Post dental revision update on me!

I did it!  It's done!  My mouth is officially mercury and cavitation FREE!!

My sister joked that I still have mercury in my eyes and thyroid though....hahaha, this is true!  I will start chelation with DMSA only this weekend, four days from the dental revision, as recommended by Andy Cutler.  I cannot go near ALA for three months, because it would force the free flowing mercury in my body from the dental revision INTO my brain, which means that Dave will need to prepare and dose all of the kids' chelation for the next three months, until I can add it into my rounds.  So I will be starting with my first round during Grayson's 48th and Gavins 22nd rounds.  Interestingly, we are each separated by about 22+ rounds.

Did it hurt?
The procedure itself was a piece of cake, and I am really still very surprised about that considering the amount of damage that was done to the back half of my mouth!  The body is truly amazing at healing itself.  Eight fillings (I know I said 7 previously, but it turns out that my one resin filling also had metal in it) were drilled out, a few were really deep and needed a calcium carbonate buffer before the filling was put in.  Grandio was the composite of choice.  It seems to have really good reviews as far as composites go and it was one of the composites in my "least reactive" biocompability results.  I was made to feel very comfy before they started work, they covered me with a warm blanket and gave me a heating pad for the hand that would have the two IVs (conscious sedation and vitamin C drip).  She did a GREAT job putting the IVs in, nothing like the delivery nurses at the hospital, lol!  Then I was draped from head to toe, literally, as we waited for the sedation to kick in.  She said they were going to see if I was a cheap date, they injected 5mg of the sedation initially, to see how sensitive I was.  I watched them as they covered every exposed part of my body, my hair with a shower cap, goggles over my eyes, draping over my body and the dam in my mouth to work around each tooth individually.  Some time after putting the oxygen in my nose and starting work, I remember hearing her say that I wasn't such a cheap date, lol, I was too aware still.  It turns out I needed 28mg of the sedation to keep me out of it.  I remember bits and pieces of the experience, the memories jump around a bit like I was in and out of it.  Before I even realized it, 9am quickly became noon and I was pulled out of my sedation to visit the ladies room while they grabbed a quick lunch.  I wearily hobbled my way to the bathroom and back.  I felt goofy like I had just learned to walk, lol.  I stole a peek in the bathroom mirror - WHITE TEETH, all white!!  My large filling was still half empty though, because it was going to be an onlay, where they fit a piece of the resin directly into the top of the tooth, based on a molding of my teeth done pre-surgery.  Twenty minutes later, I was back in lala-land and undergoing the surgical part of my procedure.  The cavitations!  In case you don't know what a cavitation is, here is a description.

A cavitation is a hole in the bone, often where a tooth has previously been extracted. Cavitations can occur in any bone in the body, but are most frequently found in the jawbones. The most common site is the wisdom tooth area.

Filled with Toxins
Recognized as far back as the 1800's, jawbone cavitations go by a number of names, such as ischemic osteonecrosis, neuralgia inducing cavitational osteonecrosis (NICO) , osteomeyelitis of the jawbone, jaw ostitis, and others. These lesions characteristically are not painful, tender or inflamed. They are silent, and thus often go undetected. These jawbone lesions are like cesspools; they become filled with toxins and even have been shown to store mercury. If your body can quarantine the toxins, you will be OK, but if they go out into your system, they can cause a myriad of symptoms.

Research
Jawbone cavitations and their bodily effects are discussed in the book, Death in Dentistry, by Dr. Martin Fisher. He presents the research of world renowned doctors, including Frank Billings and E.C. Rosenow. Dr. Billings was head of medicine at Chicago's prestigious Rush Medical College. These medical doctors did years of research on health problems as they relate to the mouth. Recent research by Dr. Boyd Haley, Head of Chemistry at the University of Kentucky, shows the toxins from cavitations to be more more potent than botulinum!

In order to address a cavitation, the doctor (this is where Dr. Grube truly stands apart from most doctors) cuts open the gums over the cavitation (in my case, all four wisdom teeth), pulls the skin back, drills a large hole into the jaw bone, cleans out the site really well and lastly cleans it out with ozonated water.  The bone will develop a blood clot where it is cleaned and scraped out, allowing oxygenation in the bone, for proper healing and ventilation.  She stitches it back up and sprays the stitches with the ozone water to make sure they are sterile.  I was pulled back out of my dreamland by 3:30 and sent upstairs for a one hour massage and accupressure!  I kept the oxygen, because that helps push the medicine out of my body.  I didn't even feel numb by this point anymore!  In fact, when I was back in the dental chair at 4:30 for the placement of my onlay, I could feel her shaving down the tooth a little, ouch!  By 5pm I was on my way to the hotel with my three favorite guys!  My whole day felt like it was only two hours long when I was actually there from 8:30 to 5pm!

The worst part of the experience was the corners of my mouth from having my skin stretched for about 5 hours.  They are raw and scabbing now.  I can barely open my mouth!  My teeth are slightly sensitive to biting still and I can feel the stitches hanging in the back of my mouth.  She leaves long-ish tails on the stitches, so I am sort of gagging on them, ick!  They should be dissolved within about 5 days.  One already fell out this morning.  I think they will heal faster, because I drink wheat grass which is VERY healing, so I let each sip sit in the back of my mouth for a few seconds before swallowing it.  I also do salt loading with my iodine doses, which involves using 1/2 teaspoon of Real Salt in some water and I drink it (YUCKY), again, I am letting that sit in the back of my mouth before swallowing too.  I probably won't be eating truly solid foods for a few days and I am not allowed to have anything crunchy, hard or hot for EIGHT weeks!  At first, I also thought my bite might have been changed, but as I allow my jaw to relax, I find my teeth settling in line again.  I have been too focused on my bite, the stitches and my teeth which tenses up all the muscles.  I can tell now that they are fine.  More than anything, the post surgery stuff is annoying.  Since taking three doses of Hypericum (homeopathy they gave me) the night of the procedure, I haven't had even a ting of pain, not one!  Dr. Grube ROCKS!!

Post-surgery, improvements?
So today is two days post-surgery and even with the disrupted sleep we've been having (kids are both sick and up a few times a night each), I feel pretty darn good!  I've already had two major improvements worth sharing.

For about the past 6-12 months, I have been experiencing pain in my left foot upon waking.  I would step out of bed in the morning and couldn't put my weight on my left foot, because of severe pain from my three small toes being numb.  It was way worse than pins and needles.  I would hobble over to my sock drawer to put on a pair of socks, then to the bathroom where the pain would finally start to go away.  The first morning after the surgery, I noticed I didn't have this pain, but I was also in a hotel and didn't know, if the firmer bed had anything to do with it...thinking maybe it was a circulation problem from a pressure point in my softer bed or something, I didn't want to get too excited.  But this morning, I couldn't wait to see what it would be like when I hopped out of bed...sure enough, I could step flat foot, no pain! WOW!  It's been a very long time since I could do that.  It now appears that I was either experiencing some form of neuropathy from the mercury or perhaps my circulation was effected by disruption to my meridian, who knows, all I know is that I am VERY happy it's gone!  I expect I may experience it again as I go through chelation though, since I will be forcing the mobilization of mercury through my body.  I did a brief search online for neuropathy causes and found this listed on Quest Diagnositics' website.

"Peripheral neuropathy may also be caused by several heavy metals. Lead toxicity is associated with motor neuropathy, whereas arsenic and mercury cause sensory neuropathy. The 24-hour urine heavy metal test is the most useful test for diagnosis of heavy metal toxicity."

This is from the Neurology Channel

"Some neuropathies develop suddenly; others progress slowly, even over a number of years. Severity varies among individuals and may vary in the same individual throughout the day. Symptoms of neuropathy generally are more severe at night."

The other interesting improvement, which I actually expected, has to do with an infection I was experiencing in the back of my throat daily.  I always had this constant need to clear my throat, even when I wasn't sick.  Taking GSE two to three times a day usually kept it under control, but if I missed a dose, it would start right back up again. I assumed this was yeast overgrowth, mainly because I know that many sinus infections are caused by yeast overgrowth and GSE addresses yeast.  When I was at my first exam with Dr. Grube, her husband who is a chiropractor, did some muscle testing on me and told me that I had a staph infection in my cavitations.  That would explain the throat clearing and why GSE helped it.  I haven't taken GSE since the surgery and I have had no need to clear my throat with the exception of waking first thing in the morning!  This was so chronic previously, that I KNOW now it was an infection in my jawbone.  Wild!! 

I don't really look forward to the joys of chelating, but I am hopeful that I will be headed down the road of aging gracefully and healthy with my mercury free mouth.  I already feel different, so I can't even imagine what completing chelation will do for me!  Stay tuned for my personal experience with chelation, I will finally know how my children feel!

PS - I found this great link which addresses cavitations in more detail.  If you have ever had a tooth pulled any tooth, even wisdom teeth, have amalgams or still use fluoride (have fluoridated water) and if all three apply, PLEASE read this!

Hiding from my family today, literally!

I am hiding in my bedroom.  Sounds extreme, I know, but keep reading to find out why.  My dental revision is scheduled for tomorrow morning which is stressful in and of itself, but it seems like every possible thing that could go wrong before the big day, has.  It's been one exciting stressor after another.

If you have been following my blog, you know that I have been trying to have my amalgams replaced since before Christmas!  First, I put it off because I wanted to do more research into the Huggins protocol, then I found a Huggins dentist and scheduled my initial exam appointment to start the process.  I was thrilled, but hesitant about the cost.  It took some time for me to come to grips with the cost difference of using a Huggins alliance dentist.  My husband assured me that we cannot put a price on health, and that we would figure it out, regardless of what we had to do to make this happen.  The day before my exam with Dr. Grube, she called at 9:30pm to cancel, because of a conflict with her schedule, so the appointment was again  pushed off to a later date.

At that appointment which was in the middle of February, they gave me the biocompatibility blood test to have done between then and my dental revision date, which we scheduled for March 7th.  There was barely enough time to get the test done by their "emergency" turn around time of five days.  It normally takes two weeks!  So I knew I had to rush out to get my blood work done on that Monday (one week, five business days from my dental revision date).  The doctor told me that Quest won't do test kit blood work, LabCorp was their best recommendation, but ultimately, it was on me to find a lab that would cooperate with the detailed, lengthy instructions on the test kit paperwork.  After fasting through Sunday night into Monday, I promptly called the closest LabCorp number (a thirty minute drive away) and couldn't find any way to get through their telephone system to a live person.  Everything was automated about their location, hours, test info, etc.  I pressed every button trying to reach a live person, hahaha, with no success.  So I called the headquarters number from their website and spoke with someone there.  I told them that I had a test kit from my doctor who recommended LabCorp and that I had to confirm they could draw and centrifuge a blood serum sample.  She told me that they could, the charge for the blood draw would be $23 and she asked for the name of the Lab it was being done for (BioComp Lab) and she went to check to see, if they could do the shipment of the sample for me too since it was a 30 minute drive for me.  When she came back, she said they could do it and that they would be able to pull up the lab in their computer to find out what the FedEx charge would be, I would just pay them there.  Perfect!  I was on my way in no time.  Dave even took the morning off so I could leave Gavin with him.  And boy was I starving....go figure, the one day I needed to fast, I WOULD be hungry, wouldn't I?  Hunger pains and all, lol.

As my luck would have it, when I arrived at the lab, the lady had no idea what to do with the test kit.  I sat beside her as she read through the pages of paperwork and then called the headquarters and her direct supervisor who both told her she could not do the test.  WHAT?!  Are you freakin kidding me?  I was furious, hungry, 30 minutes away from home and had no backup plan, because I CALLED FIRST to make sure they could do it!  Luckily, just that weekend I had gotten the name of a generic lab in the area for Grayson's blood work from Dr. Schmidt and I called home for that info.  The lady there told me they could do it, I was so relieved.  So back towards home I went, starving by now since it was nearly lunch time.  The place I went to was called Any Lab Tests Now!....a little ghetto?  Yeah, it was.  They had two dogs walking around with no separation from the blood draw seating and when the girl (I said lady before, but she was a girl) was preparing to draw my blood, she was very unsure of herself.  She aimed at my vein three times, diving in like she was going to prick me, then backing up, diving in, backing up....she was clearly nervous.  But I was just glad to have it done.  There was still more though, the blood had to sit and clot for 15 minutes, then be spun (centrifuged) for 20 and frozen for 2-3 hours.  Dave went back to pick it up, he verified that it was frozen and was yellow (proper separation) and then he priority overnighted it to BioComp....$50, geez!

So you would think this would be the end of it....I was relieved to be on my way to the dental revision which was only 6 days away at this point.  Tuesday passes by, then first thing Wednesday morning when I am on my way out the door with the kids to play outside, a package gets delivered to my front door from Dr. Grube.  It's another biocompatibility test kit.  And why?  I hoped it had been an error.  I called the office and they told me the lab was supposed to call me the night before (which they did and I just never got the message, totally my fault).  I needed to do the test over!!  And since I never got the message from the night before, I never fasted for this test and couldn't do it today!  And it's now the Wednesday before my Monday appointment!  I called the lab (which is two hours behind in time, of course, just my luck) which is when I found out that the "problem" with my blood sample was actually that my blood reacted to just about EVERYTHING on the test.  I was even moderately reacting to gold, which is very rare. So he said two things were possible, one is that the sample was heat damaged in transit, although it looked fine when it arrived, and the other possibility is that I am truly reacting to everything, in which case, I would really need to get myself to a doctor, fast!  Great, like I needed more worries!  So the new plan was to redo the test first thing Thursday morning and overnight it to them for Friday morning delivery.  They would test it as soon as possible and e-mail the results to us (me and Dr. Grube) by mid-day....THEIR mid-day, which is two hours behind our mid-day, lol.  Talk about cutting it close, we had NO room for error this time.  And I still had to find a lab that would do my blood draw and properly.  I had a bad feeling about the lab I chose.  This also meant an additional blood draw fee and another overnight delivery.  But whose counting pennies now, right?  It's like buying a house and worrying about the inspection fees, just do it and shut up!  The cost of doing business.

Thursday morning, I happily did my thing, got the blood draw (at a WONDERFUL lab right around the corner from my house, I'm such an idiot), went back to pick it up from the lab, sent it out Fed Ex by 1pm (my best friend got me a 75% discount on Fed Ex!!), things were looking up.  I felt good about it all.  Sure enough, Friday I received a "normal" test by e-mail.  I was still highly reactive to some things, any dental materials that included: aluminum (so glad I make my own deodorant and stopped using make-up with aluminum!), copper, zinc acetate, beryllium, gallium, zirconium, bismuth, lithium (hmmm, I take this as a supplement), cadmium and molybdenum (something else I take as a supplement).  I was also moderately reactive to: lead, mercury (go figure) and nickel.  The majority of findings, luckily, were still in the least reactive category, which is how it should be, whew!

So back to why I am hiding in my room.  Thursday night the kids came down with an illness.  Grayson came home from school with a raw upper lip from a burning runny nose and Gavin couldn't seem to sleep a wink.  Now, Grayson is coughing all over the place and Gavin has diarrhea.  Being sick would NOT be good considering the stress I will be putting my body under for this procedure.  And to make matters worse, I was late with my period so I feared pregnancy, which thankfully has been proven wrong, although now...yes, I am going to be going through surgery on my second heaviest flow day!  So today I sit here in my bed, complete with stomach pains and a headache which are par for the course, but they also have me worried about possibly getting sick.  I have done everything under the sun to try to remain healthy amongst sick kids: 80,000IU of vit D3 a day, zinc, high doses of CLO for the increased vit A, vit C (although I can't use it 36 hours before the surgery), homeopathy, hydrogen peroxide in my ears, and washing my hands every time I go near the kids....the skin is practically raw.  I have been drinking wheat grass regularly, and using a super antioxidant called Protandim daily, so I hope they have boosted my health power!!  The stress can't be good, I have been so highly stressed since the shenanigans with the blood testing, I just hope the baths with epsom salts and deep breathing help fight this off.  I am trying to stay as calm as possible!! Writing is therapeutic for me! Just one more day, I keep telling myself, just one more day!!  By tomorrow this time, I will be in the chair and on my way to a healthier future!

PS - I want to also thank my wonderful husband who has been extremely supportive of this whole process along the way.  Right now, he is downstairs taking care of our sick kids and making a triple batch of pancakes to have ready for our long drive early tomorrow morning and then again for our return drive Tuesday morning (we will need to spend the night there after the surgery).  Without him, this would never have been possible.  He has assured me that we will do whatever is necessary, we want to grow old together!  This healthy husband of mine has no fillings, not one.  No one can tell me that mercury doesn't harm us when placed in our mouths, I am living with the proof in so many ways.