CHAPTER ELEVEN

SUPPLEMENTS TOO!

I use a supplement program that I believe provided the necessary building blocks for my body to rebuild the damage area of myelin or to build new pathways around the damaged area. At the same time, the diet seemed to slow down and finally stop further MS attacks. In other words, I have tried to take a total nutritional approach to the MS problem.

Even though the exact sequence of events in the way damage occurs or the way the diet stops that damage is not known and neither the sequence nor the way in which the supplements reverse the damage is known, the simple fact is that this program does, in fact, work for me. Attacks slowed down, becoming less severe and a slow reversal took place allowing me, as a patient, to live a more normal and more productive life.

As a matter of fact, I feel so ell all the time that I have sometimes found myself half agreeing in my mind with those who kept saying that I must have been misdiagnosed. Then, in December 1988, I was in the VA hospital for a reexamination. For the first time I was given an MRI. The neurologist who looked at the MRI results could hardly believe what he was seeing. He said that both sides of my brain are so full of plaques that he would not believe the results had he not done the exam himself.

The plaques he saw would be typical of someone confined full-time to a wheelchair or even bedridden. To watch me walk around, speak with precision, read without the aid of glasses and play tale tennis in the day room amazed him. If I were the only MS’er able to do the same things, I, too, would think it was a miracle. But we now have had enough people on the program for a long enough time that we are beginning to find more and more people like myself that are questioning their diagnosis.

I believe that you, too, no matter how debilitated you presently are, can improve. Whether you can come back as far as I have; only a great deal of time and determined dedication can tell. But I know absolutely without a single question or reservation in my mind that you do not need to get any worse! Diet has helped too many people for it to be a fluke.

For information purposes here is a list of supplements I use and the reasons for including them in my program. I have listed them in what I consider their relative importance to my overall recovery on the program. Remember, I have taken these supplements for over 20 years without any side effects and others have told me that they used similar supplements for from five to fifteen years. Other than a few persons having an occasional minor bout of nausea when they first started taking the, all have reported no problems.

The reaction of most doctors to whom I’ve shown this list, has been something in the vein of, “My God, you’ll kill yourself taking all that!” Once again, it only proves that doctors are not infallible. I’m a very lively corpse. The last time I got this reaction, I just told him to keep an eye on me and keep me covered with regular checkups and blood tests, to make sure that nothing did get out of kilter.

But sometimes, even I, when I look at the pile of pills in front of me and although I’m totally aware of how much good they have done me, I still have to talk to myself. I say, “TAKE THE SUPPLEMENTS!” There is just no denying that it gets tiresome taking a handful of pills 4 times every day, for a lifetime.

There are lots of good vitamin supplement companies out there and I really don’t recommend any one company over another. I would caution anyone wanting to use a supplement program to look at the small print on the back of any bottle he or she is considering buying. If it has a lot of extraneous material in it, such as, coloring or preservatives, I would choose something else. The vitamins and minerals will help us, but there is absolutely nothing those “extras” can do for us.

Most of the people I have talked to over the years want to know just exactly what I take, the precise amounts of the various ingredients. They seem to feel they are not familiar enough with supplements to choose without a specific product with which to compare. So with the understanding that this is not a product endorsement, and that these are not the only satisfactory products available, but rather just the formulas that were both adequate and available to me at the time here is the list.

A HIGH POTENCY MULTIPLE VITAMIN In the day of modern foodless foods, everyone should take at least a good multiple. Because the Swank diet changes our nutritional intake quite drastically, we will find that we need this type of broad-based vitamin even more than most people. I use a product called Naturvite: one tablet per day. The formula is: Vitamin A 2500 IU, Vitamin D 1000 IU, Vitamins B-1, B-2, B-6 25 mg each, Vitamin B-12 25-mcg, Vitamin C 150mg, Niacinamide 150 mg, Calcium Pantothenate 50mg, Vitamin E 25IU, Biotin 20mcg, Folic Acid 100mcg, PABA 25mg, Choline & Inositol 150 mg each, plus small amounts of minerals, liver and digestive enzymes. The basic reason I chose this formula over the other multivitamins is its high amount of vitamin B-12. Since one of the great problems common to most MS’ers is tiredness, the B-12 helps combat it.

NATURAL VITAMIN E Saturated fat, which is severely restricted by the Swank Diet, is use by the body as an anti-oxidant. In addition to removing a great portion of the saturated fat by adding the oil, I am vastly increasing the amount of unsaturated fat in my diet, which is prone to oxidation. This combination could lead to dangerous amounts of fee radicals being formed in the body if not compensated for. I use large, therapeutic amounts of vitamins C and E to compensate. I use 1600 IU of natural mixed tocopherol vitamin E (Look for di-Alpha natural E). I do not use synthetic vitamin E (di-Alpha) as it is only about one-fifth as biologically active and therefore would require an intake of 5 times as much. One 400 IU Vitamin E capsule four times per day.

PROMOTOL This is a brand name of the Viobin Corp. It was a patented product until the patent expired recently. It has the ability to help increase stamina, endurance and energy – the reasons for which it was originally patented. With the tremendous exhaustion we MS’ers have most of the time, it is essential to me to use something in addition to the B-12 which helps overcome the tiredness. This product is also the best source I know of natural Octocosonal, a 28 carbon waxy alcohol that, I believe, may be one of the building blocks of myelin. Even though there are now synthetic Octocosonal imitators on the market in dry form, I continue to use the oil form with which I have had all of my success. One ten-minim capsule 3 times per day.

VITAMIN C with Bioflavonoids and Rutin The uses that the body makes of vitamin C are many and varied. I am interested in getting enough for it to assist the vitamin E as an anti-oxidant and enough to help ward off any infections. I want to have as little of a chance as possible of additional stress. I use a mineral ascorbate vitamin C called Super Gram II. Each tablet contains 1000 mg of vitamin C plus 100 mg of bioflavonoids and rutin. Small amounts of the minerals, potassium (as citrate-aspartate), calcium, magnesium, zinc, manganese and molybdenum are provided as ascorbates. Two tablets, two or three times per day. (A total of 4 to 6 thousand mg of vitamin C per day.)

CALCIUM OROTATE. As far as I know, this formula is the only licensed MS treatment in the whole world. It was developed and licensed in West Germany several years ago, but it has been my experience that by itself, it is not satisfactory in controlling the disease. However, because of the Swank Diet prohibition on milk products, calcium supplements are essential and the oratic acid carrier has special properties that make it a possible major contributor to the overall program. I use 500 mg Calcium Orotate tablets (each provides 50 mg of elemental calcium). One tablet three times per day.

At the time of updating this material, our brave defender of the major drug companies, the US Food and Drug Administration, has decided that the salts of oratic acid (among them, calcium Orotate) are illegal drugs. This after 20 years on the market, helping people and no complaints.

The problem may be just that as a supplement there wasn’t any money in the product for the big drug companies and it doesn’t seem that the FDA can allow that to happen. After all, with the FDA revolving door policy, today’s drug enforcement policy maker is both yesterday’s and tomorrow’s prescription drug manufacturer.

We are trying to find a substitute for this product. Dr. Neiper’s replacement, Calcium EPA is also illegal in this country at this time.

VITAMIN B-6. This vitamins is used primarily by the nervous system, but also is used in converting essential fatty acids.

There has been much written in the scientific journals recently about the danger of too much vitamin B-6. When I first started using this program, I used 100mg of B-6 daily. But I found that I got better results with 200mg. Then a couple of people told me they had started using 500mg daily, without any ill effects.

So for a few years I was using 500mg in a timed-release formula. Like everyone else, including all the doctors in the scientific literature, I assumed that there was no toxicity because of its water solubility. But even though there have only been a few documented cases of vitamin B-6 toxicity reported, (7 reported worldwide according to Lancet) all at much higher levels than I ever used (between 1,000 and 2,000mg per day over long periods of time), I felt it better to reduce my intake back down to the 200mg level (which I had previously found adequate) to be on the safe side. I use vitamin B-6 100mg tablets. Two tablets per day.

MULTIPLE MINERALS. This diet not only limits calcium, but also other minerals, such as zinc and manganese which also appear to be necessary in several of the biological systems that are essential for recovery. The multiple vitamins and the vitamin C formula I use have some minerals in them, but maybe not enough. I add a multiple mineral that gives me an additional 1000mg of calcium in 2 tablets along with good amounts of the other minerals.

I did not think these extra minerals were really necessary for overcoming the MS, so for years, I did not take them. I really started on them when I started losing my teeth from lack of calcium. I figured if my calcium was that low, the rest of my minerals must also be on the low side. One tablet twice per day.

NIACINAMIDE, VITAMIN B-3. Niacinamide is used in therapy for some mental patients to help them stay on an even keel. Kind of to keep small emotional problems from growing into big ones. If anyone ever had a reason to help keep things from getting out of hand, we MS’ers do. I use 500mg tablets. One per day except under extra heavy emotional stress situations when I use two per day for that one day of heavy stress. *CAUTION, DO NOT CONFUSE WITH NIACIN* which can cause a very uncomfortable flush at this dosage. (I have to remind myself of this every once in awhile, because I got niacin by accident a time or two.)

LECITHIN. The myelin is made up of almost 70 percent lipids. There is also a great deal of Phosphatidyl Choline and Inositol in various forms in myelin. Both phospholipids and these B complex-like factors are provided by lecithin. I use two rounded tablespoons of the granular form of oil-free lecithin at home for the sake of economy. When I’m traveling, or at other times when capsules are convenient, 12 of the 19-grain capsules are approximately equal to the two tablespoons of granules. I use 12 capsules: three capsules, four times a day.

PANTOTHENIC ACID, VITAMIN B-5 Although this is the most prevalent vitamin in our food supply, our bodies use it in tremendous amounts when we are under stress. Since MS is a constant and on-going stress, I feel I need more than the average person. I use the 500mg tablets. One daily.

LIVER. The liver is our human master chemical plant. MS’ers experience many problems that must be solved chemically within our bodies. I think a well functioning liver is as much the answer as anything.

The old Witch Doctor is really not a part of our heritage, but he did seem to have a few good ideas. Among them was that his patients should eat the organ meats that correspond to the part of the body he thought needed strengthening. The theory seemed to be that tissue from man or animal was similar and that by eating the animal organ meat, everything that man needed to rebuild his own internal organ was available.

I like to use liver as a part of my diet. Most of the time I have 6 oz of broiled liver once a week. This seems to get unpalatable for me on occasion. When this happens, I use 11-grain Desiccated Liver tablets. Two tablets three times a day.

Dr. Swank has always recommended the use of Cod Liver Oil along with the low fat diet. When he first put me on the diet and I tried to take the oil, its taste and smell were more than I could stand. I decided that if the cod liver oil was the deciding factor in getting control over the disease, I would never be able to accomplish it.

Then my friend, Dale Alexander, developed a way of emulsifying the fish oil with lecithin and mint (or orange) flavoring that makes it palatable. It is marketed by Twin Labs under Dale’s name. One tablespoon each day.

In the last several years, much has been written about EVENING PRIMROSE OIL capsules for MS. Since I was not aware of its existence at the time I was busy overcoming the disease in myself, and for the first 10 years or so that others with MS were seeking me out, it played no part in my recovery. From my reading of the reports on prostaglandins by Dr. Horrobin, it appears that what I have been doing is stimulating all of the same systems that the Evening Primrose Oil does, as well as others.

However, over the last few years several MS patients I have talked to and who could afford the added expense, have used the Primrose Oil along with their programs. Some of them report that they think it has speeded up both their rate of remission and the completeness of their remissions. The literature suggests an intake of six capsules daily.

I have begun using two primrose capsules daily, but since I have no more symptoms of MS anyway, I don’t see any change. It appears that there are several varieties of Evening Primrose plants and there seems to be some controversy about how much Gamma-Linolenic acid might be available in the oils of some of the varieties. The only brand of oil used in the scientific studies that I have seen has been the product from Efamol Co.

If anyone intends to try and follow any supplement program which involves large numbers of pills like the one I use, I would suggest they don’t try to take all the supplements at the same time during a day. For easier swallowing and for better utilization by the body, they should split them up into four groups and take them at the 3 meal times and bedtime.

WHAT ABOUT THE COSTS?

The question of cost always comes up. After all we are all on budgets. If a person were to buy the smallest sizes of all the same supplements I use, the average cost would be about $108 per month. But by buying larger sizes and shopping sales, etc., I can hold the price to around $95 per month.

Of course, if I ever let myself run out of everything at the same time and had to buy everything at once, the cost to start up again (assuming all the small sizes again) would be around $126, not including the Primrose Oil. The small difference is because many of the bottles last for well over a month at a time, so the monthly average is less than the initial cost.

That sounds like a lot of money, however, in the perspective of the benefits I have gotten from the program, it is really a bargain. Have you priced a six-month stay at a nursing home, lately? (Which is where I would probably be if I didn’t take all my supplements.) The same money will keep me in supplements for as long as many of us will probably live.

Besides, my eating habits were typically American; eating out in restaurants for lunch most days and for supper once a week or so, with some snacks thrown in along the way. And all that is very expensive. However, by following the diet as prescribed by Dr. Swank (which means almost never eating in restaurants), I save more than the cost of the supplements right out of my previous eating-out-in-restaurants budget.

When you add in the savings of going back to basics and buying almost everything fresh and raw instead of as convenience foods, my wife and I find that our food budget savings are considerable, even with spending the added money on the dietary food supplements.