Irish Artist - beta blocked for 16 years ...

[Irishartist]

Hello all, this is my first post ...

My name is Samuel and I am a 34yo father of three, living in the North of Ireland.

I discovered Dr McDougall's work (hello Dr McD!) about a year and a half ago and am still struggling to adhere to the McDougall program. Dairy has gone, as has coke, most fried food, etc etc. I have moments of breaking regularly and eat chocolate and crisps. Even chips. With the kids I find it hard not to hoover up whatever they have left lying around, and my family members, lovely people that they are, have decided that this new 'vegan' thing is dangerous and in no way support my efforts. (An example, for easter my father sent the kids about 20 packets of chocolate in a large plastic bucket.)

So its all down to my willpower really, and I simply dont have a lot of that. It certainly has developed over the past year, but I am prone to binging still.

The reason Im McDougalling is ... well 2 reasons really:

1 I am absolutely invalid as regards my health. When I was 18 (16 years ago) I took some very severe panic attacks, severe enough to have me admitted to hospital several times. These didnt settle and so I was prescribed beta blockers. I still take them all these years later. I am very agrophobic as a result, and rarely leave my safety zone, which is a circle rather close to my house. (I wasnt even able to have a proper wedding, wasnt able to celebrate my 30th birthday, etc etc) Obviously with my wife and children I feel I am letting them down immensely but what can I do? I am terrified of having an attack, and the attacks are absolutely mortifying.(sorry for moaning ... this is like one long moan!)

2 I always kept reasonably fit through walking, jogging, cycling etc until 4 years ago when something happened to my stomach. I dont know what it was, but Ive been having severe problems ever since. My doctor suggested I go for an endoscope but I was too panicky to go to the city. He said, after finding the HPryori virus, that I prob had an ulcer. Since then I really have been disabled. i can walk only short distances now. I cannot play games with my children. I cannot travel far. Simple tasks are too much.

----

So then I discovered the MCD program. My diet was indeed dreadful. i switched (without doctors advice i hate to admit) to a vegan diet and within 6 months I functioned a little better. another year on and I can still function a little better but my stomach still burns at intervals, and i have days, like today, when Ill be housebound.

i do apologise for moaning like this, but I am here on the forum to ask advice of anyone who has successfully healed stomach troubles / come off beta-blockers. I feel like death is approaching me. I have fough so hard for so long, and the life force is slowly leaving me. I look at my 3 sons and pray that they do not lose their father, but if I compare myself now to myself 10 years ago, I have just slowly gone downhill until now I am practically disabled.

I wil not give up. It is not in my nature. it is not in the nature of my people. And so I am here, looking for encouragement, answers, information, whatever it takes to be able to have some sort of quality of life again and be a proper father to my little sons. God bless you all, Samuel

[SactoBob]

Welcome, and we all here wish you success.

Most of us who have gotten to total adherence with the program will tell you that it has been really worthwhile and made quite a bit of difference as compared to partial adherence. If you haven't seen Doug Lisles "Pleasure Trap" video presentation (dvd is here, or the book, or you can view part for free at Veg. Society of Hawaii) please do so. You will need a lot of will power for partial compliance because you never lose the cravings. With full adherence, the bad feelings usually go away in 30-60 days.

Re the panic etc., I had some issues with this a number of years ago (probably - the symptoms also went away when I had a lesion taken off my spinal cord). I don't have any of these problems any more, and the book that really made a difference was Anxiety, Phobias, and Panic by Reneau Z. Peurifoy. I really believe in this self help program over meds, and that program really works in my experience and that of many others.

Good luck, and if you do go for adherence, you will find a lot of help here.

[Faith in DC]

Dang Samuel. I can understand how you are feeling. I had a endoscopy friday the 3rd of April and my stomach started giving me fits right afte that. They took some biopsies of my stomach. I was so sick last week, so sick and the pain. The doctor won't come out and say ulcer and says it's nothing to do with the procedure. But he did prescribe Carafate and it's helping me so much.

[ncyg46]

I don't know about panic attacks but I do know about ulcers....
if you cut all the oil, the chips which have oil...you will do better. You have three great sons..I know it is a different program but have you ever watched BBCof america with You are what you eat with jillian mckeith...I watch it all the time and the chips gotta go. I can't eat any oil...or I have stomach problems......

http://www.bbcamerica.com/content/273/index.jsp

it's close to McDougall .I just like to see what they show...don't know if you get this or not but it is interesting. Main thing is get rid of the oil, chocolate and things that are not part of the plan. I can't eat a thing that has oil in it or I am parked for the day in you know what, so i don't eat it anymore......not fun. Had a dad that got most of his intestines removed, so I don't eat that anymore!