Nasty accident

Nasty accident leads to a better life


In August 2020, I fell off my bike after hitting a high curb on a bridge in East Berlin and injured myself badly. A young Indian student who happened to be passing by went to great lengths to help me.

When I insisted on carrying on with my journey to visit my daughter, he gave me his phone number and asked me to contact him in the next few days to let him know I was alright.

When I wrote to him later, he invited me to visit his research centre, where he was working on his doctorate in DNA sequencing. The location was impressive, right in the city centre — even the main staircase of the building was designed in the shape of a double helix.

Discovering Ayurveda

Our conversation in the rooftop café that evening turned to health in general, and it was there that I first heard about Ayurveda. Curious, I began reading, and was struck by the overlap with plant-based nutrition and veganism.

If you’d like an introduction, I can recommend two books:

My Experience

I started following the four-stage detoxification process described in Chaudhary’s book. By the end of six months, these were the — to be honest — surprising results:

  • Lost 7 kg in weight (which I had intended try to lose)

  • LDL cholesterol reduced to an acceptable level

  • Pre-diabetic glucose levels dropped to normal

  • Blood pressure normalised (I stopped medication, under medical supervision)

  • Increased fitness and VO₂ level now at 47.8 (apparently very high for my age)

  • Less craving for foods and drinks that don’t serve me well

  • A calmer, more peaceful outlook

The downsides: a phase of unpleasant body odour, some skin rashes, a boil on my leg, and a painful bout of gout in my right foot. I can’t prove these were detox symptoms — but I suspect they were.

Reflections

Despite enthusiastic claims from its supporters, scientific evidence for Ayurveda is limited. Yet I can say without hesitation that it has worked for me, although always in tandem with a fairly strict sports regime and healthy diet.

In future blogs, I’d occasionally like to share some practical tips from Ayurveda that I’ve found especially useful. They also happen to fit well with a vegan or vegetarian lifestyle — though that isn’t a requirement.

“The wound is the place where the Light enters you.”
— Rumi

Location: Berlin, Germany

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