By Steve Matson, UK
Being a guy and having been sent a letter from my doctor years ago, enquiring if I was still alive because they had not seen me for 15 years, speaks volumes with regard to my previous aversion to medical care. My journey of becoming a vampire and becoming allergic to the sun progressed for two years before I made an appointment to ask a doctor what was happening.
I enrolled in a year-long course when I was in my early 50s to learn Kinesiology, a healing modality. Midway through the course I started developing small painful blisters on the back of both of my hands. They were not too dissimilar to a Fire Ant bite or a welding splatter of small molten metal, when it hits unprotected skin. But, they took a long time to heal and were a bit unsightly. I dropped out of the course, for I felt it was based too much in the head and not enough in the body, and my hands were now not that appealing to look at or touch anyone.
‘Fragility of skin’ is an interesting expression, unless it refers to your own skin when exposed to sunlight and then it’s not so interesting. It means, that any skin exposed to the sun breaks down and becomes a scab. If bumped or scratched, the top layer of skin would peel off and cause exudate, which is essentially blood from which the blood cells have been filtered out, leaving a clear fluid to fill the area. You look like a zombie movie extra!
When my skin condition could no longer be ignored and I was having to wear white cotton gloves (like Michael Jackson but without the talent) to bed to protect the sheets and pillow cases, I went to the Doctor and was prescribed some topical cream which was identical in ingredients to what I had sourced myself, and which had no effect.
I waited till the locum doctor was next scheduled and made an appointment with him for a second opinion. He was not sure what I had but knew someone who would. A month later, I received a letter for an appointment to see a top Dermatologist in 4 months’ time.
Time passes and I attend the appointment. I am told I would need blood tests to confirm her diagnosis of PCT (porphyria cutanea tarda). I was asked if I drank alcohol, to which I replied yes. The doctor told me that PCT could be caused by drinking alcohol so I was told to stop drinking for six months, wear long sleeved shirts and put lots of SPF 50 sun cream on anything exposed to the sun and then come back in six months’ time.
The layman’s definition for PCT is that there is an enzyme in the liver that controls the amount of iron in our blood, and that enzyme was not working in my liver. A normal amount of iron in our body is generally defined as 13.5 to 17.5 grams (g) of haemoglobin per decilitre, and my count was almost 2000g. Strange fun fact, under UV light if you have PCT your urine is red.
There is a short list of causes for PCT:
- Alcohol
- Genetics
- Side effect of HRT treatment in women
- Petroleum Hydrocarbon by-products (solvent poisoning)
The six months passed and from the onset of this problem it had now been two years since the first lesion appeared. I was developing small scars on the backs of my hands and arms, around my hair line, neck and face; any area in fact that was exposed to the sun. By this point being in the sun was physically painful and I looked like a Biblical leper.
During this period we had gone camping in the Lake District and did a lot of hill walking/climbing, or do they call them mountains with rockpaths? Even though I did my best to protect myself from the sun, my arms and hands became swollen from oedema. My body was not a happy camper!
The next appointment came around to see the doctor. I was asked if I had abstained from drinking and I replied yes, for the entire period. She then asked if I had noticed any difference. I replied: Yes, I had saved a shed full of money for not drinking but the skin thing was still the same.
I was given a prescription of Quinine in a very small amount of half a 5mg pill once a week and told to come back in two months. No change occurred with this treatment either.
I was then sent to a Professor of Haematology that does research on PCT in regards to genetic links and was always looking for test candidates. The tests came back negative for what he was looking for and two more months had passed and still no treatment.
By now it had been two and half years, the tops of both hands now had very little elasticity due to the scarring and I was getting desperate for anything that would offer me relief. I jokingly said to the doctor, because the problem is too much iron in the blood, can’t you just do some old time bloodletting? It turns out that was the last option but has a modern name. Therapeutic phlebotomy refers to the drawing of a unit of blood in specific cases like haemochromatosis, polycythaemia vera, porphyria cutanea tarda, etc., to reduce the number of red blood cells.
The treatment resulted in me having a pint of blood drawn every other week and the weeks in between having blood tests to monitor the iron levels and this went on for three months. I drank a lot of sports drinks, high in glucose to keep my blood sugar up during this period. The head doctor had told me the exercise was to get me as close to being anaemic as possible.
My last blood extraction was not going to happen because my doctor was not there and the locum said I was near the lower safe level. I was adamant that after almost 3 years I wanted it finished, so the locum had to get a senior doctor to confirm I had no history of heart problems and inform me of the risks of becoming anaemic. They took the blood. Like a car when the tank is in the red and the light is flashing, my body let me know what it is like to try and run the body on low iron. It took almost four months to get my iron levels back to normal. I have been a regular blood donor for years and have now been donating platelets for the past few years … just in case. I can now empathise with people who have suffered anaemia, it really kicks your behind and zaps your energy to do everything!
After eliminating all the other causes for this dis-ease it came down to this; it was caused by disregard to myself. I had spent most of this life fully engaged in trashing my body with excess in everything. I had accidentally poisoned myself with a chemical solvent, trying to clean expanding foam off my hands. This was a one-off exposure, but I still remember how fast the solvent evaporated from my skin, so that it required repeated applications to clean my hands. But, it was not evaporating as much as it was being absorbed by the skin, Doh! The can clearly stated on the warning label that gloves should be worn, not to have contact with bare skin and to only use the solvent in well ventilated areas.
My life before Universal Medicine was one that was lived not so much in the fast lane but the laid-back autopilot on cruise control lifestyle. I had tried many times to compete in the Darwin Awards that is given for thinning out the gene pool but could only manage to come in second place.
I have been told by people that know me, that I should write a book on my exploits titled ‘And I’m still alive’! I have first-hand experience of what small and big things can do to your body and the dire consequences. The scars on my body are a map of this journey.
I have spent the last 15 years with the support of Universal Medicine modalities and treatments unravelling the disregard I have lived and now have regular check-ups with the doctor to support my physical health.
I have found out first hand, what happens when we disregard what our body is constantly telling us, even about the small things we do, and the dire consequences and manifestations that can unfold. Now, I am no longer a vampire, but embrace the warmth of the sun, as I embrace the warmth I have reconnected to in me.
Read more:
Medicine and Serge Benhayon 
Amazing sharing Steve. That we can ignore our bodies in the face of what they communicate to us until such a point that it becomes so serious, says a lot about how we all hold onto what we have been a part of until something brings us to the point where the balance tips and we come to ask deeper questions of what is really going on.
Your life experience is a reminder that if you could get out of these difficult situations, everyone can. In any case, your honesty and will to know the truth of what was behind your condition, were fundamental for it.
Though your experiences of neglect and disregard sound extreme, they sum up the ‘normal’ human condition of living like a floating head that has no body. We often only stop and look down at our body when we are forced to by an illness or ailment, like in your case. Your writing also made me consider the relationship that we can have with medicine, where we want to be miraculously fixed and don’t have to make changes to how we are living.
I love your gentle sense of humour and playfulness Steve as you describe what must have been a painful process to go through, one which also took a long time to heal. When we are disconnected from our bodies we have a tendency to live in disregard as we are disconnected to what our bodies are constantly communicating to us. When we reconnect back there is no way we can disregard our bodies because we feel the preciousness of who we truly are.
It’s amazing how many things we try and books we read when if we just truly sat down and let the body present it would share everything we ever need to know.
Our particles are the particles of God. They don’t require us to treat them in a particular way, they don’t demand respect or insist that we treat them with care but when we don’t, then they can’t help but reflect the fact that they’ve been neglected.
How is it that we can continue to disregard our body when it speaks so loudly – I feel you have been willing to go there Steve and listen and discontinue the disregard. Until humanity lets go of its arrogance we will continue to be perplexed by such conundrums.
Lovin the humorous angle on your own life here Steve. It is such a common thing amongst men to not take care of their bodies and to be reluctant to get help or support with their health. I think this stems from many societal messages we get fed from young that it is not manly to look after your body and take care of yourself. So great that you now see taking care of your health and your body as a priority.
Andrew I also think that the reluctance to seek medical support comes from a fear of what potentially might be wrong. It’s easy to assume that most people would want to know what was wrong with them so that they can deal with it but that may not be true. A significant amount of people would rather not know.
Great what is presented here and it leaves me wondering how much money could be saved and quality of lives improved if medicine started by looking at the lifestyle choices we make that so obviously have an impact on our body. Medicine does an incredible job in all it offers however if we want a true answer and healing to occur it has to simply come down to how we love and care for ourselves and each other.
“After eliminating all the other causes for this dis-ease it came down to this; it was caused by disregard to myself.”
Disregard, basically treating ourselves shabbily is our accepted way of living. Not only that but we teach it to our kids through our parenting and our education system. Everywhere you look in society we’re able to see gross lack of self care. We model it in our homes, we trudge it through our workplaces and we herald it in our recreational lives as well. Hence we’re a world of very sick people, set to get even sicker.
I agree with you Alexis and for a species that prides its self on its intelligence we are not very intelligent at all.
The belief that we are intelligent comes from a consciousness that wants nothing more than for ‘us’ to think that there is an ‘us’ and for that ‘us’ to think that we’re an intelligent species. That consciousness doesn’t want us to know that in truth there is no ‘us’ there is only the collective intelligence of God.
The humour and lightness in your writing is a joy to read, Steve, yet you are sharing a deep and meaningful message around self-care and regard. The last line touched me deeply, not only the warmth of the sun (God) to nourish you but also the warmth of re-connecting to yourself. Beautiful.
Love this last sentence “I embrace the warmth I have reconnected to in me”. With this kind of reconnection comes all our healing. I personally would love to hear more about your way back to yourself and HOW you get rid of disregard more and more. As I see disregard as a modern plague that is absolutely underestimated in its harm.
Thank you Steve.
Steve I can relate to the warmth that you have connected to inside, to me it feels like an aliveness, it has a vibrancy and yes a warmth and is a world away from the cold almost reptilian feeling that so many of us live with that comes from living in a disconnected way. A way that is characterised by function, the functioning ability of the individual rather than the quality and interconnectedness of the being.
This is beautiful to read, Steve. I love the way you tell your story, to the detail, straightforward and with a twinkle in the eye. Even in situations where we are deep in them we can be the observer and keep a clear head and eye for what is going on.
A revealing article on the benefits of self-care.
Self-care is a rabbit warren into love. The deeper we go into self care the closer we get to love until eh voila we pop our heads up into the clearing of love but even then the self care continues, it never stops because it becomes a non negotiable foundation in life. A rock solid support that is there for us regardless of our environment or who we’re with.
I like how you write, not taking yourself too seriously – and I agree, such a book would be worth reading. Great to hear that you’ve turned your life around. What a waste it would otherwise have been.
Thanks for sharing this Steve. From what I have personally experienced and observed in others: disregard is a hidden plague which seems to underlie many illnesses that can be considered almost untreatable. Bring on the awareness of what living true care and regard for ourselves is like on a day to day basis. And there is the possibility that taking this approach alleviates pressure on the health systems.
If we consciously knew the truth of who we all are then it would be impossible for us to treat ourselves the way that we do. We are the absolute preciousness of God, the spectacular body of God on earth but we’ve fallen for the illusion of human life with all of it’s trappings and so as long as we see ourselves as one dimensional beings then we’ll be able to keep treating ourselves as badly as we do.
This to me is where Serge Benhayon and Universal Medicine plays such a huge part in questioning human life as it is currently lived, and as you have said Alexis ‘all of the trappings’, and we have manufactured many of these. Now we have a choice to live in the illusion or climb our way out of them.
Thanks Steve, I enjoyed your style of writing and what you had to share – what a journey and a long term discomfort from a situation using the solvent on your skin. It’s a great reminder for us all to take more precious care of ourselves and let go of any disregard. Like yourself I have been in many seemingly small situations where I haven’t placed my well-being first, and the long term ramifications are there in my state of ill health today.
Your journey that you share, Steve, expresses clearly that the body is the marker of truth.
How true jstewart51 our bodies do not let us get away with anything at all, and how marvelous that is to have a body speaking so loudly to us throughout out lives, not letting us get away with our disregard.
Our bodies are either portals for a consciousness that is true or portals for a consciousness that is not true and those two radically different consciousnesses impulse our every thought, word and movement. When we’re being moved by a consciousness that’s not true then this goes against the natural grain of Life and basically sets up disharmony in the body. It’s a bit like continually driving a car in the wrong gears, initially the car won’t show any signs of damage but after a while the entire car will be affected by the fact that it’s been driven in a way that is disharmonious and one part or several parts will need fixing or replacing and potentially the car will get to the point where it simply can’t be started again and has to be sold for scrap.
A very lucid account Steve Matson of how our bodies cannot hide the quality of our self regard or lack of it. Skin is one of the hardest organs to heal when it is diseased. There is no better medicine than the warmth within us, which when connected to on a regular basis brings a resounding glow of health to our every particle.