Teresa Gryder's Naturopathic Notes: How to get healthy and stay that way without taking handfulls of meds for the rest of your days.

Living in the Grey Area

7/28/2021

In this polarized time, people are falling into groups as if it were their only safety. In politics if you aren't a Republican, you're a Democrat. In medicine you're either pro-vaccine, or an anti-vaxxer. In religion you're either devout, or an atheist. I'm here to tell you that none of those are true.

I'm an Independent, politically. I'm a vaccine moderate, meaning I think some vaccines are good and some not so good, and some people should get vaccines that other people should not. I'm "spiritual but not religious" meaning that I don't go to any church but I have my own practice which brings me into contact with the sacred and sublime, and I believe that some such practice is essential for becoming a moral human. In other words, I live in the grey.

If you are like me and don't fit into the pre-made groups, welcome. Fellow seekers, people who do not accept anyone else's narrative and prefer to learn and discover and make our own story, we are this nation's hope for the future, this world's hope for the future. Collective intelligence relies on both diversity and disagreement; we have to be able to talk about tough issues without shutting each other down. Without disrespecting each other.

When you already know all the answers, in spite of not having done the study for yourself, you are taking a shortcut to a dead end. People who are sure that one political party or the other is 100% on the right track are mistaken. People who think that every single human should be given the Covid-19 vaccine are just as mistaken as those who think it's a government effort to inject micro-chips and track us all. People who think that every single soul who does not agree with their religion is going to hell, they're already in a philosophical dead end. It can be hard to turn around in a dead end.

It is important to understand the best arguments of your adversaries. It is valuable to develop real arguments for your positions rather than simply saying that the other side is wrong, or so-and-so told you so. Humans being social creatures are susceptible to accepting whatever version of reality is used by those around us--but we are also intelligent enough to question it.

It's time to develop our moderateness, our humility and kindness. Nobody can know everything. Admitting that we don't know is an opportunity to learn. Admitting that we've been listening to an authority figure who doesn't actually know gives us an opportunity to investigate new sources, to check out different experts, and to develop a more nuanced and complete view of our world. The truth pretty much always lies somewhere in the grey.

Covid update 11/23-24

11/23/2020

KIDS CAN TRANSMIT COVID AFTER ALL---AND PRETTY WELL
https://www.princeton.edu/news/2020/09/30/largest-covid-19-contact-tracing-study-date-finds-children-key-spread-evidence
Remember how they were saying that children don't transmit the virus, so it's OK to send your kids to school? Well that appears to have been wrong. Best protect your kids from exposures so that they don't bring it home to you.

VACCINE TRACKER
https://www.raps.org/news-and-articles/news-articles/2020/3/covid-19-vaccine-tracker
Been dorking out about all the vaccines under development? Yeah lots of people are. Not me, so much, I'm just working and waiting. My take on vaccination: we're going to want it, but we also don't want it to hurt us, so it's worth waiting. If you end up getting a vaccine that works really well, great. If you get a vaccine that kinda halfway works, get another one the next time you have a chance. Do what you can to improve your immune response to the vaccine. A future email newsletter will be about this subject.

MOST CONTAGIOUS STRAINS COME TO DOMINATE
https://todayspractitioner.com/covid-19/coronavirus-genetic-mutation-may-mean-it-is-more-contagious/#.X701_6pKjNZ
Lots of mutations have appeared in COVID-19 the ones that make it more contagious are a big advantage for the virus, meaning that more and more of the cases are the most highly contagious strains. Which means that mask wearing is even more important, and during our current spike staying completely away from others may be of ultimate importance. The study was done in Houston, TX: https://mbio.asm.org/content/11/6/e02707-20.

THE CURRENT SURGE IS WORSE THAN ANYTHING BEFORE
https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2020/11/13/934566781/the-pandemic-this-week-8-things-to-know-about-the-surge
This article is 11 days old already but it documents how fast the case rate accelerated in the first half of November. An increased case rate is inevitably followed by increased hospitalizations and deaths. During this time when so many people have the virus, there is nothing you can do except stay away from people. Even your dearest friends and relatives can give you the virus, or you can give it to them. So take some time to hibernate, meditate, read books, and otherwise entertain yourself at home. Don't even go shopping if you don't have to. This situation could last all winter if lots of people ignore this advice, but you don't have to be the one dying or killing your dearest people. Being a homebody is not the end of the world. It's easier to be free when you are alive.

Antibody Immunity for Covid and what it means for you

9/19/2020

NEW REVIEW OF MANY STUDIES ABOUT COVID ANTIBODIES
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-020-18450-4

Released 2 days ago, this synthesis review shows that immunity to SARS-COV2 behaves in a normal way. When a person has been quite sick and survived, they will likely have high antibody levels for that particular sickness--for a little while. These are the people from whom you might wish to get convalescent plasma, because it's probably full of antibodies that could help. But these antibodies ramp down pretty quickly once you clear the sickness. A person who had the virus months ago will not have as many antibodies in their plasma as a person who just cleared it last week. This is why there aren't studies to prove that convalescent plasma is a good treatment: it depends on the person's immune response and on the timing.

IgM is the first kind of antibody your body makes, and appears about a week into an illness. After that your body switches over to making IgG antibodies. The fact that IgM antibodies decrease after the illness is NORMAL. The IgG antibodies that are made next are the keepers. They keep being made, but at lower and lower levels if you aren't still fighting the same virus. This is also NORMAL. Your body does the same thing for ever flu it ever encounters. The fact that your body KEEPS making antibodies has to do with its MEMORY. The immune system has cells called Memory B Cells--the ones that know how to make antibodies for a specific condition--they are your body's memory. As long as your memory B cells survive, your body has a blueprint of how to make more B cells that can more antibodies to fight that remembered infection--in other words, it can respond faster.

Memory B cells can live a long time but eventually they die. The rate at which they die varies by age and lifestyle and also by what other infections you get. One really good reason to get vaccinated against Measles is that getting measles infection can kill your memory B cells, making you MORE susceptible to things that you've had before. And that stinks. I hope that you are vaccinated for measles (the MMR is available if you aren't) and that you also get vaccinated for the flu this year, because it's good to protect your lungs.

As for the COVID vaccine, we're likely to have a lot of options with varying efficacy that are available to most of us next year. I don't know for sure what will come out, but I will say that for myself I will try to get one vaccine/year, hopefully different kinds each year, to help my body build up resistance by exposure to lots of different parts of the virus. For those who are worried about adverse effects from vaccines, let me just say that they really are rare, a lot more rare than the diseases. Also you can also minimize your risk of adverse effects to vaccines by improving your ability to detoxify your body. I can help with that for sure. Spring and fall are good times for a deeper detox!

The CDC no longer legitimate info gatekeeper 9/19/2020

9/19/2020

CDC GUIDANCE ABOUT COVID-19 FLIES IN THE FACE OF SCIENCE
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/09/17/health/coronavirus-testing-cdc.html
Several of our most important government agencies have fallen prey to anti-science populist politics and can no longer be trusted to sort through the information and tell us what to believe or trust. We need good-faith gatekeepers of information in this age of excessive and some false "speech" clouding every question. In this case the scientists (especially the ones that study infectious disease) are telling us that to contain this pandemic we need to test EVERYBODY and make sure that all the asymptomatic carriers are quarantined. The CDC just issued a report saying that we shouldn't be tested unless we have symptoms. This is what we have been doing, and it has resulted in nearly 200,000 dead in this country alone. If we continue with this method, and with the likely efficacy of vaccines being in the neighborhood of 50%, and with the likely avoidance of the vaccine by somewhere around 50% of the population, we can expect A MILLION DEAD in this country alone. So the CDC, in line with the authoritarian administration that has perverted it, is setting us up for an ongoing pandemic disaster. Best get some great time outdoors with friends this fall while the weather is still good, because when wintertime comes smart people will keep their indoor social circles tiny. TINY.

COVID-19 Links and Thoughts 9/14/2020

9/14/2020

WE NEED TO KNOW WHAT HAPPENED WITH THE ADVERSE EFFECT
https://blogs.sciencemag.org/pipeline/archives/2020/09/14/vaccine-transparency
It is not OK for vaccine manufacturers to hide the specifics of adverse effects, any more than it is OK for governments to hide the specifics of nuclear incidents. If the people is to trust the makers of vaccines or the governments of countries, we need to hear prompt, factual information from them.

COVID-19 Links June 12

6/12/2020

Don't Be A Superspreader! They start more cases than the rest of us.
https://arstechnica.com/science/2020/06/just-10-20-of-covid-19-cases-behind-80-of-transmission-studies-suggest/

Tear Gas: The Whole Story
https://www.propublica.org/article/tear-gas-is-way-more-dangerous-than-police-let-on-especially-during-the-coronavirus-pandemic

The Party Might be Virtual but Our Pride is Not
https://theweek.com/articles/917795/pride-celebrations-virtual-during-coronavirus-pandemic

You Probably Want a Flu Shot This Year
https://thehill.com/policy/healthcare/502166-the-next-covid-19-challenge-convincing-people-to-get-their-flu-shots

A 17 year old Tracks Disease and Protest better than the Government
https://www.technologyreview.com/2020/06/12/1002838/avi-schiffmann-17-year-old-guide-building-pandemic-protest-tracker/

Diabetes is a Risk Factor for COVID, and COVID is a risk factor for Diabetes
https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMc2018688

Cases in India Take Off
https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/daily-cases-covid-19?country=~IND

Cases Increase as States Open: Wear a Mask
https://apnews.com/feb4c26d9364497cf82ee7c0c1b1b3d5

T-Cells are Part of the Immunity You Need
https://www.cell.com/action/showPdf?pii=S0092-8674%2820%2930610-3

COVID-19 Links 15

4/23/2020

Updated 4/24

1/5 of New Yorkers have had the Dread Virus
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/04/23/nyregion/coronavirus-antibodies-test-ny.html

Vitamin C Reduces ICU and Ventilator Duration, Might Help Before That
https://todayspractitioner.com/respiratory-health/is-vitamin-c-the-unsung-covid-19-hero/#.XqMVz9NKgiN

Parisian Poop Patterns Parallel COVID-19 Cases
https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2020.04.12.20062679v1

Arguments about ReOpening Especially Interesting Given the Politics
https://www.foxnews.com/us/americans-support-extending-coronavirus-stay-at-home-orders

Virus is Expanding in Navajo Nation
https://www.knau.org/post/northern-arizona-coronavirus-cases-grow-navajo-nation-infections-continue-surge

Hemostatic Derangement? Washing Post Reports Clots Killing Pts
https://www.washingtonpost.com/health/2020/04/22/coronavirus-blood-clots/

Antibody Testing (Serology) Strategy
https://www.centerforhealthsecurity.org/our-work/pubs_archive/pubs-pdfs/2020/200422-national-strategy-serology.pdf

Accuracy of Current Serology Testing Variable
https://www.fiercebiotech.com/medtech/covid-19-antibody-testing-a-disaster-says-roche-ceo-as-its-diagnostics-sales-rise

Vaccination Rates in Freefall
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/04/23/health/coronavirus-measles-vaccines.html?referringSource=articleShare

Covid Patients Should NOT Discontinue ACE Inhibitors or ARB's
https://www.ahajournals.org/doi/abs/10.1161/CIRCRESAHA.120.317134

COVID-19 Antibodies: Introd to Immunology and Vaccines

3/26/2020

Are you an immunologist? Yeah, probably not. There aren't a lot of immunologists in the world. I'm not one, though I've studied immunology under one of the best (Dr. Heather Zwickey) and I try to keep up. It's a fast moving field. Every time I hear Dr Zwickey speak she tells us about some new receptor or cytokine that they've discovered, and a bunch of new correlations between the things we already have a little info about.

If you don't speak the language of immunology, a lot of the talk these days won't make a lot of sense. How does the body fight off a virus? How is a vaccine made? These questions have long, complicated answers. In this post I want to teach you the basic outline of the answers, even if we don't go into all the terminology and details.

One word you're going to hear a lot about is ANTIBODIES. Antibodies are, for the most part, a good thing. Antibodies are what you have if you have gotten sick and managed to fight off the infection.

But how do you get them?

When you first get an infection, something has invaded your body. It could be a virus or a bacteria or a cancer cell that won't stop multiplying. The first step in fighting off such an invader is to recognize it. We have immune cells who are always on patrol for invaders. The take samples of antigens from the invader's surface and deliver them to headquarters (a lymph node). At headquarters there are cells that design and manufacture antibodies that match those antigens. Antibodies are Y-shaped proteins that stick to the antigens on the invader cells and mark them for destruction.

After the invader antigens are marked, a different set of immune cells charges out and kills them. This is when you start getting better from your illness. Unfortunately the process of noticing the invader, delivering the antigen sample to HQ, designing and making the antibodies, tagging the invader cells and killing them takes about a week. It's not fast.

When your body has never fought off a certain invader before, your immune system is said to be "naive" about it. Once you have been exposed and are making antibodies, you are said to have "immunity".

This is why vaccines are so useful. A vaccine is basically a sample of antigen injected into your system to jump-start the process of recognition, delivery, and antibody-making. If you've had the vaccine for a particular kind of invader, then your body already has the antibody designed and a few of them are already made. This cuts days off of your response time to that infection. The faster you can mark the invader with antibodies and send in the troops to destroy it, the less time it has to grow in your body and make you badly sick.

When it comes to COVID-19, we had doubts about humans making good antibodies to it, because we don't seem to develop antibodies to the other coronaviruses that cause the common cold. Without developing antibodies, we don't have immunity. We can get the common cold over and over again, and it can be just as bad as it was the last time.

But the GOOD NEWS is in, and that is that people who've had COVID-19 are making antibodies to it! That means that we will be able to make a vaccine, and that the vaccine will work. This study from China, posted today (3/26/2020), says they found 206 different antibodies to COVID-19 in the immune cells of patients that survived it. Not only are there 206 antibodies detected so far, but they stick really well to the virus. Good news indeed!

The next step after testing people for the virus is to test them for the antibodies. Some of us have already had it. Wouldn't it be great to know if you've had it yet? If you knew that your immune system had already beat this virus and was ready to beat it again, you could go work in a hospital with sick people and not worry about getting sick.

It's true, we don't know how long immunity will last after exposure and antibody response, but we will learn that in the next year or two. In the meanwhile I am encouraged that research is finding good antibodies that can be used for a vaccine. Hope is on the Horizon.

A Fever is a Good Thing (Here's Why)

10/26/2019

This is the author using a down jacket and cat to get warm.

If you’ve ever had the flu, you know how miserable it can be. Chills and sweats, body aches, coughs and sniffles—there’s nothing about it that anyone would choose to embrace. Many people get the flu vaccine every year and while that’s not the subject of this article, I will say that most of us don’t need it. Even if you get the vaccine, you might get the flu. Even if you don’t get the flu, you could easily get a cold or some other bug. When the days get short and the air gets cold and dry, more people get sick. That’s just the way it is.

In my parents’ generation the main treatment for a cold or flu was lowering the fever. Aspirin was avoided for children because it could cause Reye’s syndrome, but Tylenol was given. These days ibuprofen or naproxen are popular options for lowering a fever. But what if lowering the fever makes you sicker in the long run? What if it impairs your body’s effort to kick the bug out?

That is exactly what is happening. If you start to feel sick and get chills, the last thing you really want to do is lower the fever. It does not help you get better any faster. Instead of popping pills intended to keep yourself from getting a fever, you want to facilitate the fever. This is because fever is part of your immune system’s way of dominating infections and kicking them out. Once you realize this, you will know what to do. You might even be able to prevent yourself from getting all the way sick.

Whenever you feel strangely cold, it could be because your body has decided to turn up its internal thermostat. Chills are a sign that your body wants to be hotter. The best thing you can do is help it get as hot as it wants. Drinking hot tea, wrapping up in a blanket, curling up next to a fire are a good start. A hot bath is great. It’s hard to keep a bathtub hot for very long so boil a kettle of water and keep it on the side to pour in (carefully!!) when your water starts to cool down. If you have access to a hot tub or sauna where you won’t infect others, those are even better. Put on a warm hat or hoodie. Make a hot water bottle and put it on your midsection or your feet. Curl up with the kittie. The only warming thing you don’t really want to do is to exercise because you probably feel really tired if you have a fever and it will only make you more tired. Get warm and rest.

If your body is getting sick, it is mounting an immune response to something. You want it to do that. You want it to get the fever because that will help it get rid of the infection. Heating treatments are used for cancer too, because heat activates the immune system. There is nothing wrong with letting your body get a degree or three warmer than it usually is!

Unfortunately as we get older our bodies don’t get fevers like they used to. Kids make great fevers, so high that they can have harmless seizures from being so hot. Adults can get good fevers, high enough to kick infections, but rarely hot enough to cause seizures. Old people sometimes don’t get fevers at all, and this is a problem, because it’s hard to tell when they have an infection, and because the infections can hang around a long time. Regular heating treatments for elders are not a bad idea even when they are not sure if they’re sick. Some elders have low body temperatures to start with so if their temperature measures as “normal” (98.6F) they actually are having a fever.

Obviously you must be careful when using boiling water, heating pads or anything hot that you do not burn someone. A body temperature of 99F or more generally counts as a fever and if it gets over 101F or so your fever is getting real. This means the body is fighting something it considers dangerous. Generally we get higher fevers from bacterial infections than from viral ones, but getting our body totally warm helps us beat viruses just like it helps us beat bacteria.

The moral of the story is that fevers are good! If you get a fever, that means you are healthy enough to have a functional immune system, and it is doing its job. If you get the chills, your body is serious about beating an infection, and the best thing you can do is to get yourself toasty warm, drink liquids, and rest. Don’t eat food, that distracts the immune system, much of which lives in the intestine. Just get yourself hot and wait it out.

When your body suddenly starts sweating and you feel way too hot, the fever has broken. It’s OK to take off your hat and get out from the covers when this happens. The fever might come back again, or it might not. If it comes back again, drink hot liquids and cover up and get warm again. Usually after a few cycles of this the illness will be over. Unlike the lingering sickness that would have happened if you lowered the fever with pills and stopped your immune system from working. So be thankful for the innate intelligence of your body and enjoy the fever! It’s what nature intended.

Simple but Feared Treatment for the FLU

1/9/2015

Americans are pretty much terrified to stop eating. In this newsletter Dr Gryder discusses why fasting is a reasonable home treatment for the flu. If you'd like to receive future email newsletters directly to your inbox, you can sign up here.