Breaking Barriers Blog

Would I have achieved my life-long dream of running the Boston Marathon for the first time in 2009 without homeopathy?  The answer is a resounding NO.

I know what some of you are thinking—homeopathy?  You’re kidding.  That’s hoodoo stuff.

I have a close friend, an avid runner, who has been suffering from plantar fasciitis for at least 2 years.  Like most obsessed runners, he cannot stop running and runs through the searing pain.  He’s tried various medical and alternative procedures such as, special foot inserts, running barefoot, running on his toes, taping his foot, massage therapy, acupuncture and even electric shock, blood transfusions and drinking cranberry juice before a run (yes really).  Nothing helped.  But when I mention homeopathy, he looks at me like I still believe in Santa Claus.

Yes, being open to homeopathic medicine is a paradigm shift—a total departure from how we view medical healing in our culture.  So what is homeopathy?  According to Homeopathic Medicine at Home by Maesimund B. Panos, M.D. and Jane Heimlich, the fundamental law upon which homeopathy is based is the law of similars, or “like is cured by like.”  The law of similars states that a remedy can cure a disease if it produces symptoms in a healthy person similar to those of the disease.

For instance, a person develops a fever with chills, flushed face and dilated pupils.  The homeopathic doctor searches for a remedy that produced all of these symptoms, under controlled conditions, in a healthy person.  When the sick person takes the remedy, the symptoms disappear.  The law of similars enables the doctor to select the one medicine (the simillimum) that is needed by matching the symptoms of the individual to the symptoms the remedy induces.  The remedy stimulates our immune system (vital force) to cause healing.  All homeopathic remedies are derived from plants, animals and minerals from all around the world.  They are FDA approved and completely safe. **

Yes, I can see you looking at me like I’m crazy.  Maybe I am, however, this form of medicine has been around since the 1700’s and is the first choice of treatment of such people as David Beckham, Whoopie Goldberg, Paul McCartney, President Clinton, Martina Navratilova, the Royal family of England, and me.  After all I am a runner who is getting faster in my fifties.  Now, that isn’t normal and I’m convinced homeopathy is one factor in my success.

When I trained for the Kansas City Marathon in 2008, I suffered a knee injury.  It wasn’t critical enough to strop training and I “ran through” it in typical obsessive fashion.  When I crossed the finish line in Kansas City and realized I had broken the magic 4-hour mark (after trying unsuccessfully the previous 10 years), of course, I was thrilled.  But when I realized later that I had qualified for the Boston Marathon for the first time in my life at the age of 54, I was—well—beyond thrilled.

It was October 2008 and I had six months to train for Boston.  Of course I could have just run the marathon slow for the joy of running it, but give me a break—it was Boston!   I wanted to run strong.  I knew I wouldn’t really enjoy the experience unless I could run at my potential.  So I wanted to train hard enough to run a strong race.

Despite the pain and stiffness, I ploughed into training.  But when my weekly training miles exceeded 40 miles a week, I could no longer run through the pain in my knee.  Icing helped bring down the swelling and I wrapped a bandage around my knee to support it, but alas, I was losing the battle.  The pain was too much to bear.  The Boston Marathon was only 3 months away.  I started to despair.  It was inconceivable that I would give up now.  So decided to see a doctor…but not the kind of doctor you may think.

I had already established a relationship with a homeopathic doctor, Dahlia Shemtob H.D., CCH, when I had started to suffer from the lovely symptoms of pre-menopause and sought out a safer alternative to manufactured medications such as Estradiol and Premarin which are linked to heart disease and breast cancer.  For more information about the Women’s Health Initiative, a long-term study on the effects of hormone replacement therapy, follow this link:   http://www.nhlbi.nih.gov/whi/.

I started seeing Dahlia (yes, I call her Dalia) in 2004 for help with pre-menopause but found I was healing from chronic sinus issues and long-term anxiety attacks.  I even got help dealing with the emotional trauma of divorce.  As I was purging issues that were causing me emotional distress, my immune system was getting stronger and I was healthier.  I was getting fewer colds and feeling more energetic.

It was an easy decision to consult with Dahlia when I could no longer run with my knee injury.  I wasn’t sure what to expect because my work with her up to that point was to boost my overall immune system, but I had read that homeopathy was also effective in treating acute injuries and illnesses as well as chronic ones.

Dahlia was not interested in a diagnosis.  She was only interested in how the pain felt and how it affected me.  After I answered her probing questions she prescribed a remedy for my injury, Anacardium.   I took the two pellets she prescribed and put them under my tongue.  They were tasteless and odorless.  Then I hoped for a miracle.  The result was nothing short of amazing.**

The next day, I went out for a run.  No, I didn’t feel the pulling sensation and the stiffness had diminished somewhat but, more importantly, I felt no pain.  I ran a 15-mile training run that day with no pain.  I was amazed but mostly overjoyed.

I improved over time even though I was running over 40 miles a week at that point.  As my training increased to 60 miles a week, I wondered if the injury would surface, but it didn’t.  I still felt no pain.  I ran my first Boston Marathon in April 2009 in 3:53:42—the fastest marathon of my life at the age of 54.

Now I have officially started training for my second Boston Marathon and I am, again, training to run a strong marathon.  This time I have been living with a hamstring injury since before I ran my last marathon on May 1^st (another PR at the age of 56 by the way).  It has progressively gotten worse and I cannot run without pain.

This time I consulted Dahlia before I was not able to run at all.  She prescribed the same remedy, Anacardium, and I am recovering amazingly fast.  I am confident my training will proceed as planned.  If you want a faster alternative to conventional medicine, consider homeopathy.  Boston—here I come!

**For a more detailed description of homeopathy, homeopathic remedies, the function of a homeopathic doctor, and a comparison to allopathic medicine, see my Premium Content.

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I registered for the Boston Marathon today.  Registration opened today for runners who beat their Boston qualifying times by 20 minutes or more.  I did that!  I ran the Lincoln Marathon in Nebraska on May 1, 2011 in 3:53:23 (a PR by the way at the age of 56).  My qualifying time is 4:15.  So I’m in.  I will run Boston for the second time in my life on April 18, 2012.

Why did the Boston registration process change?  The race is now so popular it sold out in a record-braking 8 hours and 3 minutes last year.  I had actually qualified for the April 2011 race when I ran the San Francisco Marathon on July 25, 2010 in 4:06:08 but when I logged onto the website at the end of the first day of registration, I discovered it had sold out.  Wow, what a disappointment!  I wasn’t the only one who was frustrated.  A couple of other runners I know did not get in either.  So the BAA came up with a rolling registration process to allow the fastest qualifiers by gender and age group to register first.  It effectively makes qualifying tougher.  To top it off, the qualifying times for each age group will decrease by 5 minutes for the 2013 race.

I am happy to say that I met the challenge for the 2012 race and was able to register on the first day.  This is a dream come true for me for the second time in my life and it is that much more satisfying under the tougher standards.

Now for the next  seven months I will be officially training for the Boston Marathon.  It has a nice ring to it!  The last time I ran in April 2009, I ran a personal record in 3:53:42 at the age of 54.  That was the silver lining on a beautiful cloud…so to speak.  This prize came to me after trying diligently to qualify for Boston by running eight marathons in 10 years—and not being able to qualify…just couldn’t do it.  Then came that faithful day, October 18,2008, when I stood on the starting line of the Kansas City Marathon.

I had actually retired from running marathons after I ran my tenth race, the Wichita Marathon (now called the Prairie Fire Marathon in Kansas) in 2006 in 4:07.  I was persuaded by my bother Danny to run Kansas City with him and his wife Amy.  Even though I had officially retired  in 2006, I decided to train one more time.  I had just separated from a relationship and it was devastating.  Running has always been my way of working through the difficult challenges in my life and I needed a positive goal to look forward to.  I decided to jump back into training.

This time I trained to be strong.  I didn’t put any pressure on myself to perform.  When I stood on the starting line in Kansas City, I was at peace.  I was not thinking about the previous 10 years–a whole string of perceived failures of not breaking the four-hour barrier and not qualifying for Boston.  When the gun went off, I ran like the wind.  No pressure, no stress.  I finished the marathon in 3:55:46, 31 seconds off my PR when I was 40 years old.  This finish was good enough to qualify for Boston for the first time at the age of 54.  In fact, I beat my qualifying time by over 9 minutes.

Since that wonderful day in my personal history, I have qualified three more times, Boston 2009, San Francisco 2010 and Lincoln 2011.  What will happen in Boston 2012?  That remains to be seen but I’m going to go for it, of course.  My goal is to enjoy the moment and have fun.  I want to finish strong.   If I run fast—well that’s the icing on the cake.  Boston—here I come!

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