Some of Terrie's Story...
It was 1996, and I had been working for 10yrs in the health industry as an Exercise Scientist in Corporate Health. This year I was also in the height of my training for the Atlanta Paralympics.
I had been riding – and loved riding - a bike since I was able to walk so racing a tandem bike on the track and road came relatively easy to me.
It was at this time that I noticed some odd occurrences that I discounted as serious, yet was keeping an eye on as I wasn’t offered any medical diagnosis to account for them apart from them being ‘atypical’.
For starters, my left leg started to ‘jump’ and ‘miss a beat’ during our bike training sessions. One of the techniques a cyclist practices is a smooth pedalling action and I found for the first time that in the middle of a pedal stroke my left leg would ‘jerk’ all of a sudden and put me out of the pedalling action. Not all the time but I noticed it happening.
Secondly, we were training in the climate chambers to acclimatise for our racing in Atlanta and I noticed that during and after this particular training I was feeling very unwell, and from my observation, I was disproportionately unwell compared to how other people were handling the sessions.
I was also instructing exercise to music classes and noticed that in stretching I could no longer get a full stretch down my left leg. My physiotherapist was helpful yet cautionary that this was a sign of some tissue (nerve inflammation) problem, and that I had better pull back from training.
I tried mediating training, stretching, changing my exercise routine, made sure I was hydrating well, got more rest and sleep - with no positive improvement. Another anomaly I had noticed was, that although I tried with all the knowledge I had and could draw on at the time, my body fat % was just not going down. For cycling I wanted to drop this extra amount of fat - that had decided to remain regardless of what I did - so that I was lighter on the bike as well as more supple.
At this time I was also on hay fever medication, hormonal therapy, anti-inflammatories and painkillers for different symptoms. Parallel to these physical symptoms I noticed that my fatigue was more often and longer than previous and the colour of my face was pale more than usual. My concentration and patience at work was lessening and I spent more time in bed resting than I did socialising. In 1997 I took a few months off after the 1996 Games. Once back on the road and track preparing for the 2000 Games -
Giving ourselves our best
Terrie (Rt) in the 90's at height of exercise career & international gold medal achievements, tandem cycling.
When did you give up on seeing
yourself as being able to have a
robust body ?
When did society change it's view
on what a robust body feels and
looks like ?
How much has your understanding
of human biology & lifestyle
exposures dictated your body's condition ?
How empowered are you to make
your own decisions for your body ?
?
?
?
?
..."muscles starting to tear at the smallest actions like stepping up onto a stool;
my fatigue levels increased; my tolerance
to heat and cold was less; my energy for
a basic living day was noticeably
reduced." Terrie Sanders.
Without knowing which nutrients I needed and other factors that had led to the tissue degeneration - it just continued to worsen.
"My physical return to health was
gained through a deeper understanding of the affect that chronic toxin exposures have on our human biology and how to read this in our functional pathology using the Queen Profile & the Seven Subclinical Signs for optimal health." Terrie Sanders.
an accident during a road training session left me with some broken bones to heal. This required strong pain killers and surgery. Although not a pleasant situation, I thought my state of fitness would bring me back from this quickly and strongly. This was not to be. I found that my health deteriorated dramatically including muscles starting to tear at the smallest actions - like stepping up onto a stool; my fatigue levels increased; my tolerance to heat and cold was less; my energy for a basic living day was noticeably reduced.
Looking back these were signs that I had moved my biochemistry out of balance and had initiated the seven sub-clinical signs in a way unique to myself and as a result - without knowing which nutrients I needed and other factors that had lead to the tissue degeneration - it just continued to worsen.
I did notice that some nutritional supplements seemed to help, but I never found an answer that turned my situation around nor did I feel comfortable with what seemed a random guess at the food and supplements that I might benefit from.
I had always had the belief that supplementation was unnecessary if I ate a diet in line with the National Heart Foundation Guidelines.
This is some of the background that led me to venture to enquire further than my current training and knowledge and started me on this path of enquiry with regards tissue degeneration and bioenergetics of exercise and nutrition. It turns out that it was lucky I was exercising for some of this time, and at other times it was to my detriment. I was also lucky that I had followed my own commonsense through some difficult times which served me well.
My physical return to health results were gained through a deeper understanding of the perspective and actions advised via the Human Health Model using the Queen Profile Test & Seven Subclinical Signs. I then followed up my growing professional interest in this approach and involved myself in training and study to now make this available to my clients.