I haven't been ill in years. Discounting being hungover, I literally haven't had so much as a cold in longer than I can remember. It might even go back to when I used to smoke, which was over 5 years ago. And it's not like I wrap myself up in cotton wool either.
I put this down to a few things. I exercise a lot. I eat well. I don't smoke. If I have a night of drinking I'll kill myself in the gym for the next
couple of days to get it all out my system. I put my body through a lot as well. Everyday at the gym I'll have a rotation of saunas and cold showers,
which must surely train my body for dealing with being out of a comfort zone. And as strange as this will sound, I don't feel comfortable being
comfortable. I live by the premise that if you pamper your body too much, it will not be able to defend itself. So throughout the Winter I'll
frequently go out without warm weather clothing, and I'll go the whole Winter round without the heating on and sleeping with the windows open. This
included the 06/07 winter that I spent in Nova Scotia. I don't push myself to stupid degrees, but your body is a lot more capable at dealing with
adversity than people realise. It's just getting comfortable being out of your comfort zone. You get your body used to dealing with harsh scenarios,
and your bodies defences will toughen up. That's my theory anyway. I have absolutely zero evidence to back this up, but for years whenever there has
been a cold of flu going around, I can happily live in houses with infected people, using their crockers, breathing their air, and I never catch a
thing. I may be lucky, but I put it down to the way I live.
One other thing I do, is avoid medicines at virtually all costs. If you are taking pills for every headache, lemsip's for every cold and lozenges every time you sneeze, then what is there left for your bodies immune system to do? Nothing. And if it has nothing left to do, it will be like the fat man who sits in front of the TV all day, waited on hand and foot. It will have no real use so become a recluse. Even for things like dry skin, using moisturiser relieves your body of having to help itself. And this is my stance on medicines.
For a serous illness, then they are justifiable. I class serious as an illness that your body could not fight on its own. For that situation you have
no choice. But for anything less, surely you're just weakening your bodies defences for the next time they're attacked. It's like when people feed
wild animals. If you hand feed a tiger one day, they won't go hungry that day, and will go on with their life the next. But if you do so for two
days, or for a week, or for a month, or for a year; everytime that you domesticate them a by hand-feeding them, is a little step toward losing their
wild animal instincts. Hand feed them for long enough, and eventually they will not be able to fend for themselves. I view the bodies immune system
like this. Pamper it with medicines every time it is about to be called into duty, and eventually it will lose the ability to operate. Treat it
harshly, giving it tough conditions, where it has to fight to survive however, and the animal becomes stronger and fiercer everyday to the point
that very little can overcome it.
This is why I would have to be laying on my death bed before I would accept any medical help. I don't remember exactly, but the last time I recall
receiving any medical attention was when I was in junior school and I got stung in the eye by a wasp. My whole face exploded, and I had to have a
device of some kind inserted into my veins so that I could have adrenaline quickly interted into me if my throat started to close up. From here I've
had nothing. I used to be very susceptable to colds and flus back when I smoked. And back then I would take lemsip's and cough sweets etc. But back
then I didn't live the way I do now. I think torturing my body with smoke for 3 years ultimately made my body stronger as I got out the other side,
even if the journey wasn't too fun.
Since I had that change of lifestyle at about 17, where the fat, smoking teenager turned into the sporty,
gym-happy, healthy-eating "man" I guess, then I've never seeked any type of medical help. Not even a cough sweet for a sore throat. And that,
ultimately, is why I believe that I have one of the best immune systems around. I may just be lucky. Some people are. But judging by the rarity
that I will even get a cold, it's hard to dispute my claims, even if I cannot back it up with any scientific evidence. I often have disputes with
science. And this is one of those occasions where I feel that common sense combats any of the crap that medical science can come up with. Keep on
fighting your aids's and your cancer's. But what is the point of using drugs to combat illness's that won't even kill you anyway? It's the pussy's
way out.
To move away from the topic here a little; I do have some questions about the ultimate aims of those who choose to fight illnesses like aids and
cancer. What is the ultimate goal here? Are humans ultimately hoping to be able to live forever? Cure one disease and nature will create another.
We're never going to achieve immortality, so why spend so much time and money developing such treatments, that nature will soon bring us back to
square one. No one knows where these diseases originally came from. But human life is developing at such a rate that everyday, people are exposed to
things that evolution has not prepared them for. Looking at things from a macro perspective, what does curing such diseases actually achieve? We
achieve a few more human years yes. But it is only time before the next uncurable disease comes along. Cancer 2 or something. And to really look at
things from a heartless, macro perspective, the more people that die off, the less carbon emissions in the world.
Look at it this way. If we do cure
cancer and aids etc., then the increased number of people on the planet will lead to increased carbon emissions, which will lead to an increase in
natural disasters, which will lead to an increase in human deaths. On the other side of the coin, if half the planet suddenly died off, then the
affect would be reversed. This is just natures way of fucking with us. So indirectly curing diseases, could just kill off people else where. An
extreme example of the pleasure-pain theory I guess.
I know this makes me sound heartless. But I just try and look at things from a realists perspective, letting all emotions and political correctness become neutral. I have never had to experience a serious illness from a micro point of view. Maybe the day I do, I will view things differently. Even if it will not affect the validity of what I have said here. Sod's law I'll probably die of aids myself in a couple of years. Shit happens though I guess. We're all playing a game of death roulette. No one knows when they're going to go. All we know, is that we are all going to go. May as well just sit back and enjoy it.
Page written on: 23 May 2008
