Category: Recovery from Serious Illness: Lyme, CIRS, & More

The Lie that Never Sleeps

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Not much over the course of a chronic illness wreaks havoc on your ability to cope, like discouragement. For me this came on Christmas day of which I spent half of sleeping or passed out. Was it from too much spiked eggnog? I think not. Succumbing to unconsciousness is involuntary in the “post-ictal” period of a convulsive episode. Yes, still dealing with that Gentle Reader along with the familiar foe of discouragement. At least the latter dynamic doesn’t stick around very long anymore.

February will mark a full year since the discovery my lead toxicity per bone lead testing. Most sojourners of chronic illness venture at some point into testing for heavy metal toxicity. I did so in 2013 via blood, hair, and urine testing from a few different companies and ordered by a few different Doctors. Chelation and detoxification protocols subsequently yielded impressive reductions of both kinds of mercury without a significant correlation of improvement in clinical symptoms. I returned to the detox protocols periodically over the past 10 years; having clean binders to use when exposed to a new toxin in my environment has been a very helpful tool to have and process to know. I am grateful for the knowledge and experience.

Flash forward to earlier this year when the Lord showed me that I had been exposed to lead in my childhood and that this might be something to address specifically. I would come to understand that blood testing for lead shows acute or recent exposures, not ones from years ago. Only bone lead testing will show latent exposure and the body’s way to deal with it is by storing Pb in one’s bones. So where or how does one get this tested? My research yielded two places to contact in the United States, one at an integrative medicine clinic at John Hopkins Hospital in New York and another possibly by researchers at Purdue University in Indiana. The latter had tested children poisoned a few years ago in Flint, Michigan and West Chicago but would they test me? I contacted an Assistant Professor from the bio of his published research which led to an email, a phone call, and a long car ride to his laboratory in West Lafayette, Indiana. Dr. Aaron Specht had one of the few handheld XRF Fluorescence devices in the country and offered me pro bono testing. What a fascinating experience!

My bone lead was high. Bone lead can be elevated for many adults of Baby Boomer age and older from marked exposures in the environment of our childhoods: leaded gasoline and paint. Lead was removed from both by the 1970s but not before wreaking their havoc on the generations poisoned by them. An Aunt recently told me that we were likely also affected by pollution from steel and manufacturing plants in what is called the downriver area of Detroit, not many miles from where we all grew up. But the kicker for me was the home of my childhood. Every day from birth until I went away to college was spent breathing secondhand smoke. Cigarette smoke contains many toxins, not the least of which are lead, cadmium, arsenic, and mercury. (Further mercury toxicity for me came from a mouthful of amalgams and weekly consumption of tuna fish!) Then there were about three years when my Dad and his teenage employees used lead solder in our basement for his business rewinding slot car motors. I remember watching the smoldering lead up close, playing with the rolls of lead, chasing mixed metal shavings with magnets, and thinking nothing of it at the time. No one did.

My Dad was diagnosed with a psychotic disorder, likely Schizophrenia, Paranoid Type, during those years in the late 1960s. He would later contract Parkinson’s Disease. We don’t have a family history of either of those; both can be correlated with heavy metal toxicity in the research literature. My Dad’s longest employee, a teenager named Billy, also developed a psychotic disorder but it was shrugged off at the time as related to his drug abuse. Probably so. He later committed suicide. Flash forward a few decades and I am the only surviving member of my immediate family who all lived for years in that house, all deceased due to various medical conditions. I still wouldn’t make a correlation for me between heavy metal exposures and serious health issues, even with an objective finding of high bone lead, until the Lord showed me a timing clue: the Convulsion Disorder started around the time of menopause and a diagnosis of both osteopenia and osteoporosis. I was losing bone with the drop in estrogen associated with menopause; lead displaces calcium and is stored in the bones often for decades as the body’s own protective mechanism. Studies have shown elevated bone and blood lead for women with certain difficulties during all stages of menopause and this can include onset of seizures.

Shortly thereafter I began a course of chelation with various types and forms of EDTA. Turns out that after some concerning side effects that I would need to switch to calcium disodium EDTA which Dr. Charles Beck had compounded for me. After 6 months and consultations with several different Doctors, I was still struggling. “It can take a year” they told me, for the natural process of bone re-modeling and chelation to make any difference. Then I remembered a compound I had discovered in 2013 that had unique properties to bind heavy metals, most notably mercury then lead, but was no longer readily available. OSR#1 had been removed from the market by the FDA despite phenomenal success forming strong bonds with heavy metals and chelating it without side effects. I did more research. One blogger said she had a legitimate source for the original compound, not the imitation supplement sold in Europe, that was now made by a new company who sold it as a water purification product. Downside: it’s extraordinarily expensive! The new owner of the company producing what is now called by it’s chemical name, NBMI, was a retired Dentist and former president of the major professional organization that trains dental professionals in biologic dentistry (aka mercury-free dentistry). I’ve been using NBMI for 4 months now and have had remarkable breaththroughs in my worst symptom: daily convulsive episodes after eating a full meal. Holy cow, a real and welcome change at last!

So Lord willing in February, my beloved Stevers and I will head back to see Dr. Specht to re-test my bone lead level. Will there be change? Will there be an explanation for why I have had a series of severe side effects during the chelation process with EDTA then NBMI? (Examples: four types of mouth sores at once at the same time as two skin conditions, one of which was shingles. Yeah, December has been pretty rough.) Was there still mercury lingering in my tissues despite testing suggesting levels were low and now NBMI is binding and chelating all of it? Can the body hold lead in other tissues over the years besides bone? What is the association between convulsive episodes and eating a full meal for crying out loud? Could lead toxicity and possibly lingering heavy metal toxicity in general explain my rap sheet of literally 200+ diagnoses over the past 13 years of serious illness? In truth, I may never know the answers to any of these questions. The setbacks are incredibly discouraging, disheartening, devastating. The road to recovery or some semblence of it just seems to get longer with more potholes. The “ROUGH ROAD AHEAD” sign seems more like my experience than anything else. But as long as it’s not the “ROAD IS OUT AHEAD,” there is hope, right?

Forgive me Gentle Reader, for this long blog and update of sorts. If you’re still reading this, thank you and I want you to know that I haven’t given up yet and neither should you! Please don’t give up on either of us getting answers when it seems like one more thing is going wrong. Neither of us is at the end of our road yet, right? The road very likely can be repaired or go a new way instead that ain’t all bad. As long as we can do a little that is good each day then a little is what we shall do. We’ll do more when we can as unto the Lord. As long as there is a little hope for a better tomorrow then going forward with a positive expectation for same is what we shall do. The God we celebrate on Christmas day is the symbol, author, and Master of the good that is to come for those of us who believe that Jesus came to save you and me. We shall overcome the discouragements of this day, this life as promised in His Word. Get with Jesus and let the leading of the Holy Spirit see you through it all. He loves you so Gentle Reader. Always. JJ

suicide, discouragement, Christian, Jesus, God, Chronic illness, lead, toxicity, heavy metal, mercury, testing, bone lead, Lord, faith, hope, Romans 5

Transitional Spaces

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Transitional Spaces

From July 7, 2024

Hallways and parking lots have been peculiar places for me until more recently.  These are common throughways between two places, often after sitting awhile or engaging in some kind of activity before travelling through them.  Whether on foot or by some kind of vehicle, our time in hallways and parking lots is usually fairly short.  Get in, get out, go through, get on to the next thing.  They are pretty mundane really, but it wasn’t always this way for me.

I came to understand that my difficulty with these two spaces was more symbolic of something else than a phobia per se:  bad things happened to me that made it difficult to move on through various stages of my life.  I have come to understand that trauma keeps a person stuck emotionally for a time even though the days come and go, one still has to get to work or school or some necessary appointment, eat, sleep, and repeat.  The feelings we experience sometimes don’t match up with the task at hand, minutes on a clock or demands of life pushing us forward.  (This gets even more difficult when interacting with the people in our lives!)  My emotional stuck-ness manifested itself in weird inner experiences that affected my ability to walk down a hallway in the darkness of night or to quickly get into my car and drive to the next stop on my To Do List or calendar.  Each played out differently, however.

There was a sense of spiritual darkness lurking in the hallway of any home I lived in as an adult.  A simple task of getting up to go to the bathroom in the middle of the night was a big ordeal; I needed to turn on a light, never entering into a dark room lest I become overwhelmed with fear.  A night light didn’t count; that was spooky too.  It’s as if I felt the presence of another being in the hallway, there to bring me harm.  He wasn’t an intruder.  He was a sixth sense even demonic being dressed as a male figure in my mind’s eye, there to taunt and torment me with this FEAR.  I really can’t explain it to someone who doesn’t know or hasn’t experienced the spiritual realm. I can just tell you that it’s real and it’s terrifying.  So as a Christian, I’d attempt to put on my “spiritual armour” as we read in Ephesians 6 and even quote scripture such as Romans 8:38-39.  We read in the book of Matthew that the Word of God was Jesus’s defense against the lies of Satan in the desert so that became my sword of the Spirit to deal with these fears as well.  A counselor who specialized in ritual abuse suggested that I put up my hand with a stop sign as I moved through the hallway.  In the end, these methods became rituals unto themselves until I was finally freed from all of it years later. 

My point is that the transitional space of a hallway marked my difficulty moving on from one moment to the next with confidence.  It took sheer will and determination to finish a project, exhausting me in the process.  Larger projects and processes had severe consequences if realized.  The biggest example:  fibromyalgia came with completing my Master’s degree.  In all, I over attended to details and still made mistakes or left things out.  In my professional life, supervisors and my fellow Occupational Therapists and Assistants would compliment the thoroughness of my documentation then cite my poor productivity at work getting it all done.  I’d leave work and sit in my car in a severe state of “brain drain,” that continued for hours afterwards; falling asleep at night usually entailed an involuntary review of the work day once again.  Letting things go in general to rest or relax was really, really hard for me.

So there I would sit in a given parking lot, needing to drive home or somewhere else with little mental ability to do so for long while.  At times this was an hour or more.  Higher level thinking skills were there but challenging to draw upon, requiring an inordinate amount of energy to transition from one task to the next, driving from one location to another.  After my ex-husband left our marriage in 2003 it got so bad that I kept a small spiral notebook in the console of my car.  I’d write down a few lines of poetry or sentences of prose to cathart, cathect, or move past the feelings that were immobilizing me.   I made lists and kept every little detail recorded on my calendar. Eventually the Lord allowed the crafting of a new life with Steve, who I call my Intended Beloved, and the excitement of our new life together carried me through the day much better than before.  What a blessing!

Then things got bad again when I developed a severe neurological illness at the end of 2011, worsening with the onset of what would eventually be labeled as a Convulsion Disorder in 2012. Not only was I spending a lot of time in my truck between appointments, you know “checking for messages” and the like, I was dealing with the sequelae of my symptoms.  Did I pick up a perfumey scent walking through the toiletry aisle in the grocery store?  Was the building moldy and now I’m in the pre-tic phase of a convulsive episode?  Quick!  Open the windows, remove my coat, eat and drink something, or just do anything to lessen the reactivity to some offending chemical or scent if I can even think rationally to do act at all.  Many times I had to call Steve when able to do so, to rescue me.  He talked me through the situation or actually came to get me and drive me home.  What an ordeal for both of us!  Steve was usually at work, needing to figure out what to say on the phone to his wife in a crisis.  At least a couple of dozen times over these 12 years of chronic illness, he has needed to drop everything he was doing to rescue me from some situation away from our home.  Very stressful indeed.

As the Convulsion Disorder became more compartmentalized, as I came to understand and release more of the demonic trappings from abuse that occurred in my past, and as my complete dependence upon the Lord for everything including the very breath of life became my way of life, the power of the transitional spaces diminished significantly.  This took time.  Now I regularly walk through the house with no lights on as I prepare for bed.  I hardly ever even think twice about it as even the habit attached to this behavior broke down then went away.  The time I spend in my truck between destinations these days is less than ever I can remember unless I am not feeling well that day.  Further, the feeling of spaciness has shifted to the end of the day, requiring a different set of coping behaviors.  But alas it may be from me simply doing more.  Perhaps bedtime will be my next area of victory?  I hope so! 

And that will be a good thingy Gentle Reader.

A rebirth of sorts

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How do you keep the music playing in your life? The kind that gives meaning to the days, warmth to the nights, zest to ordinary moments, flow to the blood in your veins?

The answer will be as individual as us all. Your passions, my loves, their mission, his one thing, her “can’t live without” until life changes, that is. Then when we find something new or even reminiscent of what has gone before, we can get excited all over again. Life is just like that, eh?

I thought I knew what to do in relationships then realized that I have only known a part of what it was like. There’s always the other person’s perspective. Then there’s the erosion as memory fades or doubt enters in or something else altogether. Then one party moves away. It could be death. It could be a parting of ways. It could be the presence of someone new that pushes out the old or questions you, him, her. And if by chance the whole encounter or encounters or memory or memories become tainted by emotion then everything changes again. We may crumble into a pile of tears. We may strike up a rage within us, swearing to never live that way again. We may never want to love again for to do so would risk the pain of loss: too great a price to pay. Or so we say. Chances are good that we probably WILL love again. Or love something instead of a someone. To love is to be alive, really. And I submit to you that we must never ever give up.

I’m not sure why the relatively sudden passing of an Uncle is bringing up so many different thoughts and emotions. My Uncle Larry, my Mom’s brother in-law, was well loved by so many and is now gone. I was the first in my extended family of cousins to meet him as I was the oldest grandchild in both of my parent’s families. At age 5, I was the flower girl in the wedding of my Mom’s sister Shirley, to the man who would become my Uncle Larry. As the years went on I would have painful memories with him along with many good ones too. Swimming in his parent’s in-ground pool was simply the best. But most of the better memories have come in more recent years. I am older now. I can now say that I am glad I got to live all of these moments; I can see now that even the more painful ones were used by God to teach me things, toughen me, humble me, and bring me to the altar of forgiveness. Letting my Uncle Larry go means releasing everything from our relationship as family in addition to the varied emotions that pulled me around for too many years. The goodness in the mix is more important now and will be ones with which will go forward in my life. 

So I will focus on the goodness. I cannot say the same for my immediate family. My younger brother is now gone. My youngest and other brother is now gone. My Mother is now gone. My Father is now gone. Their stories with Larry are long gone with the passing of all of them. Although I have had many brushes with death myself, looks like I am living on to tell at least one of the stories here. And so I shall.

It was probably the mid 1970s. My Mom had picked up her pictures from the local drug store that developed them at a time when to do so would have been a great luxury for us. Polaroid photos along with the negatives came back in a divided envelope, printed with inserts naming all of the ways you could reprint your keepsakes for a fee. We never did. We just placed the 3″ x 5″ images in a shoe box for to put them in an album was too much work for a single Mom. Finding the old shoe boxes was like opening up a treasure chest in the bottom of our Mom’s closet, filled with memories of Christmas, birthdays, graduation parties, and more. The golden nugget for me was the collection from that Thanksgiving dinner at Grandpa and Grandma R’s house.

The house was so cloudy with cigarette smoke that family had to wash the walls once per year to remove the yellow streaks and stains that would build up on them. We never knew my Mom’s parents’ home any differently. My Mom smoked at home right at the kitchen table or when washing dishes at the sink. She placed an ashtray nearby with a third by the side of her bed. I don’t recall my Dad smoking but he would have been long gone somewhere else for decades after their divorce and before this: one of the last times we celebrated Thanksgiving at my Grandparents’ home. Glass or aluminum ashtrays graced my Grandparents’ black-and-white Formica table as well; a kind of family tradition of sorts. Sad, really. I retreated to the family room after all the dishes were done to get away from the fresh billows of smoke and noise. I don’t recall anyone else smoking, just my Grandparents and my Mom. With only so many places to go in that 3 bedroom ranch, there were still cousins and aunts and uncles everywhere. Eventually as our family grew, we would move our holiday dinners to My Uncle Larry and Aunt Shirley’s home for Thanksgiving; Christmas was always at our house.

My Uncle Larry must have either borrowed my Mom’s camera to take pictures or gave her that one photo of me some weeks later. I do recall him taking it. I didn’t want to look at him directly. Why would he be taking a picture just of me anyways with so many other kids around? I was wearing my brown corduroy blazer that I had made myself on my Mom’s Singer sewing machine. Sewing was the only way for me to get really nice clothing for special occasions. The rest usually came as hand-me-downs from Uncle Larry’s more affluent family. I guess they were just trying to help us out, my Mom being a divorced woman raising three kids on her own. No child support. At least from my Father, that is.

Friends had told me that I was pretty but I never had a boyfriend. Someone nominated me for homecoming queen and I declined to participate fully. My self-esteem had been destroyed by abusive events earlier in my childhood. Self-worth would come for me from what I could do, make, achieve, or accomplish so any recognition that I would accept would be the ones coming from those activities. This way of being actually became a type of addiction, becoming a “human doing” instead of a “human being” and yet it helped me survive the first three decades of my life. Then I found Jesus Christ and a measure of healing with a self worth that came from being a daughter of the King: my Heavenly Father and perfect source of love and acceptance, recognition and more. That is another story!

In the picture I had my hand over the right side of my face. Perhaps I was leaning on my cheek with my elbow on the arm of that recliner chair in which my Grandfather would take naps when we were little. The room was dimly lit as it was nighttime by the time we were done with dinner and dessert, dishes and too many bottles of Town Club pop. In that picture I saw for the first time in my life, a beautiful young woman. I had never seen her that way before. Evidently my Uncle Larry saw something too, worth capturing forever on film. I’m sure that I looked at the negative from which the photo was printed. Even from that strip of plastic, when held up to the light, I would be able to see myself for the first time from a perspective separate from my own inner struggles. Emotion had no say. There it was back-lit by the blue walls stained with time and their own stories. On Thanksgiving as a teenager, I was not lost but captured forever in a lovely pose amidst the mayhem of a simple family gathering. Gee, what if I had moved my hand, my Mother would ask. Knock it off Mom I would later reply silently. The composition was as it should be. And I was beautiful in it.

Thank you Uncle Larry for this memory that I will cherish forever. Almost 30 years later I found a love relationship that makes me feel like the day I saw the young woman in that photograph. You met my Steve a few times during fellowship with other family members and, I believe, have extended your approval of him, and of me both. You know that I have found my Intended Beloved at last. Steve is an engineer, a family man, car guy, and really smart, just like you were. Maybe you know that I have finally found a way to play the music intended for my life, with all of its passions that transcend the minutia of the days. He is the one, after my Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, who makes my heart sing!

Gentle Reader, my prayer for you is that you may re-capture a memory today in a beautiful way. And then run with it to your heart’s content! JJ

The Whole is Greater

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The whiskers on a dog’s snout are a curious thing. Long coarse hairs emerging from soft furry mounds or what we would call pimples if they were on our own faces, seem somehow cute. “Dog whiskers have two major functions: helping dogs understand and sense their environment and conveying emotions,” according to PetMD. These are so important in a dog’s life that removal creates tremendous stress, alters sensory perception and balance. I can relate on how something so seemingly insignificant as whiskers are to the life of an 80-pound beast can affect just about everything in his or her life should it go awry. Fortunately for Bella, all is well these days.

We rescued Bella about a year ago from the Doberman Rescue Group in Tulsa, Oklahoma. Oh we tried to find a Dobie closer to Indiana to adopt but things kept going awry literally the day before picking up some seemingly sweet pup. One adoption agency hadn’t vetted their dog’s behavior when the foster, who happened to be a Dog Trainer, wasn’t present. Zora attacked a Veterinary Technician during a visit to get her shots updated the day before we were scheduled to pick her up! Well that wasn’t going to work for us. Another Dobie Mix was uber friendly in multiple videos of her at events hosted by the adoption agency. We didn’t find out until the day before we were to pick her up that she wasn’t friendly with other DOGS though, just people. Holy cow. Our home is in a court with small dogs living in the house on one side of us and a German shepherd puppy on the other side of us. That just wouldn’t work for us or the dog either.

Isabella had lived for 8 months in an 8 x 10 foot kennel in the country of northeastern Arkansas. She had been surrendered at one year of age by her former owner then fostered by the Doberman Rescue Group. We met her foster Mom, Michelle, who explained her routine of visiting Isabella each day to let her out, feed her, and let her run around in the fields behind her family’s property. Isabella had a friend, Mr. Noble, with whom she would race around with in the tall grass on hot summer days. She knew some basic commands and was beautiful. Her single-haired coat seemed like it would minimize any allergy symptoms that we had developed when trying to adopt a long-haired German shepherd after our first GS, Elle, passed away. We’re not Doodle people and hypoallergenic dog breeds just didn’t appeal to Steve and me. We had researched numerous breeds, watched training videos, scoured more adoption websites, talked with Michelle at length several times, filled out our application, paid the fee, and made arrangements for Steve to travel to pick up Isabella. He would stay overnight at his cousin’s home in Little Rock then schedule a meet-up at the home of a paddling friend; Michelle was willing to drive 90 minutes to deliver Isabella. Everything went smoothly as planned.

Isabella was very sweet on Steve’s drive home to Indiana. Our young pup placed her head on Steve’s shoulder as he drove for most of the day with a few stops along the way. She had an accident that first night as she wandered, quite disoriented, through the limited area of our home to which we initially gave her access; the crate training turned out to be the best method to acclimate her to her new life. We took her to the vet, changed her name to Bella, gradually introduced her to more of her new surroundings, began training, and slowly transitioned her diet to better food. Over the next several months she grew taller and put on almost 14 pounds to her current weight of 81 pounds! True to her breed, she is a high energy dog that craves at least 3 walks per day, treats, and lots of toys! She learned to pull Steve on his long board through the neighborhood, even showing off for other dogs as they whizzed by together. A year later, she is at home with us: having gone on many adventures, made friends with the pups who live nearby in addition to many hoo-mans, learned a few tricks, and become protective of our home. We love her so!

The whiskers of life, the little things or maybe bigger ones too, that distract me from the whole of all that my days can be really bring me down sometimes. I am grateful that a shiny black and brown pup often senses those moments and lays her head on my lap, waiting for a gentle scratch around the ears or bum. The wiggle of her muscular hind end with a stumpy tail characteristic of the doberman side of her lineage is just too cute for words. Her whole body wiggles with delight and makes me smile in the process. While my life really hasn’t changed much since I was last writing more regularly here (as I still have convulsive episodes most days of the week and they are crushing in so many ways) I can do more when I am more stable. For that I am grateful. I could be distracted by many new health problems and perhaps I am for a time. The whole of my life is greater than these icky parts; there is also even more to be grateful for than ever before. Bella is one of those gifts. My beloved Steve is an even bigger gift in my life. My Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ, is the greatest gift of all.

Where do you find your joy Gentle Reader? Is it enough to sustain you through the icky or smaller parts of your life? I do hope so. Life is increasingly difficult and complex these days. It just seems like there is no time to waste on things with no lasting value, pleasure, or meaning. The speed of life keeps increasing bringing both bad and good news faster and faster, requiring us to find a bigger picture that will sustain us no matter what the day brings. When I finally get going in the morning or afternoon, it is often Bella that I see before my beloved Stevers. Every day, her wiggly, stumpy tail attached to a smiling beast coming through the door and pushing up against me to let me know that I am loved is simply wonderful. I love you Bella.

Thank you Lord for the message of keeping our eyes mindful the bigger picture in our lives. Thank you Lord for all of Your good, good gifts. Whiskers included. JJ

When you have time to think: grow more food!

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When I have an unexpected break in the flow of my weird days, it doesn’t take much to get me to think about gardening. Or future projects. Or chores undone as the weather threatens this or that. Or to check out the plethora of garden bloggers and You Tubers that I follow, looking for those golden nuggets of wisdom. Then I match it all against my training as a Master Gardener and all of this leads to a very long To Do List, perhaps with a wacky experiment here and there. While my heart will always belong to the landscaping of flowers, bushes, and trees, my latest focus has become a quest to GROW MORE FOOD!

Growing More Food in the Secret Garden

This simple space that was once created as a dog pen has graciously become our Secret Garden. Indeed it holds many “tricks and treats” that have come into the light over the 2022 growing season here in USDA Growing Zone 5b/6a. Here’s a list for inquiring minds that want to know with more details to follow if you comment or send me a message below.

  • Companion planting helps!
  • Tepee trellising maximizes space.
  • Grow bags work!
  • Cover crops improved soil fertility of this in-ground bed along the house.
  • Sunset runner beans are pretty in bloom and can be eaten fresh or dried for later. (Pictured here drying on a tepee in the far right back corner and draping the gate. Two tepee trellises.)
  • Tulle fabric works well as an insect cloth.
  • Saddle grow bags from Smart Pots beautify the fence.
  • Composting rocks! (Middle left with makeshift pallet gate)
  • Having a holding area (left foreground) is valuable for transitioning/nursing plants.
  • A cold frame is a game-changer for extending the growing season, starting seeds in the spring.
  • Placing the cold frame along the southern wall of the house added even more warmth when needed.
  • A Univent affixed to the lid of the cold frame regulated internal temps really well.
  • Elevating planters/grow bags deterred bunny damage.
  • Make growing spaces beautiful simply by adding mulch and annuals to enhance enjoyment, utility, and even increase pollinators.
  • Adding native plants nearby significantly increases pollination and production of edibles.
  • Use all vertical elements for growing more food! (There are cucumbers outside the fencing in the distance.)
  • Rings of “chicken wire” at ground level (cucumbers and others) are my go-to for protecting exposed plants from rascally rabbits. A multitude of sprays, hair, cayene pepper, etc. just haven’t worked for long enough even when methods are rotated.
  • Aromatic herbs help deter pests as well. (Rosemary grew between the large French marigolds and calendula.)

Overall I can say that re-purposing both garden spaces and supplies fun! Did you catch the pool noodle that elevates the drape of the green tulle fabric? Now let’s add the next chapter in the Secret Garden this fall where the in-ground bed transitioned for the colder weather.

The open ground is now covered in over a foot of leaves and will soon house sections from our GreenStalk vertical garden. (Sections are disassembled and the leaves will provide insulation to overwinter Seascape strawberries.) The cold frame along the wall has a “blanket” of bubble wrap affixed with black office clips to the poly carbonate panel in the lid to add additional insulation without blocking all of the light. I can easily access the grow bags by removing the plastic clamps purchased from a hardware store. I find that it’s important to check the soil every day or so for watering needs, uncovering the front side of the grow bags on warmer days as the soil can heat up quickly! It’s not unusual for temps to reach 80 degrees under cover when outdoor temps are in the 60s.

The plants include:

  • Strawberries and perennial herbs of oregano and pineapple sage overwintering in their grow bags.
  • Newly planted leafy greens of Red Russian kale, pad choi, spinach, arugula and romaine lettuce sprouting from seed also in their grow bags.
  • Carrots, radishes, and Mizuna mustard growing inside the cold frame.
  • Flowering calendula and French marigolds that will remain until they succumb to the cold.

I’m not sure how many of these will reach maturity but chances are good that most of them will make it through much of the winter here. If a crop looks like it is struggling then I will harvest them as microgreens! Last year I grew leafy greens in what I deemed a “Bubble Garden” made from halves of 5-gallon water jugs. (You can see the Daikon Radish cover crop next to it in the photo below.) While most plants inside the Bubbles didn’t put on huge growth over the winter and some became somewhat bitter, virtually all of them were still alive in the spring. That is, if they were not already eaten!

The Secret Garden has come quite a ways since the days of the BG . . . Could there be a green house in my future? That would fulfill the namesake of Hope Beyond, for sure. Tee hee. :JJ

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