Do Not Be Afraid

“And when we stand before God, and you are sent to Paradise for doing according to your conscience, and I am damned for not doing according to mine, will you come with me, for fellowship?”

A Man for All Seasons - Robert Bolt

When Covid hit, we obediently sheltered in place, keeping away from everyone and waited for the magic month to pass when it would be gotten under control. To protect us from illness, we were shut out from mass for two months. Finally free to return to church, in drastically reduced numbers, we dutifully spaced from each other. Because I was over 65, I was told to stay away from the most important thing in my life for my safety. I didn’t stay away and helped disinfect the church after mass.

The disease was new on the scene, there was no vaccine, and the jury was out about how to fight it. However, honest dialogue was no longer tolerated; discussion between honored and respected M.D.s, was censored. Hydroxychloroquine, used successfully in Africa to fight malaria for many years with few side effects, was effective in reducing the symptoms of the disease and could have saved lives early on in the pandemic; that didn't matter. If doctors talked about Hydroxychloroquine, they were threatened with losing their license over misinformation. It was suddenly banned or severely restricted in the U.S. Dr. Fauci and the CDC ruled against it.

The drug cocktail president Trump was given after which he quickly recovered from Covid was never discussed. Why? Because it was President Trump who had gotten it and recovered. Physicians no longer had the right, much less the responsibility to determine what was best for their patients. It was considered misinformation to suggest that someone who had recovered from Covid, had the antibodies, and had not gotten the vaccine should be considered in the same immunity status as someone who had gotten the vaccine.

Dr. Scott Jensen won the Doctor of the Year Award for Minnesota before Covid hit. After contracting Covid himself, he made statements that did not go along with the news media and CDC’s narrative, he was threatened with losing his license.

I respected the rights and reasoning of those who got the Covid vaccine. However, I had to follow my conscience; I was unwilling to let the government, or coercion force me to do anything to my body. I continued to live my life without the vaccine and I was healthy. I was accused of spreading the virus.

No one had gotten Covid due to my decision to live life normally because I had not gotten Covid. Portrayed as selfish and/or stupid: a hillbilly for refusing to get the shot; I believed requiring physically healthy people to remain locked up and isolated during Covid when it directly battered their mental health, and sent suicides and drug deaths soaring, against a malady that had a 99.5 survival rate was short sighted and stupid.

Regarding public health and my own body, I did not want to cave to pressure of the media, the mob, or the government (so far, in America, the government exists for us, not us for the government). While at the clinic for my annual check up in November of 2021, I asked for a Covid antibody test. I had no antibodies from the disease. Apparently I’d not infected anyone in the year and a half I’d been walking around living my life vaccine free. While I had done what I was told as far as masks and distancing were concerned (though I had no faith in either), I was glad that instead of hunkering down, living in fear, I lived a rich life during Covid.

In December 2021, symptom free, I received positive test results. Our clinic recommended monoclonal infusions for me. I was relieved to find that these were available in Baldwin, a nice pastoral drive about 20 miles away, rather than having to haul myself up through traffic to the Twin Cities.

Good friends, knowledgeable, highly intelligent, informed people, some part of the medical community, urged me to jump into action. I contacted the recommended doctor, outside the medical establishment, who prescribed ivermectin. Beginning to not feel well, I drove the 20 miles through the traffic I’d hoped to avoid, to pick it up from the closest pharmacy that would carry it. A young, immune friend also picked up high quality vitamins and supplements for me and gave me detailed instructions on how to use them to fight COVID. Another friend, a fairly renowned nurse (though she would fight that title tooth and nail), relayed advice she had just gleaned from going through the same thing with her husband. She sent me an oximeter in the mail so I could monitor my blood oxygen and heartbeat levels.

I began the supplement, ivermectin regimen and drove myself to Baldwin for the monoclonal infusion. In the infusion room, I met a man who had contacted the same Dr. I had for the ivermectin. He unvaccinated, had contracted Covid from a vaccinated person. Since we were there for two hours, we talked a lot sharing our different perspectives about approaches to fighting Covid. I learned how difficult the pandemic had been on our fantastic nurses; I felt sympathy for them. When we finished, they cheerfully reminded us that ten days after the onset of symptoms and if we had no fever, we were immune, free and clear for three months; we could infect no one.

Upon returning home, my immune system reacted drastically to receiving the infusion: at first I could not get warm, even under 4 quilts, then once I did finally warm up with the help of applied warm packs, my temperature rose to 100.5. It began to go down within an hour. This was the only time during the ordeal that my temperature was above normal. I had the symptoms, similar to what were described for Covid, just for that night – wildly fluctuating temperatures and intense body aches, I believe they were probably from the infusion. By morning I was heading back to normal. My Covid symptoms were stopped in their tracks.

Five days after receiving the positive test results, I went out and cleared snow, albeit very light, from our corner yard sidewalks. It felt great, .

My intention of reporting all of this is to give people information. The vaccine was not the only solution to COVID. Ivermectin, the supplemental regimen and the monoclonal infusion worked. The amount of fear mongering, control of the population and restrictions of civil rights were not warranted. We gave up too much because of Covid.

From Crisis magazine

Will the Unvaccinated be Saved?

and

Natural Immunity

Another One

The tree we lamented losing last fall has begun to come down on it's own. Today Peter asked me if I'd seen what was in the street. I was afraid to look; afraid it was some poor hapless animal, but it was a big limb of our tree.

Peter called the city and within minutes the supremacists were back.

I ran out to tell them about my blog post from last fall and was surprised to meet Timothy.

"I am Cambodian," Timothy Oeun, told me.

I loved it!

White Male Supremacists

Today I heard the whine of incessant chainsaws. “There goes my nap,” I thought. Then I sat in my chair and looked out the window. There was a large white truck parked in front of our neighbor John’s place and emerging from the top of the truck a long arm at the end of which was a bucket. There were two men in it. They were beginning to take down the ill-fated ash tree in the boulevard. It's not the only one that needs to come down.

Instead of despairing over my nap, I decided to watch. It was like watching ballet.

Two young men traded turns at cutting branches from the tree, systematically handing off the chainsaw as one or the other of them got tired. One of them was responsible for deftly moving the arm holding the bucket so that they were in perfect position to cut the next branch and still be in position to fling it onto the growing pile of branches below. As one cut, the other grabbed the section that was to be detached from the tree in a specific way so that it’s weight, once cut, would not cause the chainsaw to backlash. At the same time the branch would be supported so that it could be easily flung onto the tidy heap on the pavement in front of the truck. They kept the pile to a small, efficient footprint. It was obvious that they both had to be physically strong to maintain the cutting, throwing and coordinated changes without a break. They also needed to be aware of traffic and each other to work together flawlessly.

I watched for about a half hour and then decided I could probably at least rest, even though this was going on not far from the bedroom. I settled in, eyes covered with scarf, cat ensconced in the crook of my arm, and soon the whine slowed and then stopped altogether.

Forty-five minutes later I was astonished to find the truck gone and no trace of a branch left in the street.

Next summer, at our request a large damaged Basswood tree on the edge of our yard is slated to come down. I’ve asked that they wait until “our” squirrels are well out of it in the spring. It is going to be a hard loss for them, and us.