There were huge boils, about the size of a silver dollar, and some larger. They were over all parts of my body: in my armpits, on my private parts, all over. But I didn't go to the doctor.

There were bumps, pimples, black and dark, on my ankles and wrists. Many of them kept coming back, no matter how clean I kept my body. In fact, the cleaner I kept, the more they stood out. But I didn't go to the doctor. I figured I could take care of it myself.

I itched. It was an unbearable itch that covered my entire body. I had to take a strong brush and give myself a good scrubbing, from shoulder to feet all of the time, to stop the crazy itch. My body was covered with indescribable markings. I'd hide in my room and scream to myself as I scraped them. I didn't want anybody to see. Still I took it lightly, even though I knew that if it didn't go away, I'd be carried away.

There was more evidence:

• My hands were limp. I couldn't play piano or guitar. The fingers moved in their own direction.
• My hair started to fall out.
• My teeth were shaky.
• I had scabs all over my face.
• I started to lose weight and get that anorexic look. In less than a year I lost 30 pounds. I was down to 90 pounds and going down fast. I used to pray not to lose another pound.
• I was losing my energy and strength. I couldn't get myself up off the you-know-what.
• My vision was fading.

I still barely questioned all those body changes: boils, pimples, scabs, eruptions, ulcers on my legs and feet, weight loss, the sapping of my very vitality.

My look was worse than death itself. I looked like death walking. I came from a condition that is only uglier than death. I was skin and bones, scabs all over my face.

I kept working, moving, knowing that I would overcome this. It was a passing thing.

I'd been ill before. I survived 2 comas each one lasting 5 days. Conventional doctors gave me up for dead. "Miraculous Recovery" was stamped across the front of my chart! I knew by their own admission that they had nothing to do with my recovery. How great Thou art! I knew I had it going on.

I carried on, knowing what I knew about the visible evidence that I saw, that I felt, that manifested itself everyday. I continued, daily, hoping I would pull out of this. Strong as I am, I knew I would pull out of it. Strong as I am, I knew I would make it.

One of the most vivid signs was my lack of ability to move quickly. I'd always flitted through life on a dance floor, at a run. But my body was no longer responsive. I couldn't turn over in bed at night. I was just that weak. And still I thought: Just tired. Just tired. Still. My mental machinations, my "defense mechanisms" were protecting me from myself, were keeping me from knowing what I knew I knew.

And I thought this: the illness is too sudden. It happened too quickly. It was too sudden to be a natural deterioration of the body. I didn't want to recognize it. This much debilitation within a year. I couldn't move without a struggle. Therefore, I came to the realization that something was poisoning my system. I was scared to eat. And my body was screaming out loud. All the evidence was there.

I remember well the morning I decided that I had to go somewhere, to some hospital.

About a week before that, a pimple had broken out on the back of my leg, and it wouldn't close up. It was a small, little pimple. About the size of a pin head. I nursed it and I watched it, and it just wasn't gonna heal. It became a festering ulcer, bigger than a silver dollar. So I took myself, and admitted myself into the hospital. They said to me: "Anybody ever tell you that you were diabetic? We think we’ll keep you.^"

Little did I know, but surely found out later, that the health care system as we know it had no help for me. There was no health there. Only medicine and disease. There was no care, either.

I put my life in the hands of someone else. I should never have done that. I was treated and released, and upon my release I only got worse.

I thought I was sick when I went in the hospital. I knew I was sick. When they first started me on treatment, they gave me the medications, a special diet, and advice on the consequences if I didn't "work it" as they said. I was told I had to conform to the treatment or die. Trustingly, I tried the treatment. "See you soon," they said when I left. They knew I'd be back. And I was.

When I got out of the hospital and came home, I could see death coming if I did not take full responsibility for my own recovery. I was so weak I had to have a crutch to climb my two front stairs. I thought I was sick and weak when I went into the hospital, but when I got out, I really took a plunge.

To add to that devastating experience, I now had to concentrate on the medications, the diet, the things that I had to get right. The diet, new lifestyle and medication would kill me if I didn't know what I was doing. And it nearly did.

I had two return trips to the hospital because of their medicine and not knowing how to "work it." And nobody cared.

I couldn't leave my life in the hands of anyone other than myself. It wasn't the illness that was killing me. It was the treatment that was killing me--and quickly.

I landed right back in the hospital with what they call hypoglycemia. After about four months of that treatment I truly knew that I had to save my own life. And that was the beginning of my struggle to heal myself. I was on a one woman crusade to find some Old Truths to save my old behind.

I got out of that system. I began my quest in search of natural things. That's when I found you, Dr. Goss. Right back to the Old Truths.. You pointed me in the right direction and I saved my own life. You directed me there, and today I thank you for it.

Right now, it's hard to forget the signs and symptoms preceding this health plunge to the depths of hell. Not that I want to forget them. In retrospect the signs were popping out all over my body.

To lose all my energy. After being vital, vibrant and energetic all my life, dancing and singing, moving, living, loving--to not be able to climb a step or two! I was devastated. So I cried. A lot.

But I'm back, now. I back. Since my diagnosis, I'm on no medication. I'm on only good healthy natural food, and the herbs of our earth.

Pure Love,

Charmaine Blakeney
Los Angeles, CA

Editor’s Note:
The herbs that Charmaine used included the following:

CKLS, Uva Ursi, Freed-om, Fe-Y, C-1 and 4PG.

What she call "good healthy natural food" is a vegetarian diet. (No flesh or flesh by-products and nothing that does not grow from the earth, except for plenty of spring water.)