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by Maireid Sullivan
2012, updated 2025
Work in progress:
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Index
- Learning from personal experiences
- The Gut and the Kidneys
- Why Maintaining "Basic" pH is so important
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There's an APP
- The role of OXYGEN in preventing immune system breakdown
- The Human Genome Project
"It is more important to know
what sort of person has a disease
than to know what sort of disease a person has.”
- Greek Physician Hippocrates, (460-370BC),
"father of medicine"
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Few ideas have changed our vision of nature as profoundly as the idea of change underlying the evolution of living beings.
"By adopting your own personal stress-busters, the chaos of life can become a lot more manageable. But how to start? ... relaxed people take an inventory of how they deal with stress and then figure out healthy strategies to balance out coping mechanisms that aren't beneficial."
– Lindsay Holmes, 7 Habits of People Who Never Lose Their Cool (2013) |
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We each need to do our own research.
We need to become your own health maintenance detective.
We need to listen to our own 'body-language' because every body is different.
We seek information when we need it, and, of course, we go to the "experts" for peer-reviewed reports. When those answers aren't satisfying, and we have the inclination - the will and the energy - to continue investigating, independent cross-discipline study can be enlivening.
The key is to stay focused on the point - examining our conditions - because we can find clues in the most unexpected places -
and connecting with like-minded people turns the effort into a very inspiring journey of discovery - for sharing.
Boosting our immune system reduces stress and prevents infections: Chronic stress can suppress the immune systems ability to prevent illness.
Allergies to various foods and food processing methods can have nearly instant impacts on children - and adults.
Too often, when parents don't understand why children are 'acting out' they try to suppress symptoms with medications.
Now we know:
Immunotherapy is the future of medicine(1) - embracing and optimistically 'connecting' all 'natural' health(2) perspectives. |
Learning from personal experience
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As the eldest of 7 children, raised on a farm on top of a very high hill in West Cork, Ireland, by two nurses and a dietician, (mother, grandmother and great aunt), health maintenance has been my lifelong focus, allured by fond memories of rare 'remedies' such as whenever someone was feeling down, we had a tradition of digging a hole in the ground and bending down close to breath the air from it. Of course, the soil was organic.
Long story short, my daughter attended the Melbourne Rudolf Steiner School,
and
I taught singing and dancing to cover her fees: When she was 10 years old, I became step-mother to three children, from age 2, 4, 7, each suffering from various food allergy symptoms: eczema, asthma, and bed-wetting.
Comparative history:
Examining the children's genetic heritage, an Austrian mother and Scottish father, led me to a comparative analysis of inherited dietary compatibility.
1. Dairy products: Comparing capacities for absorption;
'smaller' molecules in goats milk and 'larger' molecules in cows milk.
- Attaie/Richter, 2000, Size distribution of fat globules in goat milk
- Curry, 2020, "Bronze Age Europeans couldn't drink milk"
2. Wheat: Discovering that gluten intolerances are caused by metal blade milling of wheat, which 'shocks' the nutrients needed to digest gluten, vs
the more 'flexible' uneven surface of stone milling,
which allows the grain to pass more slowly through the mill,
at a lower temperature, thus preserving nutrients.
For example, the 2-year old suffered from eczema.
His father and I took turns waking up several times every night to 'cool' his rash when he scratched until he cried out. In addition, within minutes of eating 'something he shouldn't have' he 'externalized' by fighting with the others.
The 4-year old suffered from asthma and 'introversion' - bordering on autism.
- His confidence grew as we tutored him in reading.
- By supporting his diaphragm with my hand (singers technique) I was able to correct his 'reversed' breathing pattern, which followed hypertension after eating the wrong food. Within two years the 7-year old overcame bed-wetting.
Discovering solutions to gluten intolerance meant home-baking (bread, cakes and cookies) with Bio-Dynamic stoneground flour - and switching to goat milk.
All commercially processed foods and sweets were banned.
One delightful memory is worth sharing:
Some years later, while on our way to a school camp, we stopped in a small town, and gave them pocket-money to buy sweets - for the first time.
All four moaned - yuk yuk yuk yuk! - and spat them out!
By strictly following a diet of organic/Bio-Dynamic fresh foods, we all 'outgrew' allergy symptoms and continue to flourish on energetic creativity.
(Ten years later, I returned to music fulltime: maireid.com) |
The Gut and the Kidneys
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"Gut Microbiome is a microscopic world within your larger body. The trillions of microorganisms that live there affect each other and their environment in various ways... populated by trillions of microscopic organisme .. include a thousand species of bacteria, as well as viruses, fungi and parasites." - Cleveland Clinic Overview
"The kidneys perform important functions that keep the body in balance, such as filtering blood, regulating blood pressure, and removing waste. Simple lab tests can check kidney function to help find problems early."... Your kidneys filter about 200 quarts of fluid from your blood each day! Most of it is cleaned and returned to your body, while about 2 quarts turn into pee, stored in the bladder until you need to go to the bathroom." - National Kidney Foundation
Our Kidneys maintain the blood's "Basic" pH balance:
Now that I've discovered the role "Basic" pH balance plays in maximising oxygen uptake, I'm even more intrigued to discover this 'hypothesis' on supporting kidney health:
Uric acid build-up in the kidneys can cause "renal insufficiency"
– aka the inability of the kidneys to filter waste.
The human metabolism produces highly acidic wastes, which must be eliminated, or they will be reabsorbed and stored, as plaques, in fat, joints, arteries and blood vessels: Symptoms of plaque build-up lead to joint pain, pseudo-gout, gout, arthritis, chronic kidney disease, kidney stones, kidney failure, hypothyroidism, high blood pressure, cardiovascular diseases (heart failure), cancer, and neurodegenerative disorders - such as Alzheimer's plaques.
Our body pH is scaled from 0 to 14;
pH imbalance (low oxygen - "Acidosis") is the primary cause of kidney failure.
In short, numbers below 7 are acidic (low oxygen - "Acidotic")
and numbers above 7 are alkaline (high oxygen - "Basic"), but there is a limit;
Blood, lymph and cerebral spinal fluid in the human body are designed to be 'slightly' alkaline, at a pH of 7.35 to 7.45, which is maintained by the Kidneys - (supported by the duodenum, which produces Bi-Carb soda to neutralise stomach acids in the final stage of the digestive process - to protect the kidneys).
Another valuable insight on our Kidneys.
I often attended lectures presented by Alex Podolinsky, Australia's leading Bio-Dynamic agriculture pioneer and the local "Rudolf Steiner" school founder.
One of his most intriguing topics of discussion was on the collaborative evolution of the ears and the kidneys, based on his hypothesis that the kidneys register our feelings. He gave us an exercise;
Bite into a piece of celery or a green apple, and follow the taste 'sensation' all the way to the kidneys.
I've continued to use that technique to judge how I feel in any circumstance – including meeting and 'tuning in' to people. Besides daily monitoring of oxygen uptake, maintaining "Basic" pH, our 'feelings' can be a source of guidance through 'interweaving' condition of planetary evolution, no less.
Learning about the Bio-Dynamic (BD) "500" fertiliser processing method 'energised' me too: 'turning' water by hand in a large tub, adding 'compost' solution, to create a wall of water, followed by turning in the opposite direction, causes 'chaos' – "chaordic disorder" – which 'activates' the BD "500" nutrients.
The dance of order and chaos
Contemplating the dance of order and chaos demonstrates how 'feeling' nurtured by our capacity for creative innovation can lead to improved conditions:
Feeling Wings - (Tk 2, Dancer, 1994 - on Bandcamp)
@1992 Maireid Sullivan
Silent love says so much more
than fiery songs can ever sing.
Deep thoughts reach out to explore
and find the hidden spring.
I look into my soul
to spread enfolding feeling wings
On high my woman's heart will soar
moving slowly with the winds.
And the world will roll along
with a spirit and a power
bringing words to love song
to bind our hearts in one.
Oh, love and freedom
you are ever-lovely things
we live and die for freedom
to hear love's spirit sing.
Out of chaos, new levels of order emerge– interdependent, collective learning– leading to 'informed' collective wisdom;
Catastrophe after catastrophe, we learn to understand the implications of "chaotic" manifestations in our emotional responses and physical conditions.
Dance as Metaphor
Maireid Sullivan,
1997
Excerpt
My argument is this:
1. If our ability to direct our 'Alpha brain-wave intuitive capacity' is the source of our capacity for wide-ranging 'insight' as a natural evolutionary part of brain chemistry, THEN I want to learn how to contribute to 'naturally' developing those innate capacities, especially if we can learn to 'shape' our thinking by applying our imaginative powers to support optimistic interpretations of our experience.
"A visionary world view is the wand that makes dreams real," - Maireid Sullivan, Celtic Music for a new-world paradigm, 1995
2. To be sure to be sure:
Our expectations can be strengthened by PROOF.
When we can't 'prove' that we will be able to experience a 'higher' quality of consciousness in “life after death” we MAY choose to fulfill our goals by relying on a preferred 'endorsed belief system':
'belief before proof', referred to by scholars as "the theory of teleological reality" - eg. - Christian Wolff, (1679-1754), R.J. Richards, 1980/(pdf).
This brings everything back to FREE CHOICE
- to exercise our "personal sovereignty"
- and the consequence must be egalitarianism.
The 'power of one' is witnessed in our ability to serve others.
Contemplations on Celtic Heritage
Excerpt
I use traditional Irish dance as my metaphor to show how we can comprehend a greater dimension of insight. This is an exercise for the imagination:
While it would help to know how to dance the simplest form of jig, it doesn’t really matter if that isn’t possible. The dance can be imagined.
Prepare as you would to dance a simple Jig.
- Close your eyes, and imagine yourself standing very straight and still.
- Let your body feel very light and weightless.
- Imagine you are bouncing up and landing back down on your toes, just lightly enough to spring back up again.
- Focus on the point where you body feels weightless, at the point where you can imagine yourself springing up.
Continue to focus your imagination on feeling weightless, until you experience a fresh, heightened awareness of your body.
Maintaining focus is the key.
You will become aware of the field of energy flowing around and through your body. Imagine being held up from the Medulla Oblongata, at the base of the brain, the first entry of the nervous system into the embryo.
When there is an opportunity to actually dance to the music with someone else, it is really great if both people have done the imagination exercise first. Then, when you move toward the other person in the dance, you will feel their energy field touching yours long before you come close to each other.
Notice how your ‘energy’ and attitude affects others, and likewise, how their presence affects you. It is a thrilling sensation. >>>more
Relaxation reduces stress
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Move, stretch, dance, run, jump.
– Eat more fresh organic fruit and vegetables.
– Go out into fresh air – sunlight energises infection-fighting T-cells which play a key role in immunity.
– Anticipating a happy or fun event increases endorphins with other hormone levels to support a state of relaxation.
– Sleep helps us heal and grow – and LEARN!
'Learning' is processed into memory at the same stage of sleep as healing and growth. Sleep supports the immune system by distributing immune cells to the lymph nodes, where they prevent infections.
(see Sleep Studies here).
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Why Maintaining "Basic" pH is so important
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21st century science offers a much more precise understanding:
Excerpt from the Introduction to Maintaining pH Balance -
"By maintaining body pH slightly above pH 7.4 cancer cells become dormant and at pH 8.5 cancer cells will die while healthy cells will live."
- Paul Davies, (2013), Exposing cancer's deep evolutionary roots, Physics World, July 2013 pages 37-40, (pdf).
Flashback to High School Biology lessons.
Understanding how our Immune Systems evolved via 'collaboration' is our most encouraging 'sustainability' factor.
High School-level Biology curriculum teaches cell structure, anatomy, and genetics for plants, animals, and humans: The potential for 'cell' mutation is deeply embedded in all multi-cellular organisms - mammals, birds, fish and reptiles - with shared evolutionary roots going back hundreds of millions of years.
While dissecting frogs, we were informed of a long-established scientific theorem:
– 'primordial single cells' developed on earth long before oxygen formed
– before "The Great Oxygenation Event" with ongoing scientific confirmation: (ScienceDailyNews, 2013);
– which "caused an ecological upheaval, because oxygen is such a reactive molecule” (Holmes, 2017);
– that "primordial cells" chose to form a 'cluster' inside a 'skin' to protect themselves from OXYGEN (Biello, 2009);
– and those 'clusters' EVOLVED (Cooper, 2000) to become our 'body' – every body.
Self-preservation has encouraged collaboration over many millions of years
– 'in tandem' with mitochondria, DNA, RNA: The human Immune System is a survival strategy (Temperley et al, 2010). |
There's an APP ... for better food & cosmetics choices
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Toxic Personal Care Products
Beware that products boasting "all-natural" labels can still contain harmful chemicals, so be sure to check the full list of ingredients.
Today, there are many valuable resources available online to help research the potential toxicity of ingredients.
My favourite:
When Australia-based Homeopath Bill Stratham "became increasingly concerned about the detrimental effects on health caused by synthetic chemicals in the foods we eat and cosmetic products we use every day,"
in 2001, he self-published The Chemical Maze, supported by his local Lions Club, to make it simpler and easier for the general public to recognise additives and ingredients in foods and cosmetics.
Needless to say, "it went viral" which encouraged him to continue documenting his research via annual updates. Now, 'there's an APP for that' which makes it so much easier to use.
>>> more
"If you can't eat it, don't put it on your skin."
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The role of OXYGEN in preventing immune system breakdown
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Breathing is not just for oxygen -
It’s now linked to brain function and behaviour.
How we inhale and exhale, including breathing through the nose or mouth, effects our brain power:
Physical movement, in fresh air, oxygenates the body – all movement: laughing, singing, dancing, yoga, tai chi, walking, running, sports, etc.
Very informative overviews:
1.
The Nobel Prize in Medicine Goes to Your Body’s Oxygen Detector
Three scientists won the award for uncovering the molecular switch that regulates how cells behave when oxygen levels drop.
by Megan Molten, Science, July 2019
Every time you breathe in, you supply your body’s cells with the oxygen they need to convert food into energy. Scientists have long known that cells must sense how much oxygen is available to adjust their metabolic rates, so they can efficiently and safely burn fuel to build new tissues... >>>more
2.
To Heal Wounds, Cells Time-Travel Back to a Fetal State
Cells can reprogram themselves after an injury much more radically than people thought. - Jordan Cepelewicz, Science, Sept 2, 2018 -Wired
Summary
AN EMBRYO STARTS out as just a single cell. It’s not long before it divides into two cells, then four, then eight, and so on — a process marked by rapid growth, in which these early, unspecialized cells proliferate wildly to start building all the tissues of the body. As development proceeds, these embryonic (and later fetal) stem cells become more specialized, differentiating into the precursors of various cell lineages, which in turn give rise to more mature cells: blood cells, nerve cells, muscle cells, intestinal cells. Major functional changes in these tissues continue to take place after birth, as the organism adapts to life outside the uterus, for the first time using its lungs to breathe air and its digestive system to process food.
A few cell populations retain some of that early plasticity as adult stem cells, helping both to maintain tissues on a day-to-day basis and to heal wounds.
In recent years, moreover, it’s become clear that those aren’t the only cells that stay flexible: Sometimes, when the repair process calls for it, more specialized cells can take a few steps back, or “de-differentiate,”
to re-enter a stemlike state, too. >>>more
3.
Rhythm of Breathing Affects Memory and Fear
Gottfried, et. al. 2016, Neuroscience News
"The rhythm of breathing through the nose sparks electrical activity in the human brain that enhances emotional judgement and memory recall." - Professor of Neurology Jay Gottfried 2016
Northwestern Medicine scientists have discovered that the rhythm of breathing creates electrical activity in the human brain that enhances emotional judgments and memory recall. . . . This discovery led scientists to ask whether cognitive functions typically associated with these brain areas — in particular fear processing and memory — could also be affected by breathing. >>> more |
The Human Genome Project
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We're not just a product of our human cells.
We are a product of our microbiome as well.
1990 - 2003
The Human Genome Project, (HGP) launched in 1990 and completed in 2003, was an international project coordinated by the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) and National Institutes of Health with the following goals:
– identify all the approximately 20,500 genes in human DNA,
– determine the sequences of 3 billion chemical base pairs that make up human DNA,
– store this information in databases,
– improve tools for data analysis,
– transfer related technologies to the private sector, and
– address the ethical, legal, and social issues (ELSI) that may arise from the project. . . >>> more
The HGP produced radical new insights, such as the major discovery that
(i) the human body consists of far fewer genes than previously believed,
(ii) our genes are also shaped by 'foreign' bacteria and other microbes in our body,
(iii) these genes do not function as expected.
Analysis of the data continues.
2015
"10% Human:
How Your Body's Microbes Hold the Key to Health and Happiness"
(2015), Harper Collins
by Dr. Alanna Collen, UK evolutionary biologist, science writer, environmental scientist whose husband, biologist Ben Collen (1978-2018) succumbed to cancer in May 2018. Dr Cullen began her research on the human microbiome when she became very ill after taking excessive amounts of antibiotics.
Summary
Excerpt: Obesity, autism, mental health problems, IBS, allergies, auto-immunity, cancer. Does the answer to the modern epidemic of ‘Western’ diseases lie in our gut? You are 10% human. For every one of your cells, there are nine impostors hitching a ride. You are not just flesh and bone, but also bacteria and fungi. And you are more ‘them’ than you are ‘you’. Your gut alone hosts 100 trillion of them and until recently we thought that our microbes didn’t matter. This is all set to change as the latest scientific research tells a very different story, one where microbes run our bodies and becoming healthy is impossible without them. >>>more
In 2016, Dr Cullen posed a question:
"As it stands, two-thirds of adults are overweight or obese,
1 in 68 children has autism, around 15-20 percent of people have IBS, and something like one in 10 people have an autoimmune condition. If these disorders are not part of the human condition, then what's causing them? ...
If it's not altered genetics behind the rise in these modern chronic health problems, it has to be a change in the environment.
Our modern, medicated, antiseptic lives, though nearly free of deadly infections, come with a downside. We are neglecting 90 percent of our cells. They are not human cells, but microbes --and we are only just beginning to realize how much they matter to us."
- Dr. Alanna Collen, (2016), From Germ Theory to the Microbiome:
Why Microbes Still Rule Our Lives, HuffPost Blog.
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Go To:
– Maintaining pH Balance
– Food for Thought
– Detox and Cleanse
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