The Open Road ... Summer 2006

Editor’s Notebook ...James Schmidt

My Journey with Arthritis

In the summer 2002 issue of The Open Road, I wrote about my journey and challenge with arthritis. Since that time I have been asked by members to give an update on my progress and I am happy to report that I have been doing great.

I had both rheumatoid and osteo—the former being the more serious for me. I had been diagnosed with arthritis in the mid-70’s—and had a catastrophic relapse in 1991. The cause of this turn of events was damage caused from the arthritic drugs that I had been taking. When admitted to hospital, all drugs were stopped and the true damage of the arthritic condition that had been masked for many years reared its ugly head. I left the hospital on crutches, weak and nursing a heart condition. During the next six months, when I was recuperating at home and determined not to stay on drugs, I began looking for an alternative to the dangerous drugs and was led to the Cayce material. I could write a whole other story about synchronicity and mystical discoveries, but to make a long story short, I can simply say the Universe led me to the Cayce material.

In 1978 I was fortunate to attend a “residential program” sponsored by the A.R.E. in Virginia Beach. During that program we were shown and experienced the various treatment modalities outlined in a recently developed “A.R.E. Protocol” taken from the readings. Interestingly, one of the highlights was a talk given by a lady who had cured herself of arthritis some 35 years earlier by following a somewhat similar treatment regime. She indicated that it was nine months before she saw any change in her condition—a fact which absolutely reinforced the Cayce readings’ adage, “patience, persistence and consistency.”

The treatment protocol included the Cayce “alkaline diet,” regular massage with peanut oil, spinal manipulation, taking of Atomidine for five days followed by an epsom salts bath and then a massage with peanut oil and finally castor oil packs followed by colon hydrotherapy. The therapies are applied on a cyclical basis. Key to the process is attuning body, mind and spirit and believing that a healing is occurring.

I followed this protocol rigorously for two years, discontinuing, after ten months, the arthritis drug that I had reluctantly been taking for pain relief. Since that time I have continued with elements of the protocol. Today I am essentially pain free and have been for several years, with only a continuing minor challenge with my right thumb. I have no physical constraints. Another interesting result was that I also used to have daily headaches which disappeared almost immediately, and the psoriasis on my arms, that disappeared within two months on the program. Over the past four years I have given presentations to various groups and at the Fellowship conferences about my experience. Giving words of encouragement to others with similar conditions, I sow the seeds, and let the Universe do the follow up.