Whale Vomit
By Cathy Jameson
My husband and I have had a running joke for years. Anytime I suggest he use a natural remedy, like homeopathic drops or an essential oil for an ache or a pain, he says, "No thanks. I'll pass. I don't need any whale vomit." I reply, "Fine. More for me."
Then we laugh and laugh.
Whale vomit. I’m not sure when we started saying that since it’s something we’ve never used. I don’t think it’s something people actually use anyway. I do remember, though, when I started to hear more about using natural products for ailments. That was many years ago while scouring Yahoo! message boards. I remember being inspired by other parents who used natural products to help their children detox. I wanted to have a success story for my son, too, so I eagerly kept reading their stories. Back then, we didn’t know why my son’s behavior, demeanor and health took a turn for the worse. Before going down the medical route, I resorted to trying something simple. First, I made changes to his diet. Then, I opted to use some supplements that another parent suggested. The first ones I remember ordering were digestive enzymes. After seeing a pretty quick response, I thought I’d read more to see if other ones could help.
From basic over-the-counter ones, like vitamin D3 to ones that have to be special ordered, supplements remain part of life here.
Over the years, protocols have changed. We rotate through some things faster than others. Other bottles stay in the supplement basket on the kitchen counter unopened for weeks, sometimes months, at a time. Lately, I’ve been focused on alleviating my son’s constipation that returned. When that happens, we look at several factors, like what he’s eating and how hydrated he is (or isn’t). Some days, when it becomes apparent that we need to encourage some movement, it’s back to basics – prune juice, senna, and a stool softener. Fortunately, as things soon begin to get moving for him again, life goes a bit back to normal. I was glad for that, especially last week. Around the same time as things settled down for Ronan, I found that I needed to take care of something myself.
I’ve felt some discomfort in my shoulder that hasn’t gotten any better with basic homeopathic treatment. Instead of finding an ounce of relief, the pain started to get in the way of doing things. One day it got really unbearable. If whale vomit was a thing, it’s still not as far as I know, I might’ve considered trying it that day. I had been using a salve that had helped, and that smelled pretty amazing, but I needed something a bit stronger. That day, it was my turn to reach into the supplement basket.
Early that morning and after another terrible night of sleep (for the third night in a row), I needed to change things up. So, I grabbed the first bottle I saw thinking it was the Boswellia. Boswellia has worked wonders on other joint and bone pain in the past, and fairly quickly, too, so I prayed it would do the same for my very achy shoulder. Thank the good Lord I thought to read the label seconds before popping the capsule in my mouth. It wasn’t the bottle of Boswellia that I had grabbed…it was the bottle of stool softener! I know for a fact that that supplement would do my pain absolutely no good. Laughing at myself, I found the bottle I needed and prayed for some relief.
I slept better later that night, only waking up twice, so I think I’ll continue with the Boswellia for now. It isn’t an exact cure, but it’s doing something to make parts of life a bit more manageable.
They get a bad rap, some of those supplements, so tell us what has worked for you when you have an ache or pain that needs to be addressed. What’s your favorite go-to supplement or remedy? How does it help? And who inspired you to try it. Tell us, also, if you have a funny supplement story. One time, a long time ago, I remember reaching for a tiny amber bottle in the cabinet…thinking I’d grabbed the ear drops…but they were eye drops…my ears could see real good that day : )
Cathy Jameson is a Contributing Editor for Age of Autism.
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Feverfew capsules and Hops tincture sprayed on my hand and rubbed on our son's forehead and teasel root tincture drops are what we use for pain currently. Doc Jones of Homegrown Herbalist is on You Tube and talks about herbs that help with pain. He is a retired veterinarian and a naturopathic doctor and his family sells herbal tinctures and powders. He's fun to listen to as he likes to laugh while educating. Also, GAPS diet minus allergens helps our son too plus a pharmaceutical pill that he takes to help reduce meltdowns.
Posted by: lorim | July 17, 2023 at 01:59 PM
Hey; I actually knew of the existence of whale vomit. I was surprised that there is enough of it to wash upon beaches . It is collected to make really expensive perfumes - It has the smell of musk. It is better than finding a gold mine.
I learned of it when I, and the rest of the family were all itchy 36 years ago, I started making my own soaps and looked into essential oils and found out about whale vomit. All of our itchiness it turned out was overgrowth of yeast, and a keto diet brought that under control. Hubby has a bit of it right now. No carbs for him today, plus not over shooting his eating window with gluten crackers made with seed oils too.
That said:
Yeah we too have a box, or should I say boxes at different locations around the house, filled with supplements and vitamins.
To listen to Dr. Mercola is all about getting excited and buying more.
I have found that a hand full pills is daunting to my family.
I could not even get my mother to take as much as one pill, a D3 pill. She refused. So I had to cut open the D3 Pill and drip the D3 oil the edge of her scrambled eggs and make sure it was in the first bite she took. The dropper form of D3 oil was always nice find to purchase. Turmeric and black pepper was put in the rest of her scrambled egg.
I take my turmeric in a cup of coffee with butter and black pepper. That is a diet hack to maintain keto longer in intermittent fasting, and not get really hungry. I read that in a book I bought, after Dr. Mercola interviewed the author.
As far as my family goes. Our water is terrible, so we get our water from a spring inside the National Daniel Boone Forest where my parents grew up. I make lemonade with this spring water with concentrated lemon juice,. Lemon juice was suggested by a very good urologist. He said it stopped the development of kidney stones, maybe gall stones too. Even a bit of vinegar will do the same thing.
So I made my family give up pops and believe me; 20 years ago, of pop drinking became a major problem for our family, and a very hard thing to give up.. They cried a lot.
So they drink plenty of lemonade, and into that I also put N-acetyl cysteine which has a sour taste like lemonade, glycine which has a sugar taste, and thus the stuff that glutathione is made of. We all have heard of glutathione right ?
There is something called niacinamide that we should take sips of all day long, and I put some of that in the lemonade too. . It is a vitamin B3, that reduces inflammation in the blood vessels and helps in their health. Oh, and the lack of B3 is what killed so many in the south at the turn of the 1900s because they started milling corn different.
I also put in taurine too. It is sour also and I can get away with it. What is taurine for? I forgot and I had to go and look it up. It is an antioxidant and anti-inflammatory properties may enhance insulin sensitivity, That brings us to berberine. IT helps with blood sugar too. Helps enhance quercitin. and co-enzyme Q 10 that I give everyone when my husband complains he has no energy and is worse. Notice - not all the time.
So a lot of the above supplements e I can get away with on a daily basis, in a big ol'e gallon of lemonade that they will drink all day.
Oh yeah and I also put on top of that basket of vitamins a bottle of methylene Blue. It is for oxidative stress relief of the mitochondria . Two drops once a day in their lemonade. Cause Poling and my hubby has the same mitochondria problem. So I assume the rest of the family does too.
Most into the lemonade, and brushing off my hands of that problem with satisfaction.
My Mother suffered a vaccine reaction 60 plus years ago to a flu vaccine. All those years from the time forward it was a constant complaint about her stomach. She had to use a syringe each day to go to the bathroom, unless it turned to diarrhea that would last a week or two or three. If she had a regular bowl movement she was thrilled.
When I took over her care completely, and made her diet gluten free, she still had kefir that is dairy once in awhile she did improve. She even said so.
Most important and Cathy you may consider this for Ronan - a slice or two of sweet potato every day, or at least a common food eaten regularly is almost a miracle from God on how it helped. It helps a lot more than the salads did. Salad gave bulk, but it just hurt cause they would not move on through, it seemed to make constipation worse.
Salads, . I grow my own salads of endives, radicchio , and all kinds of different lettuce. Endives another big article that Dr. Mercola wrote and I followed up on. Endives and radicchio are both chicory,. What does chicory do, and why I was excited about it? I don't remember. Dang it. Oh it helps in constipation? It helps in weight lose and for my kids = yeah.. Well it may add bulk but it just seems to sit there, even for me. It takes a sweet potato to get it to move.
In the last year Mother's complaints about her stomach again began to resurface and she did became worse. I had to use a syringe on her two or three times a day. In the last month of her life - this past May, it really turned on and we were struggling with it a lot, plus nausea. Three days before she died she started throwing up when I brought her breakfast in . For three days she laid up in the hospital, with what they said was a bladder infection, but it was a slow brain bleed. She was highly anxious, she was afraid and paranoid, her upper stomach hurt. She was hungry, she would eat, but then would throw it all up. On the last day of her life, I found out that she had a brain bleed, a slow one in the back, lower part of her head. Not a bladder infection. I am pretty sure she had had an on again and off again brain bleed all year long.
You would think with blood vessel leakage in the back of the brain that she would not have made it through covid she caught in September. After all the Covid, virus clings to the ACE receptors in the blood vessels. WE got her through it with nattokinase, Quercetin, zinc, vitamin C, blood pressure meds, aspirin,, vitamin D, Everything I could get in a tablespoon of peanut butter I would put in that peanut butter. Apple sauce is a good one too. . From the very beginning I gave her ivermectin apple flavored - horse paste. I took it too. I shared with her my antibiotics till we ran out.
She came through covid pretty good. She was still moving, she was still talking, she was still feeding herself. I stopped the supplements, and soon she relapsed from a secondary infection we both had, and ended up with pneumonia; that ended her up in the hospital . She came out of the hospital with constant diarrhea, not talking, not feeding herself, I had to use a lift to move her, She had moments that she would space out.
So again there was the peanut butter filled with supplements including nattokinase.
She slowly was able to talk wonderfully, walk and feeding herself, she did not trust her balance though. Her balance was off and she was careful in her walking, we had to be with her as she moved from the bed to her walker. She again was able to get in and out of the car into her wheel chair.
I then left off most of supplements cause she refused to take all those supplements. But we kept taking Vitamin D3 and turmeric in her egg, and melatonin in the evening.
OH I recently found out that 5 HTP which I had a bottle of already, makes melatonin. Did you all know that? Well it makes serration that turns into melatonin with the help of B6, and it works better than taking melatonin. It does! I tried it last night.
For six months my mother did okay. We even took her a couple of times on a 45 minute road trip to see the dentist, and had a tooth pulled out during that time. She had some diarrhea briefly, one time that caused a bladder infection, a brief hospital stay to get rid of that, but I thought I was going to keep her for at least another five years.
Health problems always make themselves better known toward the end, It makes me think back about all of those years ago about that flu shot. Blood vessels, blood leakage, damage to the messaging part of the brain to the GI tract? A brain bleed close to the hypothalamus , in the cerebellum. That is the lower back part of the brain.
It makes me think back to my daughter's reaction to the DPT vaccine, and she came down with Kawaski disease. Kawaski disease is inflammation of the blood vessels. She too was easy to throw up, her personality changed to a very easy going to a very irritated toddler. My son, my husband, my own thyroid trouble, the hypothalamus rules the endocrine system, and mood.
Recently Dr. Mercola had on a guest - about keeping the brain healthy Once again nattokinase was mentioned. I think it might be a very important supplement not to forget , and let lay around in the box on the counter top.
So back to whale vomit. I looked up what it takes to ferment soy and make it into natto. Natto is where nattokinase comes from. Food is better than trying to get a pill down people. What is natto like? It says that natto will be a shock to the western taste buds.
Natto sounds like whale vomit! Might need to stick to a pill.
I also know it takes 12 to 30 times of trying a new food before the human psyche will accept a food. I get to hear 30 times a question with accusing eyes about me putting whale vomit on their dinner plate again? I have to go through 30 times, - for each of them to just please, please, please take just one bite.
Meanwhile: I have to reduce not only sugar, but linoleic acid (seed oils) intake. I have been working on that for a couple of years now. I see that L-alanine helps take seed oils out of the body. I had a bottle of that at one time. Did I finally throw it out? I can't remember I will have to check.
But sweet potatoes sliced, with butter on it and baked in the oven. I got that one. I need to get off of here and can up the last of last year's sweet potatoes and weed this year's crop, and think about if fermented soy whale oil natto is possible? Hmm, I wonder if they just sell natto powder and what food to put it in and on?
Any suggestions?
Posted by: Benedetta | July 17, 2023 at 12:33 PM
Cathy, a couple of years ago I developed some pretty bad chronic pain in my left knee, bad enough to interfere with my sleep. Getting online I found out about something called hyaluronic acid, which I believe works by increasing the amount of lubricating fluids in our joints. I gather that it also works in conjunction with collagen, but since I drink a cup or two of homemade bone broth every day I probably get as much of that as I need anyway. Within just two days the pain in my knee was a lot better, and within a week it was gone completely. I stopped taking it after finishing off the first bottle and the pain has never come back.
Posted by: Greg Hill | July 16, 2023 at 03:13 PM
Thank you for the tips! I added turmeric late last week, hoping for some relief. I also started putting a tiny drop holy water on my shoulder. It’s from Lourdes, given to me from a friend who brought it back for Ronan. I figured it can’t hurt. Praying (one or both!) can help.
Posted by: Cathy Jameson | July 16, 2023 at 12:22 PM
I hope your shoulder feels better soon!
Like everything else, you may want to look for the root cause. You may have a small tear in the rotator cuff; chiropractic care, physical therapy, and specific changes in sleep position can help it to heal without surgery. (Surgery is usually necessary for large and complete tears.)
Turmeric supplements can also help with inflammation; turmeric is more effective in combination with black pepper.
Posted by: Alison | July 16, 2023 at 09:09 AM
I was having lots of digestive issues. I decided to go gluten free. The digestive issues vanished. I should have done it sooner. Decades ago I went dairy free. The dark circles under my eyes went away. It isn't difficult to be dairy and gluten free and the benefits make it well worth the effort.
Posted by: Dr. William H. Gaunt | July 16, 2023 at 07:36 AM