Stay Off My Operating Table

From Bedridden to 500-Mile Hiker: Mimi K. Morgan's Stunning Health Transformation 164

• Dr. Philip Ovadia • Episode 164

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This episode features the remarkable story of Mimi Morgan, a 70-year-old woman who overcame multiple severe health conditions through dietary changes. Despite battling rheumatoid arthritis, Parkinson's disease, and life-threatening infections, Mimi defied medical expectations and regained her health.

For decades, Mimi followed trendy low-fat, plant-based diets, which she now believes contributed to her declining health. After being hospitalized multiple times and told she had little hope for recovery, Mimi decided to radically change her approach to food. She adopted a high-fat, low-carb diet, eventually transitioning to a carnivore and then a "lion diet" consisting primarily of animal products.

Within months of changing her diet, Mimi began experiencing significant improvements in her symptoms. She was able to wean herself off all medications and regain her mobility and energy. Now at 70, Mimi feels healthier than ever before and is training to walk 500 miles across Spain.

Mimi's story highlights the potential impact of nutrition on health and challenges conventional medical wisdom about managing chronic diseases. Her experience suggests that dietary changes may offer hope for some patients facing seemingly intractable health conditions.

NOTABLE QUOTE
"I'm just continuing training for my 500 mile walk and trying to, you know, share my story and hopefully give people hope, but especially the older ones, you know, the So many are told, I mean, I've heard it a gazillion times, you're over 60, of course this hurts. You know, you're over 60, of course you're on medication."

#ChronicIllnessRecovery #nutritionandhealth  #highfatlowcarb  #HealingThroughDiet #OvercomingParkinsons #healthtransformation  #foodasmedicine  #carnivorediet

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Theme Song : Rage Against
Written & Performed by Logan Gritton & Colin Gailey
(c) 2016 Mercury Retro Recordings

Any use of this intellectual property for text and data mining or computational analysis including as training material for artificial intelligence systems is strictly prohibited without express written consent from Dr. Philip Ovadia.

Speaker 1:

He was a morbidly obese surgeon destined for an operating table and an early death. Now he's a rebel MD who is fabulously fit and fighting to make America healthy again. This is Stay Off my Operating Table with Dr Philip Ovedia.

Speaker 2:

Hey, welcome back folks. It is the Stay Off my Operating Table with Dr Philip Ovadia, and we have today what I'd like to think of as my people, the common folk, the non-medical professionals, the people that I don't have to say, hey, I don't understand what you're talking about with and this story in particular. I'm really excited to hear the details about Phil, who's our guest today.

Speaker 3:

Yeah, really excited to have Mimi Morgan with us today and she's just got a real amazing story that I agree with you needs to get out there. People need to hear, to understand. You know, it's one thing to talk about the science, which we oftentimes do and we have the experts on, but really hearing from the people whose lives have been changed by this, I think, is super important as well. Very excited for our conversation today. I'm going to turn it over to Mimi to give a little bit of her background and then we can really get into her amazing story.

Speaker 4:

Hi, how are you today, doc? Thank you, I'll be 70. I'm shortchanging myself. I'll be 70 September 2nd. I live in Charleston, south Carolina.

Speaker 4:

I grew up in the Northeast and luckily had parents where we ate really farm to table and nose to tail food. You know, deer had the. I remember as a child going down to the cold cellar and getting the slabs of smoked meat and bringing that up. So we ate well and that really stayed through my childhood. Everything was homemade. We had very little packaged food so I had a good basis of eating.

Speaker 4:

And then, as I got into my 20s and the you know fat's a problem and being, you know, conscious and wanting to be stay trim, you know, I started eliminating fat from my diet and continue with that and then in my 30s became a vegan for at least six years, definitely high plant-based. After that I was pretty active and fit I'm an accomplished equestrian and always active do adventure, sports and things like that. And it wasn't until I got into my 50s. My youngest daughter's off to college. I have a career. I was a stay-at-home mom that I started working around the clock too much and on a diet low fat, low protein, mostly plant-based. My health started to catch up with me, like a lot of us, and I started to fail. And then it was in my late 50s where everything came crashing around me.

Speaker 2:

Up until this point, you're relatively healthy.

Speaker 4:

I'm relatively healthy. I did have childhood asthma and had a lot of colds and infections, but I think you know, because what food I did eat was not packaged food, I didn't get into the package craze and the fact that I was active I was able to sort of slow down the major decline. But when it hit me really hard and came fast.

Speaker 3:

All right. Yeah, I think that's an important point. You know, because when you talk about doing like vegetarian vegan, you know type approach. You were doing it, you know, if my math is correct, you know, probably in the 1980s or so, and it still would have been a non-processed kind of plant-based approach. Largely they didn't have a lot of-processed kind of plant-based approach. Largely they didn't have a lot of the plant-based processed junk food that's out there today that I think so many young and this is a little bit of a stereotype but the young vegan women that are really doing vegan but they're doing a processed vegan diet which I think is a lot different than a kind of whole food plant-based approach that you were likely doing. But you know, fairly common. For you know what I hear, what you know many people hear. You know women start to hit their 50s and the wheels start to fall off the bus for many different reasons. So maybe talk about some of the challenges that you then faced and what happened from there.

Speaker 4:

Yeah, it probably wasn't until my late 50s. And now I'm not sleeping well, I'm overworking, I'm still on that plant-based diet Now. My sleep is disrupted. Full-fledged menopause and that didn't handle that particularly well. Had difficulty with that. I started having a number of falls. I broke a couple of wrists. I had to have multiple surgeries pretty insignificant falls but I was having trouble healing. And actually my second surgery I developed for my wrist, I developed Dupuytren's and a rapid case of Dupuytren's.

Speaker 4:

I'm probably saying it wrong. There's a fancy name for it, but it's where the collagen is overproduced and it happens typically in your hand and there's a number of nodules and it forms on your tendons and your hand claws up. You lose the use of your hand and I was a dinnerware designer and within three months I had all the Dupuytren's nodules, including on my thumb, all of my fingers down my fingers down the palm of my hand into my wrist and my thumb was starting to. I was losing the use of my thumb. So that's really when the downfall came and when my body started attacking myself and treatment is to cut those right before your hand claws. There's no cure for it and then it comes back again and as an artist.

Speaker 4:

That was my livelihood. I said that's not possible, I can't live with that. So I started to do research and found a radiation therapy in Germany, traveled out of the state to a doctor who had done it and had worked with the doctor in Germany at a cancer center and had this done back here in Charleston two weeks of radiation to kill it. That was 12, 14 years ago and it destroyed all the nodules and I'm completely free. While I was there I started to have a lot of pain in my neck. I couldn't stand. The radiologist said something's not right with you. Let me see you walk. And she had me do a couple other things. She sent me to a rheumatologist and that's where I was diagnosed with rheumatoid arthritis, and I had just turned about 60 then. And then it just keeps getting worse.

Speaker 3:

Yeah, and you're still doing plant-based at this point.

Speaker 4:

I'm still plant-based.

Speaker 3:

Okay.

Speaker 4:

I've given up gluten with the RA and I gave up nightshade, but I still am plant-based. Very little protein, still no fat.

Speaker 3:

Okay, all right, very interesting. And yeah, you know, the Dupuytren's, you know, is a very concerning condition, like you said it, you know, for many people that leads that they just can't use their hand anymore because the the tendons essentially inelastic, they don't move anymore, they get these nodules on them. Yeah, you know, and I'm certainly not an expert in it, but it's something that sounds like an autoimmune reaction.

Speaker 3:

And certainly the arthritis rheumatoid we know to be an autoimmune reaction, and again, things that we're starting to recognize as this. Now one of my curiosities is you're going through all of this, and was there any consideration that you know your diet may have been contributing to these problems?

Speaker 4:

Zero From physician. Zero except for, you know, nightshades and gluten, I was told. Definitely stay away from nightshades. That aggravates pretty much everybody with rheumatoid arthritis, but gluten some people. Other than that there was no discussion and honestly I just listened to the doctors. At this point now I am in an enormous amount of pain. My health is really starting to fail because I had a pretty severe RA in my feet so now I can't walk very well and moving. And again I was active, nothing from them and I'm just listening to them, totally unaware that there might be another option. Yeah, so actually two months to the day. So for RA I was put on. Let me just back up.

Speaker 4:

Ra was put on the traditional prednisone, so I was on that for a couple of years. Then we went to Plaquenil. That didn't do enough. Then we added methotrexate, then we added Humira, which turns out I'm severely allergic to. I had hallucinations. I would walk down the street and literally not know what town. I was in A street that I walked down every day for 20 some years. And now I'm totally confused and they took me off of that. At first they didn't realize that what was causing these issues? Put me on a Rensia, so now I'm on those. Shortly after that I started to develop some pretty severe neurosymptoms started to not be able to swing my left arm was dragging my left leg, balance problems. My children noticed I started to have facial masking. My cognitive ability.

Speaker 2:

What is facial masking?

Speaker 4:

Facial masking. Sorry, so you lose the expression in your face.

Speaker 2:

Oh, okay.

Speaker 4:

Just go blank. Yeah, started to have cognitive issues, had trouble putting a meal together, you know my executive function started to take a hit. Something was clearly not wrong and two months, two years to the date that I was diagnosed from rheumatoid arthritis, I was diagnosed with Parkinson's disease and they immediately put me they're very concerned about my balance because I flunked all the pull tests where they pull you, and I shouldn't have flunked them that early on with the symptoms. I also had a number of autonomic symptoms. So they put me on immediately on carbidopa, levodopa, which is the gold standard.

Speaker 2:

I'm impressed that you can pronounce that.

Speaker 4:

I mean, I took 900 pills every three months. Of those, you better believe I can. I had to. And then things got worse. Not only did I have severe nausea, which meant my diet now transitioned to graham crackers, bananas and saltines, the only thing I could stomach. I was told to avoid protein. I'm still not eating fat. I can have four to six ounces of protein at the end of the day.

Speaker 2:

Wait a minute. You are told to avoid protein.

Speaker 4:

It competes with the medication, so I had a choice. The medication works, or I eat, avoid protein. It competes with the medication, so I had a choice the medication works or I eat the protein. Everybody still hears that. Everybody who has Parkinson's is still hearing that. I went to three of the top centers and you still hear that.

Speaker 2:

Yes, it might just be the world in the last month, but hearing this kind of absolute, it's stupid, it's worse than ignorant, it's malevolent. I'm sorry, I don't mean to throw us off.

Speaker 4:

No, I hear you and that's the way I feel now.

Speaker 2:

You're told to avoid fat and told to avoid protein.

Speaker 4:

Told to avoid protein. I'm still not eating fat, but, yes, I could have four to six ounces of palm full at the end of the day where my medication wouldn't work and I didn't want anybody to see me. I didn't want you know, I wanted to function. I didn't want to give up work. I listened to them.

Speaker 3:

It kind of sounds it's one thing after another and more medication, and more medication, and then we have another diagnosis and you know, and it doesn't really sound like anything that they were trying, anything that they were recommending for you was making any improvements.

Speaker 4:

Yeah, no, I was just barely getting by and eventually had to quit work because I just couldn't do it. I mean, I just am getting, you know, two years and a couple of months I just had to give up work. I just couldn't function. And so my mindset, you know, I'm in my early 60s, so any thought of any kind of full, wonderful life was out the window. Doing anything adventuresome it was really like, and I was definitely losing heart. You know, my, my outcome was bleak. You know, every day was a chore. It was pretty tough. You know I wasn't depressed, but I just wasn't optimistic, not with what I was, I had and how I felt, not to mention, you know, the chronic pain is really setting in. Parkinson's can be painful as well, with rigidity, and then everything takes forever. Your world gets smaller, your movements get smaller, it's hard to talk, I had trouble with speech and some swallowing, and so I was discouraged.

Speaker 3:

I guess, yeah, certainly, I guess. And so how long ago would this have been? Now that you're at this point, how long ago.

Speaker 4:

So it was five years, a little over five and a half years ago, when I'm at this point. How long ago. So it was five years, a little five and a half years ago, when I'm at this point. I did have a little window of a little window of optimism. I thought, OK, I got to get back out walking again I'm using walking sticks and using a cane at this point and I walked two miles. When I got home I realized that one of my earbuds had dropped. They were a brand new gift, and so I had to walk back and to get it. And so, as I'm walking back, of course it's at the one mile mark. So now when I get home, I've walked four miles and you know, that gave me a little bit of sense of hope because I actually felt pretty good from walking. I joke now, but it's just so absurd.

Speaker 4:

I fixed my lentil meatballs for dinner, had those in the ovens of all things, and sat on a bench to enjoy the fresh air it was in February, it was actually a particularly warm day here and sat on the bench, went to get up and I couldn't move. And tried it again, and I couldn't move. Tried to dial my phone. I couldn't do that. Two men were outside getting ready to jog, tying their shoes, and I knew something was not right. And I was able to call to them and ask for assistance and about a minute later they sat me on the bench insisting to call 911, and it was at that point I knew I was having a stroke. I had previously had a TIA on the same side about 10 years prior, and I had a medium stroke.

Speaker 2:

Bill. What's a medium stroke?

Speaker 3:

You just mean it was kind of medium in severity.

Speaker 4:

Yes, medium in severity is how they judge it, so that's based on how long your symptoms are. So yeah, wasn't?

Speaker 3:

a major.

Speaker 4:

It was a medium which is bad enough yeah, exactly I know, you know like I mean. My one would have been better, but I had medium stroke. I got tpa, which is some drug to prevent blood clots, probably within 45 minutes, if not, and came through the stroke the best of everything, actually. Unfortunately, the IV that I was given was infected with staph.

Speaker 4:

A I was released from the hospital three days, unaware that staph is raging through my body. I complained of a headache and chills about 24 hours later at my daughter and son-in-law's home, because they wanted to watch me. I passed out. Luckily my daughter caught me and in the middle of the night they deemed that I had they finally figured it out. They want to send me home. Luckily, the next team of doctors said something's not right, we're keeping you. And they did blood cultures in the middle and I discovered that I had bacteremia.

Speaker 4:

I was in the hospital for 11 days. The first five days I tested positive, which is not very good. They followed the standard protocol. Finally, they broke the protocol on day five and gave me an additional antibiotic. The whole time I'm screaming. First two or so days I was out of Dilaudid. On Dilaudid, which is, you know, a narcotic, I couldn't remember anything because the pain was the most unbearable pain I've had. So they put me on. I started to get better. I'm still complaining in my back, but I am slowly getting better. With the second antibiotic they sent me home with a PICC line, which is a line that travels from your arm through your chest 20. Now I'm on 30 days of antibiotics. Unbeknownst to me and my family, they took me off the antibiotic that made me better and kept me on the one that wasn't working in the first place.

Speaker 2:

Oh what? Yeah at all, none of the benefits or advantages available to the average person in the United States, and you were shuttled off to the worst of the worst types of medical facilities in order to be able to be abused so thoroughly. Is that correct?

Speaker 4:

Yeah, except for I am educated. I just still, when I'm too sick now at this point to question too much of anything. Luckily, there's a good part of the story coming next where my family started to question, which is why I'm here. But yeah, and I'm at the top medical university here in charleston, so there is oh wait, this isn't like some backwater third world country.

Speaker 2:

We're talking about.

Speaker 4:

This is a top medical university a top medical university and yes top medical university. Yes, some of the best doctors that are doing this, jimmy the best doctors are doing the best doctors are doing.

Speaker 2:

I'm sorry to be snarky, but I'm so weary of this you know, it's pretty mind blowing. Go on.

Speaker 4:

Yeah, so I go. So I'm released after 11 days, about 10 days in. Something's not right. But you know, and my back is still hurting. Everybody's still telling me you know, you've been lying down. Of course your back is hurting.

Speaker 4:

I finally go home to my house. I have a townhouse 27 steps to get to the top floor. I finally convinced my family to let me go home prior to that. I'm in a walker now because my mobility is not good and I walked a mile. I'm like I really got to do something and that's all I knew to do. So I walked a mile, got my family, got me upstairs, got me set for the night and left me there, went to, I went to go take a step to go to bed. A couple hours later and I couldn't move, called him for help and they came over. I'm becoming hypothermic. They rushed me to the hospital again I'm still got the PICC line and then they do the blood work, all the typical things, and the doctor comes back and says great news, you're doing great, your blood works fine, your white blood cells are count, it's good, we see no problem, we're sending you home.

Speaker 4:

And I'm lying there in the emergency room just dying and my son-in-law said absolutely not, we are requesting an MRI. My mother-in-law keeps complaining about the pain. Something's not right, please do it. And she said no, we have really sick people in the hospital. We're discharging her. He said no, we refuse that. We're demanding an MRI. Don't care what it costs. She said I'll call security. He said I don't care what it costs. She said I'll call security. He said I don't care who you call, we're not leaving.

Speaker 4:

And finally, about three in the morning they brought me down for an MRI. Came back a few hours later and not even the doctor. A nurse came in and said we have bad news for you. She's really sick and she's not going anywhere. She has dysgitis, osteomyelitis of her spinal, she has an abscess in her spinal canal. If it bursts she's going to die. And at this point now they believe it's NERSA, because I'm not getting well on the antibiotics and we're not sure we can get a doctor to touch you. But you really need emergency surgical debridement to try to hose you down because you're not going to survive through the night.

Speaker 3:

Yeah, I mean, as unbelievable as this all sounds, the unfortunate thing that I have to kind of verify is this happens, and this happens, you know, more, way more than it should. I mean, happening once is more than it should, but this is not an uncommon thing, I would say, in the medical system. And it really, you know, yes, you had bad, but it also sounds like there were a number of, you know, lapses in care, a number of mistakes made, you know, and the system, you know this is just a I mean it's kind of a textbook example of how the system goes wrong and how our medical system goes wrong. And you know, we're going to get to the, to the recovery part, obviously, because you're still here talking to us, which a lot of people aren't after going through something like that.

Speaker 3:

But you know, you just start with how one issue that maybe wasn't even that significant and really could have been, you know, dealt with maybe in a different way, and things just start to snowball and you know, and then it really becomes a situation of, you know, kind of the sicker you get, the sicker you get, because now your body just can't fight off anything like a staph infection, which you know, quite honestly, staph is all around us and staph gets into us on a regular basis and when your body's working like it should, it can fight off staff. But when your body is already compromised from all these other things that have been going on, that's when we get these real bad problems. So now you're in the ER, you know again they wanted to send you home. Your family, thankfully, intervenes on your behalf. You get this test and now it shows you have a real life-threatening issue. I guess what happens from here.

Speaker 4:

This was March, beginning of March, the third time in the hospital. First time I went in was February 7th. I didn't get out of the hospital until about another six weeks later. I had complications, including all my white blood cells were destroyed another T and you know, a tough recovery. They finally put me on daptomycin, which was the drug that started to kill the bacteria. Because I'm still not getting well through this whole time, I was released about April 8th. So I was in the hospital from February 7th to April 8th and I went to rehab for about three weeks to learn to walk. I had emergency surgery on that night. They did finally convince the doctor to operate. I have self-fusing in my spine but they did hose me down with antibiotics. I took another six months for the abscess with the bacteria in my spine, six to nine months before it destroyed.

Speaker 4:

I left rehab and then put on Bactrim DS twice a day, had home health care, physical therapy. Finally got well enough to do physical therapy outside the home, had that for three times a week for about 15 months and I still was not able to be mobile, still had to sit to wash my hair. Still had to sit to do any meal prep. Still had to use aid to walk and to move, and I'm really losing hope at this time. And the doctors are like you know, this is I mean, you're alive, this is it. And you know, by the way, you still only have a 50-50 chance of beating this because this thing's with all that you have going wrong. It's a good chance of coming back at a later date. So we want you to be on antibiotics for life.

Speaker 4:

And so then, about a month or so later, I had what? My epiphany, my mailbox story, where I was walking down the street and I had a couple times gotten to a quarter mile. I'm still on the same diet because I'm still being treated for Parkinson's, so I'm still low protein, and but anyway, I walked to the mailbox and you you know my family's thinking about a home for me at some point and I'm thinking I'm not going to survive till we get to that point. And I turn around in an absolute defeat and I'm stopped dead in my tracks with a question presented to me, and for me it was a divine question and that is okay. So you can't walk what you, where you want to go, you can't do what you want to do. What do you have in me? And I stopped and paused and my answer was I have 10 steps. And I turned around and I took those 10 steps and every day I went back to that same place and asked myself that question and took 10 more steps. 10 steps is barely across the room physically, mentally, emotionally. Those were the hardest 10 steps I took because I'm still in a lot of pain.

Speaker 4:

And after about a month or so of doing that and now I've always been lean and now I'm not lean because I'm not mobile and I'm still eating a high carb diet I went across the street to somebody for him to help me to lose weight, spend an hour and a half with him. He was a former chiropractor, it was a weight loss clinic, and he proceeded after hearing everything I ate and all I brought my bag of medication. He asked me if I would trust him and I said sure. And then he proceeded to tell me he wanted me to eat 50 fat, 25 protein and 25 carbs. And I looked at him and said are you crazy? I'm trying to lose weight and you're going to make me fatter. He said trust me and I said okay, this point I knew if I went back to the doctors. They were going to give me another medication for another symptom, and it was from that point, from meeting him, that things really started to turn around.

Speaker 4:

And it was probably so, I'll say. At the 30 month mark I didn't feel like I needed to go back to the doctor and get another medication, so I was stable. And then, about three months, I started feeling a little better, and it was six months I started to feel pretty good. I started feeling a little better, and it was six months. I started to feel pretty good. I'm now even getting higher fat, higher protein. I'm even dropping my carbs more naturally. I'm eating a lot of beef, I'm eating the fat on the beef, and it was about nine months that I noticed my neurosymptoms improved and that's when the light bulb went off in my head realizing oh my God, what I eat, I mean really is absolutely healing my body.

Speaker 2:

That can't be true. Yes, that can't be true. You can't get better just by changing your food.

Speaker 4:

Do you know how many doctors didn't want to hear?

Speaker 2:

Mimi, he's a cardiac surgeon. He knows what he's talking about. That's not possible, is it Phil?

Speaker 3:

I think we got all the proof we need right in front of us here. Yeah, yeah. So you know. You said you went to this chiropractor initially to lose weight when, I guess you know you sort of mentioned it. But when, how did it start to occur to you that you know the food was having more of an effect than just losing weight and you know that the food was your medicine. That's such a great question.

Speaker 4:

I love it so about the next week. So I met him every week and I said to him I really like to lose weight faster. And he sat me down for another hour and said you do know you are a severely sick woman, right? And I said yes, he said we're not worrying about your weight, we're going to get you well. The weight's going to be a benefit. You've got to get it in your head that what you eat is going to make you well and we need to get you off whatever. And he wasn't taking me off any medication. He's, you know, he's thinking the doctors are going to do it and it's. And he said, and he had to drill that through me and finally I, you know it really went off.

Speaker 4:

I started to kind of get a glimpse, but really at when my neurosymptoms for my Parkinson's started to kind of get a glimpse, but really at when my neuro symptoms for my Parkinson's started to improve. And I, because I would take pills every three and a half, four hours to function and start, and I mean you didn't even need to set a timer, I just knew when my body started to have off symptoms. And now all of a sudden I'm getting four and a half hours and I'm like I don't need my medication quite yet. And that's when I really knew that weight, that this, none of this, was about weight, this was none of it at all, that my body would work that out and that I would get well, and that then I started to realize I'm going to heal myself and I'm not recommending to any of your viewers, but I wasn't going to get. I was not getting assistance. I have some leeway with Parkinson's medication. We're encouraged to. You know we only can see them once a year, and the second time is with a physician assistant. They're so jammed with patients but I and so there's enormous amount of leeway in managing it. They really want you to take responsibility for that. But I wasn't getting help from other doctors and so I proceeded at that point to start to wean myself off of all my medication, and obviously the first one that went was my heartburn medication, twice a day because I don't have heartburn now, eating a high fat and protein diet, eliminating carbs, and I ran with it for about a year and a half. I never faltered, I never cheated. I'm getting better by the week. You know what little weight I needed to lose is just dropping off of me. I'm getting energy. I'm moving more. Those 10 steps brought me to two miles. I'm getting energy. I'm moving more. Those 10 steps brought me to two miles. I'm finding hope. And I'm two years now free of being off all medication.

Speaker 4:

I took myself off of the antibiotics two years ago, against doctor's orders. I went in to talk to them and they said no, we absolutely don't want to talk about it. You'll die if you get off of them and I'll come back in 30 days. And I said I, we absolutely don't want to talk about it. You'll die if you get off of them and I'll come back in 30 days. And I said I've been off for 45. And the doctor's answer was I kid you not. Ok, so you're alive. Let me know if you have trouble. And I have been free of any medication since then.

Speaker 3:

Just amazing. And have you followed up with those doctors more?

Speaker 4:

No, I fired them all two years ago. I don't see any doctors. No, I have no ailments, I have zero symptoms. Uh, and I had for my Parkinson's. Not only did I have those symptoms, I had um severe neurogenic bladder, I had lymph dystonia.

Speaker 2:

I had-. Okay, Mimi, I know you're talking, I know half of the people you're talking to are medical professionals, but the other half isn't. What is that stuff?

Speaker 4:

So neurogenic bladder is typically a Parkinson plus or an advanced Parkinson. It's when. So with Parkinson's, your body doesn't get the messages. You know you think you're smiling and you're not and that's the masking you have. So my bladder is. My brain and bladder are not communicating. So my bladder is getting a message that it's full. For me it was every 30 minutes, which is just hell and obviously it wasn't full. And I mean, try sleeping when your bladder tells you it's full every 30 minutes, and then dystonia is. The doctor has probably a better scientific way of saying it, but literally I would wake up in the day or I'd wake mostly nighttime. I would be disrupted where your limbs, my legs and my hands would contract and distort in the most unnatural positions and I couldn't move them.

Speaker 2:

It's a very these are all neuro symptoms that can be part and typically part of Parkinson's.

Speaker 4:

I had night terrors where I acted out my dreams at night. That's very dangerous. I had that. I had a vocal voice tremor. My speech was very slow, so I had a lot of side symptoms. Besides these diseases, I had a lot of symptoms Plus. I was B12 deficient. I had to take injections for that folic acid. I mean so there were Did you just say B12 deficient, I had to take injections for that folic acid? I mean so there were-.

Speaker 2:

Did you just say beach whale deficient?

Speaker 4:

B12, yes, I had to take injections for B12. Of course, I wasn't eating any kind of beef or anything, so they had me on B12 injections.

Speaker 2:

B12,. Okay, yes.

Speaker 4:

B12,. Yeah sorry.

Speaker 3:

Yeah, and you know the interesting thing. So I mean there's a lot you know to kind of dig into there. You know butic effects. You know one of the major deficiencies in a plant-based diet is vitamin B12. It's just not available in plant foods and you know it's for people that are strict on a vegan diet. You have to supplement it. Essentially, it's interesting to hear that and you know all of this starts to get better when you change the food that you're eating. And you know again, I'm sure it's a combination of a lot of things the nutrients you were getting and then getting off these medications and ultimately you know your body being able to heal itself when it's given the proper nutrients and proper nutrition to do. Just amazing to hear again. So how long ago, when did you start that? You know, essentially, a ketogenic diet, a high fat diet. When, how long ago was that now?

Speaker 4:

So three and a half years. I was loyal on it for a year and a half During that latter part of it, realizing I didn't have symptoms. So why do I need the medication? So weaned myself off A year or 2023, january I went carnivore and started to get better.

Speaker 4:

I still had trouble with getting a lot of ear and bronchitis infections this past year. Mrsa came back twice last year and so this January I did lion's diet and had a little sinus issue this last two weeks, but for the first time in my life it's not gone to my chest and I'm a lifelong asthmatic, with some scarring too. So that's a huge win. And no antibiotics and it's a mild annoyance one. So I've been, you know, really at my absolute best these last seven months doing the lion's diet.

Speaker 4:

I knew I needed to streamline and it's, I mean, and it's absolutely amazing and I feel the best I've ever felt in my life and I've had periods in my life where I felt really great. But I have an enormous amount of energy. I weight train with a private trainer. I started a little over two years ago because I was diagnosed with borderline osteoporosis and they wanted me to put on medication. I said no, so I found a trainer, I work with her and I walk quite a few times a week, including a long walk, a five-hour long walk, and I'm training to walk 500 miles across Spain next spring, and this is a woman who, over five, five years ago, couldn't walk more than a quarter of a mile with aid.

Speaker 2:

Wow, okay, I just want to summarize what I think I've heard. You spent several decades eating the trendy food, got wildly sick the best that allopathic medicine has to offer. Gave you a bunch of drugs, made you sicker and told you were going to die. You got tired of that, started eating ketogenic and then, carnivore and feel better than you've ever felt in your life.

Speaker 4:

Did I miss anything important? No, and I'm going to be 70 in three weeks and it's not. And we do heal slower when we're older. So I really think that's part of the miracle. You know I have recovery is a little slower work and training and you know my long walks. But yeah, I'm going to be 70 when pretty much everybody's on medication and is accepting they can't move, they can't do this. And another story to this and I posted a lot those 27 steps. I never went back to my place. They said I'd never walk steps like that again. So I got moved out and never went back from the hospital to there. And I now once a week with my trainer, run up and down steep steps every week with a 20-pound kettlebell, just because they said I couldn't do it.

Speaker 3:

Oh my God, Give them hell.

Speaker 2:

You better believe it. Yes, yes, give them hell, yeah, really amazing.

Speaker 3:

And you know, again, I think these stories so as unbelievable as the story was of you know how sick you got and why you got there. You know the recovery is even more unbelievable, and yet it's. You know, I am hearing similar things all the time now from people of they just change the food they eat, and all of you know all sorts of problems that the medical system, quite frankly, views as unsolvable, untreatable. You know, the medical system was just struggling to keep you alive. They honestly and I can tell you because you know I've been there they weren't really thinking about making you better, they were just trying to keep you alive. They were just trying to keep you alive.

Speaker 3:

And you know, and unfortunately I think for a lot of clinicians, a lot of doctors, we can't think past that and we really can't think about. You know, maybe there's something that we're missing that you know cause, contributed and caused all this in the first place. And you know it sounds too simple. Right, it can't be as simple as just change what you eat, but more and more we're learning it really is that simple. And again, this isn't new. You know, there was a physician, you know, a little while ago by the name of Hippocrates right, who said let food be thy medicine. And you know, here we are 2000 years later and we really were not able to improve upon that. And because we've tried to and we've forgotten that, you know, I think that's largely why we find ourselves where we are today. Yeah, sadly. So what's next for Mimi then?

Speaker 4:

So what's next for Mimi, then? I'm just continuing training for my 500 mile walk and trying to, you know, share my story and hopefully give people hope, especially the older ones. You know so many are told I mean I heard it a gazillion times You're over 60. Of course this hurts, you know you're over 60. Of course you're on medication and just continue to strengthen. I really feel, after going Lyon, I really feel like I am completely healed and you know, it's just work at it every single. You know, work at it every single day.

Speaker 4:

You know, one of my sayings is you know you can do hard things and consistency every day, making decisions every day that were for my health, and putting that number one really changed me, because it wasn't just what I ate that had to change, I had to change my mindset. You know, I view and I love food, I love to cook. I was telling Jack, I make the best beef shanks you've ever had, braised beef shanks, and so that's still important. But food is nourishment for me. Now, no longer is it entertainment. So I've had to change my mind, and the same with you know, exercise keeps me moving and keeps me limber, able to do things. So I've had to change my mindset too.

Speaker 2:

This is it's beautiful. I love it.

Speaker 4:

Oh, thank you, I do too.

Speaker 2:

You know, when we started the show three years ago, we'd have guest after guest, usually some sort of scientific expert, talking about what they had learned. And it was, you know. It was exciting, it was riveting, it was amazing. But that was three years ago is amazing, but that was three years ago. And I and I'm I'm starting to hear the same thing, so much from the scientific side, that I've grown, I have very little patience anymore, because there's so many stories like yours. It's not like your, yours is extreme, but it's not one of a kind. There's thousands of these stories and I guess what we've got to do is just keep hammering. I realize, phil, you have constraints constraints on you that I don't have, but I've when I see somebody like this, so close to dead from the best that our officially accepted and approved science has to offer, and now 70 years old, pretending to walk 500 miles, recovered from things that everybody said was going to kill her, doing what we've been talking about for three years quit eating crap.

Speaker 4:

Get fresh air, get sun. I'm so grateful.

Speaker 4:

There isn't a day, and almost really a moment, where I don't wake up just absolutely grateful and amazed given a second chance like this it never, when I never did I, could I have imagined, because I, you know, I was looking 85, I, and I moved like I was 85 and pained my children, my daughters and my grandsons to see their once active Mimi, you know walking, you know not going to make it that long, and now they see me. They can't even keep up with me. Now, you know, and I love it and they love it what's been the reaction from your friends, your family.

Speaker 3:

You know the people around you and saw this transformation. You know in real time what's their reaction been.

Speaker 4:

It's been mixed. You know they absolutely excited and ecstatic. You know we did reach a point where they said, okay, so you're better, are you going to stop this and just eat like the rest of us do? And I said, no, I got well, this way, why would I go back? And there was some pressure and finally they gave up and now they just accept that I'm going to do what I want to do. Friends are glad for me, but they like what about fiber? And I can't give up carbs and don't you need your vegetables? And you know meanwhile they're pretty inactive and, you know, are eating sweets and all sorts of things while they're on diabetes or pre-diabetes medications and statins and all that. You know that's been discouraging. I hope that their light bulb go off, but you know they're and I understand.

Speaker 4:

You know I once listened to my doctors and didn't research and they're listening to others. You know some people are interested and want to know more. Certainly I have a lot of people on Twitter that are, but generally people are really skeptical of anything other than the government pyramid, of how you're supposed to eat a meal and what's touted in the majority of the medical community. And again, I don't even go to doctors because I don't even want to hear them. You know, they'll say to me I actually had to have a vein cauterized about a year ago and they just did some tests to check. He says you're going to live to a hundred.

Speaker 4:

And then he said by the way, I want you on statins as a precaution and you'll look fabulous. I said absolutely not. And then I was like you know, I'm just not going to see a physician until it's a life emergency. It's an absolute emergency. I'm just not going to. I don't have anything wrong with me, so I don't need to go anyway. So it's been a really it's an interesting mix. You know, sometimes I feel like I'm in Twilight Zone, like you saw how sick I was and you're really telling me to go back to doing what got me sick.

Speaker 3:

Yeah, believe me, I have the same feeling sometimes.

Speaker 2:

Mimi, one of the cool things about this is that you're just a person who was sick and got well and you're not trying to sell something. I am really glad to see you've got a link tree where people can just follow more of your story and learn more about you and and I'm going to make sure this shows up in our show notes because there are people who are listening who are thinking my mother should hear this, my father should hear this, my brother should hear this. There's a way to get well.

Speaker 4:

Yeah.

Speaker 2:

And stories like this will encourage them that, hey, if somebody is sick as me, we could do it yeah.

Speaker 4:

Yeah, and if you're not sick, I encourage you because I have no doubt in my mind that if I had eaten how I eat now, I wouldn't face probably anything that I faced. I literally have no doubt. I mean, I probably in a week eat more fat than I probably ate in five years time. That's how literally fat starved I was.

Speaker 2:

All right. You have immediately become one of my favorite people on the planet. I'm so glad you were with us. I applaud you, Thank you for being so stubborn that you refused to die and can be a source of such hope, inspiration and optimism for a lot of other people. I guess we're done.

Speaker 4:

All right. Thank you so much for having me Good Phil.

Speaker 3:

I was just going to ask when is the trip across Spain?

Speaker 4:

So I'm planning, if all goes well, the end of April and May. I haven't booked it yet. I need to get over this hurdle, which I have, and then I'll start to, but yeah, next spring.

Speaker 3:

Awesome, yeah, we certainly. I encourage everyone to go find you on social media, follow Mimi and follow this amazing journey as it continues and just thank you for coming and sharing your story and spreading this message of hope. Ultimately, I think that's really what it's about is that there is hope and you can change, and you can change and you know. The unfortunate reality is that you can't rely on others to make that change, for you to you know, to save you. We all got to save ourselves.

Speaker 4:

I think You're right. Thank you so much for having me. I appreciate it.

Speaker 2:

We've all got to save ourselves. We do All right For Dr Philip Ovadia and Mimi. Good Lord, I've gone blank on your name, taylor. This is a stay off my operating table podcast. We'll talk to you next time.

Speaker 1:

Chances are you wouldn't be listening to this podcast if you didn't need to change your life and get healthier. So take action right now. Book a call with Dr Avedia's team. One small step in the right direction is all it takes to get started. Contact us at ifixheartscom slash talk. That's ifixheartscom slash talk.

People on this episode

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Dr. Philip Ovadia

Host
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Jack Heald

Host