27 February 2006

Public service announcement

I never thought I would get arthritis. I thought arthritis was for old, cranky people whose dispositions had somehow settled into their joints.

Little did I know that it was the arthritis making them cranky, not the other way around.

A few months ago I started to get all these weird stiffnesses. My right ring finger would no longer move smoothly - it would not move at all, then suddenly pop into place. My right shoulder got so painful that I could not lift my arm over my head without screaming like a girly-girl.

Our newspaper carries a medical advice column, Dr. Gott. The cool thing about Dr. Gott is that he will toss out folk remedies and let his audience do a kind of populist testing.

One of his folk remedies that his readers swear by is grape juice and Certo pectin for arthritis (another is sleeping with a bar of soap under your sheets at the foot of your bed for leg cramps). The recipe is 3 or 4 ounces of grape juice to 1 tablespoon Certo liquid pectin, taken once in the morning and once at night.

Sounds weird, but it worked for me. My painful, stuck joints are completely normal, even though I have tapered off the Certo and juice to about 4 or 5 times a week. Better than Vioxx any day.

4 comments:

spotted elephant said...

Wow. I'm glad to hear that the grape juice worked so well. Besides, it's really tasty, and how often does that happen with medicine?

I feel guilty that my grandma never got sympathy for the arthritis in her index finger. OTOH, she was 90 years old and that was all that was wrong with her, so no wonder.

Tiffany said...

My friend was diagnosed with arthritis last year and she is 25. She, too, was having problems with her joints in her hands and arms. I'll have to let her know about the grape juice!!

SUEB0B said...

Well, when you put the pectin in it, it is kind of slippery and a little sour, but it goes down quick.

Tiffany, I hope it works for your friend. It just amazed me.

Unknown said...

I have been a carpenter for 40 years and arthritis had taken over my body (and my gut grew because of inactivity).I have been taking one teaspoon of Sure Jell No Cook Pectin for about one year now and I am completely cured of my knee pain. Before I started, I had to sit just about all the time and even then it hurt to start walking. I call it a miracle!

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