Overcoming Rheumatoid Arthritis
Cardiac arrest, lesions, thinning hair, life-threatening hypertension, increased appetite and weight gain, loss of muscle mass, depression, convulsions, vomiting material that looks like coffee grounds, emotional instability and irritability, hallucinations, long-term memory loss, schizophrenia, blurred vision, and decreased resistance to infection.
Those are a few of the reported side effects for the drugs I was prescribed with in 2005. I sat in the doctor’s office, with my mom, attempting to process the the news I had just received. I was diagnosed with Rheumatoid Arthritis — a crippling auto-immune disease in which one’s body attacks itself, causing severe joint pain and deformation.
I was only 16 years old and it seemed I only had two choices — take the immune-suppressing drugs, which had side effects that were sometimes worse than the disease itself, or bypass the drugs, and accept the fact that my body was going to slowly deteriorate.
My mom was hesitant to put her 16-year-old son on drugs with potentially-dangerous side effects, so she asked the doctor if there were any alternative treatments. His response: “No — I’m a doctor; you’re just going to have to trust me.” And that’s when my journey began.
In 2005 I was a typical teenage boy. I listened to rap music, secretly enjoyed romantic comedies, and was obsessed with all things sports. I experienced a significant growth spurt and fresh off my two-year stint with braces, my confidence was sky-high. I had my first real girlfriend, I was running three miles a day, playing pick-up basketball multiple times a week, and just started a weight-lifting program. Things couldn’t have been better.
Unfortunately, my unhealthy lifestyle was also typical of a teenage boy. Although I was exhaustingly active and in amazing shape, I stayed up till the wee hours of the morning playing video games and ate fast food every day — sometimes multiple times. On the outside, I was perfectly healthy, but I had no idea of the destruction going on inside my body.
On a random August day, I woke up with a unfamiliar pain in my right wrist. I didn’t remember injuring it lifting weights or playing basketball, so I assumed I had just slept wrong. I applied Icy Hot throughout the day and by the next morning the pain had gone away.
A few weeks later, I woke up with a similar pain in my left shoulder. Assuming this was another instance of sleeping wrong, I applied Icy Hot and the pain subsided. Only a few days later, I woke up with pain and discomfort in both of my hands, as well as my fingers and wrists. The pain was so severe that I wasn’t even able to squeeze my shampoo out of the bottle.
At that point I knew something was wrong. I visited various doctors and took countless blood tests. The common diagnosis was “growing pains”. Eventually one doctor referred me to a Rheumatologist, where I was formally diagnosed with Rheumatoid Arthritis. He insisted on prescribing Methotrexate and Prednisone immediately — both powerful, immune-suppressing drugs.
My mom was adamant about finding an alternative treatment, because she refused to accept the fact that I would have to live the rest of my life in pain. Being a naive teenager, I was not receptive to the idea of attempting to treat an autoimmune disease “the natural way”, by doing things like changing my diet and taking a vitamins. My thinking was, “These guys went to school for eight years for a reason; they know what they’re talking about. I’m sure if there were an alternative treatment, they would know about it.” I asked my mom, “Why don’t you just give me the pill?!”. Luckily, she insisted that we were going to treat the disease a natural way.
The days and weeks following my diagnosis weren’t pretty. We visited a handful of natural doctors, most of whom I thought were insane. One visit in particular prompted a mental breakdown. I sat in the office with my mom, listening to the doctor explain how she wants to put me on a diet consisting of only raw vegetables and nuts. I sat there in silence, watching my mom politely nod, while I thought to myself, “If this lady thinks I’m eating strictly nuts and vegetables in some off-the-wall attempt to cure a disease, she has lost her mind”.
On the car-ride home my mom proposed the idea of eating only nuts and vegetables to me. I sat in the backseat, without saying a word, but as soon as we walked in the door, I started screaming, crying, throwing stuff. I had a lot of anger built up, which manifested in a complete meltdown. My mom, who felt horrible, decided to scrap the nuts and vegetables diet, vowing to find another way. That’s the moment I mentally committed finding another way, and trusted that between my mom and I, we’d figure it out.
We continued to visit natural doctors until we found one we both liked. The one we settled on freaked me out at first, because he was so intense, but I was sold when he said with the utmost confidence, “Oh, you have Arthritis? We can fix that.” I thought, “Either this dude is a lunatic like the rest of them, just one with supreme confidence” or “Hmm, if somebody else besides my mom seems to think we can do this, let’s do it.”
My treatment consisted of a food sensitivity test — accompanied by a specialized diet avoiding all the foods my body was “sensitive” to — various acupuncture sessions, dozens of vitamins and supplements, homeopathic medicine, joint massages, joint creams, etc.
My life got worse before it got better. In the months following my diagnosis I broke up with my girlfriend, had no energy, suffered from undiagnosed anxiety and depression, woke up every morning in pain, and was on a diet of plain chicken, brown rice, applesauce, green vegetables and vegan ice cream. Among the simple tasks I was unable to do because of my condition included: running, opening a milk carton, squeezing shampoo out of the bottle, playing video games, shooting a basketball, and looking over my shoulder to change lanes, while driving. Every movement hurt — from walking to class, to putting on my backpack.
But as the days turned to weeks, and weeks turned to months, I saw significant improvement in my health. The pain wasn’t nearly as severe. My mom got the hang of cooking, so my diet improved drastically. And I started doing things I was doing before Arthritis. (I’ll never forgot the first time I shot a basketball again — something I thought I’d never do).
It took ample time for my body to heal itself of all the damage I had done 16 years, but two years of natural, drug-free treatment later, my blood tests came back normal. Instead of treating the symptoms of Rheumatoid Arthritis with drugs that could’ve caused heart problems, skin problems, memory problems, and other immune system problems, my blood tests showed that I no longer had the disease, nor the side effects accompanied by the drugs. The only long-term sacrifices I made were: take a few extra vitamins every day and alter my diet to avoid certain foods — like gluten and dairy. But I wasn’t out of the woods just yet.
Fast forward to Summer 2010. I was a few months removed from my 21st birthday. Since I was still feeling healthy and RA-free, I began to neglect my diet. I was finally legal, so I starting drinking. I’d also eat fast food a few times a month and hang out in hookah bars. I continued to feel healthy, despite falling back into old habits, so I felt that there was no incentive to remain on my strict diet.
At the end of May, I flew to Boston to live with my extended family and complete a three-month internship. During my first month in Boston, I half-heartily followed my diet, but my last two months consisted of nothing but pizza, McDonalds, beer, hot wings, banana splits and more beer. I was still feeling good, all things considered.
Two weeks before my internship ended, I came home from work on a random Thursday night. I posted up on the couch to watch the latest episode of Jersey Shore and indulge on some gluten-free donuts, when I felt my lower lip beginning to swell up. With my lip continuing to swell up, I turned off Jersey Shore and decided to go to bed. I assumed the swelling in my lip would be gone in the morning.
A few hours later, I woke up and headed to the bathroom. I turned on the light, looked in the mirror and was blown away with how swollen my lip had become. I kid you not when I say my lower lip was as thick as bratwurst sausage.
I was staying in my aunt and uncle’s house, alone, while they were away. It was three o’clock in the morning and not only was my lip not getting better, but the swelling felt like it was spreading to my throat area. To die with a swollen lip would’ve been bad enough, but it would’ve been absolutely tragic if my last memories were a plate of gluten-free donuts and an episode of Jersey Shore. (Now that’s a Situation.)
I panicked and called my mom. She suggested we iChat (the 2010 version of Facetime), and upon seeing my lip her reaction went something like, “Oh my gosh, Jordan. You need to go to the emergency room now!” Reluctantly, I called my cousin — who lived 30 minutes away — who I also iChated with. After making fun of the size of my lip for a few minutes, him and his fiance took me to the emergency room. The nurse asked me ‘what brought me in tonight’ (seriously?! my lip looked like it was swallowing my face), they pumped me full of steriods and antihistamines and kept me there overnight.
Following my internship, I flew back to Vegas, and was diagnosed with Leaky Gut Syndrome — a condition where pin-sized holes in your intestines allow food particles to enter your blood stream, causing various reactions. My reaction came in the form of chronic hives.
For the next six or seven months, I was in worse shape than I was in 2005. Not only did my joints hurt again, but now I was breaking out in hives every day — face included. Again, the doctors provided no hope, saying I’d have to take an antihistamine every day, for the rest of the my life.
I carried a Benadryl everywhere, for fear of swelling up. I went weeks without leaving my house and lost contact with friends, as my social skills slowly diminished. I ate nothing but plain chicken, rice and apples, because no one could figure out what foods were causing my hives. I was so malnourished, that I lost 30 pounds and my testosterone levels plummeted.
My life consisted of nothing but school and watching movies, by myself — I was rotting away. I was desperate to work out, but my elbow was so inflamed, and deformed, that I didn’t even have the range of motion to wash my hair left-handed, let alone lift, even a two pound weight.
After re-testing my food sensitivities, my trio of natural doctors — along with my mom — helped me figure out a plan of attack. It took a seven months, a ridiculously strict diet, along with various vitamins and supplements, but I finally stopped breaking out in hives and my blood tests returned to normal. I started going out for the first time in almost a year, and slowly re-gained my confidence and re-kindled my friendships.
Despite still being somewhat limited, I dragged myself to the gym. All I could do was lightly jog, do a few sit-ups, curl two pound weights and pull-ups on the assisted pull-up machine. I was disgustingly skinny and malnourished, but the hard part was over with. Leaky Gut Syndrome and chronic hives were a thing of the past, as was Rheumatoid Arthritis — again. As time went on, I steadily became healthier, and eventually felt even better than I did prior to living in Boston.
Over the past seven years, I’ve been to hell and back because of my health. But now I’m the healthiest I’ve ever been, and the happiest I’ve ever been. I can now say with complete conviction, that I feel normal for the first time since my freshman year in high school. I’m still on a strict diet, and although I cheat every once in a while (Doritos Taco!), I learned my lesson from my days in Boston. I lift weights five days a week, run, and play pick-up basketball with my friends. Not only am I not on any medications, I don’t even take over-the-counter stuff, like Tylenol. Looking at me, you’d never know what I’ve been through.
The other day I was asked if I’d do it all over again. My answer is absolutely. Not only am I healthier than I ever could’ve imagined, but my mom is healthy, and my kids/family will most definitely be healthy as a result of my experience. The process has also made me an incredibly strong person, both mentally and physically, and I feel like there’s nothing I can’t do.
Being legitimately healthy changes your outlook on life, and I sincerely hope that everyone has the privilege of complete and total health some day. Whether or not the ailment is as small as ‘trouble sleeping’, or as large as an auto-immune disease, there’s an alternative to the pills the doctors prescribe, which only treat the symptoms, not the condition. Your body has the amazing ability to heal itself, if you’re willing to put in the effort. I’m living proof.
This story still has plenty of chapters to be written, but not many people can say they’ve overcome an auto-immune disease. I’ve done it twice.
article originally written in 2013
2019 update — I left my corporate job to pursue a career in health.
contact: jor.sams@gmail.com
