The Real Snake Oil: Why We’ve Been Misled About Healing and MS
When you live through something as devastating as multiple sclerosis for thirty years and somehow come out the other side stronger and wiser, the first thing you want to do is share what you’ve learned, to stop others from suffering.
But it takes real courage to speak up. The moment you step outside the box, you paint a target on your back. I know. I got my butt kicked (and yes, it’s still being kicked).
And I get it. Many in the MS community are wary: wary of false hope, “miracle cures”, and the endless stream of quick fixes.
Here’s the thing though. Labelling diet, exercise and lifestyle changes as “snake oil” isn’t just frustrating, it’s dangerous and disempowering.
It sends a message to every person with MS that they have no control, no agency, and no hope outside of a prescription pad.
And that, my friends, is the real snake oil.
Let’s be real. There isn’t a single disease on Earth that diet, exercise and mindset can’t help improve, and with zero side effects.
Yet people still demand, “Where’s the science?”
And I can’t help but ask:
How could there be?
Who’s going to fund long-term studies that combine diet, mindset, exercise and medicine?
They’re too expensive. Too complex. Too unprofitable.
Does the truth doesn’t need a sponsor?
The truth is, if one DMT worked, or one medical intervention worked, or just diet worked, then MS would be an easy puzzle to solve. But it’s not one thing. It’s everything. Healing from MS requires a multi-layered approach: medical, physical, mental, emotional and spiritual. The fact that it’s complex doesn’t make it impossible. It just means it takes more than one tool.
That’s why dismissing lifestyle changes as “snake oil” is as dangerous as refusing to consider medical treatment or a DMT. Both matter. Both have their place. To reject either side is to cut yourself off from part of the healing equation.
My Journey: No Stones Left Unturned
When I was diagnosed with MS at 24, I asked my neurologist about diet.
He patted my head and said, “Why would you do that when you can just take an injection for life?”
An injection that wasn’t a cure, reduced relapses by only 30 per cent, and ultimately did little to change the course of my disease.
But what did I know? I was a 24-year-old aerobics instructor, naïve and compliant.
By 30, I was half-blind, dragging my leg, and my arms barely worked.
Three young children. A prognosis of a wheelchair by 40.
And a despair so deep I no longer wanted to live.
Something had to change.
So I ditched the ineffective needles and decided I would either find another way to heal, or die trying.
And I nearly did, several times.
I dove into diets, fasting, meditation, shamanic healing, saunas, coloured lights.
I went overseas for a stem cell transplant.
I joined a CCSVI trial.
I studied Buddhism, neuroplasticity, yoga.
I took natural and unnatural drugs.
I spent hundreds of thousands on supplements.
I stopped just short of swallowing intestinal worms sourced from a man in the cesspools of Calcutta.
There were no stones left unturned.
Some things worked. Most didn’t. But one thing never changed:
my belief that I could influence my outcome.
And eventually, I did.
My limbs came back. My relapses stopped.
I’ve now been in remission for over a decade.
So yes, you can imagine my elation, but also my urgency to share what I’ve learned.
Don’t lose hope. Try. Fight. Refuse to settle for a broken body.
What I Know Now
Never Let a Good Disaster Go to Waste is not just my memoir, it’s my war cry.
I’m not here to profit from anyone’s pain. I’ll give my book to anyone for free because I know that the giver is also the receiver. Helping someone shorten their time of suffering is the greatest gift I could receive in return.
If I can inspire even one person to take back their health, to believe that change is possible, then it’s all been worth it.
Never lose hope.
If I had, I wouldn’t be running today.
I wouldn’t be climbing mountains.
I wouldn’t be here, writing this.
We are both our greatest asset and our worst enemy.
It takes knowledge, discipline and courage to rise above pain, to do the hard yards, to become who we are meant to be.
“We are what we think. All that we are arises with our thoughts. With our thoughts, we make the world.”
And that’s the truth science is only just catching up.