Tuesday, November 6, 2012
Saturday, November 3, 2012
The BEST WORDS : More than 200 of the ....
...Most Excellent, Most Desirable, Most Sensible, Most Suitable, Most Satisfying Words
Mark Twain famously declared, " The difference between the almost right word and the right word is really a large matter - 'tis the difference between the lightning bug and the lightning ."
The Best Words are the lightning words, the ones that illuminate the way for those who hear what you say and read what you write.
Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes explained, Language is the skin of living thought.
We recognized that just as your skin bounds and encloses your body, so does your word stock bound and enclose your mental life. The best Words summons you to stretch your vocabulary by mastering uncommonly useful and usefully uncommon words. Accept that invitation and you will liberate your thoughts and your feelings, your speaking, your reading, and your writing(typing online) - everything that makes up YOU.
The point of leaning new words is not to impress your friends/readers or to seem more intelligent that they. The point is to see more, to understand more. An ever-increasing vocabulary uncovers connections, introduces spheres, and - in reminding us that there are words for all thoughts, all feelings, all behaviors, all things invisible and invisible, and word lovers alike.
The Best Words will definitely be on my best-of-the-word-books-blog.
Mark Twain famously declared, " The difference between the almost right word and the right word is really a large matter - 'tis the difference between the lightning bug and the lightning ."
The Best Words are the lightning words, the ones that illuminate the way for those who hear what you say and read what you write.
Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes explained, Language is the skin of living thought.
We recognized that just as your skin bounds and encloses your body, so does your word stock bound and enclose your mental life. The best Words summons you to stretch your vocabulary by mastering uncommonly useful and usefully uncommon words. Accept that invitation and you will liberate your thoughts and your feelings, your speaking, your reading, and your writing(typing online) - everything that makes up YOU.
The point of leaning new words is not to impress your friends/readers or to seem more intelligent that they. The point is to see more, to understand more. An ever-increasing vocabulary uncovers connections, introduces spheres, and - in reminding us that there are words for all thoughts, all feelings, all behaviors, all things invisible and invisible, and word lovers alike.
The Best Words will definitely be on my best-of-the-word-books-blog.
Friday, November 2, 2012
Our Vision, and how YOU can Get Money Today…
Our Vision, and how YOU can Get Money Today…at Empower Network is much different than any other company you’ll find in the marketing space, because the fuel that drives our vision is helping someone brand new make their first $100 online. We look out for the ‘little guys’ and live and die by the value we provide to our members.
We treat our members AS VALUED PARTNERS, always staying mindful that your #1 priority is to build your business and keep it profitable. We’ll never overwhelm you with training or distractions that you don’t need or want. Our #1 priority to help you grow – personally and financially …and make our community a place where lives are impacted and ANYONE can succeed.Our vision is to help hundreds of thousands of network marketers, affiliate marketers and entrepreneurs have massive breakthroughs and create a permanent change in their quality of life and financial situation.
http://theinnozablog.blogspot.sg/2012/06/1-water-generation-from-thin-air-in.html
Dr. Richard Teo Keng Siang, millionaire and cosmetic surgeon with a stage-4 lung cancer, sharing on 24 Nov 2011, 8 months after his diagnosis.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8pbelDGpWvs&feature=related
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cC8lJyxOZvA&feature=channel&list=UL
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rLFzJntPDCs&feature=related
(Click the links above if you like to hear him)
Dr Richard Teo Keng Siang
Below is the transcript of the talk of Dr. Richard Teo Keng Siang, who was a 40-year-old millionaire and cosmetic surgeon with a stage-4 lung cancer, sharing at a Dental Christian Fellowship Meeting. He would have liked to share this with you too.
HIS BACKGROUND
Hi, good morning to all of you. My voice is a bit hoarse from the chemotherapy, so please bear with me. I thought I'll just introduce myself. My name is Richard, I’m a friend of Danny’s, who invited me here.
I’d just begin to say that I’m a typical product of today’s society. Before this, I was talking about how the media influences us etc. So I’m a typical product of what the media portrays. From young, I’ve always been under the influence and impression that to be happy, is to be successful. And to be successful, is to be wealthy. So I led my life according to this motto.
Coming from a poor average family, back in those days, I was highly competitive, whether in sports, studies, leadership. I wanted it all. I’ve been there, done that. But at the end of the day, it’s still about money.
So in my recent last years, I was a trainee in ophthalmology, but I was getting impatient, cos I had friends of mine who were going out into private practice, making tonnes of money. And there I was, stuck in a trainee-ship. So I said, ‘Enough, it’s getting too long.’ At that time, there was a surge in protégés of aesthetic medicine. I’m sure you’re aware, aesthetic medicine had peaked over the last few years, and I saw good money in there. So much so that I said, ‘Forget about ophthalmology, I’m gonna do aesthetic medicine.’ So that’s what I did.
The truth is, nobody makes heroes out of the average GP in the neighbourhood. They don't. They make heroes out of rich celebrities, politicians, rich and famous people. So I wanted to be one of these. I dived straight into aesthetic medicine. People were not willing to pay when I was doing locum back in those days. Anything more than $30, they would complain that “Wah, this lo kun (doctor) jing qwee (very expensive)”. They made noise and they were not happy. But the same people were willing to pay $10 000 for a liposuction. So I said, ‘Well, let’s stop healing the sick, I’m gonna become a beautician; a medically-trained beautician.’
And that was what I did – liposuction, breast augmentation, eyelid surgeries, you name it, we do it. It was very good money. My clinic, when we started off, waiting time was 1 week; 1 month; became 2 months; became 3 months. There was so much demand that people were literally queuing up to have aesthetic work done on them. Vain women – easy life!
So the clinic grew. I was so overwhelmed, from 1 doctor, I employed 2, then 3, then 4 doctors, and carried on. Nothing is ever enough. I wanted more and more and more. So much so that we set up shop in Indonesia to lure all the Indonesian tai tai’s. We set up shop, set up a team of people there, to get more Indonesian patients to come in.
So, things were doing well. I’m there, my time has arrived.
Around some time in February last year, I said, ‘OK, I have so much spare cash, it’s time to get my first Ferrari. So there I was, getting ready for the deposit. ‘OK! There comes my first Ferrari!’ I was looking for land, to share with some of my friends. I have a banker friend who makes $5 million a year. So I thought, ‘Come, let’s come together. Let’s buy some land and build our houses.’
I was at my prime, getting ready to enjoy. At the same time, my friend Danny had a revival. They were going back to church, some of my close friends. They told me, ‘Richard, come, join us, come back to church.’
I have been a Christian for 20 years; I was baptised 20 years ago, but it was because it was fashionable to be a Christian then. All my friends were becoming Christians then. It was fashionable! I wanted to be baptised, so that when I filled in a form, I could put there “Christian” – feels good. In truth, I had never had a bible; I don’t know what the bible is all about.
I went to church for a while, after some time, I got tired. I said it’s time to go to NUS, stop going to church. I had a lot more things to pursue in NUS – girls, studies, sports etc. After all, I had achieved all these things without God today, so who needs God? I myself can achieve anything I want.
In my arrogance, I told them, “You know what? You go tell your pastor to change your sermon to 2pm. I will consider coming to church.” Such arrogance! And I said 1 statement in addition to that – till date, I don’t know I’ve regretted saying that – I told Danny and my friends, “If God really wanted me to come back to church, He will give me a sign.”. Lo and behold, 3 weeks later, I was back at church.
THE DIAGNOSIS
In March 2011, out of the blues – I was still running around, ‘cause I’m a gym freak and I always go to the gym training, running, swimming 6 days a week. I had some backache, and that’s all I had, but it was persistent. And so I went for an MRI to exclude prolapsed disc. And the day before I had my scan, I was still in the gym, lifting heavy weights, doing my squats. And the next day, they found that half my spine had bone marrow replacement. I said, “Woah, sorry, what’s that?”
We had a PET scan the next day, and they diagnosed that I had terminal lung cancer, stage 4B. It had spread to the brain, half the spine, whole of my lungs were filled with tumor, liver, adrenals…
I said, “Can’t be, I was just at the gym last night, what’s going on?” I’m sure you know how it feels – though I’m not sure if you know how it feels. One moment I was there at the peak, the next day, this news came and I was totally devastated. My whole world just turned upside down.
I couldn’t accept it. I have a hundred relatives on both sides, my mom and my dad. 100 of them. And not a single one has cancer. To me, in my mind, I have good genes, I’m not supposed to be having this! Some of my relatives are heavy chain smokers. Why am I having lung cancer? I was in denial.
HIS ENCOUNTER WITH GOD
So the next day, I was still in a state of denial, still unable to accept what was going on. There I was lying in an operating theatre in a hospital, for a needle biopsy (for histology). There I was, just completed the biopsy, and lying in the operating theatre. The nurses and doctors had left; told me I had to wait for 15 minutes to do a check X-ray to make sure there’s no pneumothorax (a complication).
And there I was, lying on the operating table, staring blankly at the ceiling in a cold, quiet operating theatre. Suddenly I just heard an inner voice; it was not like coming from outside. It was inside. This small inner voice that I had never felt before. And it said very specifically, it said, “This has to happen to you, at your prime, because it’s the only way you can understand.”
I said, “Woah, why did that come from?” You know, when you speak to yourself, you’d say, “OK, what time should I leave this place? Where shall I have dinner after this?” You’d speak from a first person point of view. You don’t say, “Where should YOU go after this?” Whereas the voice that came spoke as a third party. It said, “This has to happen to YOU, at YOUR prime, because this is the only way YOU can understand.” At that time, my emotions just overflowed and I broke down and cried, alone there. And I knew then, subsequently, what it means to understand that why this is the only way.
Because I had been so proud of myself, my whole life, I needed nobody else. I was gifted with things that I could do, why do I need anybody else? I was just so full of myself that there was no other way I could have turned back to God.
In fact, if I were diagnosed with stage 1 or 2, I would have been looking around busily for the best cardiothoracic surgeon, remove a section of the lobe (do a lobectomy), do preventive chemotherapy…The chances of it being cured is extremely high. Who needs God? But I had stage 4B. No man can help, only God can.
A series of events happened after that. I wasn’t sold after that, because of the inner voice, I became believing, prayers, all that. No I wasn’t. To me, it was just ‘maybe there was a voice; or maybe that was just me talking to myself.’ I didn’t buy the story.
What happened next was that I was being prepared for chemotherapy. I started off with a whole brain radiation therapy first; takes about 2 -3 weeks. In the meantime they prepared me for chemotherapy, supplements etc. One of the things they used for chemo was a thing called Zometa. Zometa - they use it to strengthen the bones; once the bone marrow (replacement) is cured of cancer cells, it becomes hollow, so we need Zometa to strengthen the bone to prevent compression fractures.
One of the side effects of Zometa is that it can cause osteonecrosis (bone death) of the jaw, and I had to have my wisdom teeth removed. Years ago, I had my upper wisdom teeth removed, cos it was giving me trouble. The lower ones didn’t give me trouble so I said, “Forget it, just leave it.” So of cause, Danny volunteered to remove it for me.
So there I was, lying there in a dental chair, asking myself, suffering all the side effects of radiotherapy, and now I have to go through wisdom tooth surgery. As if I’ve not had enough to suffer! So I asked Danny, “Eh, bro, is there any other way? Can I not go though this?” He said, “Yes, you can pray.”
I said, “What’s there to lose? Ok lah, pray lah!” And so we prayed. And we did an X-ray after that. Everything was all there, all the appliances and everything. And lo and behold, the Xray showed that there was no wisdom teeth in the lower jaw. I know most people have 4 wisdom teeth, maybe some have none, but to be missing one or 2, as I understand – I’m not too sure, as I understand – is not that common.
Still I was, “Nah, I don’t care about that.” To me, as long as I didn’t have to take out the tooth, I was happy. At that point, I still wasn’t sold on prayers. Maybe it was just a coincidence – for whatever it’s worth.
I continued meeting my oncologist, asking him, “How long do I have?” I asked him. He said, not more than 6 months. I said, “Even with chemotherapy?” About 3 – 4 months, he said.
I couldn’t grasp that. It was difficult to come to terms. And even as I went through radiotherapy, I was struggling everyday, especially when I wake up, hoping that it’s just a nightmare; when I wake up, it’s all over.
As I was struggling, day after day, I went into depression, which is the typical denial, depression blah blah blah that you go through. But for 1 reason, I don’t know why, there was this specific day that I was supposed to meet my oncologist. At about 2pm, I felt this sudden surge of peace, comfort, and in fact, a little happiness. It was just overflowing. For no rhyme or reason, it just came about 2pm, as I was getting ready, dressing up to meet my oncologist. So much so that I whats-aped all my friends that, “Bros, I just feel so good suddenly! I don’t know why, it just came!”
And it was only days, or was it weeks after, that Danny revealed to me that he had fasted for 2 days for me, and he was bargaining with God, and fasted for 2 days, and he ended his fast at that exact same point, about 2pm thereabouts, that this surge of sensation came to me for no rhyme or reason. And I didn’t know that he was fasting for me. And when he ended the fast, I felt that sensation!
Whoa, things were getting a bit too coincidental. I was starting to buy a bit of the story, but still I wasn’t sold. As days passed by, I completed my radiotherapy, about 2 weeks plus. Getting ready for chemo, so they let me rest for a few days.
See, the mortality rate of lung cancer : Lung cancer has the highest mortality rate. If you add up breast, colorectal (colon) cancer, and prostate cancer (the top few cancers in Singapore for men and women), if you add up the mortality rate of these 3, it still doesn’t add up to lung cancer. Simply because, you understand, you can remove the prostate, the colon, the breast, but you cannot remove your lungs.
But there’s about 10% of lung cancer patients who do pretty well for some reasons, because they have this specific mutation; we call it the EGFR mutation. And it happens, only 90% of the time, in Asian ladies who never smoked in their lives. Me, first of all, I’m male. 2ndly, I’m a social smoker. I take one a day after dinner; weekends, when my friends offer me, I take it as well. I’m a light smoker, not a social smoker. But still, my oncologist was still not hopeful for me to have this mutation.
The chances of it happening for me was maybe 3-4% for me to get it. That’s why I was being primed to go for chemo. But through all the intense prayers, friends like Danny, people that I don’t even know, it turned out that, during my waiting for chemo, the results came back that I was EGFR positive. I was like, “Woah, good news!” Cos now I don’t have to undergo chemo at that time, because there’s this oral tablet that you can use to control this disease.
Just to share with you some idea – this is a CT scan – thorax – of my lungs, before treatment.
AFTER BEFORE
Every single dot there is a tumour. You can see all the mets (metastasis) there. This is just one single plane. Literally I had it in both lungs, and I had literally tens of thousands of tumour. That’s why the oncologist told me, even with chemo, at most 3-4 months.
But because of this mutation, they have this oral medication. This is what happened after 2 months of treatment. As you can see over here; this is what God can do. And that’s why I’m still here having this opportunity to share with you. As you can see over here, the difference between before and after treatment.
At that point, I said, “Well, it’s to be expected, isn’t it? The medicine is good.” I’m still not buying the story. Well, the guys prayed for me and the tumour markers started to come down. 90% of the tumours were wiped out, and the tumour markers came down to more than 90% over the next few months.
But still, you know, once you have the clinical knowledge, you know the statistics. One year survival, two year survival; having all this knowledge is not a good thing. Cos you live with the knowledge that even with all this, the cancer cells are so unstable, they keep mutating. They will overcome and become resistant to the drugs, and eventually you’re gonna run out of medication.
So living with this knowledge is a huge mental struggle, a huge mental torture. Cancer is not just about a physical struggle, it’s a huge mental torture. How do you live with no hope? How do you live with not being able to plan for the next few years? The oncologist tells you to bear with it for the next 1 – 2 months. So it’s a lot of struggles as I went through: March, then April. April was my lowest point, in deep depression, struggling even as I was recovering.
HIS ACCEPTANCE & PEACE
And one of those days, I was there in bed, struggling in the afternoon, asking God, “Why? Why do I have to go through this suffering? Why do I have to endure this hardship, this struggle? Why me?”
As I fell asleep, in my dreamy state, a vision just came, that says Hebrews 12:7-8.
Now mind you, at this time, I had not read the bible. I have no clue what’s Hebrews, I don’t even know how many chapters there are. Totally clueless.
But it says Hebrews 12:7-8, very specifically.
I didn’t think too much of it. I just continued sleeping. Then I woke up, and I said, “What’s there to lose? I’d just check it out lah!” Danny had bought me a bible; it’s still quite new. I said, “It’s ok, just try.” So I flipped to the Old Testament. Hebrews to me sounds like something ancient, so it should be in the Old Testament right? So I flipped through the Old Testament. No Hebrews there. I was so disappointed.
Then I said, “Maybe New Testament, let’s have a look!”. WOW – New Testament, there’s Hebrew’s!! It says Hebrews 12:7-8. It says, “Endure hardship as discipline as God is treating you as His children.”
I said, “WAH!! Where did that come from?” I was getting goose pimples all over my body. I said, “This can’t be, right?” I mean, what’s the chance of somebody, who has never read the bible, to have a vision of a chapter of a specific verse, that answers my question directly?
I think God called to me directly as I was there sleeping, struggling with it, asking God, “Why do I have to suffer? Why do I have to suffer this?” And God says “Endure hardship as discipline as God is treating you as His child.”
At this point, the chance of that happening is even lesser than my EGFR being positive. There’s just no way; there’s so many millions of thousands of verses in the bible, how can I just conjure up something like that?
So at that point, I was sold I said, “YOU WIN! YOU WIN!!”
Ok , I was convinced. And so from that day onwards, I started believing in my God. And the last time I heard that inner voice was the end of April. And that inner voice, same thing, in the afternoon, as I was sleeping (this time I wasn’t struggling, just going to sleep). In a dreamy state I just heard Him say, “Help others in hardship.”
It was more like a command, rather than a statement. And that’s when I embarked on this journey, helping others in hardship. And I realised that hardship is not just about being poor. In fact, I think a lot of poor people are probably happier than a lot of us here. They are so easily contented with whatever they have, they’re probably pretty happy.
Hardship can happen to rich people; it can be physical hardship, mental hardship, social, etc. And also over the last few months, I started to understand what this true joy is about. In the past, I substituted true joy with the pursuing of wealth. I thought true joy is about pursuing wealth. Why? Cos let me put it to you this way, in my death bed, I found no joy whatsoever in whatever objects I had – my Ferrari, thinking of the land I was going to buy to build my bungalow etc, having a successful business.
It brought me ZERO comfort, ZERO joy, nothing at all. Do you think I can hold onto this piece of metal and it’s going to give true joy? Nah, it’s not going to happen.
True joy comes from interaction with other people. And at a lot of times, it is a short term pride, the past. When you pursue your wealth, Chinese New Year is the best time to do it. Drive my Ferrari, show off to my relatives, show off to my friends, do my rounds, and then you thought that was true joy? You really think that those guys who sold you your Ferrari, they share their joy with you? And your relatives, wow, they share this joy with you? In truth, what you have done is just to illicit envy, jealousy, and even hatred. They are not sharing the joy with you, and what I have is that short-term pride that wow, I have something you don’t have! And I thought that was joy!
So what we have is basically a short-term pride at the expense of somebody else. And that wasn’t true joy. And I found no joy at all on my deathbed, thinking of my Ferrari – to hold on to it, sayang it?!?
True joy I discovered comes from interaction. Over the last few months I was so down. Interaction with my loved ones, my friends, my brothers in Christ, my sisters in Christ, and only then was I able to be motivated, able to be uplifted. To share your sorrow, to share your happiness – that’s true joy.
And you know what makes you smile? True joy comes from helping others in hardship, and because I’ve gone through this, I know what hardship entails. In fact, there’re some cancer patients who tell me a lot of times, people come up to them and tell them, “Stay positive. Stay positive.” Yah, right. You come in my shoes and you try to stay positive! You don’t know what you’re talking about!
But I have the license. So I’ve been going out to meet other fellow cancer patients, to share with them, encourage them. And I know, because I’ve been through it, and it’s easier for me to talk to them.
And most importantly, I think true joy comes from knowing God. Not knowing about God – I mean, you can read the bible and know about God – but knowing God personally; getting a relationship with God. I think that’s the most important. That’s what I’ve learnt.
So if I were to sum it up, I’d say that the earlier we sort out the priorities in our lives, the better it is. Don’t be like me – I had no other way. I had to learn it through the hard way. I had to come back to God to thank Him for this opportunity because I’ve had 3 major accidents in my past – car accidents. You know, these sports car accidents – I was always speeding , but somehow I always came out alive, even with the car almost being overturned. And I wouldn’t have had a chance. Who knows, I don’t know where else I’d be going to! Even though I was baptised it was just a show, but the fact that this has happened, it gave me a chance to come back to God.
Few things I’d learnt though:
1. Trust in the Lord your God with all your heart – this is so important.
2. Is to love and serve others, not just ourselves.
There is nothing wrong with being rich or wealthy. I think it’s absolutely alright, cos God has blessed. So many people are blessed with good wealth, but the trouble is I think a lot of us can’t handle it. The more we have, the more we want. I’ve gone through it, the deeper the hole we dig, the more we get sucked into it, so much so that we worship wealth and lose focus. Instead of worshipping God, we worship wealth. It’s just a human instinct. It’s just so difficult to get out of it.
We are all professionals, and when we go into private practice, we start to build up our wealth – inevitably. So my thought are, when you start to build up wealth and when the opportunity comes, do remember that all these things don’t belong to us. We don’t really own it nor have rights to this wealth. It’s actually God’s gift to us. Remember that it’s more important to further His Kingdom rather than to further ourselves.
Anyway I think that I’ve gone through it, and I know that wealth without God is empty. It is more important that you fill up the wealth, as you build it up subsequently, as professionals and all, you need to fill it up with the wealth of God.
Click here and know inspiration-success-story-wow-cool
1.Making Money on the Internet <
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cC8lJyxOZvA&feature=channel&list=UL
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rLFzJntPDCs&feature=related
(Click the links above if you like to hear him)
Dr Richard Teo Keng Siang
Below is the transcript of the talk of Dr. Richard Teo Keng Siang, who was a 40-year-old millionaire and cosmetic surgeon with a stage-4 lung cancer, sharing at a Dental Christian Fellowship Meeting. He would have liked to share this with you too.
HIS BACKGROUND
Hi, good morning to all of you. My voice is a bit hoarse from the chemotherapy, so please bear with me. I thought I'll just introduce myself. My name is Richard, I’m a friend of Danny’s, who invited me here.
I’d just begin to say that I’m a typical product of today’s society. Before this, I was talking about how the media influences us etc. So I’m a typical product of what the media portrays. From young, I’ve always been under the influence and impression that to be happy, is to be successful. And to be successful, is to be wealthy. So I led my life according to this motto.
Coming from a poor average family, back in those days, I was highly competitive, whether in sports, studies, leadership. I wanted it all. I’ve been there, done that. But at the end of the day, it’s still about money.
So in my recent last years, I was a trainee in ophthalmology, but I was getting impatient, cos I had friends of mine who were going out into private practice, making tonnes of money. And there I was, stuck in a trainee-ship. So I said, ‘Enough, it’s getting too long.’ At that time, there was a surge in protégés of aesthetic medicine. I’m sure you’re aware, aesthetic medicine had peaked over the last few years, and I saw good money in there. So much so that I said, ‘Forget about ophthalmology, I’m gonna do aesthetic medicine.’ So that’s what I did.
The truth is, nobody makes heroes out of the average GP in the neighbourhood. They don't. They make heroes out of rich celebrities, politicians, rich and famous people. So I wanted to be one of these. I dived straight into aesthetic medicine. People were not willing to pay when I was doing locum back in those days. Anything more than $30, they would complain that “Wah, this lo kun (doctor) jing qwee (very expensive)”. They made noise and they were not happy. But the same people were willing to pay $10 000 for a liposuction. So I said, ‘Well, let’s stop healing the sick, I’m gonna become a beautician; a medically-trained beautician.’
And that was what I did – liposuction, breast augmentation, eyelid surgeries, you name it, we do it. It was very good money. My clinic, when we started off, waiting time was 1 week; 1 month; became 2 months; became 3 months. There was so much demand that people were literally queuing up to have aesthetic work done on them. Vain women – easy life!
So the clinic grew. I was so overwhelmed, from 1 doctor, I employed 2, then 3, then 4 doctors, and carried on. Nothing is ever enough. I wanted more and more and more. So much so that we set up shop in Indonesia to lure all the Indonesian tai tai’s. We set up shop, set up a team of people there, to get more Indonesian patients to come in.
So, things were doing well. I’m there, my time has arrived.
Around some time in February last year, I said, ‘OK, I have so much spare cash, it’s time to get my first Ferrari. So there I was, getting ready for the deposit. ‘OK! There comes my first Ferrari!’ I was looking for land, to share with some of my friends. I have a banker friend who makes $5 million a year. So I thought, ‘Come, let’s come together. Let’s buy some land and build our houses.’
I was at my prime, getting ready to enjoy. At the same time, my friend Danny had a revival. They were going back to church, some of my close friends. They told me, ‘Richard, come, join us, come back to church.’
I have been a Christian for 20 years; I was baptised 20 years ago, but it was because it was fashionable to be a Christian then. All my friends were becoming Christians then. It was fashionable! I wanted to be baptised, so that when I filled in a form, I could put there “Christian” – feels good. In truth, I had never had a bible; I don’t know what the bible is all about.
I went to church for a while, after some time, I got tired. I said it’s time to go to NUS, stop going to church. I had a lot more things to pursue in NUS – girls, studies, sports etc. After all, I had achieved all these things without God today, so who needs God? I myself can achieve anything I want.
In my arrogance, I told them, “You know what? You go tell your pastor to change your sermon to 2pm. I will consider coming to church.” Such arrogance! And I said 1 statement in addition to that – till date, I don’t know I’ve regretted saying that – I told Danny and my friends, “If God really wanted me to come back to church, He will give me a sign.”. Lo and behold, 3 weeks later, I was back at church.
THE DIAGNOSIS
In March 2011, out of the blues – I was still running around, ‘cause I’m a gym freak and I always go to the gym training, running, swimming 6 days a week. I had some backache, and that’s all I had, but it was persistent. And so I went for an MRI to exclude prolapsed disc. And the day before I had my scan, I was still in the gym, lifting heavy weights, doing my squats. And the next day, they found that half my spine had bone marrow replacement. I said, “Woah, sorry, what’s that?”
We had a PET scan the next day, and they diagnosed that I had terminal lung cancer, stage 4B. It had spread to the brain, half the spine, whole of my lungs were filled with tumor, liver, adrenals…
I said, “Can’t be, I was just at the gym last night, what’s going on?” I’m sure you know how it feels – though I’m not sure if you know how it feels. One moment I was there at the peak, the next day, this news came and I was totally devastated. My whole world just turned upside down.
I couldn’t accept it. I have a hundred relatives on both sides, my mom and my dad. 100 of them. And not a single one has cancer. To me, in my mind, I have good genes, I’m not supposed to be having this! Some of my relatives are heavy chain smokers. Why am I having lung cancer? I was in denial.
HIS ENCOUNTER WITH GOD
So the next day, I was still in a state of denial, still unable to accept what was going on. There I was lying in an operating theatre in a hospital, for a needle biopsy (for histology). There I was, just completed the biopsy, and lying in the operating theatre. The nurses and doctors had left; told me I had to wait for 15 minutes to do a check X-ray to make sure there’s no pneumothorax (a complication).
And there I was, lying on the operating table, staring blankly at the ceiling in a cold, quiet operating theatre. Suddenly I just heard an inner voice; it was not like coming from outside. It was inside. This small inner voice that I had never felt before. And it said very specifically, it said, “This has to happen to you, at your prime, because it’s the only way you can understand.”
I said, “Woah, why did that come from?” You know, when you speak to yourself, you’d say, “OK, what time should I leave this place? Where shall I have dinner after this?” You’d speak from a first person point of view. You don’t say, “Where should YOU go after this?” Whereas the voice that came spoke as a third party. It said, “This has to happen to YOU, at YOUR prime, because this is the only way YOU can understand.” At that time, my emotions just overflowed and I broke down and cried, alone there. And I knew then, subsequently, what it means to understand that why this is the only way.
Because I had been so proud of myself, my whole life, I needed nobody else. I was gifted with things that I could do, why do I need anybody else? I was just so full of myself that there was no other way I could have turned back to God.
In fact, if I were diagnosed with stage 1 or 2, I would have been looking around busily for the best cardiothoracic surgeon, remove a section of the lobe (do a lobectomy), do preventive chemotherapy…The chances of it being cured is extremely high. Who needs God? But I had stage 4B. No man can help, only God can.
A series of events happened after that. I wasn’t sold after that, because of the inner voice, I became believing, prayers, all that. No I wasn’t. To me, it was just ‘maybe there was a voice; or maybe that was just me talking to myself.’ I didn’t buy the story.
What happened next was that I was being prepared for chemotherapy. I started off with a whole brain radiation therapy first; takes about 2 -3 weeks. In the meantime they prepared me for chemotherapy, supplements etc. One of the things they used for chemo was a thing called Zometa. Zometa - they use it to strengthen the bones; once the bone marrow (replacement) is cured of cancer cells, it becomes hollow, so we need Zometa to strengthen the bone to prevent compression fractures.
One of the side effects of Zometa is that it can cause osteonecrosis (bone death) of the jaw, and I had to have my wisdom teeth removed. Years ago, I had my upper wisdom teeth removed, cos it was giving me trouble. The lower ones didn’t give me trouble so I said, “Forget it, just leave it.” So of cause, Danny volunteered to remove it for me.
So there I was, lying there in a dental chair, asking myself, suffering all the side effects of radiotherapy, and now I have to go through wisdom tooth surgery. As if I’ve not had enough to suffer! So I asked Danny, “Eh, bro, is there any other way? Can I not go though this?” He said, “Yes, you can pray.”
I said, “What’s there to lose? Ok lah, pray lah!” And so we prayed. And we did an X-ray after that. Everything was all there, all the appliances and everything. And lo and behold, the Xray showed that there was no wisdom teeth in the lower jaw. I know most people have 4 wisdom teeth, maybe some have none, but to be missing one or 2, as I understand – I’m not too sure, as I understand – is not that common.
Still I was, “Nah, I don’t care about that.” To me, as long as I didn’t have to take out the tooth, I was happy. At that point, I still wasn’t sold on prayers. Maybe it was just a coincidence – for whatever it’s worth.
I continued meeting my oncologist, asking him, “How long do I have?” I asked him. He said, not more than 6 months. I said, “Even with chemotherapy?” About 3 – 4 months, he said.
I couldn’t grasp that. It was difficult to come to terms. And even as I went through radiotherapy, I was struggling everyday, especially when I wake up, hoping that it’s just a nightmare; when I wake up, it’s all over.
As I was struggling, day after day, I went into depression, which is the typical denial, depression blah blah blah that you go through. But for 1 reason, I don’t know why, there was this specific day that I was supposed to meet my oncologist. At about 2pm, I felt this sudden surge of peace, comfort, and in fact, a little happiness. It was just overflowing. For no rhyme or reason, it just came about 2pm, as I was getting ready, dressing up to meet my oncologist. So much so that I whats-aped all my friends that, “Bros, I just feel so good suddenly! I don’t know why, it just came!”
And it was only days, or was it weeks after, that Danny revealed to me that he had fasted for 2 days for me, and he was bargaining with God, and fasted for 2 days, and he ended his fast at that exact same point, about 2pm thereabouts, that this surge of sensation came to me for no rhyme or reason. And I didn’t know that he was fasting for me. And when he ended the fast, I felt that sensation!
Whoa, things were getting a bit too coincidental. I was starting to buy a bit of the story, but still I wasn’t sold. As days passed by, I completed my radiotherapy, about 2 weeks plus. Getting ready for chemo, so they let me rest for a few days.
See, the mortality rate of lung cancer : Lung cancer has the highest mortality rate. If you add up breast, colorectal (colon) cancer, and prostate cancer (the top few cancers in Singapore for men and women), if you add up the mortality rate of these 3, it still doesn’t add up to lung cancer. Simply because, you understand, you can remove the prostate, the colon, the breast, but you cannot remove your lungs.
But there’s about 10% of lung cancer patients who do pretty well for some reasons, because they have this specific mutation; we call it the EGFR mutation. And it happens, only 90% of the time, in Asian ladies who never smoked in their lives. Me, first of all, I’m male. 2ndly, I’m a social smoker. I take one a day after dinner; weekends, when my friends offer me, I take it as well. I’m a light smoker, not a social smoker. But still, my oncologist was still not hopeful for me to have this mutation.
The chances of it happening for me was maybe 3-4% for me to get it. That’s why I was being primed to go for chemo. But through all the intense prayers, friends like Danny, people that I don’t even know, it turned out that, during my waiting for chemo, the results came back that I was EGFR positive. I was like, “Woah, good news!” Cos now I don’t have to undergo chemo at that time, because there’s this oral tablet that you can use to control this disease.
Just to share with you some idea – this is a CT scan – thorax – of my lungs, before treatment.
AFTER BEFORE
Every single dot there is a tumour. You can see all the mets (metastasis) there. This is just one single plane. Literally I had it in both lungs, and I had literally tens of thousands of tumour. That’s why the oncologist told me, even with chemo, at most 3-4 months.
But because of this mutation, they have this oral medication. This is what happened after 2 months of treatment. As you can see over here; this is what God can do. And that’s why I’m still here having this opportunity to share with you. As you can see over here, the difference between before and after treatment.
At that point, I said, “Well, it’s to be expected, isn’t it? The medicine is good.” I’m still not buying the story. Well, the guys prayed for me and the tumour markers started to come down. 90% of the tumours were wiped out, and the tumour markers came down to more than 90% over the next few months.
But still, you know, once you have the clinical knowledge, you know the statistics. One year survival, two year survival; having all this knowledge is not a good thing. Cos you live with the knowledge that even with all this, the cancer cells are so unstable, they keep mutating. They will overcome and become resistant to the drugs, and eventually you’re gonna run out of medication.
So living with this knowledge is a huge mental struggle, a huge mental torture. Cancer is not just about a physical struggle, it’s a huge mental torture. How do you live with no hope? How do you live with not being able to plan for the next few years? The oncologist tells you to bear with it for the next 1 – 2 months. So it’s a lot of struggles as I went through: March, then April. April was my lowest point, in deep depression, struggling even as I was recovering.
HIS ACCEPTANCE & PEACE
And one of those days, I was there in bed, struggling in the afternoon, asking God, “Why? Why do I have to go through this suffering? Why do I have to endure this hardship, this struggle? Why me?”
As I fell asleep, in my dreamy state, a vision just came, that says Hebrews 12:7-8.
Now mind you, at this time, I had not read the bible. I have no clue what’s Hebrews, I don’t even know how many chapters there are. Totally clueless.
But it says Hebrews 12:7-8, very specifically.
I didn’t think too much of it. I just continued sleeping. Then I woke up, and I said, “What’s there to lose? I’d just check it out lah!” Danny had bought me a bible; it’s still quite new. I said, “It’s ok, just try.” So I flipped to the Old Testament. Hebrews to me sounds like something ancient, so it should be in the Old Testament right? So I flipped through the Old Testament. No Hebrews there. I was so disappointed.
Then I said, “Maybe New Testament, let’s have a look!”. WOW – New Testament, there’s Hebrew’s!! It says Hebrews 12:7-8. It says, “Endure hardship as discipline as God is treating you as His children.”
I said, “WAH!! Where did that come from?” I was getting goose pimples all over my body. I said, “This can’t be, right?” I mean, what’s the chance of somebody, who has never read the bible, to have a vision of a chapter of a specific verse, that answers my question directly?
I think God called to me directly as I was there sleeping, struggling with it, asking God, “Why do I have to suffer? Why do I have to suffer this?” And God says “Endure hardship as discipline as God is treating you as His child.”
At this point, the chance of that happening is even lesser than my EGFR being positive. There’s just no way; there’s so many millions of thousands of verses in the bible, how can I just conjure up something like that?
So at that point, I was sold I said, “YOU WIN! YOU WIN!!”
Ok , I was convinced. And so from that day onwards, I started believing in my God. And the last time I heard that inner voice was the end of April. And that inner voice, same thing, in the afternoon, as I was sleeping (this time I wasn’t struggling, just going to sleep). In a dreamy state I just heard Him say, “Help others in hardship.”
It was more like a command, rather than a statement. And that’s when I embarked on this journey, helping others in hardship. And I realised that hardship is not just about being poor. In fact, I think a lot of poor people are probably happier than a lot of us here. They are so easily contented with whatever they have, they’re probably pretty happy.
Hardship can happen to rich people; it can be physical hardship, mental hardship, social, etc. And also over the last few months, I started to understand what this true joy is about. In the past, I substituted true joy with the pursuing of wealth. I thought true joy is about pursuing wealth. Why? Cos let me put it to you this way, in my death bed, I found no joy whatsoever in whatever objects I had – my Ferrari, thinking of the land I was going to buy to build my bungalow etc, having a successful business.
It brought me ZERO comfort, ZERO joy, nothing at all. Do you think I can hold onto this piece of metal and it’s going to give true joy? Nah, it’s not going to happen.
True joy comes from interaction with other people. And at a lot of times, it is a short term pride, the past. When you pursue your wealth, Chinese New Year is the best time to do it. Drive my Ferrari, show off to my relatives, show off to my friends, do my rounds, and then you thought that was true joy? You really think that those guys who sold you your Ferrari, they share their joy with you? And your relatives, wow, they share this joy with you? In truth, what you have done is just to illicit envy, jealousy, and even hatred. They are not sharing the joy with you, and what I have is that short-term pride that wow, I have something you don’t have! And I thought that was joy!
So what we have is basically a short-term pride at the expense of somebody else. And that wasn’t true joy. And I found no joy at all on my deathbed, thinking of my Ferrari – to hold on to it, sayang it?!?
True joy I discovered comes from interaction. Over the last few months I was so down. Interaction with my loved ones, my friends, my brothers in Christ, my sisters in Christ, and only then was I able to be motivated, able to be uplifted. To share your sorrow, to share your happiness – that’s true joy.
And you know what makes you smile? True joy comes from helping others in hardship, and because I’ve gone through this, I know what hardship entails. In fact, there’re some cancer patients who tell me a lot of times, people come up to them and tell them, “Stay positive. Stay positive.” Yah, right. You come in my shoes and you try to stay positive! You don’t know what you’re talking about!
But I have the license. So I’ve been going out to meet other fellow cancer patients, to share with them, encourage them. And I know, because I’ve been through it, and it’s easier for me to talk to them.
And most importantly, I think true joy comes from knowing God. Not knowing about God – I mean, you can read the bible and know about God – but knowing God personally; getting a relationship with God. I think that’s the most important. That’s what I’ve learnt.
So if I were to sum it up, I’d say that the earlier we sort out the priorities in our lives, the better it is. Don’t be like me – I had no other way. I had to learn it through the hard way. I had to come back to God to thank Him for this opportunity because I’ve had 3 major accidents in my past – car accidents. You know, these sports car accidents – I was always speeding , but somehow I always came out alive, even with the car almost being overturned. And I wouldn’t have had a chance. Who knows, I don’t know where else I’d be going to! Even though I was baptised it was just a show, but the fact that this has happened, it gave me a chance to come back to God.
Few things I’d learnt though:
1. Trust in the Lord your God with all your heart – this is so important.
2. Is to love and serve others, not just ourselves.
There is nothing wrong with being rich or wealthy. I think it’s absolutely alright, cos God has blessed. So many people are blessed with good wealth, but the trouble is I think a lot of us can’t handle it. The more we have, the more we want. I’ve gone through it, the deeper the hole we dig, the more we get sucked into it, so much so that we worship wealth and lose focus. Instead of worshipping God, we worship wealth. It’s just a human instinct. It’s just so difficult to get out of it.
We are all professionals, and when we go into private practice, we start to build up our wealth – inevitably. So my thought are, when you start to build up wealth and when the opportunity comes, do remember that all these things don’t belong to us. We don’t really own it nor have rights to this wealth. It’s actually God’s gift to us. Remember that it’s more important to further His Kingdom rather than to further ourselves.
Anyway I think that I’ve gone through it, and I know that wealth without God is empty. It is more important that you fill up the wealth, as you build it up subsequently, as professionals and all, you need to fill it up with the wealth of God.
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Thursday, November 1, 2012
INSULIN-INDEPENDENT DIABETES
SOME METABOLIC ASPECTS OF STRESS AND DEHYDRATION
"I firmly believe that if the entire materia medico as now used could be sunk to the bottom of the sea, it would be all the better for mankind—and all the -worse for the fishes."- Oliver Wendell Holmes
INSULIN-INDEPENDENT DIABETES
Basically, there are two types of diabetes. For the treatment of one, insulin is needed because the pancreas no longer manufactures insulin. This type is called insulin-dependent diabetes. For the treatment of the other, some chemicals are needed that can gradually release insulin from the pancreas so the diabetic can control the clinical symptoms. This type is called insulin-independent diabetes; the pancreas still has the ability to manufacture insulin. Insulin-independent diabetes, established in the elderly and which can be regulated by the intake of "tablet" forms of medication, is most probably the end result of brain water-deficiency, to the point that its neurotransmitter systems—
particularly the serotonergic system—is being affected. The physiology of the brain is designed in such a way that it
automatically begins to peg-up the glucose threshold so that it can maintain its own volume and its own energy requirements. The brain needs glucose for its energy value and its metabolic conversion to water. The prevalent consensus of opinion is that the bulk of energy requirement in the brain is provided by sugar alone. My personal view is that this is only the case if there is water and salt shortage in the body. Water and salt are absolutely essential for the generation of hydroelectric energy, particularly for neurotransmission mechanisms.
The reason and the mechanism for altering blood sugar levels is quite simple. When histamine becomes active in water regulation and energy management, it also activates a group of substances known as prostaglandins (PCs). PCs are involved in a subordinate system for rationed distribution of water to the cells in the body.
The pancreas—a very complex gland located between the stomach and the duodenum—other than being the seat of insulin manufacture is engaged in the production of copious quantities of a bicarbonate-containing watery solution. This bicarbonate solution is emptied into the duodenum to neutralize acid coming from the stomach. This is how the acid from the stomach is neutralized. It happens that while the stimulating agent, PG of the E type, may
be involved in shunting circulation to the pancreas so that the watery bicarbonate solution can be made, at the same time it naturally inhibits the secretion of insulin from the pancreas. It acts like a very tightly operated servomechanism.
The more one system has to be served, the more the other system will be decommissioned.
Why? Simply,insulin promotes movement of potassium and sugar into the cells of the body. It also promotes entry of some amino acids into cells. Accompanying the passage of sugar, potassium, and amino acids, water will also pass into the cell that has been stimulated by insulin. Such action will automatically reduce the available water that is more easily accessible from outside the cells. In a dehydrated state, the action of insulin would be counterproductive. The logic employed in the design of the body has therefore installed the two actions of water distribution to the pancreas and the needed inhibition of insulin action in the same agent—prostaglandin E. In this way, and at the expense of severe deprivation of some cells, water is made available for the act of food digestion and acid neutralization in the intestines.
As it happens, when insulin secretion is inhibited, except for the brain, the metabolism of the body is severely disrupted. In a dehydrated state, the brain benefits from insulin inhibition. The brain cell itself is not dependent on insulin for its functions While cells in most other parts of the body are totally dependent on the properties of insulin for their normal function. If we think about it, there is a natural logic to the ultimate production of insulin-independent diabetes in severe chronic dehydration. Why is it called insulin-independent diabetes? Because the body can still
manufacture insulin, although it takes the influence of some chemical agents to promote its secretion.
This phenomenon of insulin inhibition with dehydration shows that the primary function of the pancreatic gland is directed at the provision of water for food digestion. Insulin inhibition is an adaptation process of the gland to the dehydration of the body.
TRYPTOPHAN AND DIABETES
Even the simplest explanation on tryptophan may seem too complicated. However, some very basic understanding
about this amino acid must be provided to make sense of some of the statements that are presented in this book
Remember, the body is a very complex chemical plant that is extremely sensitive to fluctuations in the flow of its
primary raw materials.
The brain is designed to resuscitate itself, when there is water and salt shortage in the body. It raises the levels of
sugar in circulation. The raised level of sugar is supposed to balance the vital osmotic equilibrium, in the same way
that a doctor resuscitates a patient by the use of sugar and salt-containing intravenous fluid drips. One also needs
to recognize another simple point: Osmotic forces that must be available for extracellular fluid volume regulation are
developed primarily by its salt content, by its raised sugar content, and sometimes by its increased uric acid content.
But in insulin-dependent type of diabetes, there may be severe salt shortage, in which case the brain has no
alternative but to raise the level of sugar even more to compensate for the low salt reserves in the body. This
process is an automatic step in the design of the brain activity that is master-managed by the various direct, and
indirect, functions of tryptophan. It has also been shown that tryptophan is the basic substance that the body needs
as a vital ingredient to convert into the three or even four most essential neurotransmitters so far recognized.
In insulin-independent diabetes, one needs to pay particular attention to adequate protein intake to make up for the
possible tryptophan insufficiency that may be the root cause of the disease. Why? It seems that dehydration causes
a severe depletion of brain tryptophan, a most essential amino acid in the human body. When there is adequate
amount of tryptophan in the brain, among its other effects, the pain threshold is raised—one endures pain better.
»Tryptophan content in the brain shows a great drop in its levels in some diabetic animals.
To stress this point again, salt, sugar, and uric acid are involved in balancing the osmotic forces of fluid composition held outside the cells. Salt content is responsible for the greatest contribution to the extracellular osmotic balance. Regulatory properties of tryptophan itself, or its dependent neurotransmission systems, operate a measuring mechanism for the amount of salt that is kept in the body. Serotonin, tryptamine, melatonin, and indolamine are derived from tryptophan, and all are neurotransmitters. Thus, tryptophan is the natural brain regulator for salt absorption in the body. It seems that lower levels of tryptophan—and in consequence, its neurotransmitter products—will establish lower-than-normal salt reserves.
As a back-up mechanism in the body, the RA system seems to compensate by inducing salt retention in the body.Histamine and its RA system activity become increasingly engaged if the tryptophan-dependent neurotransmitter systems become less involved—through shortage or increased breakdown of tryptophan. It
follows that a low-salt diet is not conducive to the correction of a diabetic's high blood sugar.
• If the blood sugar is to come down, a slight upward adjustment of daily salt intake may become unavoidable. Tryptophan is also a most prominent amino acid employed in the correction of errors in the process of DNA "printout" or replica production. With another amino acid, lysine, they form a bridging system (lysine-tryptophanlysine tripod) that cuts and splices the inaccuracies in DNA transcription. This property of tryptophan is most essential to prevention of cancer cell development in the body.
With the brain's tryptophan replenishment, the histamine-operated systems will be trimmed down to their primary responsibilities—unexaggerated functions. Salt content of the body will be better regulated. The sensation level before registering pain stimulus will be raised. Acid secretion in the stomach will come under normal control. Blood pressure will be normalized to its natural levels for the operation of all functions in the body: kidneys, brain, liver, lungs, gastrointestinal digestive activities, "shower-head" filtration of water into the nerve cells, the joints, and so on will function within their normal range of activity.
There is a direct relationship between walking and the build-up of the brain tryptophan reserves. There are several amino acids that compete for crossing the naturally designed barrier system into the brain. They all have to "piggyback" on the same transporter proteins. These competitors to tryptophan are grouped under the title of branched-chain amino acids (BC amino acids). During exercise, these BC amino acids, along with the fats, are used
as fuel in the larger muscles. Muscles begin to pick up these amino acids from the circulating blood. As a result, the odds are changed in favor of tryptophan for its passage across the blood-brain-barrier and into the brain. One major physiological value to exercising is the direct relationship of muscle activity to the build-up of the brain tryptophan
reserves.
• The brain tryptophan content, and its various by-product neurotransmitter systems, are responsible for maintenance of the "homeostatic balance of the body." Normal levels of tryptophan in the brain maintain a wellregulated balance in all functions of the body—what is meant by homeostasis. With a decrease in tryptophan supply to the brain, there is a proportionate decrease in the efficiency of all functions in the body.
Depression and some mental disorders are the consequence of brain tryptophan imbalance. Prozac used in some mental disorders, particularly in depression, is a drug that stops the enzymes that break down serotonin, a byproduct of tryptophan. When more serotonin is present, all nerves function normally. However, Prozac cannot replace the indispensable role of tryptophan itself. One has to work at replenishing body reserves of tryptophan through a balanced diet and regular water intake.
My research has shown there is a direct relationship between water intake—hemodilution—and efficiency of function in the transport system for the passage of tryptophan into the brain. Water shortage and proportionate histamine release bring about an increase in the rate of tryptophan breakdown in the liver. It seems that adequate water intake arrests the increased and inefficient metabolism of tryptophan in the body. Chronic dehydration causes its loss from the pool of different amino acids held in the body. Tryptophan cannot be manufactured in the body; it must be imported through food intake. It is one of the essential amino acids. Thus, hydration of the body, exercise and the intake of right foods help replenish brain tryptophan reserves.
Another most important fact to remember is the idiosyncrasies that seem to operate in protein metabolism and their manufacture. Proteins are manufactured from joining amino acids together. There are 20 amino acids (AAs) from which different proteins are made. Each protein has a different mix of these AAs. Depending on the sequence of the mix, different characteristics are installed in each protein. Depending on the sequence and the number, the mix can function as enzymes, as assembly lines for the manufacture of other proteins, and as energy generators in the hydroelectric pump units.
All functions of the body are regulated by the special properties and the "sequence characteristics" of its AAs used in enzymes and body proteins. There are eight essential AAs that are not manufactured in the human body; they must be imported from food intake. There are three AAs that can be manufactured but in limited quantities. At certain times, they also become partially scarce. The other nine AAs are amply manufactured within the body. If the normal percentages held in the reserve pool of AAs in the body begins to fluctuate beyond a certain range, some AAs are dumped (differently broken or consumed) to keep the composition of the AA pool within the normal range for future protein and enzyme manufacture. Of the AAs that get dumped in stress, tryptophan seems to be one of the most important.
However, one can not consume this or that amino acid by itself to balance the pool, even if one knew all the intricate ramifications. One must consume the full range of AAs to build the "reserve pool" in due time. The precaution one can take is to eat proteins that have these AAs in ample proportions. Some proteins, such as long-exposed meat, may become deficient in some amino acids. The best proteins are those stored in the germinating seeds of plants, such as lentils, grains, beans, etc.—also in eggs and milk that nature provides to produce the next generation of
chickens and to feed the calf.
Lentils and green beans in particular are good stores for AAs in food ingredients. They contain about 28 percent proteins, 72 percent complex carbohydrates, and no oil. These types of foods are by nature better stores for provision of AAs in proportioned amounts. After all, these better choice of "foods" are naturally designed to procreate a "perfect" replica of the species concerned. The storage of a balanced amino acid composition as a life starter is part of the process.
Insulin-independent diabetes should be treated with an increase in water intake, exercise, and diet manipulation to provide the necessary amino acid balance for tissue repair, including brain tissue requirements. Salt regulation should also be kept in mind. Diabetes is a good example of the next-generation damage that is caused by dehydration. Whereas the onset of dehydration-induced diabetes is normally seen in the elderly and it is often reversible, the more serious and structurally damaging variety of the disease is often inherited by the offspring.
Juvenile diabetes will need the same approach to its early preventive treatment before permanent structural damage can take place. It should be remembered that the genetic transcription mechanism of the parents—in particular the mother—if affected by amino acid pool imbalance, will be equally represented in the offspring. In effect, this is how genetic damage and inherited disorders establish. What you will read in the next few paragraphs is designed to show a representative process. 60/72
"I firmly believe that if the entire materia medico as now used could be sunk to the bottom of the sea, it would be all the better for mankind—and all the -worse for the fishes."- Oliver Wendell Holmes
INSULIN-INDEPENDENT DIABETES
Basically, there are two types of diabetes. For the treatment of one, insulin is needed because the pancreas no longer manufactures insulin. This type is called insulin-dependent diabetes. For the treatment of the other, some chemicals are needed that can gradually release insulin from the pancreas so the diabetic can control the clinical symptoms. This type is called insulin-independent diabetes; the pancreas still has the ability to manufacture insulin. Insulin-independent diabetes, established in the elderly and which can be regulated by the intake of "tablet" forms of medication, is most probably the end result of brain water-deficiency, to the point that its neurotransmitter systems—
particularly the serotonergic system—is being affected. The physiology of the brain is designed in such a way that it
automatically begins to peg-up the glucose threshold so that it can maintain its own volume and its own energy requirements. The brain needs glucose for its energy value and its metabolic conversion to water. The prevalent consensus of opinion is that the bulk of energy requirement in the brain is provided by sugar alone. My personal view is that this is only the case if there is water and salt shortage in the body. Water and salt are absolutely essential for the generation of hydroelectric energy, particularly for neurotransmission mechanisms.
The reason and the mechanism for altering blood sugar levels is quite simple. When histamine becomes active in water regulation and energy management, it also activates a group of substances known as prostaglandins (PCs). PCs are involved in a subordinate system for rationed distribution of water to the cells in the body.
The pancreas—a very complex gland located between the stomach and the duodenum—other than being the seat of insulin manufacture is engaged in the production of copious quantities of a bicarbonate-containing watery solution. This bicarbonate solution is emptied into the duodenum to neutralize acid coming from the stomach. This is how the acid from the stomach is neutralized. It happens that while the stimulating agent, PG of the E type, may
be involved in shunting circulation to the pancreas so that the watery bicarbonate solution can be made, at the same time it naturally inhibits the secretion of insulin from the pancreas. It acts like a very tightly operated servomechanism.
The more one system has to be served, the more the other system will be decommissioned.
Why? Simply,insulin promotes movement of potassium and sugar into the cells of the body. It also promotes entry of some amino acids into cells. Accompanying the passage of sugar, potassium, and amino acids, water will also pass into the cell that has been stimulated by insulin. Such action will automatically reduce the available water that is more easily accessible from outside the cells. In a dehydrated state, the action of insulin would be counterproductive. The logic employed in the design of the body has therefore installed the two actions of water distribution to the pancreas and the needed inhibition of insulin action in the same agent—prostaglandin E. In this way, and at the expense of severe deprivation of some cells, water is made available for the act of food digestion and acid neutralization in the intestines.
As it happens, when insulin secretion is inhibited, except for the brain, the metabolism of the body is severely disrupted. In a dehydrated state, the brain benefits from insulin inhibition. The brain cell itself is not dependent on insulin for its functions While cells in most other parts of the body are totally dependent on the properties of insulin for their normal function. If we think about it, there is a natural logic to the ultimate production of insulin-independent diabetes in severe chronic dehydration. Why is it called insulin-independent diabetes? Because the body can still
manufacture insulin, although it takes the influence of some chemical agents to promote its secretion.
This phenomenon of insulin inhibition with dehydration shows that the primary function of the pancreatic gland is directed at the provision of water for food digestion. Insulin inhibition is an adaptation process of the gland to the dehydration of the body.
TRYPTOPHAN AND DIABETES
Even the simplest explanation on tryptophan may seem too complicated. However, some very basic understanding
about this amino acid must be provided to make sense of some of the statements that are presented in this book
Remember, the body is a very complex chemical plant that is extremely sensitive to fluctuations in the flow of its
primary raw materials.
The brain is designed to resuscitate itself, when there is water and salt shortage in the body. It raises the levels of
sugar in circulation. The raised level of sugar is supposed to balance the vital osmotic equilibrium, in the same way
that a doctor resuscitates a patient by the use of sugar and salt-containing intravenous fluid drips. One also needs
to recognize another simple point: Osmotic forces that must be available for extracellular fluid volume regulation are
developed primarily by its salt content, by its raised sugar content, and sometimes by its increased uric acid content.
But in insulin-dependent type of diabetes, there may be severe salt shortage, in which case the brain has no
alternative but to raise the level of sugar even more to compensate for the low salt reserves in the body. This
process is an automatic step in the design of the brain activity that is master-managed by the various direct, and
indirect, functions of tryptophan. It has also been shown that tryptophan is the basic substance that the body needs
as a vital ingredient to convert into the three or even four most essential neurotransmitters so far recognized.
In insulin-independent diabetes, one needs to pay particular attention to adequate protein intake to make up for the
possible tryptophan insufficiency that may be the root cause of the disease. Why? It seems that dehydration causes
a severe depletion of brain tryptophan, a most essential amino acid in the human body. When there is adequate
amount of tryptophan in the brain, among its other effects, the pain threshold is raised—one endures pain better.
»Tryptophan content in the brain shows a great drop in its levels in some diabetic animals.
To stress this point again, salt, sugar, and uric acid are involved in balancing the osmotic forces of fluid composition held outside the cells. Salt content is responsible for the greatest contribution to the extracellular osmotic balance. Regulatory properties of tryptophan itself, or its dependent neurotransmission systems, operate a measuring mechanism for the amount of salt that is kept in the body. Serotonin, tryptamine, melatonin, and indolamine are derived from tryptophan, and all are neurotransmitters. Thus, tryptophan is the natural brain regulator for salt absorption in the body. It seems that lower levels of tryptophan—and in consequence, its neurotransmitter products—will establish lower-than-normal salt reserves.
As a back-up mechanism in the body, the RA system seems to compensate by inducing salt retention in the body.Histamine and its RA system activity become increasingly engaged if the tryptophan-dependent neurotransmitter systems become less involved—through shortage or increased breakdown of tryptophan. It
follows that a low-salt diet is not conducive to the correction of a diabetic's high blood sugar.
• If the blood sugar is to come down, a slight upward adjustment of daily salt intake may become unavoidable. Tryptophan is also a most prominent amino acid employed in the correction of errors in the process of DNA "printout" or replica production. With another amino acid, lysine, they form a bridging system (lysine-tryptophanlysine tripod) that cuts and splices the inaccuracies in DNA transcription. This property of tryptophan is most essential to prevention of cancer cell development in the body.
With the brain's tryptophan replenishment, the histamine-operated systems will be trimmed down to their primary responsibilities—unexaggerated functions. Salt content of the body will be better regulated. The sensation level before registering pain stimulus will be raised. Acid secretion in the stomach will come under normal control. Blood pressure will be normalized to its natural levels for the operation of all functions in the body: kidneys, brain, liver, lungs, gastrointestinal digestive activities, "shower-head" filtration of water into the nerve cells, the joints, and so on will function within their normal range of activity.
There is a direct relationship between walking and the build-up of the brain tryptophan reserves. There are several amino acids that compete for crossing the naturally designed barrier system into the brain. They all have to "piggyback" on the same transporter proteins. These competitors to tryptophan are grouped under the title of branched-chain amino acids (BC amino acids). During exercise, these BC amino acids, along with the fats, are used
as fuel in the larger muscles. Muscles begin to pick up these amino acids from the circulating blood. As a result, the odds are changed in favor of tryptophan for its passage across the blood-brain-barrier and into the brain. One major physiological value to exercising is the direct relationship of muscle activity to the build-up of the brain tryptophan
reserves.
• The brain tryptophan content, and its various by-product neurotransmitter systems, are responsible for maintenance of the "homeostatic balance of the body." Normal levels of tryptophan in the brain maintain a wellregulated balance in all functions of the body—what is meant by homeostasis. With a decrease in tryptophan supply to the brain, there is a proportionate decrease in the efficiency of all functions in the body.
Depression and some mental disorders are the consequence of brain tryptophan imbalance. Prozac used in some mental disorders, particularly in depression, is a drug that stops the enzymes that break down serotonin, a byproduct of tryptophan. When more serotonin is present, all nerves function normally. However, Prozac cannot replace the indispensable role of tryptophan itself. One has to work at replenishing body reserves of tryptophan through a balanced diet and regular water intake.
My research has shown there is a direct relationship between water intake—hemodilution—and efficiency of function in the transport system for the passage of tryptophan into the brain. Water shortage and proportionate histamine release bring about an increase in the rate of tryptophan breakdown in the liver. It seems that adequate water intake arrests the increased and inefficient metabolism of tryptophan in the body. Chronic dehydration causes its loss from the pool of different amino acids held in the body. Tryptophan cannot be manufactured in the body; it must be imported through food intake. It is one of the essential amino acids. Thus, hydration of the body, exercise and the intake of right foods help replenish brain tryptophan reserves.
Another most important fact to remember is the idiosyncrasies that seem to operate in protein metabolism and their manufacture. Proteins are manufactured from joining amino acids together. There are 20 amino acids (AAs) from which different proteins are made. Each protein has a different mix of these AAs. Depending on the sequence of the mix, different characteristics are installed in each protein. Depending on the sequence and the number, the mix can function as enzymes, as assembly lines for the manufacture of other proteins, and as energy generators in the hydroelectric pump units.
All functions of the body are regulated by the special properties and the "sequence characteristics" of its AAs used in enzymes and body proteins. There are eight essential AAs that are not manufactured in the human body; they must be imported from food intake. There are three AAs that can be manufactured but in limited quantities. At certain times, they also become partially scarce. The other nine AAs are amply manufactured within the body. If the normal percentages held in the reserve pool of AAs in the body begins to fluctuate beyond a certain range, some AAs are dumped (differently broken or consumed) to keep the composition of the AA pool within the normal range for future protein and enzyme manufacture. Of the AAs that get dumped in stress, tryptophan seems to be one of the most important.
However, one can not consume this or that amino acid by itself to balance the pool, even if one knew all the intricate ramifications. One must consume the full range of AAs to build the "reserve pool" in due time. The precaution one can take is to eat proteins that have these AAs in ample proportions. Some proteins, such as long-exposed meat, may become deficient in some amino acids. The best proteins are those stored in the germinating seeds of plants, such as lentils, grains, beans, etc.—also in eggs and milk that nature provides to produce the next generation of
chickens and to feed the calf.
Lentils and green beans in particular are good stores for AAs in food ingredients. They contain about 28 percent proteins, 72 percent complex carbohydrates, and no oil. These types of foods are by nature better stores for provision of AAs in proportioned amounts. After all, these better choice of "foods" are naturally designed to procreate a "perfect" replica of the species concerned. The storage of a balanced amino acid composition as a life starter is part of the process.
Insulin-independent diabetes should be treated with an increase in water intake, exercise, and diet manipulation to provide the necessary amino acid balance for tissue repair, including brain tissue requirements. Salt regulation should also be kept in mind. Diabetes is a good example of the next-generation damage that is caused by dehydration. Whereas the onset of dehydration-induced diabetes is normally seen in the elderly and it is often reversible, the more serious and structurally damaging variety of the disease is often inherited by the offspring.
Juvenile diabetes will need the same approach to its early preventive treatment before permanent structural damage can take place. It should be remembered that the genetic transcription mechanism of the parents—in particular the mother—if affected by amino acid pool imbalance, will be equally represented in the offspring. In effect, this is how genetic damage and inherited disorders establish. What you will read in the next few paragraphs is designed to show a representative process. 60/72
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