Wellness Journey
I started doing my own research about MS and wellbeing and this is when I came across other people's MS recovery stories. I wanted to learn more about how they managed their MS and what diets they recommended. I purchased professor George Jelinek’s book ‘Overcoming MS’ and I read about Terry Wahls’ success story. This is when I started to see some light at the end of the tunnel! The only thing was, I was never the type of person to read books so I’d opt to research online instead! I thought ‘ok, it seems as though diet is at the forefront of the recovery process so i’m going to try and change my diet’. I started researching about food, anti-inflammatory foods in particular and noticed that a diet high in vegetables seemed to be the best option. I thought ‘ok, I’ll see how I go on a vegetarian diet and take it from there’. As I continued to research, my vegetarian diet turned into a vegan diet. The more I researched, the more I felt overwhelmed as I found the information to be conflicting. It got to a point that I just didn’t know what to eat, what to do or where to start!
I then came across a book called ‘Become a Wellness Champion’ by an author named Pam Bartha. Pam was also diagnosed with MS and has been in remission for many years. I thought ‘ok, let’s give reading another go!’. As soon as I started reading Pam’s book, I felt an instant connection! Pam’s book is all about healing your body naturally and how to start. As I’ve mentioned before, I’m the type of person that prefers to not take medication so I was instantly attracted to healing my body naturally, it just made sense to me. After I finished Pam’s book, I started watching Pam's video's and I started noting down things that I wanted to research further such as holistic health, functional medicine and herbal medicine.
The first step was to seek a Naturopath to try and find the ‘root cause’ of what was driving my dis-ease however, I didn’t know any Naturopaths. The questions began, who can I trust? will I be able to find someone who specialises in MS? I started researching, reading reviews and looking for Naturopaths. I came across a website called the ‘Wellness Guru’. I read the website over and over and decided Fiona was who I wanted to work with.
Fiona is a fully qualified Naturopath with over 15 years of experience who manages her own chronic neurodegenerative disease and has a special interest in treating people with chronic neurodegenerative diseases including MS. I felt so happy, it truly felt like a ‘finally’ moment! I decided to take a leap of faith and made an appointment with Fiona.
In June 2018, my first appointment with Fiona arrived, I was feeling a range of emotions as I just didn’t know what to expect and I really hoped that I was taking a step in the right direction. My appointment consisted of sharing my diagnosis, talking about my journey, how my body was functioning, my diet, my lifestyle and what I wanted to achieve. Fiona explained what to expect and how we were going to achieve it. The second step was to do some blood tests.
In September 2018, it was time to receive my MRI scan results. I was feeling pretty stressed about these results as they would reiterate whether I needed to change my medication. This time, I had 1 new lesion in my brain. Once again, the neurologist and nurse recommended that I change my medication. I thought ‘1 is better than 3, I wonder if the small changes that I have made to my diet is actually helping!?’. I agreed to review the medicine brochures again however my focus was on healing my body naturally and hoping that this would work!
In October 2018, the results from my blood tests were in. Fiona went over all the results with me and I found out things that I never knew about my own body! We discussed diet, lifestyle and treatment started. The first steps were to change my diet to better support my body, exercise, take natural supplements and commence treatment which involved herbal medicine - my wellness journey began!
I continued to research and worked on my lifestyle. Fiona had suggested daily walks as well as Yoga and Pilates to strengthen my core muscles. Yoga didn’t appeal to me, I was more of a Zumba and Kick Boxing kind of girl so I started Kick Boxing! I lasted all of 3 classes, well 2 1/2 as I was feeling quite unwell in the 3rd class and my body was so sore from the previous class, I actually don’t know how I didn’t faint! I then thought, I’ll give Pilates a go so I researched the closest class and I ended up at my local five star gym. I was so excited, I got dressed in my lycra’s and off I went. When I arrived at the gym there were a few men in the class, I thought ‘hmm this is interesting’ and then another man walked in who was the instructor! I really enjoyed the class however it just wasn’t the class for me, it was definitely an interesting experience though!
During this time I was also looking for a local hairdresser who used organic products on their clients. My sister’s friend, Josie recommended ‘Kira’ from Oshun Salon. I had stopped colouring my hair as I wanted to give my body the best chance to heal. I’d always loved colouring my hair (thanks to my beautiful cousin Maria who is an amazing hairdresser!) so this was a difficult decision for me to make. I thought ‘fantastic, I’ll make an appointment with Kira’. As soon as I walked into Kira’s salon, I felt a sense of calm. I soon found out that wonderful Kira was also a Yoga teacher! I thought ‘what are the chances!’.
In the meantime, I was still having issues with my back so I decided to see a Shiatsu massage therapist. Once again, it was important for me to find a therapist who understood my condition. I started seeing, Kate Redman-Brown who came recommended to me. Kate is not only a qualified Shiatsu massage therapist, she is also a flexibility and strength teacher who has over 25 years of experience and also lives with MS.
It was now March 2019 and I was expecting my MRI scan results. This time the wait felt different, I was feeling a little nervous however I was actually looking forward to receiving my results as I was interested to see if what I was focusing on had made a difference. The neurologist advised me that my results showed no new lesions! I recall looking at my husband and we both had tears of joy in our eyes! All I kept thinking was ‘Yes! all this hard work and determination is paying off!’. The neurologist suggested to continue taking Copaxone and keep on doing what I was doing as it seemed to be working!
I'm participating in The May 50K with my amazing team the ‘Wellness Warriors'! Yes, we've decided to take on the challenge to walk 50km’s throughout May to raise vital funds for MS Research.
Research is the KEY to changing the future of MS.
You can show your support by sponsoring me and/or my amazing team at the following link:
https://www.themay50k.org/fundraisers/mirellapetrucci
Thank you, your support truly means so much xx