Seeing the Light

A neighbor told me she was having great health calamities that seemed to emanate out of her brain, and after being scheduled for the MRIs and CATscans, she mentioned Vitamin D deficiency as a possible suspect, which I happened to note, has overlapping similarities to Seasonal Affective Disorder (SAD), and fibromyalgia (autoimmune diseases), and so it struck me that despite being lactose-intolerant, I don’t have the symptoms or concerns of Vitamin D deficiency, SAD, FMS, and innumerable dysfunctions as I frequently do, and even my main concern of late seemed to have corrected itself, and the reading of this blog http://www.fightingfatigue.org/?p=1220 , seemed to be deja vu of my reading of the fibromyalgia blog, on learning that a doctor had claimed that his “guaifenesin protocol” cured that condition.

In short, just as guaifenesin (the active ingredient in (Robi)tussin) seemed to work wonderfully and reliably at liquefying the mucous so one could breathe comfortably and cough out clotted mucous from the lungs during a cold, flu or other respiratory episodes, that liquefying of the mucous occurred throughout the body, and so as the body’s main medium and lubricant, it was logical that a lot of functions would be impaired in every cell, tissue and organ in the body -- with some being more notable and problematical than others.

I went on to observe that that seemed to be a familiar aspect of aging and all deteriorative conditions noted through literature and medicine -- a condition called “phlegmatic,” or lifeless/unresponsive.

Medical people don’t like such panaceas, or universal explanations as to why things can go wrong universally -- because the specialists orientation, is their belief that each thing is totally unrelated to any and every other.

But there’s also a very modern understanding of cause and behavior which identifies the “critical path” -- that if things go wrong there, nothing else can go right subsequently, and so the hundred things that go wrong, are really only one thing that needs to be solved for every other thing to be right.

Vitamin D deficiency seems to be another one of these “critical paths,” much as I found guaifenesin to be a few years before. But even prior to that, I noted living in the Pacific Northwest that I was particularly susceptible to Seasonal Affective Disorder (SAD), which I noted, was cured by my purchasing a season’s pass for the tanning booths during the winter months -- and in all seasons, felt a need to get a fair amount of exposure to maintain my well-being.

However, this year, because of the economy and a move back to the Pacific Northwest after ten years in Hawaii, I wondered if I would have to take up another tanning pass because one of the great bargains I discovered was that full spectrum compact fluorescent bulbs could be purchased at the same price as the standard ones many find to be substandard about conventional fluorescent lighting,

There is a huge difference between low-spectrum (soft-white) and full-spectrum (daylight) bulbs): the former illuminates at 2400K while full spectrum is 5000-6500K, and at the 100 watt equivalent of only 23 watts, seems to have a demonstrable therapeutic effect -- and particularly because I replaced all the bulbs, and keep them on all the time, which has the effect of transforming my entire living area, into a quasi-tanning booth or light therapy unit, and so haven’t felt the need to use a tanning booth.

but the thing that had me perplexed as of late was that my need for reading glasses (aging eyes) had disappeared, and I wondered which of the nutraceuticals I had been taking had that effect on me -- until my neighbor broached the subject of her Vitamin D deficiency and I hastily replied, that the most effective means of deriving this vitamin seems to be in high intensity (at least 23 watts) of full spectrum (daylight) compact fluorescent that Walgreens sells cheaper than anybody else at 3 for $9.

And so unlike everybody else around me being susceptible to all kinds of afflictions in this year’s particularly light deficient season, relative to everybody else, I seem to have resisted the depression quite well and have improved.