Doing it the Natural Way 

Written by Donna Martini

It all started with a major belly ache one day after eating honeydew melon.  My stomach distended from the chest down and was so tender I couldn’t move off my bed.  An hour went by and the feeling worsened as nausea took hold and a pain started to generate from my intestine. Not sure of what to do, I just laid there hoping it was indigestion and would go away, but it didn’t.  For almost 18 hours I was stuck on that bed with a fever that reached 101 degrees and no explanation of what was going on.

There was no vomiting so it wasn’t a virus or appendicitis, but what was it?  A bad melon?  Two weeks later, the melon question would be answered as the same symptoms attacked after eating lunch.  This time, the fever came quickly and lasted about 24 hours before it would subside.  Two weeks after, it struck a third time and lasted even longer.  My doctor was not much help and wanted me to get to a gastroenterologist, but I wasn’t convinced it was my intestines or colon.  I started to look up my symptoms and realized it could have been peritonitis, but since it was intermittent, the peritonitis had to be a symptom of another condition. 

While trying to put the puzzle pieces together, I remembered a conversation with my friend Leslie.  Her first symptom was gastro trouble.  I quickly Googled ovarian cysts and found the number one symptom was stomach distress caused by the cysts leaking estrogen into the abdomen.  There were also other symptoms listed that I was experiencing, but never made the correlation.  I called my gynecologist and made an appointment.

The day of the exam I explained my issues, but my doctor just gave me a cross-eyed look and said the symptoms were probably unrelated.  I insisted on a sonogram and he denied me.  Upon examination, he found no physical evidence of cysts.  I insisted again and made a case for myself telling him of my girlfriend Leslie’s cancer and how the doctors thought her symptoms were innocent as well.  He finally did the sonogram, and guess what?  There were a bunch of cysts in there, one being almost 6mm and, yes, they were probably the culprits causing of all of my stomach distress.

This gynecologist recommended I go on birth control pills and wait it out.  This time, I looked at him cross-eyed.  “Is that the best you can do?”  He nodded.  “What about natural hormones and progesterone cream?”  “No”, was his answer to me.  “I don’t want to put anything in your system that would mask the symptoms.”  I thought to myself, ‘And birth control won’t mask anything?’  He continued, “Let’s give it some time and see if they go away on their own.”  “But doctor,” I pleaded, “What about the symptoms?  I can’t live like this!”  “Unless you go on birth control”, he insisted, “I can’t help you.”

So I dumped him and went back to my regular doctor who believed in natural cures and gave me a prescription for progesterone gel.  After only one week, some symptoms subsided and I felt so much better, but I wasn’t convinced those cysts would disappear on their own.  At that time, a friend of mind was considering raw food dieting and bought me Carol Alt’s book, “Eating in the Raw”.   I already owned a Vitamix machine and was using it regularly, eating at least one meal a day as raw, but I thought, “What the heck.  I always wanted to try this, and there can’t be a better reason to start now.”  I followed the advice in the book and her newsletter, continued with the progesterone cream, and then took it a step further.  I decided to stop using all unnatural products on myself, including deodorants, creams, hairsprays, etc.  My concern was that I could be making my system work harder than it had to.  This was an opportunity to help it heal itself.

During my yoga practice, I used visualization to teach people how to breathe.  I decided to use the visualization techniques to imagine healing energy entering my ovaries, allowing the cysts to shrink on their own.  I am not sure what aspect of healing helped more, but in a short time, my breast tenderness went away, my water retention issues lessened, and the stomach bloating stopped.  I was a happy girl!  Next was a trip to the doctor to see if the cysts reduced in size, or better yet, were gone altogether.  Happily, the next sonogram showed that the cysts had shrunk to tiny little issues.

It has been a year since I “self diagnosed” and am happy to say that the progesterone gel is still working well for me.  I have lost a bra size by the way which makes me even happier and my skin looks great.  The high estrogen was causing break outs and a change in my skin elasticity.  My stomach issues improved in one area, but my autoimmune system is still kicking in as far as food allergies, etc.  That is another issue however that I am addressing.  More to follow on that as I am totally dedicated to healing myself of all ailments I have experienced since birth. 

The moral of this story is to never take No for an answer.  In addition, YOU are in charge of your body and not the other way around.  I wasn’t about to allow those tiny estrogen filled bubbles to change my life and take charge of my attitude.  The best advice I can give is to get a doctor who believes in you and take responsibility for helping him find your cure.  Then change everything about your life, because chances are, what you are doing or not doing, however innocent, is probably what is making you sick in the first place.

Please email me at donna@donnamartini.com  for information on the progesterone gel.  D.