Cellular Health

Cells make up your organs. When cells die, your organs fail and health deteriorates, and you age and die. Therefore cellular health plays a pivotal role in your health and well-being.

To maintain and sustain life, some of your cells replicate themselves continually, such as epithelial cells in your intestine, while others do not divide, such as your heart cells and neurons in your brain. For this reason, it is important to maintain the cellular health that do not replicate.

The good news is that, on average, most normal human cells have more than 100 years of lifespan built into them.

The bad news is that all human cells require energy and oxygen to function normally, and in this oxidative process free radicals are created. For example, when you breathe in life-giving oxygen, you also breathe out harmful carbon dioxide. This oxidative process is how your Creator has ingeniously built normal cell death into your body system to ensure your mortality. Slowly and accumulatively, these free radicals build up in your cells, leading to premature cell death. You cannot prolong life indefinitely, but you can extend lifespan by slowing down the oxidative process of free radicals. In other words, eradication of free radicals holds the key to health and longevity.

Premature cell death is due to both human and environmental factors, such as bacteria and viruses, free radicals, toxins, and trauma, which can cause irreparable damage to your cells, and thus instrumental in accelerating the demise of these cells. However, many of these factors are not only avoidable but also preventable.

Essentially, genes play an important role in determining the quality of your cells. In other words, your genetic time clock governs how long your cells will live, and this is partially determined at birth. However, your objective is to outpace your genetic time clock. Remember, nothing is set in stone; you always have a choice—the choice is all yours.

How Body Cells May Become Damaged

Your body is composed of negatively and positively charged molecules, which must be balanced in order to enable your cells to function normally. A free radical is formed when there is imbalance in these molecules. A free radical also damages other molecules, causing them to produce more free radicals—and thus creating a chain reaction of damages that become the scourges of aging and the sources of disease and disorders, in particular, autoimmune diseases. 

Read my book: My Myasthenia Gravis to find out how to fight an autoimmune disease naturally without drugs;

Stephen Lau 

Copyright© 2018  by Stephen Lau

Conquer Stress to Overcome Muscle Weakness

 Conquer Stress

Stress is one of the causes of many autoimmune diseases, including myasthenia gravis. Conquer stress to overcome many of the symptoms of myasthenia gravis, including muscle weakness.

Some people can conquer stress, while others cannot. Some researchers have attributed this to the psychological and physical makeup. Essentially, those who do not easily succumb to stress demonstrate not only strong commitment to themselves but also staunch belief that change is challenging but unavoidable in life. As a result, they show adaptability and flexibility, which contribute to enhanced physical and mental health. In other words, stress management is all in the mind.

Your brain is the hardware of your whole being. Your brain is responsible for your stress. It is all in your mind. You are what you think, and you become what you think. Therefore, manage your stress through you mind. You control your own thinking, and your brain creates your own world: how you live your life, and how happy you are. And you are responsible for how you feel - even the stresses in life.

This is what happens when stress occurs. You have a thought (usually a negative one) about the stressful event or situation. Your thought sends electrical signals to your brain, which releases chemicals, and you become aware of your own thinking. No matter what you think, your thought is real to you, and must be treated as real. The goal is not to discard that thought or to distract yourself from that thought, but to change your perception of that thought.

To be able to change that thought, you must be aware of your body's reactions to the chemicals released by your brain as that thought occurs. For example, notice how your muscles tense up when you are distressed.

The next step is to talk back to that negative thought. Change your thought, and do not believe it. Learn how to train your mind to change your thought, and accordingly change your feeling about that thought. Reinforce your changed feeling by talking back to that thought which gives you the stress. Always use positive affirmations.

Next time, when you are confronted by a stressful situation, think "STOP!" Take a deep breath. Do some mental reflection, such as asking yourself why you think you are distressed. Acknowledge any feeling of anxiety, and become aware of the subtle changes in your physical body. Talk back to any negative thought responsible for creating the stress. The final step is to take appropriate action. Make a list of possible solutions to the problem. If it requires tackling the problem immediately, take the action at once: procrastination only aggravates the situation. But defer taking action if you are able to deal with it more effectively later on. Relax, such as taking a deep meditation, or doing something enjoyable to calm yourself.

Use your mind to manage your daily stress.

Stephen Lau

Copyright © 2018 by Stephen Lau

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What Are Autoimmune Diseases?

What Are Autoimmune Diseases?

Your Creator has given your body an immune system that protects you from disease and infection. Sadly, your immune system may attack itself in the form of autoimmune diseases, which can affect many parts of your body, including your nerves, muscles, endocrine system (the system that controls your body’s hormones and other chemicals), and digestive system.

There are more than 80 types of autoimmune diseases, including multiple sclerosis, type 1 diabetes mellitus, rheumatoid arthritis, and myasthenia gravis, among many others.

Many of these diseases associated with autoimmunity are often chronic, requiring lifelong care and monitoring.

Most of these autoimmune diseases strike women more than they do men, particularly women of working age and during their child-bearing years.

Risk Factors

(1) Stress is a major factor triggering the onset of an autoimmune disease, especially if you already have an over-stressed or a weakened immune system. As you age, your stress may increase with increased limitations on your life. In order to cope with daily living, you need to conquer your stress, which may lead to depression and anxiety, which are commonly associated with aging.

(2) The genes you inherit may predispose your susceptibility to developing an autoimmune disease.

(3) Viruses may also contribute to the development of an autoimmune disease.

Symptoms

Autoimmune disease symptoms may vary according to the types of autoimmune disease. Though they may share some common symptoms, it is often difficult to diagnose which type of autoimmune disease you may be having. Many of them often do not show a clear pattern of autoimmune disease symptoms at first. In addition, these symptoms may come and go (known as remission).

Treatments

Autoimmune disease treatments depend on the type of autoimmune disease you may have, and the severity of the autoimmune disease symptoms. Since autoimmunity takes many forms, autoimmune disease treatments may require different specialists, for example:

A dermatologist to treat alopecia areata, psoriasis (problems of skin, hair, and nails)

An endocrinologist to treat type 1 diabetes mellitus and thyroid disease (problems of glands and hormones)

A gastroenterologist to treat Crohn’s disease and ulcerative colitis (problems of digestive system)

A hematologist to treat pernicious anemia and autoimmune hemolytic anemia (problems of blood)

A nephrologist to treat lupus (problems of kidneys)

A neurologist to treat multiple sclerosis and myasthenia gravis (problems of nerve)

A rheumatologist to treat lupus and scleroderma (problems of arthritis)

Generally, all conventional medical treatments aim at:

Relieving symptoms through the use of drugs

Preventing further damage to organs affected: e.g. insulin injections to regulate your blood sugar if you have type 1 diabetes mellitus; drugs to control your inflamed kidneys if you have lupus

Suppressing the immune system through immune-suppressing drugs

Your immune system is your body’s most specialized defense mechanism to protect you from any foreign invaders, such as bacteria, fungi, and viruses. As such, it requires an intricate network of optimum functioning of many different cells in your body.

No Miracle Cures

Conventional autoimmune disease treatments aim at suppressing the immune system in order to prevent further destruction of self-tissues. At best, they may limit some symptoms and even manage pain, but they do not result in a permanent cure. There are no miracle cures for autoimmune diseases.

In autoimmune diseases, the immune system is attacking the tissue because it is the unhealthy tissue that causes the initial attack. Once the tissue is targeted and attacked, the immune system “remembers” it, and continues to attack it. Therefore, using medications, such as prednisone, corticosteroids, or with proteins that block specific parts of the immune system, such as interferons, to suppress the immune system may, at best, slow down the attack by the immune system. But as soon as the medications are reduced, the attack comes back with a vengeance, because the tissue has become further degraded and unhealthy.

Holistic Approach

The immune system is supposed to protect the body from foreign invaders. Therefore, to suppress the immune system so that it will not attack itself is not really the solution to the problem. To address the issue is to strengthen the tissue so that it will not be targeted in the first place, instead of lowering the potency of the immune system as a means to reduce the severity of the attack. In order to cure autoimmune diseases, a holistic approach to healing the body and the mind is necessary. After all, autoimmune diseases evolve from a dysfunctional autoimmune system, which involves the whole body, not just any specific body part or organ. Therefore, the whole body must be healed first, before any healing will begin.

Stephen Lau

Copyright© by 2018 Stephen Lau

Mindfulness to Cope with Stress

Mindfulness to Cope with Stress

Stress is one of the underlying causes of autoimmune diseases because stress may cause a dysfunctional immune system.

Stress may come in many forms, and one of which is pain. Whether physical or emotional, pain is stressful. Somehow, we cope with that stress. Humans learn how to deal with, for example, the pain of loss by staying busy, such as busily planning a memorial service for the death of a loved one. As a matter of fact, we all learn at an early age that being busy is one of the ways to deal with stress.

Getting busy has immediate payoff in that it takes one’s attention from the stress. In life, many of us use the same strategy of getting busy to deal with difficulties in our lives: we keep ourselves busy to avoid unpleasant or difficult experiences. For example, we keep ourselves busy to earn more money, to gain more respect, or both, because we may have an unfulfilled love relationship. We often get busier and busier until it has become addictive. Unfortunately, at the end of the day, everything falls apart, and we become distressed and disillusioned. So, getting busy is but a temporary solution to stress.

Be mindful of your business. Mindfulness requires you to take time to explore your inner self—that is, what is the most important to you, or your core values in life. You can be busy, while maintaining your mindfulness.

A Buddhist teacher once said: "When you are washing dishes, wash dishes. When you are talking on the phone, talk on the phone." But many people are talking on the phone, while driving! That, unfortunately, is not mindfulness.

Mindfulness is "concentrated" relaxation because your mind focuses only on the present moment, not the past, and not the future. Remember, only the present is real to you. Mindfulness is what meditation is all about. Meditation focuses on mindfulness of the present moment to relax both the body and the mind.

Stephen Lau

Copyright © 2018 by Stephen Lau

Ayurvedic Aromatherapy

Ayurvedic Aromatherapy

Ayurveda, the oldest system of medicine in the world, had great impact on medicine worldwide: its translated works around A.D. 400 began to influence the Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM), as well as the Islamic medicine and other medical systems around the world.

Ayurvedic medicine is based on the theory that healing, which has to be wholesome, is contingent on an individual's unique constitutions. Ayurvedic treatments are based on diet, herbs, and oils designed to meet the individual's health needs to promote healing. In other words, Ayurveda offers a holistic approach to healing and health.

An important aspect of Ayurdevic natural healing is aromatherapy, which is the use of essential oils from medicinal plants for healing purposes. According to Ayurveda, plants are "receptacles of light." That is to say, they receive life energy from the sun, and therefore they can make whole that which has been damaged or which is incomplete. In Ayurveda, essential oils extracted from medicinal plants are used for therapeutic treatments because they provide the life energy necessary for natural healing.

The Ayurvedic healing approach is based on attaining balance and harmony between your body systems and your constitutions associated with the basic elements of air, fire, water, and ether (similar to the Five Elements of the Chinese medical system; for more information, visit my web page: Chinese Healing).

Ayurvedic aromatherapy is the use of daily massage or self-massaging of the body with different essential oils from medicinal plants to create the balance between your body systems and your specific constitutions. For example, the loose skin between your toes, the insides of your nostrils and your ears are all full of reflex areas that respond well to a few drops of diluted essential oils.

Aromatherapy can relax your muscles, and thus helping the disease symptoms of myasthenia gravis.

Stephen Lau  

Copyright© by Stephen Lau

Detox by Fasting

Having an autoimmune disease means having a toxic body. All these years you may have accumulated toxins in your body, making it toxic. A toxic body leads to a dysfunctional immune system, and hence the development of an autoimmune disease, including myasthenia gravis. Western medicine uses toxic drugs, such as steroids, to control the many disease symptoms of an autoimmune disease. But the long-term adverse side effects are more toxins in the body. The only solution to improve the disease symptoms is getting rid of the toxins.

Internal cleansing is detoxification, which involves dislodging your body toxins and waste products from within and between cells and joints, and then transporting these wastes from your body for removal.

Fasting is internal cleansing and rejuvenation—one of the most efficient ways to detoxify your body of toxins. Fasting is to recovery, as sleep is to recuperation.

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Fasting is voluntary abstinence from food and drink, except water, for an extended period. Fasting is the best way to detoxify your body.

The benefits of fasting:

Fasting accelerates the self-healing process of your body because fasting temporarily stops the continuing work of your digestive system, and therefore instrumental in reserving that energy for your self-healing. By conserving the energy otherwise used in digesting food, fasting provides you with more, not less, energy, contrary to the myth that fasting makes your body weak. Remember, eating and digesting food expends your energy too.

Fasting activates the immune system in your body to protect you from disease.

Fasting relieves the burden of not only your digestive tract, but also your liver and kidneys, which have to work extra hard to remove additives and toxins accumulated in your body through improper eating. Fasting removes the underlying cause of any chronic disease you may have by removing the toxins, not just the symptoms, as in the case of medications.

Fasting may alleviate your body pain and rid your body of any drug dependence. Fasting facilitates you, if you are a smoker, to quit smoking during a fast. Nicotine damages the immune system.

The process of fasting

Eat more vegetables and fruits prior to a fast. Reduce the consumption of meat, and refrain from eating any meat the day before a fast.

On the first day, you may feel pangs of hunger, with a white coating on your tongue. This is just a natural response of the body to the cessation of eating. On the first day, you may experience physical weakness, which is also a natural response of your body.

On the second day, you may begin to feel gradual dissipation of hunger, with more white coating on your tongue.

On the third day, you may feel complete disappearance of hunger and the clearance of coating on your tongue..

The first three days of a fast are most challenging. However, once the challenge is overcome, you are well on the way to rejuvenation of your entire body. Remember, Jesus, too, fasted for forty days.

What to do during a fast

Drinking plenty of water is required since your body may easily become dehydrated due to the discharge of body fluids.

Continue your normal daily routine activities, but avoid all strenuous activities, especially those outdoor ones. Exercise as normal.

Bathe more frequently. Brush your body to stimulate your skin to rid toxins from your body.

Stop taking your daily vitamins while fasting..

Stop smoking if you are a smoker. That is as good a time as any to quit smoking for good.

How to break a fast

Break a fast on fruits and vegetables juice. Eating an apple is ideal for breaking a fast.

Gradually increase your intake of solid food. Eat slowly and chew thoroughly. Overeating too soon may cause abdominal pain and even vomiting.

Avoid taking salt and pepper immediately after a fast, lest they damage your stomach lining.

Continue to drink plenty of water after a fast.

Remember, the longer the fast, the less you should eat at the first meal.

Duration of a fast

A clear tongue and clean breath are a good indication that the cleansing is more or less complete.

The length of a fast depends very much on an individual. The following is just a general guideline:

A one-day fast, as often as required, preferably weekly, for good health maintenance

A three-to-four-day fast for general health and well being, several times a year

A two-week fast for complete internal cleansing, every year or so

A three-week fast (or even longer) for curing a specific disease, under the supervision of a physician.

It is suggested that you begin with a short fast, and then proceed to a

longer fast for complete internal cleansing.

Stephen Lau

Copyright© by Stephen Lau

A Healthy Immune System (2)

The Cellular Health

Cells make up your organs. When cells die, your organs fail and health deteriorates, and you age and die.

To maintain and sustain life, some of your cells replicate themselves continually, such as epithelial cells in your intestine, while others do not divide, such as your heart cells and neurons in your brain.

How Body Cells May Become Damaged

Your body is composed of negatively and positively charged molecules, which must be balanced in order to enable your cells to function normally. A free radical is formed when there is imbalance in these molecules. A free radical also damages other molecules, causing them to produce more free radicals—and thus creating a chain reaction of damages that become the scourges of aging and the sources of disease and disorders, in particular, autoimmune diseases.

The Damages by Free Radicals

There are several types of free radicals, and oxygen free radicals are most damaging, especially to your DNA and cell membranes.

Your cells require oxygen for survival. Unfortunately, what gives life also takes away life. In the process of oxidation, harmful oxygen free radicals are produced. Oxygen free radicals and other free radicals in your body cause damages to your cells.

Brain damage

The neurons in your brain may become damaged by free radicals. The damage may be irreparable because the neurons, unlike other cells, cannot replicate themselves.

Cellular damage

The cumulative damage to your DNA by free radicals is a major contributing factor to many autoimmune diseases, including human cancers.

Heart damage

When your LDL or “bad cholesterol” is attacked by free radicals, they become more attached to the walls of your arteries, and thus forming plagues to block the free flow of blood to your heart.

The only way to fight free radicals is by boosting your body’s own immunity.

Boosting Immunity

As you age, your immune system becomes weaker, as evidenced by the high incidence of influenza and pneumonia after age 25, not to mention among the elderly. Therefore, it is important to boost your immunity, which is closely related to your thymus (the commander-in-chief of fighters in your immune system against foreign invaders), with the 10 most important nutritional supplements:

Vitamin A to prevent thymus shrinkage (5,000 IU daily dosage)

Vitamin B₆ to maintain hormone levels and to prevent thymus shrinkage (50 mg daily dosage)

Vitamin C to regulate T-cell (white blood thymus cells) function (at least 1,000 mg daily dosage or up to bowel tolerance)

Vitamin E to increase infection resistance (400 0800 IU daily dosage)

Selenium to increase T-cell activity and antibody production for detoxification (100 mcg daily dosage)

Zinc to boost your thymus for maturing T-cells to fight invaders (15 mg daily dosage)

Coenzyme CO₁₀ to increase energy production for cells’ activities

L-glutathione to regenerate immune cells in the immune system (200 mg daily dosage)

Magnesium to increase enzymatic reactions (100 mg daily dosage)

DHEA to control cortisol, the stress hormone (5 mg daily dosage)

Protecting the Immune System

In addition to taking supplements to boost your immunity, you need to use diet, such as a natural thyroid diet, to protect your immune system.

Eat fresh, organic fruits, vegetables, seeds and nuts daily.

Eat natural foods. Cooking, food processing, and freezing destroy some of the health-promoting nutrients, such as enzymes, in your foods. Therefore, it is important to eat raw occasionally.

Eat phytonutrients, which are plant nutrients. These powerful nutrients include carotenoids, flavonoids, and phytosterols, among others.

Stephen Lau

Copyright© by Stephen Lau