My favorite line in the "Bourne" trilogy is given by The Professor. He appears briefly in the first installment, but it is in the second film, the Bourne Conspiracy, that Clive Owen utters the quintessential phrase of the movie. After dueling with fellow agent Jason Bourne in the countryside and lying mortally wounded from Bourne's shotgun blast, he looks at his bleeding body, and then up at Matt Damon's character and says, "Look at us. Look at what they make us give."
In that moment of humanity and pathos, when two field agents who have both been through the same trenches and heartaches connect in unspoken respect, both "The Professor" and Jason Bourne arrive at the same conclusion - that "they" have required too much of them. That the pain and trauma and incredible amount of time and life that "they" require just isn't worth the price.
At that moment, you can see on Matt Damon's face the realization - that regardless of the supposed "good" he and his fellow agent were doing...
- the remedy was worse than the disease;
- the medicine was worse than the infirmity.
I remember clearly when it dawned on me that the "remedies" I was using to fight M.E., were worse than the supposed "benefits" I was getting.
When all the medicines, foods, protein shakes, herbs, injections, pills and baths that "they" had recommended for my good with this hideous disease, was just too much - and that I had to find a better way. And it explains why I am writing the New Ampligen Diaries.
It was a typical morning. On the counter were all my vitamins, flasks, needles, herbs, tablets, supplements, and prescriptions, laid out for the day. There were the vials of B-12 and "Nexavir", the supposed Kutapressin replacement. There were my Doctor-prescribed medicines, my natural health foods, and a ton of vitamins and supplements. My body ached, so as was normal for my morning routine, while waiting for my magnesium salt infused hot bath, I asked my wife to mix up my whey protein drink in that special little blender. For years I had read that this whey protein contained the glutathione that my body lacked, and since "they" recommended it so strongly, I dutifully and habitually drank the mixture twice a day.
I hated that drink, not only because it tasted like chalk, but also because it wasn't water soluble. You had to dump these envelopes of white powder into this special mixer to blend it, or else you ended up with clumps of goo that would stick to your glass and turn to concrete within minutes. I sacrificed a lot of cups to that whey powder over the years. Plus you invariably ended up with white powder everywhere, on the sink, on your hands, in your hair - all for the sake of this "miracle" drug.
My wife was better at it than I was, so while waiting for her to carefully open the packets and gently mix the concoction that "they" insisted I drink, I opened my laptop and went to my news feeds about M.E and CFS treatments. What I saw rocked my world, and changed forever how I would view "them," and how I would survive with this disease from then on.
"Cheney Advises Against Whey Protein and Glutathione" rang the headline, louder than a shotgun blast in my ears.
"Whaaaat?" I screamed out loud. "After 15 years of promotion, dozens of published articles, a feature position on "Pro Health" and other vitamin retailers that cater to us, NOW whey protein is bad for me?"
I couldn't believe it. The money and time I'd invested in getting whey protein delivered to me, (outside the USA) was eclipsed only by the hundreds of hours spent trying to get that confounded blender to work with that hellish powder.
As if on cue, my wife came around the corner with my little elixir in hand, white whey powder dancing from her eyebrows, her nose, and covering her fingers.She looked like Al Pacino in the closing scene of Scarface.
"Guess what?" I said sarcastically to my wife, "We've been spending thousands of dollars each year apparently poisoning me with whey protein."
"Why?" she asked me sincerely.
"Because," I answered, "they told us to."
Looking at my precious wife covered in whey, that fricking little battery operated blender, superimposed over the headline seemingly mocking me on my computer screen, something came over me, and I had my "Bourne" moment.
Taking the mixture from her cute little hands, I actually repeated the words out loud: "Look at what they make us give," I said.
Today my wife and I say that line often, resonant with the knowledge that it means much more to us than dialogue from a spy thriller. It recalls to us the moment when we stopped believing in all the remedies that "they" speculated would work. It signals the time when I decided to get serious about my recovery, and put everything I had into it, for survival. Though not as dramatic as a Bourne thriller, it was every bit as serious.
For out of that "whey protein" fiasco and subsequent "they don't always know what they're talking about" revelation came a new-found respect for research, and a renewed desire to do whatever it took to get well, regardless of what "they" said.
Which is the reason that today, I have moved 10,000 kilometers across an ocean to receive the drug "Ampligen" and have committed to a full year of treatment under one of the few doctors in the world who has it, in order to get well.
I came after doing exhaustive research. I looked at everything that was out there, from Valtrex and/or Valcyte therapy, to Vistide, and other antivirals, to even stem-cell therapy and antibiotic "cocktails", and guess what I found? The drug with the most research and the most potential success turns out to be the much maligned, often controversial, immune modulator called Ampligen. I found that there were over 20 years of Journal published research reports, way more than any other therapy today, that gave me the overall impression that, this drug actually could "fix"or modulate my immune system to make me better.
I do not have a financial interest in Ampligen or Hemispherx. I am not lobbying for Hemispherx or working "against" any other drug, protocol or therapy. But so far, Ampligen is proving to work in my body as advertised, and there is lots of research to back that up. For example, from just a few of the hundreds of published studies:
There are literally hundreds of other references and published studies that cover the last 20+ years of Ampligen research, that to me added up to the best option for my time, money and hope. To see these just use and search Google Scholar for Ampligen. Then compare what you find with any other remedy currently in vogue today, and tell me, does the protocol you are following have this much research behind it? Is the remedy actually helping you, or is it another "whey protein" drink?
Recently there was a really interesting study published by a Doctor I really admire regarding his decades long statistical analysis of patients using long-term antibiotic therapy. I'm thankful for this study, and the new insights it brings to our treatment options. Yet I have to admit, when I read that this research portends $1000/month worth of antibiotics, plus liver tests monthly, for a period of 4-11 years, I have to stop and ask myself "The Professor's" implied question. Is the remedy worth it?
"Look what they make us give." 4 years and $50,000 minimum? To maybe get better?
No. Not for me. I'm putting my money on Ampligen. 1 year and less than $25,000.
With the added bonus of no ridiculous powder in a battery operated mixer.
Posts
Hi Kelvin,
ReplyDeleteI'll start with an aside:
Kelvin Lord -- couldn't possibly be a pseudonym could it? ...
... Celsius Anders.
Now, to seriousness.
1. Just where is it that you've gone to get your Ampligen treatments? FDA still has not approved. Last I heard, they've stopped availability in Canada. South Africa? Where? Who?
2. How many other patients there with you? Does it seem to you that your experience has been generally representative of others' experiences / responses? Have you come across many / any patients reaching the end of their 52-week treatment period? If so, what are they reporting; what do you observe about their state of health?
Thanks Much ... Marvin Cohen, father of a 22-year-old young man who has been seriously ill with CFS for 12 years now ...
Celsius is better than Centigrade I guess. Clever!
ReplyDeleteIf you look at my previous posts on this site and comments you'll save yourself a lot of time. I talk about who and where you can get Ampligen in the USA and the costs. But to give you a running start, there are 3 places in the USA currently: Dr. Lapp at the Hunter Hopkins Clinic in Charlotte NC, Dr. Peterson at the Whittemore Peterson Clinic in Nevada, and Dr. Bateman in Utah. Google searching will give you their websites respectively. Read my other posts and you'll see that I have spoken with many patients who completed a year on Ampligen and they are completely recovered, back to work and back to life. Research is your best weapon in this fight and if you go to some of the other Forums like Phoenix Rising you'll get more than enough information about Ampligen. Best regards.
Kelvin Lord: Could you please tell me where all your previous posts about ampligen treatment are? I just get two posts when I search. Are the ampligen treatment results still looking good? As a 20 year sufferer of M.E. living in the U.S., I thought it had been essentially banned here.
ReplyDeleteNo, Ampligen is not banned in the USA. You can get it through Dr. Peterson in Reno, Dr. Lapp in Charlotte, and Dr. Bateman in Utah. It has also recently been approved in Argentina and China. Yes it works! To see all the posts go to http://ampligen-treatment.blogspot.com and then use the menu on the far left - start with the January posts and then go in chronilogical order for the 6 months through July. After 20 years you should definitely check it out. Call Wendy at the Hunter Hopkins clinic to get info an appointment with Dr. Lapp at this number: (704) 543-9692
ReplyDeleteThanks so much for the quick reply. I have looked into all three websites and called each trying to learn more. Dr. Bateman in Utah isn't taking new patients now as she is on leave. But the other two both sound like possibilities. I think Charlotte would be the better location for me, since I am from Pittsburgh PA. So I will probably send all of my medical info to Dr. Lapp and see whether they will take me, which I imagine they will since my case history is very well documented.
ReplyDeleteThanks again so much for responding so quickly! It's a huge commitment for me, but I'd pay all I have to become well again after all these years of hell!
Hi once again, gals and fellas who, like me, are simply unwilling to take 20+ years of various different Dr.'s facile responses that immediately betray they have studied "sweet F.A." about M.E. in all the time you've ALLEGEDLY been under their treatment!!
ReplyDeleteWhat I'd really love to know from other posters is: 1.) how many of you who have received full Amligen treatment, for at least three to five months, are now back home, and completely finished with your treatments?
How many, by contrast, are 2.) feeling significantly better, but still need to go back in and get re-AMPligenized from time to time, and 3.) how often are such supplemental treatments necessary? And finally, the painful, but absolutely essential question, 4.) how many of you, despite having received at least three to four months of treatment with Ampligen, have experienced few or even NO benefits at all, even during the infusion process, or 5.) who felt significantly better while being treated, but have since slowly returned to the same old horrendous, never completely lifting, world of, among other symptoms, -- ["swamp-brain" headaches, substantial cognitive and memory problems,chronic neckaches, swollen lymph nodes behind the ears and elsewhere, nearly complete absence -- and later "punishment" -- of even very light exercise, severe pain in all one's major joints [i.e. knees, hips, shoulders, and back] and, albeit less frequently, into some of one's minor joints as well, [ankles, elbows, wrists, fingers, toes etc,] ever-returning severe alcohol, prescription and "illicit" drug, and sometimes even just fruit-juice or light food intolerances, all manner of sleep disorders, -- so that one seldom, if ever, feels fully rested or completely "awake" in the morning, waking up about five times each night -- and another five or six DAYS in a row, feeling merely "bad" to "very bad," only then to alternate with ~three to four days where one is almost comepletly bed-ridden, significant weight gain, despite eating only a fraction of what one did when still healthy, constant need to wear powerful Fentanyl pain patches, and to take about 15 other symptom relieving -- but side-effect causing -- meds each day just to function at all, and, more decisively to at least "tread water" enough at work to retain one's job, in my rather lucky case, as a tenured university professor, ... and on and on it goes for almost all true MEPs.]
Hi again folks,
ReplyDeleteI don't know why this website double posted the first half of my message instead of continuing with the following:
In my case, I've had this ever re-out-breaking -- not that anyone seems to care! -- M.E. since 12-18-1990, when the wise owls at the U.of Pgh. hospital/factory decided I needed to have an endoscopy. I was completely unconscious for that operation, since they wanted to train some new apprentice.
Within a week from the test, however, I came down with what I thought was a fairly mild flu. Unfortunately, although I could go back to teaching, it never really lifted, though I stopped vomiting, ... and then, within another two or three weeks, the odd "flu" morphed into what seems to have been, and was subsequently diagnosed by UPMC's top Infectious Disease expert, Dr. Fred Rubin, as, ... you guessed it, M.E.!
I will never forget Rubin telling me, after a complete physical and loads of other tests had ruled out virtually every other possibility; "It certainly seems to me to be yet another case of M.E," to which he immediately added; "I must see about ten new cases of this disease every week, in this office alone" -- as he had several others.
Even then, [in the Winter of 1990-1!] he told me to do whatever I could to get into one of the many already even then on-going "experimental trials of Ampligen.
And so here I am, nearing the end of the career I was just beginning back then!, and I am STILL trying to find our more about Ampligen efficacy rates and where I can go to try it even at this late date -- and without THIS fine website I'd no doubt still be floundering around on both of those fairly obvious questions, at least one would think.
So perhaps I will finally get to receive some serious treatment, -- instead of the endless offers of vitamins, new diets, accupuncture, homeopathic drops etc. etc. -- that everyone is forever telling me "Yeah, my brother in law's boss had CFS [sic] for three whole months and then tried juicing carrots and was totally better with two days!
20 dreadful years wasted in the meantime!
But, of course, it's hardly any skin off the FDA's thousands of regulator-bureaucrats' noses if I, and a zillion other folks, like most of you reading this, have to live in this constant Hell for 20 or 30 or 40 years more, -- or even until we die; and this even though the drug and treatment that might well return us to normal health may well have been sitting in Hem Pharma's warehouse since years before any of us even got ill!
If I weren't such a life-long leftist, I'd be tempted to join the the "tea-party" rebellion against such a completely un-empathetic excuse for a government as this one. It has trillions of dollars to pay out to bank- racketeers and arms merchants and a million soldiers stationed all around the world, but it has still spent NOTHING whatsoever to research M.E., even though hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of their OWN people suffer terribly from it!
Worse still, I still can't get a straight story about which other countries might already be offering Ampligen fairly routinely, or what I, as an American, would need to do to receive the treatment in one of these more civilized lands.
Oh well, I'm sure that's much more than most of you wanted to read, so I'll end.
Billo
1st: I am terribly sorry about the earlier multiple postings of my sorry story. I would delete the duplicates, but I can't figure out how to do so!
ReplyDeleteI am very heartened to hear that your ampligen treatment turned out to be so successful. At present, I cannot, I believe, afford to try the treatment, especially if it ends up costing between $50K and $100K as it has for many people I have communicated with over my 21 years of illness.
I have, however, recently been put on fairly high doses of acyclovir, famivir, and Valtrex. I vary the pills and take about 3 grams total per day. Amazingly this has helped me quite a bit, especially in lowering my pain levels and my former, horrible "swamp-water brain" headaches, as I call them, since that's about the only way I can get anywhere close to putting the feeling into words.
I am now about three months into this new treatment regime, and still seem to be improving, although I definitely have set backs. I am hoping that after 6 months to a year I might even get back to feeling more or less like my very old self, before I got this horrendous disease. In fact, it's been so long I'm not sure I even remember what being "normal" or "healthy" feels like.
Anyway, this treatment has helped me MUCH more than any of the dozens of others my physician and I have tried, and I even noticed some real improvement right from the start. I think of it as my "poor-man's ampligen treatment," since my insurance pays for almost all of the meds involved. So othere of you out there who also can't afford the full ampligen routine, might well want to ask your doctor about trying this anti-viral treatment as a "much better than nothing" surrogate.
I only hope that in a few years -- Good Lord it's been almost 30 years already the FDA has hammed and hawed on this thing! -- ampligen will FINALLY get approved for widespread use in the U.S., and thus come down into the $20k-$40k range, or lower, where I [and many other badly ill, long-suffering PMEs] could afford to try it, especially if we don't also have to relocate to a far away city for a year, and hence make no income for all that time, to receive it.
Thanks again so much for telling us all about your amazing and hope-inspiring story!! And CONGRATULATIONS on finally feeling better once again!! Best regards, Billo
That's great news about the triple antibiotic cocktail you are finding success with. I think if I didn't have the privilege of getting Ampligen I would opt for a similar protocol. Regarding the cost of Ampligen, Billo, stay tuned. There may be some good news coming out in mid-March. My sources tell me something good may be brewing that could help patients with the cost of Ampligen. As soon as I know I'll post. Thanks for the comments, and keep us updated on your progress!
ReplyDeleteWOW!! I'm glad I checked back into this website again, which I don't do often enough as usually the comments come in rather slowly.
ReplyDeleteThanks so much for the update on ampligen Kelvin Lord! I am pretty much determined at this point to give it a try as there's only so much more of this illness I can take after 21 years! It's especially hard when one has had a relapse after having felt much better for a couple of months. So PLEASE, if you hear anything at all about easier, or less expensive ways to get treated wit ampligen, post it to us here!! I'll keep dropping back to look. BTW, did you get treated by Dr. Lapp? Is he the only person still doing the trials here in the U.S.?
As to the three anti-viral drug cocktail treatment, famcyclovir, valtrex and acyclovit, that was definitely working fairly well, hence my comments about "relapsing" when I went off a couple of weeks ago.
I took myself off of them only because I started to get pain in my lower back, which COULD have been due to taking too much of the three drugs plus my regular meds. On the other hand, it might simply have been caused by bending over a zillion times the two days before. But I wasn't sure which it was, so I decided to go off them briefly and then build back up much more slowly, while also getting a test done on the kidneys. So no I'm back in the full Hell of not being able to do much of anything. Fortunately I only need to teach another few weeks and then the summer break is hear.
I am also planning on checking into going on disability, at least for awhile, as when I am really bad like this, I can only just barely keep up with all of my work. I will also need to take time off for the ampligen treatment should that materialize, which I sure HOPE it does!!
I'll post again in another few weeks about my going back on the anti-viral cocktail, if probably at a somewhat lower doses.
More when I know more. Thanks again about the heads-up on the possibility of there finally perhaps being some movement on the ampligen availability front after all this time.
Well here, after just FIVE DAYS, is the "more" that I promised to post "when I kn[e]w more." So here's my story, and I'm stickin' to it, at least until I stumble over another horrific relapse sometime soon. Since I didn't want to go to long without any anti-virals in me, for fear that that would allow some of the cells already infected with the M.E. causal agent, or one a a host of other opportunistic infections to again be able to reinfect new cells, setting the main treatment back quite a ways, I decided, soon after posting my last note here, that I should at least go back on some lower-dose version of my, "poor-man's Ampligen" treatment: namely, the acyclover-famciclover-valacyclovir "cocktail."
ReplyDelete[N.B.: The latter of these three common, anti-viral, but not anti-RETRO-viral drugs; namely "valacyclovir," should DEFINITELY NOT BE CONFUSED WITH "Valcyte," which is a completely different drug; one which my well-trusted, highly intelligent and experienced, physician of many years explained to me is really only prescrbed by him in a few, fairly rare, medical conditions, and which also has some carcinogenic ingredients, -- which was quite sufficient to keep me off of the stuff all by itself!
[BTW, I sure don't understand why the FDA, or whoever finalizes the final product names of new pharmaceuticals, doesn't force the various makers to use only names that are not easily confused -- especially considering how legibly most physicians write! -- Celebrex, Cymbalta,Seldane, get confused frequently, as do even prilosec and prozac etc. etc. Oh well, we can wait until were health to worry about all that!]
Anyway, even after taking the first famciclovir and a single acyclovir, the first day I noticed an amazing change for the better, just like the first time I tried the combo. The effect was made all the more dramatic since the few days before restarting had been some of the worst days I had had in several months, indeed, about as bad a I have ever had since first getting ill at the end of 1990. It is, of course, always possible that there's another explanation for my vast improvement, like, say, "mere coincidence." But that seems highly unlikely to me given the very quick relief I experience on both occasions and the much slower process of the typical M.E. symptoms setting back in over the course of a few weeks to a month. [And remember I am stil on a very low dose of only 500mg. Famciclover and 800 mg. of Acyclovir -- which I hope to take back up to 16000mg, starting today.
So that's all the more that I know more about at present.
Best of health an happiness to all, and,
Especially to all of you P.M.E.s, who, like me, I assume, find it so strange that everyone I ask knows at least two or three people, often even close family members, who have M.E. or something close enough to it to keep them miserable and largely incapable of working much, and yet so few of them can really empathize with you, because it's really just plain impossible to know what it's really like to feel this bad so constantly for so long ... "and besides, he's always been somewhat hypochondriacal, don't you know." And you really want to scream against such ignorance -- in good part the result of poor mainstream coverage of the disease over three decades, and the almost complete failure of the federal government to fund research on the condition. [And then what little they do appropriate, someone else steals and uses for their own cancer studies instead!]
After your trial is done how long does Ampligem work in your body? Do you have to go back for treatment for the rest of your life or when you need it? Is there any other side affects that are
ReplyDeletetemporary or permanent? Like loss of hair or digestive problems.
Hi Kelvin Lord and all others. K.L. you posted awhile ago that "My sources tell me something good may be brewing that could help patients with the cost of Ampligen." If that's the case I'm ready to pack my bags and get out of her for NC Pronto!! Have you heard nothing more by now? I can probably go to ~$50K for the whole treatment and would like to start soon. so PLEASE, PLEASE, PLEASE, PLEASE, let me know what you know, and perhaps even give me your email address, or phone number too, if that's not asking too much!! As old Rodney Dangerfield used to say "I'm dyin' out here!!" I myself can be reached at fusroy@pitt.edu or 412-243-1569 as well. I just hope you haven't been so energized once again that you're off on some world cruise and have forgotten about all of us still languishing in horrible pain, headaches, no cellular energy and all the rest of it. PLEASE MAN, DON'T LEAVE US HANGING OUT HERE!!!
ReplyDeletePoppies, there are Ampligen patients from 1991 who have never needed to go back for more of the drug, and there are some patients who after some years decided to go back for a "booster." My perspective is simple or simplistic I guess- I said I would invest exactly one year in the Ampligen protocol, but that's it. Regardless of my future, I am not planning on doing it again.
ReplyDeleteBillo, my apologies for "leaving you hanging." My plan is to post a new update soon, after 90 days off of Ampligen. So far, the news with regard to my health post-Ampligen is good. No, I haven't gone on a world cruise. But last weekend I did successfully drive up to 13,000 ft., and with four rest stops along the way, ski down Keystone Mountain from the top to the bottom! I'll have a new post here by April 20.
In the meantime, for the "news" I forecasted about Ampligen, you can read about it on Phoenix Rising under the title "Hope for Ampligen-Breaking News" http://bit.ly/einV80
It's not everything I hoped for from Hemispherx, but it does sound promising.
Thanks for your comments. Talk to you soon.
Wow! Lots of interesting stuff on your hyper-link K.L.!! I'll have to digest it a bit more when I get time. [I still have to work full time, as I have since 1990 when I got ill my first semester as a new professor. What a hellish time it's been mostly too, especially knowing that ampligen treatment was already out when I got sick, but I still haven't been able to get put on it, thanks to the FDA, who BTW have just been caught doing all kinds of nasty things, here in this land it hardly seemed completely preposterous to believe [as it does to anyone who can still push a thought through his head these days] actually was -- at least close to -- "the greatest country on earth" as we were always indoctrinated to believe, during the cold war years, a land which at least was moving closer to "liberty and justice for all." Now most Americans seem to have given up all idealism to lose their greedy minds in endless fantasies of personal avarice [never] to come.
ReplyDeleteBut enough politics for now -- tho nothing is any more political than the 40 year denial of and refusal to investigate M.E.!! Anyway, I just wanted to say that, although my so-called "medical insurance" will only give me 21 famcyclivir per month, but the pharmacy has offered to sell me 9 more 500 mg tabs for only $368 USD, I found a discount pharmacy in Canada, North West Pharmacy in Langly, BC. They have a website should anyone want to try them. They sold me, not 9, but 100 of the 500mg, tabs, total cost? $208.19 [I think USD]So now I can give the drug a real trial. It definitely seems to help more that Valtrex or Acyclovir, so we'll see if it beats the old cocktail all by itself. If not, I'll probably finally bite the bullet and go on ampligen, if I can figure out how to swing it.
Best to all, especially the fellow, whose name I have unfortunately already forgotten, but will know again next time, who has had his M.E. since 1987!! It is always a source of some small strength to me when I find another PME, who actually DOES know what it's like to live long term with this disease!
Hi all and especially "Kelvin Lord." Well, as much as I felt better with the "cocktail" of acyclovir an famcyclovir and/or valacyclovir for a couple-three glorious weeks, it no longer seems to be working which leads me think it might have knocked out the EBV or some other entero-virus for awhile, but eventually the effect wore off because it wasn't targeting the the REAL cause -- probably a retro-virus of some sort. Anyway I would like to know how Kevin Lord is doing after being off the treatment for a few months. I'd also like to ask him some other questions over the telephone if possible. I am VERY SERIOUSLY CONSIDERING CALLING UP THE PEOPLE AT THE CLINIC IN CHARLOTTE AND GIVING the TREATMENT a try. So, 1.] Is it possible for you to call me some late morning or early afternoon, [or for me to call you. if you'd prefer] so I can ask you more about whether you would still give it a "thumbs up" etc. 2.] If you don't want to talk about it on the phone, is it possible for you to send me a private email -- i.e. not posted here as well -- so that I can ask you a couple last things before I take the plunge and spend so much time and expense on the still strangely mysterious Ampligen treatment? Thanks,
ReplyDeleteBillo
Well, in case anyone is still reading this saga, I am set to begin my ampligen treatment with Dr. Black on July 13. I don't see any other way of getting better at this point. Wish me luck!
ReplyDeleteBillo:
ReplyDeleteI'm so happy for you!!! I'm at 6 months and feeling the wonderful miracle of Ampligen.
Wishing you all the best.
Here's to a better life!! Be in touch and let us know how you are doing.
Linda Barossi
Billo:
ReplyDeleteWhere is Dr. Black located - what city?
Linda
Dr. Laura Black is with Dr. Charles Lapp in Charlotte, NC. They are also known as the Hunter-Hopkins Clinic. This is where I received Ampligen in 2010. http://www.drlapp.net/ Call the office and ask for Wendy Fallick- she is in charge of drug trials like Ampligen.
ReplyDelete""We are built for the valley, for the ordinary stuff we are in, and that is where we have to prove our mettle."
Oswald Chambers
Well folks, it's pretty much a done deal now. I even have a house exchange with someone in Charlotte. So my wife and I will spend the year there, and they will take our house here in Pittsburgh. It's kins of funny that the person coming here is also going to take over teaching my courses at Pitt, while we will staying in his apartment in Charlotte. So it works out well for both of us.
ReplyDeleteI'll keep you all posted on my progress here on the Ampligen Diaries II. Thanks for the good wishes from all of you, and especially from Kelvin Lord for putting up this website, which more than anything I've read in all the anecdotal postings on the web, both praising and vilifying Ampligen, is most responsible for my finally deciding after all these years -- and even after to talking to Dr. Carter, Ampligen's inventor, himself at one point -- to bite the bullet and the cost and try to get my life back with the still largely unknown Ampligen treatments!
Linda, where are you being, or were you, being treated for 6 months? It sure sounds like it is working for you as well as Kelvin. Please share a few of the details with us if you feel comfortable doing so.
Hi Billo:
ReplyDeleteI posted a response to your question and it disappeared? I have a lot of trouble with these blogs, obviously.
My doctor is Dan Peterson at Incline Village.
I was first on Ampligen at the end of 1997. My testimony is on the internet and I thought on this blog? That was from the 1998 conference in Cambridge, Mass. You can google my name and it will come up, I think?
I was on Ampligen for 18 months and did extremely well......until........I purchased a new home and it had standing water under it - surprise! MOLD.....the toxic black stachy along with many others. I had to go to stay with family in New Orleans and I got worse, total relapse. I was working then - part time jobs and ended up horribly ill again. New Orleans is NOT a good place for someone with my symptomology.
I came back to Dr. Peterson and did another 18 months of Ampligen and once again, I did extremely well. Financially I had been destroyed and immediately went back to work...an extremely difficult job and had to make two more moves (moved 11 times since 1997)
and I could "feel" myself sinking. I managed to get through another 7 years and am back on Ampligen - at the 6 month mark right now. I'll be on for a total of 18 months again. There is no doubt it is once again effective, although I'm older, had to move AGAIN and am not in good shape. I was very concerned - would it work again? The answer is YES.......I know the drug well and can tell by how I'm reacting and had three excellent days last week. I'm alone and must care for myself, so I tend to try to make up for lost time and get a bit carried away, only to tell myself how dumb that was, but all in all, a definite positive trend. This drug has been an absolute miracle for me.
Wishing you the same outcome.....hang in there, sometimes it's not easy, but keep your focus on the outcome. It's well worth it!!!!
Linda Barossi