Huntington's

Huntington's disease is a disorder passed down through families in which nerve cells in certain parts of the brain waste away, or degenerate. Most people develop symptoms in their mid 30's and 40's.  If one of your parents has Huntington's disease, you have a 50% chance of getting the gene for the disease. If you get the gene from your parents, you will develop the disease at some point in your life, and can pass it onto your children. If you do not get the gene from your parents, you cannot pass the gene onto your children.

Symptoms of Huntington's Disease include behavior changes (hallucinations, irritability, moodiness, restlessness or fidgeting, paranoia, and psychosis), abnormal and unusual movements (facial movements, head turning to shift eye position, quick, sudden, sometimes wild jerking movements of the arms, legs, face and other body parts, slow, uncontrolled movements, and unsteady gait), dementia that slowly gets worse (disorientation or confusion, loss of judgment,  loss of memory, personality changes, speech changes), anxiety, difficulty swallowing, and speech impairment.  In a nutshell, the symptoms are a cross between Parkinson's and Alzheimer's disease.

Huntington's Disease testing is the only disease testing that I know of where patients have to go through pre-counseling and post-counseling before being allowed to see their test results. This is because the suicide rate is so high among those who find out they have the disease. I know first-hand how grueling this testing process is and the emotions that accompany this process, as I have been through it myself. This story will be shared here on my blog.

My first real experience with Huntington's Disease came when I was just a little girl and my mom's Aunt Nora came to visit us. I can still remember sitting around the dinner table and very rudely snickering as I watched her shakily pick up her dinner glass. I had never met anyone that could not control their muscles, so I viewed her as somewhat "weird". It was about this same time that my internal fear and anxiety started as I became aware that my mom had a chance of having this disease and so did I and all of my siblings. That fear lived inside of my body for almost 30 years. It was awful to have that looming over me and not to know what the future would hold.

A few years later, I remember going to visit my mom's mom in the nursing home when she was in the later stages of Huntington's Disease. She would always try to communicate with us, but she was very limited in her ability to do so. I remember her being a very kind person and I try to hold on to that memory. It really bothered me as a child that her hands and legs were tied down to the bed to control the shaking. I remember wondering if that would eventually be mine or my mother's fate.

Several years later, I would face this disease head-on as I started attending the group meetings for Huntington's Disease in Salt Lake City, UT. Because these were such emotionally painful meetings to go to, I didn't attend very often. I did attend enough to get to know some of the people there and it was a helpful way of facing this monster that I had tried so hard to ignore for so many years.

My mother started showing symptoms of HD when she was about 30 and I was about 13 years old. It was heartbreaking to watch her not only slowly lose her physical and mental health, but everything around her. My parents divorced at around that time and my mom bounced from relationship to relationship for the remainder of her life. She also went through several jobs and was homeless on several occasions. She was finally able to find peace with her passing due to the complications of HD at the young age of 59 years old.

Even though Huntington's Disease is a very terrifying thing to have to face, I have found hope through having faith in Jesus Christ, knowing that this life is a test and understanding that in the end God will make everything right. 

I have also found physical and scientific hope with the use of the supplement Protandim (a NRF-2 activator that has been clinically proven to reduce oxidative stress by 40-70% in 100% of the people 100% of the time). My mom had miraculous results with Protandim. Her story as well as others of our family's experiences with this supplement are shared in this blog. 

Recently, I have also come across the story of a medical doctor who cured herself in just nine months of  Multiple sclerosis, another brain shrinking disease, with the consumption of specific foods.  Her story can be found by clicking HERE.

In my research and experience, Protandim and the "Hunter Gatherer Diet", that Dr.Terry Wahls recommends, are the two best tools out there to combat Huntington's disease. There are also exciting and promising treatments using Gene Therapy for Huntington's disease.