Similar to your experience with your doctors, when I was being treated for chronic fatigue syndrome, I didn’t like how they recommended a wide variety of supplements and medications without adequately addressing basic lifestyle factors, particularly diet. This is what eventually provoked me to abandon the treatment. Like you, I achieved much better results on my own.

I’ve made many of the same changes that you have and I agree that it’s a nonstop commitment. However, the initial change is the difficult part, and once this is past, it’s basically just a way of life. Although I think I might be a bit more lenient with myself than what you’ve described, I haven’t had much trouble at all maintaining the healthier habits that I’ve implemented. I think it’s important for people to realize this so that they’re not overwhelmed with discouragement when faced with the difficulty and discomfort of change. It does get easier!

Thanks again for sharing your story, I’m sure many people will be inspired by it!

I have a success story to share about enzymes and probiotics as part of a total routine, but let me give you a bit of history first:

I’ve been reading some of the articles on your website and I’m very impressed. Your information is well researched and backs up so much of what I’ve been learning, too.

I have had fibromyalgia and adrenal fatigue most of my life. I began making the connection between my health and processed foods around 1996 and began eliminating processed stuff. Though I ate it rarely, I haven’t touched fast food at all in probably 13 years now. However, I was still being fooled by all the lies about eating a “healthy” low-fat diet and lots of “healthy” bread and whole grain pasta and processed vegetable oils. So I thought I was eating well, but actually wasn’t.

Then in 2006 I had a “health crash” and was told I’d had an episode of remitting-relapsing MS. This sent me back to the internet and researching where, thankfully, I began learning about the myths of cholesterol (which you covered beautifully, by the way), and the lies about the “heart healthy” diet and “healthy” canola oil and other things I thought I was doing right. At that time I couldn’t walk any distance and had trouble standing for more than a few minutes. Though I’d been doing yoga since 1988, I found I had a lot of stiffness, even in postures I’d been doing for 18 years.

Basically, I ended up going about as all natural as you can in this day and age. I stopped using chemical laden deodorants, shampoos, toothpastes and soaps, for example, as they all contain endocrine disruptors like parabens and phalates. I now only wear make up on special occasions since make-up is unregulated and full of chemicals and lead. I do not drink any juices or juice-based drinks (aside from a little shot glass of pure acai or wheatgrass here and there) and thankfully, I always hated soda, so that was never an issue. I began buying more and more organic vegetables and fruit. I added more meat and protein to my diet. I went wheat free/gluten free, which made a huge difference. I don’t eat cakes, cookies and pancakes, etc, so there’s no worry for me to deal with gluten free substitutes. I eat no breads or pastas. I eat mostly raw or lightly steamed vegetables and very little fruit. I eat nothing with sugar at this point and nothing artificial or industrially processed. The only salt I will use is natural sea salt and I basically cook whatever I eat. I almost never eat anything outside my home. Another big one- I never eat soy! Not even soy lecithin which is found in just about everything processed.

In the past 3 1/2 years of detoxing from my former life, I have seen my health improve in leaps and bounds. I have so much energy today. I am having many pain free days and little stiffness if any. Many people ask me how they can improve their situation by following what I do. The fact is, its hard to do what I do because it literally requires a 24/7 commitment. Everything from drinking enough water to never making an exception on eating stuff on the “no-no” list.

I’m always asked what supplements I take. I used to take a whole bunch of supplements but today, I only take a few. 1. probiotics (the expensive, high quality kind in the fridge), 2. Wobenzyme enzyme therapy 3. Methyl B-12 5000 (every 5 days I take one) 4. 100% pure acai supplement by Genesis Today called Acai 100 and 5. calcium lactate right before, and during “certain time of the month” (as recommended by my natropath).

I think if I could only take one supplement, it would have to be the Wobenzyme. Any quality enzyme will due, but that is the one thing I’d never want to live without. My chiropractor first told me about Wobenzyme for the fibromyalgia in 2002 but I dismissed it thinking it was expensive and not believing it would be much help. I couldn’t have been more wrong. Enzyme therapy has helped probably as much as everything else I’ve done combined. I can’t recommend it enough for a host of ailments. The power to lower inflammation is crucial to all aspects of good heath.

My natropath also recommends enzymes for people with chronic pain and even the fibromyalgia specialist (who is an organized medicine doctor) gave me the “thumbs up” on taking the enzymes for my condition. I have never taken any prescription drugs and I refuse to in the future. I see other people with fibromyalgia adding all these chemicals in food and personal care products and prescriptions to their body and their health is worse than mine was when I crashed! I say, detox your life and take those enzymes for at least a year before you think this isn’t working. It takes time to get all the junk out of the body that was put in for years, but its worth it to feel good and young again and get rid of so much inflammation.

Thanks for sharing your experience with proteolytic enzymes. As I mentioned in my response to Sharona, they seem to have a lot of potential to help resolve specific issues, and I’d like to think that they’re a much safer and perhaps more effective choice than NSAIDs.

I’m a big fan of fermented food also, especially as a natural source of probiotics.

I agree that it’s a good idea to use digestive enzymes if you’re eating a lot of cooked food. Why not try to add more raw vegetables into your diet?

I included Tom Bohager’s book in the article because I think the idea of using enzyme supplements for purposes other than digestion is interesting and seems to be promising. However, I don’t know a lot about it and can’t really offer much of an opinion on the products you mentioned.

In my opinion, using enzyme supplements in this manner seems to have good potential for addressing specific conditions, but in regard to using them on a regular basis to support optimal health, I would need to be convinced that doing so is necessary for someone who consumes quality nutrition and follows healthy habits. Without this type of outlook, it’s easy to get caught up in the hype surrounding supplements and end up taking dozens of them a day and spending a lot of money in the process. Furthermore, it’s still important to consider the potential long term effects even with natural supplements, and in many cases, such information isn’t available.

You are one smart cookie. I just wanted to let you know how interesting I find your topics. You really get it!

I loved both the books you mentioned. A couple of years ago, I took proteolytic enzymes in place of anti inflammatory medication. The enzymes were incredibly powerful and helpful with the effects of my sad, little leaky gut which was causing me such grief at the time.

I recommended the proteolytic enzymes to a client of mine who had completely severed his achilles tendon. His healing was dramatic (yes, he still needed surgery, but the doctors were astounded by his quick ability to regain full function).

We get our enzymes from fermented food now. I try to eat more fermented veggies than fresh ones because I have seen how dramatic the healing effect can be. I used to take digestive enzymes, but eating fermented food has been more helpful in my case.