I've been reading posts about all the supplements and medications people are taking for fibro, adrenal fatigue, about eating the right foods, etc. Everyone has a different take on all of this. So, my little pea-pickin' brain started pondering all of this. I do a lot of genealogy and reading of how people survived when they first came to this country. My family came in 1633 and I might even have a grandfather that was on the Mayflower but haven't absolutely proven it yet. Because of this, I started thinking about what these early settlers had to do once they made it across the ocean alive. They had to find food, build their shelters, live through blizzards, etc. Soooo........
Doesn't it make you wonder how people survived and lived their lives hundreds of years ago before all these tests and subsequent medications and supplements entered our lives? There could be too much of a good thing going on here and it's costing us a fortune to boot. Yes, people weren't eating fast foods but they cooked much of their food in lard, bread and potatoes were their mainstay because they were inexpensive, and they certainly didn't have access to all the variety of healthy foods we have today. They ate whatever they could scrape together to stop the hunger pangs and give them enough energy to provide food for their next meal. I often think about this type of thing.
Fibromyalgia has been around since Biblical times, at least, but people continued to do their chores and earn a livelihood for themselves. We all know what pain they must have suffered but they just kept on keeping on. Perhaps this helped ease some of their pain. I do think the fact that they had to keep moving, lifting, and working hard made a difference. Can you imagine having to go out, milk the cows and then come back and churn the butter, carry wood in for the stove and for heat, carry in water for cooking and drinking, hang your rugs over a clothes line and beat the dirt out of them, and scrub your clothes on a rock or, if you were one of the more fortunate ones, on a scrub board? You even had to make your own soap! How did people with fibro and other illnesses do this? They were around and the did do these things! I look at Fishchris's post. He keeps working and moving but doesn't seem to have as much pain as most of us have. I don't know too many with fibro that do this but this had to play into fibromites of the past. Golly, they were lucky if there was one doctor in their area!
For example, you never heard of osteoporosis until the bone scan machine was invented in 1994. Now, this natural occurrence in humans is called a disease and the pharmaceutical companies are in hog heaven! Now, after women have been given chemicals for their bones, they are still breaking bones! My family lives a very long time...in their late 90's to early 100's...and no one ever broke a bone! They did get more exercise since most were farmers at that time but my great grandmother was a teacher and she lived to 104 and never broke a bone either. This just makes me wonder even more!
My great grandmother's sister was a chiropractor around 1904. She and her husband both were chiropractors but, about twenty years after they started their practice, they both were struck with rheumatoid arthritis! Did they stop? Yes, they did...but only the chiropractics. They started another business making trusses. This was easier on their gnarled hands and joints and they retired in their 60's. I think the fact that they didn't stop all things helped keep them more flexible and able to live their lives to the fullest late in life. I find this really amazing!
Have any of you ever thought about all of this? There's an answer to how these people did these things in there somewhere but we need to find it! I think this is why I try to do things as naturally as humanly possible. I seem to be doing quite well using this logic...except when the rains come, ouch!
Just something to ponder.....
Sherrine