Dear Lloyd,
You
seem like an old friend though we haven't met. I'm
looking forward to corresponding with you if you
have time. I read your first book and have just
ordrered the second. l have also done some further
research and analysis for my husband Mark. In the
meantime, I thought I'd say thank you for your dedication,
love and support for your fellow HCV sufferers. Thank
you for the extensive research you completed at
your own expense that contributed to your own recovery
and then for sharing that information with others.
You are an amazing individual and I have the utmost
respect and admiration for you. I'd also like to
congratulate you on your success!
My
name is Elaine Thomet and my husband Mark Packwood
has HCV type 1a with a fatty liver and iron overload,
he's 44,is a good man and fun to be around. I've
since become his nurse out of love though I have no
formal training.
The
liver biopsy we just received last month stated my
husband is at Level 4 HCV and Level 4 Liver Cirrohsis.
His "Specialist" wants to get him on Interferon right
away and said he'd only have 10 years to live if he
did not. Don't worry, I've had my druthers about medical
doctors years before I read your book and knew that
the Interferon therapy was a last ditch, poor excuse
for a therapy, from a Specialist we spoke with 4 years
ago when we first found out Mark had HCV. So we chose
to try an alternative route first and will retest
after 3 months (October 02) to see what progress
has been made and decide at that time whether we should
continue on this route. I also just verified by the
NIH Consensus Statement from June 02, that this therapy
works least of all for Mark's type of HCV as I described
above.
Mark
feels great by the way and always has, no obvious
discomfort from his condition yet. We started your
thereapy in full July 3 this month. Just not making
our own homemade teas yet but everything else almost
to the letter. Thank you for so carefully shipping
us our orders.
I'll
let you know what I've been up to. I've read your
first book about 3 times already, making careful notes.
I began a Drug Regime spreadsheet in excel where I've
entered every ingredient from every bottle I ordered
into a spreadsheet that includes product name, manufacturer,
individual ingredients, bottle pill qty, per pill
ingredient dose, bottle price, "Lloyd's recommended
dose", Mark's actual dose, daily combined dose*, relative
bottle term, 3 mo order qty, 3 mo cost, date started
and notes. (* The whole
purpose of this spreadsheet was to make sure I could
track the doseage he was taking of every ingredient
since some ingredients were included in multiple products,
that is what the "daily combined dose" column indicates.)
The rest is just helpful to have record of and I needed
a list to tell me what to give Mark every day. I also
have him on some additional supplements not on your
original list that I am also tracking. I would like
to discuss these and possibly any new information
you've learned since your book "Hepatitiis Free" was
released. Though I'll wait to see what you had to
say in your second book because I suspect we're on
the same path. For the most part my spreadsheet is
complete and I'd like to share it with you. I'd be
interetsed in your thoughts.
I've
also just recently finished Mark's Medical History
spreadsheet. I received a copy of all his labwork
since 1995. He's currently
at ALT131/AST166 and viral count of 661K.
Noticed they were much lower in 95-98 got real high
99-01 and have come down by about 1/2 since. When
we learned of his disease in late 97 he began taking
liver and other supplements with many of the ingredients
you recommend but at very small doses.
As
I mentioned, our first specialist explained our situation
to us in early 98. He started with the whole "expect
a slow terrible death with no current cures available"
story. He then thoughtfully explained his opinion
of Interferon therapy with its poor success rate,
terrible side effects and how doctors get paid to
prescribe it, which he did not approve of. He said
if Mark showed no symptoms or discomfort, we should
wait. He felt confident that some remarkable cures
were around the corner. Suggested we get a biopsy
to determine Mark's true status. Also mentioned some
people can be carriers that do not ever develop
chronic sypmtoms. Our delay in getting the biopsy
was partially due to that last comment. Mark wasn't
anxious to get poked especially if there was nothing
we could do with the bad news in the meantime and
he felt fine.
His
current specialist (new insurance, new specialist)
was pretty pissed that it took two years to get
the biopsy since he ordered it but a lot of the delay
was due to his office and the labs not communicating
effectively. There was concern about wether or not
Mark would bleed too much because of his Prothrombin
tests. No one bothered to ask or advise us that some
herbal supplements may thin his blood...we're not
real impressed with this Dr who spent 2 minutes looking
at Mark's file/biopsy and recomended interferon and
then declared a "10 year life expectancy" if we did
not...We told him we wanted to do some more research
before we began and would get back to him.
If
my Mom didn't find your book online and order it for
me that day I don't know what we'd have done. We
both currently work 12 hours a day and probably
should continue to do so as long as we can, so we
can afford treatment and keep insurance as long
as possible. What you provided us with Lloyd, was
hope. That alone, I know, has added years to Mark's
life. That first day after his doctor told him he
had 10 years to live a miserable death I could see
Mark's spirit wilt. He started the "Why should I .
. . if I'm going to die anyway." He has a strong
spirit and I know it was just due to the shock but
you've really, really given him something to strive
for.
Other
references I've looked into you may also be interested
in were a book Alpha Lipoic Acid Breakthrough by
Burt Berkson, MD PHD. A true student of medicine
who finds the majority of the current medical community
appauling. His career began as a young doctor treating
a couple that came in dying from liver death caused
by deadly mushrooms. The hospital he worked for advised
him to make them confortable while they died - there
was no approved cure. Rather than that, he thought
to try something he'd been researching so he prescribed
ALA and they recovered expediently. He was reprimanded.
It happened again, another couple came in dying
from lethal mushrooms kiling their livers and the
hospital strictly advised him not to use ALA and
instead simply make the patients comfortable for their
death. He refused and saved them with ALA. He tried
to excite the medical community about his success.
They were adimantly not interetsed. He mentions how
when he gives lectures to doctors today they walk
away when he gets to the microbiolgy of why this
works. When he asks them why they leave, they said
they didn't need to know that much detail. This
astonished him since he believes to understand how
life works at the cellular level is the basic place
to begin saving lives. I think you'd enjoy his book.
Also
my Mom pointed me to a couple of websites, the first
of which disusses the importance of Ph balance. http://www.alkalizeforhealth.net/index.htm
Go there and scroll down the first page till you see
A Simple Test. The other site is a good one for your
records http://www.hepatitisctesting.com/home.htm
I
think you must have found this relationship with PH
balance since you now sell Coral products on your
website. I'll just quickly mention some of the facts
that stand out: most cancer patients or people with
serious disease are too acidic. Cancer can not live
in an Alkaline environment and being too acidic can
impair your body's ability to process the nutrients
you may be trying to give it. Mark is acidic (6-ish)
and I'm trying to fix that. This site said that checking
your Ph should be the first thing anyone does when
they feel sick and that Ph test strips should be in
eveyone's medical cabinet next to the thermometer.
Incredibly important!
Another
Doctor, friend of the family, general practitioner
said that ALT/AST are only basic and suggested we
add GTTP, NK and T&P panels to our bloodwork. Another
joyous event was a finding on Marks' most recent lab
work that his Alpha Feta Protein Tumor Marker was
at 22 (11 is high end of normal) indicating
that he may also have a tumor no one's noticed yet.
He tested normal 2 years ago. I think that may be
what these additional tests identify. A sonogram (CT
of the abodomen) to verify this as well was recomended.
I
look forward to hearing back from you at your convenience,
if you're interested in hearing more. I need to get
back to our "specialist" and let him know what we're
doing and what we need him do for us, i.e., order
the sonogram, additional bloodwork in October and
put Mark on the list for transplants. Also Mark takes
a heart medication Rythmol (generic Propafenone)
that we need to know if it is compromising his liver.
If he says he won't do these things since we won't
do the therapy he recomended then we'll know we need
to find another doctor who will help us.
I
know this is a lot of information at once and this
is the first we've corresponded. You seemed genuinely
interested in people's recovery paths and I wanted
you to know I was also doing a lot of work and analysis
on my own and that I am willing to share all of
this with you. I'd like to also mention that I'd
be happy to assist you in further helping the greater
community if you have any plans to continue to share
this knowedge through books or other efforts to
educate the public and/or the medical comunity.
Feel
free to share all or part of this message with others.
Thank
you and God bless!
E.
