled as she continued.
“Don’t worry, I am only asking for six
months of your life to be at my disposal.”
My immediate thought was that she was
pregnant and wanted me to go and babysit when
the baby arrived.
30
That was in 2000, a few weeks shy of my
fifty-sixth birthday.
She said she had discovered a cure for
osteoarthritis. All she needed was for me
to surrender myself to her directives, and
religiously follow everything she said for six
months. After that, she would allow me to
make my choice and leave me on my own.
A few teardrops rolled down my cheeks.
Her love for me was never questionable, but
there was no earthly way she could end in six
months the agony that had plagued me for
more than twenty years.
GAZELLE WEST
I was diagnosed with osteoarthritis in my
mid-thirties. Over the decades, doctors in
England, Russia, Canada, Germany, Finland,
India and Zambia helped me live with my
pain. All of them agreed on one point – there
was no cure for what I had.
It came down to believing that this might be my
route to recovery. The simplicity of the program
reminded me of the children of Israel in the
desert. Those who believed that they only
had to raise their heads to look at the elevated
serpent were healed from snake bites.
In 1990, my condition got so bad an
internationally renowned professor told me
that he was going to do something he had
never done before. He was going to perform
double knee replacement surgery. This was
the same professor who replaced my own
mom’s hip two decades before. He said my
condition was far worse than hers. He would
do the double replacement to save me from
undergoing two operations.
The changes in my body were visible and could
be felt within days of completing a thirty-day
detoxing program and adjusting my diet to
compatible foods. Fourteen years later, my
health is better than it has ever been. I have
not taken another pain reliever in all that time. I
don’t catch colds or coughs, and I have no trace
of nodes or swellings anywhere.
Every joint in my body hurt. The joints on my
fingers, toes and knees had protruding nodes
and swelling. I depended on pain pills to help
me get up in the morning, and swallowed
them by the dozens throughout the day. I
woke up at night to take pills so I could get
enough relief to continue sleeping.
Have I reached a perfect state of health?
Probably not, but I am enjoying a pain-free,
relaxed lifestyle. The quality of my life
is such that I got back into business and
volunteer projects. My wishes are for people
with osteoarthritis to know that they do not
have to live with pain.
I became adept at hiding tears of pain because
I didn’t want my four children to worry.
Obviously, the baby had noticed. I thanked the
professor, but never returned to his office.
Instead, I tried the famed “Water Therapy,”
which helped me manage my limp, and
straightened my back a little. The dosages for
my relief had to be increased to levels which
doctors refused to comply with, so I learned to
doctor-hunt and get multiple prescriptions to
meet my needs.
At the time of my daughter’s intervention,
I had been a vegetarian for eighteen years,
the last two as a vegan. She knew she
would have to fight to convince me that the
vegetarian diet was not for me. But I gave her
the benefit of the doubt, and said she could
have the six months she needed.
She put together writings on blood type diet,
self-healing aids and body detoxification. Her
regi Y[