By Guest Blogger on September 9, 2009

Mercury & Me

I realized the madness had to stop when I retrieved a clump of hair the size of my fist from the drain filter in my shower. For weeks, I had been surfing the net for hair loss shampoos, supplements and tinctures. With all the pictures of aging men, I had to wonder why a healthy 29-year-old woman like myself had been reduced to such desperate measures.

By the time I got tested for mercury toxicity, I had lost about 2/3 of my hair. It was not only thinning considerably, but I used to have luxurious curls that hung to my mid-back, and now I had a whispy mop that barely scraped my shoulders. My hair was literally breaking off! On top of that, I had noticed a tremor that made writing and makeup application a mess, and holding a yoga pose (even just a simple warrior!) had become a physical impossibility. I had many sleepless nights and my mood was all over the place. My memory started failing me, too—I couldn’t remember conversations I’d had the day before, and I actually booked a vacation during the same week that I was supposed to be the Maid of Honor in my best friend’s wedding. Yeah, that happened.

My life had become a mess, and I couldn’t figure out how to connect the dots. I felt like I was falling apart at the seams and if one more person winced as the complimented my new ‘haircut’ I was going to go postal.

Then it hit me. I was lying in bed one morning…somewhere in that state between dreaming and awake…and I got a message from my unconscious. Broadcast in synaptic neon I saw the word: Mercury.

All the snippets I had caught from wellness blogs and news feeds (thank you Jeremy Piven) finally crystallized into a story that made sense. Needless to say I booked an appointment with my GP and a week later held the lab results in my hands that stated I was in the 95th percentile for mercury toxicity. Not to mention that my bloodwork also showed a significantly high level of arsenic.

I could understand how the mercury had gotten into my system—I am a sushi lover and seafood aficionado. But I wasn’t in electronic semiconductor manufacturing. I’m a psychotherapist in private practice in Hollywood. The strong presence of arsenic in my blood had me baffled.

My doctor explained to me that everyone is exposed to these heavy metals and other toxic pollutants all over the place—from the water we drink, to the air we breathe, to the products we buy. She said that only some of us (lucky me!) weren’t as good at eliminating these toxins. Turns out my liver, kidneys and glands are old-fashioned, and don’t know how to filter out these substances as fast as they accumulate in my body.

“So how do I get this sh-t out of me?!” was the next obvious question. My doctor informed me that the standard treatment for heavy metal toxicity is a process called chelation, where metal-binding agents are ingested, inserted or injected into the patient’s system to bind with the metals and escort them out through the proper elimination systems.

So I was given a chelation injection on the spot, which made me instantly nauseated, scared and disoriented. I couldn’t get up to drive home for the next hour, and I felt like liquid fire was infiltrating my veins. My doctor said this was ‘normal’ and handed me a care package of 30 chelation suppositories to be inserted where the sun don’t shine every other night.

I tried the suppositories for a few weeks, and the effects weren’t nearly as violent as the injection had been. But there was a sickening spicy, metallic smell that wouldn’t seem to wash off with my fig-scented liquid hand soap and I always felt a bit like I was buzzing.

I called my doctor to see if there were any other, perhaps more pleasant, routes to detoxifying, and that’s when she told me about Sunlight Saunas. I had noticed the pretty wooden sauna in her office when I was lying there, a woosy mess. But she explained this was no ordinary sauna. Instead of using convection heat, where your body gets hot because of the temperature of the air, Sunlight Saunas use infrared heat, which is absorbed directly into the body.

I did a quick Google search and found that a neurologist in Seattle named Dr. Deitrich Klinghardt had found that “the sweat of people using a conventional sauna was found to be 95 to 97% water while the sweat of those using an infrared thermal system was 80 to 85% water with the non-water portion principally cholesterol, fat-soluble toxins, toxic heavy metals, sulphuric acid, sodium, ammonia and uric acid.” So I just had to relax and sweat and I could rid myself of the toxins? Clearly, I was game.

I bought a small unit that could fit in my bedroom and I got to sweating. I lied in that warm, womblike, temple of yumminess every other day for 30-minutes at a time (frankly, I still do). I meditate in there. I make phonecalls. I even tilt my computer on its side and watch my Netflix videos. It’s heaven.

And after 6 months of hanging out in my fabulous infrared sauna…I am healed! Hallelujah! Can I get a witness?!!

I feel great. My hair is getting thicker and longer, and there is evidence of that in my clean drain filter. I no longer shake. I no longer forget. And I’ve actually lost 5 pounds (apparently 30-minutes in an infrared sauna burns up to 600 calories).

I went back to my doctor for my lab results and found that my mercury is completely in the normal range. Not only that, but for the first time in my life, my cholesterol levels are healthy (I’ve had genetically high cholesterol since I was a kid). Another side product of infrared heat? You bet your bottom dollar. This stuff is no joke. I mean, it’s infrared heat that is used in the incubators for newborns in hospitals. C’mon.

My name is Dr. Sam Rader, I’m an infrared addict, and I’m toxin-free!

Dr. Sam Rader is a holistic psychotherapist in private practice in Los Angeles. She holds a PhD in Clinical Psychology, and is also a certified yoga instructor and certified massage therapist. Dr. Rader uses her training in psychology, yoga, anatomy, cognitive neuroscience, somatic experiencing and EMDR to facilitate wellness in her clients with a focus on the mind/body connection.

To learn more about Dr. Rader, visit www.samraderphd.com or www.raderoninfrared.com

If you’re interested in learning more about FAR infrared saunas, check out the one Kris uses here…

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