Expert: Dr. J. Shawn Leatherman - 8/20/2007

Question
Hi,
I was a healthy 36 year old woman until about 6 weeks ago when I suffered some sort of attack out of the blue. I lost consciousness and was paralyzed for a few minutes. The CT, MR and MRI scans and blood work came back negative and doctors in South Africa are baffled. The only lasting effects of this incident that I have to deal with are bouts of numbness in my limbs (especially when I'm sleeping - but not to the point of paralysis) and terrible migraine-like headaches. I'm concerned because I'm afraid the paralysis might return or it might be a warning sign of something more serious like a stroke. I also now have trouble concentrating and reading. I used to be an editor and a highly functioning individual. Please help.

Answer
Dear Henriette,

What you have described sounds exactly like a stroke to me, or a mini-stroke (transient ischemic attack TIA).  I hope that the CT and MRI that they took was of the brain, and even if they did not find focal stroke damage, that doesn't mean that you did not have one.

I would suggest that you be very careful with this and immediately start to increase all of your antioxidant intake...the best way to do this is by juicing fruits and vegetables twice daily and drinking the mixture.  It will provide you with an amazing amount of brain protection and vascular protection as well.  You may also want to include nutritional supplementation with omega three fatty acids as they have been shown to reduce system wide inflammation, and increase the functioning of brain tissue.

These suggestions will not only reduce your risk of future stroke like episodes, but will help to limit the damage that occurs with strokes.  You see the actual stroke does not cause as much damage as the re-perfusion (re-establishment of blood and oxygen) back to the injured brain tissue.

Now, it is possible that you didn't have a stroke and the problem lies elsewhere like in the upper cervical spine (upper neck).  Biomechanical issues and dysfunction of the neck can create numbness and paralysis along with other weird symptoms, but a loss of consciousness is not often associated with this. other possibilities are medication side effects, and food additive allergies or toxic build-up.  Aspartame and monosodium glutamate are frequent food additives that are neuro-toxic and cause brain tissue destruction.  There are thousands of reported cases, from all over the world, of symptoms like yours that have stemmed from the ingestion of these substances, and they are found in very common foods and drinks. Take a good look at your drink and food labels to see if this could be the case and eliminate it from your diet.

Other wise, you may need to get a second or third opinion on this.  Do not just let the doctors tell you that they have no idea!!  These types of symptoms need to followed up on.  Please feel free to write back to me with progress, other questions, or information.

Respectfully,
Dr. J. Shawn Leatherman
www.suncoasthealthcare.net