COPD treatment: My Story
I wanted to write about my COPD treatment, and my experience with aspects of this disease. About four months ago I found that I was having a great deal of difficulty breathing. I live in a two-story house with a dog and a cat, and a lot of dust. I also have two children, and I wanted them to experience the best.When I was younger, I had signs of asthma, but it was never to the point where I sought COPD treatment or constantly needed an inhaler.
Even years back, when I had a cat, I had some difficulty breathing, but not a lot. It was always manageable, and something that I didn't need to seek a COPD treatment or see a doctor about. I had your standard abuterol inhaler, but it wasn't something that I used all the time.
About six months ago, I started noticing that I was having real trouble breathing. I didn't think much about it at the time, and I blamed it on our cat. I had always been sensitive to the underhairs on a cat, and I figured that my asthmatic condition was because of the cat shedding and flaking.
So, I got a couple of inhalers from my doctor, and I dealt with the symptoms when they came along. I never thought that I needed a COPD treatment. But then I started noticing that the symptoms of shortness of breath were coming up more and more, and I was having a harder time breathing. I had a prescription from a doctor for five inhalers, which I used up in about four months.
The symptoms really kicked in at night. I would wake up short of breath, and have to use the inhaler to go back to sleep. I didn't realize that that wasn't a good thing. Still, needing a COPD treatment was the farthest thing from my mind.
COPD treatments: The Beginning
When my inhaler prescription ran out, I called my doctor and asked for a refill, but he insisted upon seeing me. I told him the situation, how I had an ongoing problem breathing, and he suggested that I take some breathing tests to test for COPD. I don't know what the technical name of the test were, but if you have ever been tested for COPD treatments, you probably know them.I was asked to breathe into a machine as hard as I could, then I was asked to breathe in a certain manner, in different ways to test my lung capacity as well as how hard I could breathe out. I remember at the end of the sessions how I would run out of breath at the end of the testing cycles. I would always let out a cough, as if I was trying to get something else out at the very end.
Halfway through the test, I was given a shot of an inhaler, and told to do it again. Immediately, my breathing improved. and my test results were much better. For my first COPD treatment, I was given a trial dose of a Advair disc, and sent home. In terms of a COPD treatment, for a few days, I was feeling pretty good using the Advair disk. But I didn't quite understand the directions, and used more than I should have. Instead of one inhalation a day, I had actually used two. I didn't have any strange side effects from it, but my trial just ran out two weeks faster.
Wanting that same relief, I called my doctor to get more. At the same time, I put in my prescription for the disk, only to find out that my insurance wouldn't cover my COPD treatment prescription because of the cost. I came to find out that even with my insurance, the disk would cost me close to $200 per month. I couldn't believe it. Such a high cost for such a small amount of drugs.
So, there was a portion of time over the next three weeks where I had no COPD treatment, and was more than a little desperate. I spent the better part of that time calling my insurance company, who said that my doctor hadn't put in the correct paperwork, calling my doctor, and telling them what the insurance company said, and pretty much getting nowhere.
I still couldn't breathe, I still needed the drugs, and I still got no satisfaction. I went back to my doctor, who prescribed me another COPD treatment, a cheaper one. Symbiocort. This one was a little less expensive than the original one.
But then, I started to read about that COPD treatment, and all the side effects that the Symbiocort inhalers cause. And after reading them and checking them out, I wasn't sure that I wanted to pursue a long-term relationship with them.
My COPD Treatment Turning Point
Now, I should tell you that I have always been a strong advocate of natural health. I've done my fair share of reading books on natural supplements, juicing, and natural cures. So I did some research online, and I really couldn't find any one thing reagrding COPD treatments that would help me. I found a clue here or there, but in the end, I was looking for the one cure that could help me, and that, on my part was a mistake.
As I've learned since, COPD treatments from a natural stance depend on a multiple supplement protocol, not just one thing.
Now, myself and my wife are happy people, but deep down inside, we both knew that we had health issues that we needed to address. We also knew that God makes one of the most incredibly perfect things on earth in the human body.
Think about it. It is amazing the amount of abuse that we put our bodies through over the course of the 70, 80, 90, 100 years that we spend on this planet. We give it the wrong nutrients and the wrong food, we breathe polluted air and drink polluted water, yet still our bodies manages to fight off disease, and keep going for the most part.
Drugs tend to hide problems that bodies are going through, and not really heal the central problem. One thing that I understood was this: I knew my body was lacking something that could turn my condition around. I just didn't know what it was, and I needed to go to somebody who could tell me what I needed, and prescribe a COPD treatment that could help.
Fortunately, my pastor told me about a doctor who specialized in natural cures, and supplements. I decided to go see him, and find out what my body was lacking once and for all.
The Doctor
Me and my wife went to go see The Doctor, a naturopath. He was a very nice man, a little eccentric, and very knowledgeable. I explained to him my situation, and how I was on the verge of being diagnosed with COPD. I asked him if there was anything that he could do to help me, and his reply surprised me. In a nonchalant manner, he said to me, "we can probably have you breathing normal in a couple of weeks."
On one hand, it surprised me, but on the other hand, it didn't. I knew that this condition could be fixed, but his reaction to my statement threw me. Could he really give me a COPD treatment that could reverse this in just a few weeks?
Me and The Doctor got acquainted, I told him some of my concerns, and he told me about some of the possible cures for my condition. I was encouraged by what he said. Then it was time for him to begin his work.
He had a microscope hooked up to a flatscreen monitor, and several devices on his desk, including a machine that tested blood for cholesterol. He took a sample of my blood using a needle that pricked my finger. A small drop of blood came out of my finger, which he quickly captured in a few small vials. He'd then transferred one of the vials to a slide, and examined the slide under the microscope. He showed me what my blood looked like on the flatscreen.
We spent a good 20 to 30 minutes looking at the blood, and how the blood cells were actually linked together, instead of free-floating singular cells. He explained to me exactly what that meant, and why I needed to have this supplement or that supplement to correct the situation.
I won't go into great detail about what he said about my particular bloodwork, because quite frankly it was so in depth that I probably couldn't remember it all anyway, but in the end, I ended up with the following supplements for my natural COPD treatment:
CoQ10
Niacin
EPA-DHA Fish Oil
CSI
Red Yeast Rice
Assorted B and C Vitamins
My wife pretty much got the same thing, except in smaller doses. My dosages were twice as large as hers. She had blood issues, as well, that were similar to mine. He told us to take these for a month and then come back. And so we did. More on the results in a moment. But first, I want you to understand how bad off I was before I started my COPD treatment.
Before My Natural COPD Treatment...
One of the things that I couldn't do was work out. I couldn't work out, because I couldn't breathe. I had a very frightening experience about two weeks before I went to go see The Doctor. I was driving around, and not paying attention to my gas tank, and I ran out of gas, about a mile from my home. I wasn't concerned about it, and I figured that I could just walk. And so I did.
But about a quarter of a mile in, I found that I was having a very hard time. And I made of very hard time. I found that I had to stop and try to catch my breath. It was like no matter how hard I tried, I could not catch my breath. It was frightening, I couldn't even imagine not being able to walk a simple mile without being able to breathe. It was really the first time that I recognized how bad my condition was.
I finally made it home, but it was after considerable effort, much more than it should have been. I say all this to frame a "before and after" scenario. Before, I couldn't breathe at night without an inhaler. Before, I couldn't walk a mile without feeling like I would never catch my breath. This was before The Doctor.
Fast forward to my second appointment with The Doctor. The Doctor re-examined our blood. He was very happy with the results from my wife. Her blood had been in a certain state, but that state had completely changed, and you could see the difference in the microscope. She had begun working out again, and was feeling much better. "It's going to be hard for you to beat this," The Doctor said to me.
I knew that to be true. My wife had been religiously taking fiber (Nopalina) on top of the Fish Oil tablets that The Doctor prescribed. Between the two, and the other various supplement that have been described, her blood had been totally transformed in just one month.
Now, it was my turn to see what happened to me in that month with my natural COPD treatments. In that month, I had felt a change. I have been using the inhaler (less and less, and I had actually begun working out again, and could do a mile on the treadmill without breathing too hard. I'd actually begun to run a little bit as well. But I had no idea how much I had changed doing my COPD treatment until the doctor looked at my blood in the microscope.
You could see the change. No longer was my blood cells clumped up, but they were looser, more free-flowing. My bad cholesterol in one month had dropped 60 points, from 250 down to 192. And I was definitely breathing better, even with animals in the house. The natural COPD treatment was working.
It was a marked improvement, an incredible change. Both myself and my wife in one short month were changed and healed by the use of natural supplements. Instead of believing the established medical line, I decided to think for myself, and seek our own COPD treatment that didn't have side effects that would affect my health, and begin a long chain reaction of drugs that would do nothing but prolong symptoms that could be quickly and easily remedied. In other words, we found what we were lacking, filled those holes, and found our cure.
To those who are struggling with COPD and are looking for COPD treatments, I strongly advise you to seek out natural alternatives. There are plenty of them. I found that I wasn't getting the cure that I needed because of the things that I lacked in my body. When I found those things, and introduced them into my body, my condition changed completely in for the better.
Over the past month, I have been receiving frantic letters and phone calls from my regular doctor, telling me that I needed to come in immediately to discuss my COPD. I finally got a hold of them today, and let them know that I would see them soon, but there was no rush. I told them that I had been taking supplements, and was feeling much better. I still will go in to see the regular doctor, but I have a really good feeling that I won't be needing any of their long term COPD treatments. I'm not done battling these symptoms of COPD just yet.
I still have a ways to go to get my body back into the shape that it should be, but I'm very encouraged by what natural means has done for me. I will do my best over the next few weeks to fill this blog was what I've learned about COPD treatments.
If you have any questions, please feel free to ask me in the comments section, and I will try to answers them the best I can. Thanks for letting me rant, and I hope that this is the beginning of a great journey for both you and I.
GeeCee
