My Alternative Healing With NMOSD

I am a winter person and totally in love with the season, especially the winter rains. I enjoy it a great deal. I would make a little bonfire on my balcony and sit for hours. But NMOSD changed everything. I’ve had 3 winters and am now into the 4th, post my diagnosis. For me, with winter comes a flare: numbness, headaches, neuropathic itch, stiffness, jerky movement, paresthesia, peripheral neuropathy, brain fog, the "MS hug", chronic fatigue and knee pain.

But this winter was exceptionally different (in a good way). I decided to look into adding alternative healing. Please note that you should always consult with your doctors before trying any alternative options, and I am only sharing what has helped me personally.

Alternative healing with NMOSD

So what happening this winter? For starters: my major relapse. Plus, being alone with my daughter with zero support. And now going through perimenopause. So I knew that my expected winter flare would pose a major obstruction in taking care of my daughter.

I had a full two months before winter to start preparing. Thus my intensive research with alternative healing began. This leads me to 2 key things:

• Diet changes and Ayurveda
• Meditation and NLP (Neuro-Linguistic Programming)

Diet and Ayurveda

Diet

When the sensations started coming back from my waist down a few years ago, it brought the worst of spasms with it. I suffered and was in an out of the ER, until I came across an article that mentioned diet and nutrition changes. I took a chance, and ditched any type of flour. My spasms seemed to just vanish.

So once again I started reading articles and watching videos. This time with my prime focus being paresthesia, and peripheral neuropathy to avoid accidents in the kitchen. The research papers I found on different websites suggested sugar as one of the main culprits. I also wanted to include more fresh fruits and veggies, with minimal use of oil. But with steroids on how could I control my sugar cravings and sugar spikes?

Ayurveda

That’s where the age our age-old Indian Ayurveda stepped in to rescue me. When I spoke to the experts, they said there is no cure; however they would help me in reducing my side effects of NMOSD.

Ayurveda includes regular meditation and exercise, eating the largest meal during lunch, limiting portion sizes and timings, managing negative emotions, limiting foods high in sugar, being mindful of when and how many carbohydrates you eat, eating a variety of whole-grain foods and vegetables every day, consuming less fat, limiting alcohol intake, and using less salt or pink salt.

It uses diet to help the body to heal. I timed when to eat and what to eat. I wrap my food by 7:00 in the evening.

My mornings began with a homemade tea that included half a spoonful of fenugreek seeds, raw turmeric, ginger, cumin, and fennel seeds. Soaked overnight and boiled in the morning, then I also add Neem and bitter guard juice and drink it with lemon on an empty stomach and before sleep. Then around 10:30-11:00 a bowl of fruit (and it can be any). With any form of diabetes fruits are a big no or in small portions, but I am advised to take a proper bowl. Lunch with cooked veggies or lentils, salad, and sometimes 2 flatbread. And in the evening I just take a combination of soaked seeds and nuts with milk. I avoid starchy veggies and have completely ditched artificial sweets, and have switched to using pink salt.

I also ensure that I do a minimum of 1 hour of exercise; either cycling or elliptical training at home. And I keep myself hydrated all the time.

Meditation and NLP (Neuro-Linguistic Programming)

In preparation for winter, I was also reading a lot of books on NLP. NLP is nothing but a change of thoughts and behavior. It helps in identifying patterns blockages and techniques that lead to body to heal. My earlier meditations were to calm my mind, practice gratitude, and better sleep. The current ones post-NLP are focused more towards incantations which is a more powerful version of affirmation, breaking my mental trap of certain thoughts and promoting overall healing and progress in life.

The results

For me, the results are incredible. Mentally I haven’t had any anxiety or panic attacks for months. I have sound sleep. I stopped getting into the trap of paranoia and stuck in an overthinking loop. I am so much in control of everything around me. I am more cheerful. There is clarity of thoughts.

Physically it is unbelievable. The MS hug and a very tiny bit of occasional morning stiffness are there, and I still feel "pebbles under my feet" as a result of nerve damage. However so far, there is zero paresthesia, peripheral neuropathy, no neuropathic itch; almost zero headaches, leg cramps and knee pain, and no brain fog. And not to forget chronic fatigue! I mean I can work for hours without getting tired. And the steroid weight is vanishing.

Winters have never been so welcoming and I am sailing through it feeling like NMOSD doesn’t exist in the same way.

P.S. I am still taking my medications on time!