Take A Pill
on 04/29/2006 at 10:46 AM
Where oh where do I start. . .
First, thank you Skipper (and God) for the 4th time in about 6 years, I was harangued for my cholesterol level - I have resisted as the first time was nanoseconds after they took Baycol off the market. I have one organ in my body which has not ever been the scene of disease, outright failure or chronic problems usually resulting in surgery - guess which one????? [the God reference was I asked last night for a sign I should either take the medicine or stand firm on my belief]
This is the 3rd time, I’ve had medically oriented proof that cholesterol is not a set in stone issue (German medical literature says it is a risk and not close to being a main one & Dr. William Douglas (The Daily Dose) who says medical lit shows that those with low cholesterol have the same rate of heart attack as high cholesterol rates.So here is the deal - drug companies vs reality:
Babies breastfed for 6+ months (the longer the better) have lower cholesterol levels and the proper hdl/ldl levels at middle age than non-breastfed persons - regardless of lifestyle inbetween. But as mentioned above - nursing a child is free and guess who makes all those ‘just like breastmilk’ formulas . . .[you guessed it, pharmaceutical companies]
Premarin (hormone replacement drug to aid menopause) is (the only thumbs up I will give PETA) horribly produced. Pre(nant)mar(es)(ur)in (e) is just that, collected pregnant mares urine - they are tied standing up 24/7 to collect their urine. Most of the delivered babies (the only time until the next pregnancy that mom is set relatively free) are sold for dog food. Nasty, horrible and soulless business (makes factory farms look almost humane) - God only knows what diseases will show up in women taking this garbage. . .[you guessed it, pharmaceutical companies]
BTW - the ‘hospital’ birth setup is contrary to nature and created by some king in France to be able to watch his misstresses give birth. And the Postpartum ward concept was developed by - - guess who - formula companies - meant to keep mothers and babies apart and formula fed. . . [you guessed it, pharmaceutical companies, as supine delivery requires - drugs - and drugged mommies opt to formula feed - an easy twofer which leads to all of the above and more]
And the final insidious trick of these companies - since the onset of artifical no fat/no sugar sweetners usage - obesity rates have skyrocketed . . .why??????
Wardmama, your prayer must have slipped in last night while I was asleep. Whe I was going through the news briefs this morning that headline jumped out at me and before I knew it I had slammed out several hundred words about the pharmaceutical conspiracy. I’ve been through the cycle I described from cholesterol medicine to blood pressure medicine to anti-depressants to .... well, I never made it to the Viagra stage but I have friends my age who have.
We got into a discussion about this over several beers a few years ago and several of us decided to cut back on the meds and wean ourselves off while exercising more and trying to take better care of ourselves. Without exception, we all feel much better today than we ever did taking six pills a day. Nowadays, an occasional Advil is all I take and then only rarely. Like I said, there may be some people whose condition can be improved by pills but not everyone on the planet needs a new drug.
You remark about breast-feeding may explain some of my BP being high as well as high cholesterol. My mother couldn’t breast feed me because her milk soured due to stress and fear (an abusive husband whom she ran away from and divorced before I was a year old). All I got was warmed over “moo-juice” (sometimes straight from the cow since we were living with her sister whose husband ran a dairy farm). There were no baby formulas at that time in the late 1940’s - at least none she could afford.
Just wait. In ten years scientists will discover that artificial sweeteners like aspertame raise blood pressure while causing fat retention. All we’ll hear from the drug companies will be “Oops”.
I come by my clinical depression (and social phobia, and anxiety disorder, and panic disorder) quiet honestly, thank you.
My high blood pressure is (normally) weight related.
For the depression I take 300 mg of Effexor. This lowers my stress related blood pressure, but one side-effect of Effexor is to raise blood pressure. So I take 50 mg of Atelonol to counter that.
Cholesterol? LDL is normal, HDL is low. Which means I need to raise it. I’m a 340 pound 6’3 man who needs to eat more (albeit the right kind of) fat.
Fortunately, I don’t have to take any kind of medication, short of the occasional Tylenol.
Back when I watched TV (I have been TV free for 9 months now!) it used to amaze me how these drug companies would advertise for their latest pill, list a whole mess of side effects (nausea, headache, sexual problems, liver disease, death, etc), then say “Ask your doctor if (fill in the blank) is right for you. There’s trouble just waiting. “Doctor, can I take this pill?” “Sure, and I’ll collect the kick-back check for prescribing it. Oh, and by the way, this pill with give you ED, so here’s some Viagra as well.”
Skipper, I agree with your last statement about finding out what artificial sweeteners will result in, but I also think it will happen with the low-carb diets. For some reason, I just don’t agree with the whole low-carb theory. I consider it the next fad diet and I think 20 years from now that people will see some health issues because of it.
There just is no substitute for a healthy lifestyle that includes exercise and moderation in sensible eating. My wife and I are on our way to reasonable weights (I’ve lost 15 so far, 35 to go) by eating properly and working on a reasonable exercise program and we both feel better than we have in a long time.
I’ve been preaching this for years. I’m not a Dr. or Pharmacist so all I usually get are Prozac induced, glazed over looks when I try to explain this to people. Unless I’m going to die, I won’t even take antibiotics - they just weaken your immune system.
My body recovered from the bird flu on its own, but I did get arrested for pooping on cars as they pulled out of the local car wash. Talk about crazy flu symptoms.
Heres a site that sums it up with a little humor… http://www.panexa.com
Good health to ya!
In the year 3535
Ain’t gonna need to tell the truth,
Tell no lies.
Everything you think, do, and say,
Is in the pill you took today.Christopher you hit it on the head (and why didn’t I remember that song, it’s one of the few of ‘my’ oldies my daughter likes - the conspiracy is to get everyone hooked on drugs of some sort so that when they finally create that ‘think, do and say’ drug - they can slip it in. Or perhaps they already have which is why common sense seems to be gone with the wind of late.
Skipper - God works in mysterious ways, the answer to my prayer was him putting that where you’d catch it.
My hubby received his cholesterol drug in the mail today (really, really made him mad. He spent the afternoon finding out about cholesterol and is in the same mood I am, madder in a way as the doc said he’d call back, because my hubby said if his level was high, he wanted to make another appointment and discuss the medication. So much for discussion.
Hmmm, was dx’d with high blood pressure. They said it was 200/120. Felt fine, no headaches, no blurry vision, etc. Went on bp lowering medication and now I have head splitting headaches nearly every day. Vision gets blurry, etc. But hey, I’ve got much lower blood pressure. Something about making a nice looking corpse keeps coming to mind…
Face it, we’re all going to die one day. It is a fact of life. The only thing I hope for is that when I go is that it is fast. No lingering death, with hospitals fussing over my insurance.
Given my job I most likely will be found dead in a hotel room when I don’t show up for work. Let someone else worry about the damned paperwork then.
Here’s my own little story:
I used to suffer from CONSTANT sinus/migraine headaches, sleep apnea (snoring and holding your breath in your sleep), and overwhelming lack of energy, horrible dry mouth, constantly loose bowels, and what I used to call ‘explosive’ heartburn. I ended up in the hospital for a week.
Before I went into the hospital I was taking copious amounts of Advil for my headaches, aciphex twice a day for my heartburn, drinking tons of caffeine to stay awake, etc. I even had some pill the dentist gave me for dry mouth! While in the hospital I was on a clear liquid diet, and took none of those medicines. Net result? I lost about 35 pounds in 5 days.
NOT the way I would EVER recommend losing weight, let me tell you. BUT, I haven’t had ANY of those problems since I’ve come home and recovered. Also, I haven’t had any of those medicines, and I think the clear liquid diet sort of cleansed my system of all the nastiness.
Here’s the way I figure it: I lost weight, which helped eliminate my sleep apnea (I was easily 40 pounds overweight). The lack of good sleep was a major cause of my headaches, so I do no longer need Advil (no sleep apnea means I sleep much better). As I took the Advil, I needed more of it to have any effect on these headaches, so the more of it I was taking the worse a job the Advil was doing to my stomach. This kick started my acid reflux problems, and the need to start the aciphex. The aciphex was flushing all the acid out of my stomach and caused my loose bowel problems. It was just one thing after another.
I usually would look at a week in the hospital as a bad thing (and trust me this one was no vacation), but the silver lining here is that I really feel better. It has prompted me to eat better, though I am by no means a health food nut, and I don’t need all those drugs. I have energy, so I am getting some good exersize, and just feel better.
Just my two cents.
Good story, Agamemnon. Too bad that yours is the exception and not the rule. Sadly, the Skipper’s article is right on the money with 90% of patients. I see it each and every night in the hospital where I work.
Not being one of those naturapathic “just breathe clean air and everything will be fine” types, I nonetheless think that the old fashioned eat right, exercise, get plenty of sleep approach has HUGE benefits, as Aga points out.
I my days as a counselor I ran into “depressed” people quite a bit. Many were on various anti-depressants, what my grand mother used to cal her “trankeelizers.”
In my experience, the vast bulk of people on a.d. meds were screwups and failures who usually had had little if any personal encouragement or head pats in their lives. My “therapy” was to work them through successes, from the tiniest, like just pulling the covers back up onto their beds in the morning, to the greatest which was to get a pianist back playing and writing music withour spending an entire night wiping down her apartment with alcohol swabs.
Depression and so many personal and social ills can be mediated or even largely elliminated so simply.
And look, have I got the thing for you, the all-new Soma Brand “It’s All So Simple!” pill!
Taken in context of one of this week’s biggest news stories (gas prices) doesn’t this line just make you wonder how gullible we Americans really are:
>She cites Taxol, the cancer drug discovered by the National Institutes of Health, but sold by Bristol-Myers Squibb for $20,000 a year, reportedly 20 times the manufacturing cost.>
This is from The Truth About Drug Companies: How They Deceive Us and What to Do About It by Dr. Marcia Angell
http://www.nybooks.com/articles/17244
She also criticizes the companies for just making of ‘me too’ drugs - variations of a drug, usually less effective.
The drug companies fell out of first place as most profitable industry in 2003. Which just so happens to be the same time the Medicare reform bill was passed. But still estimates are between $200 billion (without hospital, nursing homes and doctor offices puchases) to $400 billion.Interesting article, bottom line, Dr. Angell feels that the drug companies charge too much and spend too much time and finances on marketing and administration.
Just wonder how long it is going to take Americans to get really tired of paying for a small percentage of people to get stinking rich or to get all the bennies for free and say
ENOUGH
