The Golden One

I am a breakfast kinda girl.  I am not one who can just have coffee, and wait till lunch for a meal.  I wake up every morning to eat.  However, over the last five years, my first order of the day is a hot cup of (no, not coffee, sadly but…) turmeric with fenugreek drink!  You will say in chorus – WHAT IN THE SPICEWORLD IS THAT???

Every morning, I would pound a raw organic turmeric root (the size of my little finger nail), put the potent golden-yellow-knobby-flesh in a cup of boiling water, and add a pinch of organic fenugreek.  Soak the two ingredients for a few minutes. Voila… my perfect AM sipper is ready.  It is a routine.  It has been a routine drink for me for over five years now.  I can’t say that I love the taste of it, in the beginning, but after drinking it for this long, I don’t mind it anymore. The health values of turmeric far outweigh its bitter and pungent taste.  Turmeric, and especially its most active compound called CURCUMIN, has many scientifically-proven health benefits.

Turmeric’s natural anti-inflammatory properties make it ideal for anything in the body that is inflamed and causing pain. Numerous studies have indicated that inflammation is the root cause of nearly all diseases.

I have rheumatoid arthritis (RA), and auto-immune disease. Simply put, RA is an inflammatory disorder that affects your joints and cause deformities. RA is not the same as osteoarthritis (OA).  OA is caused by wear and tear on the body, and is generally less severe than RA.  RA, on the other hand, is caused by the immune system attacking the body.

I don’t know how I got it, but I have it.  I have no clear symptoms, although I do get slight sores and discomforts in my joints particularly my knuckles. The way my rheumatologist explains it, my RA is in a ‘dormant stage’.  It is asleep! It may flare up in the future.  When that will be, no one knows.

It has been 8 years since my diagnosis.  Healthy diet and lifestyle change have kept my inflammation under control.  I have also been taking the turmeric with fenugreek drink, every morning for over 5 years.  I believe in turmeric’s power to reduce inflammation.  The proof is in the pudding, as they say it.  This rings so true, based on my annual medical results which see massive reduction in my Rheumatoid Factor (RF).

What is RF, you may ask?  RF is a protein made by your immune system that can attack healthy tissue in your body.  Healthy people don’t make RF.  Only unhealthy people make RF.

So, the presence of RF in your blood can indicate that you have an auto-immune disorder.  I had a lot of it.

In 2013, my blood sample indicated that I had high RF reading – it was 128 IU/ml.  For point of reference, healthy people have RF reading of below <20.0 IU/ml.  Mine was 128 IU/ml.  It was very high, six times more than the average healthy range.  It was off the charts!  However, in 2019, I am happy to report that my RF is reduced to 42.3 IU/ml.  That is a huge markdown from 128 IU/ml in 2013.

I am not 100% healthy yet, because my RF is still above 20.0 IU/ml, but I can safely say that my RF is lowering, year by year, and my joints soreness and numbness are things of the past.