My mind immediately went to my appendix rupturing. But, the thought crossed my mind thatI might be dying. The pain was that intense!
After hours of being in denial and rationalizing away the pain to a gym injury, I finally ended up in the ER where I proceeded to shrivel up into the fetal position due to the pain. Like many of you, I sat for hours in the waiting room of the Emergency Room with no information on what was happening to me. Nobody seemed to care. Strike one healthcare system.
After 5 hours of writing in pain in the ER waiting room, I was finally admitted and provided a room. Straight away the nurse jammed an IV into my arm and started to dispense morphine. No questions. No conversation. Just straight to the drugs. Strike two.
Now, I will admit that the morphine was a welcome break to the agonizing pain that I was in. But, with a drug that strong, I would have at least wanted a little conversation about what was being administered. But, no.
Shortly after the drugs I was wheeled to get a CT scan and then carted back into my room to wait for a Doctor to review the results with me.
About an hour later, a Urologist knocked on my door to review the results of my CT scan. As soon as he identified himself as a Urologist, I knew that it was kidney stones.
The Urologist painted a pretty grim picture. I had an “impassable” 9mm kidney stone lodged in my ureter just outside of my kidney along with 30 other kidney stones raging in size from a few millimeters to over 2 centimeters between my two kidneys.
Based on the sheer number of stones that I was facing, the Urologist recommended a Percutaneous Nephrolithotomy (PCNL for short). Not knowing what this was I asked for him to walk me through the procedure. Almost like he was offended by me asking, he quickly and gruffly ran me through the surgery. Strike three.
For those of you not familiar with this particular procedure, they cut you open on your side to gain access to your kidney where they make another incision in order to jam a sheath (a large diameter hollow tube) through both your skin into your kidney to gain access to the stones. And in my case, this would be done on both sides of my body with the possibility of more than one of these through and through holes made on both sides in order to gain access to all of the stones.
After all that I had been through that day, I said a big “NO THANK YOU” to the arrogant Urologist. I had zero faith that this system had my best interest in mind. They simply wanted to pump me full of drugs, cut me open, and send me on my way. To hell with any long-term consequences because of this procedure.
The arrogant Urologist even had the nerve to tell me that he’d be “seeing me soon” as I was on my way out. It was now my main mission in life to prove this guy wrong.
During this time, life stopped for me. All I did was research kidney stones and talk to people that could potentially help me along the way.
I spoke with every Naturopathic Doctor, Urologist, and Herbalist that would give me the time of day to help me understand what I was researching on a deeper level. Additionally, I ended up printing and studying every research paper on kidney stones published dating back to the early 1900s.
Me on the couch in pain due to a 9mm kidney stone making the best of it by cuddling with my dog, Finley.
Every single paper on kidney stones.
My passion for finding a solution to my "impassable" 9mm stone and it's 30 other siblings became my only focus.
After an exhaustive and painful six months (that 9mm stone was still with me), I felt ready to start experimenting with all that I had learned. My goal was to prepare an herbal concoction that would allow me to naturally pass all of my stones.
Even though I felt ready to take on the world with what I had learned, it took me another three months to get the formulation right. But, when I began passing kidney stones every other day without pain because of my herbal concoction...
Me in one of the first videos that I ever recorded for YouTube.
So, in early 2018, I took to YouTube and started sharing what I learned about how to pass kidney stones naturally without the need for surgery or pharmaceuticals.
I had no clue as to what the feedback would be.
As a result of what I was sharing, people were successfully passing their kidney stones of all sizes without surgery or poisonous pharmaceutical drugs from all over the world. I was astounded by the impact that something so simple could have on so many lives.
Unfortunately, many people struggled to find all of the ingredients I was instructing them to use and asked if I would consider making a pre-made product.
At first, I was resistant. I had a demanding full-time day job in animal nutrition that had me working 60-80 hours a week, including weekly cross-country travel that drained me of much of my energy.
Plus, I also knew absolutely nothing about starting a business or developing a product. The thought was terrifying actually. Who the heck was I?
With each new request, my calling became even stronger and I knew that this would become my life's work.
It took me a few months to find a manufacturer that aligned with my values. Things like responsible sourcing practices and meeting all the FDA’s quality/safety certifications were very important to me. But, when I finally found that manufacturing partner, we were off to the races!
The resulting product was an herbal tea that I called CLEANSE. And at the time of this writing, I am thrilled to report that:
Throwback to early 2019 of me trying to keep up with fulfilling order while working a day job. Crazy times!
Since launching CLEANSE, the resulting sales have allowed me to leave my day job in animal nutrition and focus 100% of my energy and time on empowering fellow kidney stone sufferers like you to manage their condition naturally and navigate the healthcare system.
On top of all the research to create CLEANSE and future products, I continue to create educational blogs and videos every month to help people understand what's happening in their bodies when they have a kidney stone and how they can manage this themselves.
The blogs and videos I create have opened doors to a community of wonderful individuals who have opened my eyes to all the pitfalls of the heath-care system and the almost criminal lack of information that is provided to patients in need.
Seeing that there is a need for better information,
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