"Good Health - Under Construction" is an article series about dealing with unique, often surprising, and sometimes just plain mysterious health issues and supplement interactions.

Your body does not always react to things like everybody else's body...and insight from somebody who has been in your shoes might be exactly what you need.

Sometimes doctors or other medical professionals don't always understand what's going on in your body because they have literally never seen certain effects happen before!

You might get prescribed meds and written off as a hypochondriac or worse.

It's time to change that.

These articles will give you information based on real, "in the trenches" experience from somebody who has gone through the ringer and come out the other side.. my sister.

 

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My name is Alexis and I am Nick Nilsson's sister. Like Nick, who uses himself to test all his unique and unconventional training methods, I too have been the test subject in my own life.

In this article series, I'm going to tell you about my health experiences in the hopes it might help you or someone you care about.

You see, unlike Nick, who can try any supplement any company sends him to test with ease, I am the opposite. If there is a side effect to be found, I find it. If there is a type of food that suddenly causes a problem, I experience it.

 

I am sure that you are familiar with the illness called “Long COVID”.

Before COVID, this type of illness was known as “post viral syndrome”; basically describing a person who got sick and didn't recover normally from a virus.

Imagine a neighborhood of homes blown apart by a tornado. When you visit that neighborhood a year later, every house but one has begun the process, to different degrees,  of rebuilding. That one house still wiped out after a year is the person with post viral syndrome – not rebuilding and not recovering.

 

More than 15 years ago, I contracted an enterovirus, meaning a virus that infects you through your stomach, and I developed post viral syndrome.

I didn't get better.

In fact, so many things got so much worse. I have made a lot of progress since then, but I am still not “back to normal”. After that virus, I seemed to react to everything – food, supplements, you name it.

I crowned myself the “Queen of Side Effects”.

Prior to COVID, there was much less awareness and understanding by the medical community of how to treat a person with post viral syndrome. So, taking matters into my own hands like any self-respecting Nilsson would do, I began my journey of research, discovery, experimentation, disappointment and hope.

 

Nick has invited me to be a guest writer so I can share my hard earned experiences with different supplements, diets and treatments.

I don't have a book to sell or a supplement line to promote. It's just me telling you about the sometimes pretty weird things that happened when I tried new supplements or treatments and how I managed them.

I am not a doctor. I am a patient who took control of my journey of healing and now takes full credit for any improvements I've made.

 

My goal is to share that information with others so maybe, just maybe, something that happened to me helps someone else feel less alone and empowered to find a solution.

Maybe you have experienced an adverse reaction to something that everybody else seems to have no problem taking and you wonder why. Maybe I can suggest something else for you to try instead that you didn't know was an option. Or, maybe we can just laugh about it together like an inside joke the rest of the world doesn't understand.

AI can do a lot of things better and faster than us, but it can't experience physically taking a supplement, ending up in the bathroom half an hour later and living to tell about it.

Over the years, I have kept notes on things I tried, what happened when I did, and if I came up with any alternative ideas. I will be writing articles based on my notes and Nick will be sharing them with you. I continue to look for new things to try and research the @#$% out of before daring to make an attempt.

Many a conversation between Nick and I begins with the words “hey, have you heard about this supplement...”

Welcome to the conversation.

 

Welcome to Good Health...Under Construction!

 

 

Issue #1 - Is Fish Oil Messing Up Your Stomach? Or Is It The Capsule? Fish oil supplements are widely known to be anti-inflammatory, good for your heart and your brain. I have tried off and on for years to take them. I would start with one, and after a second dose, I would get nauseous and have stomach pain...

 

Issue #2 - From Bugs to Bone Broth: My Strange Journey Down the Protein Powder Aisle There are many reasons for adding protein powder supplements to your diet. Examples include trying to build more muscle, meal replacements, dietary restrictions, and increasing protein to help your body heal from illness. My reason has been to help support my body as it heals...

 

Issue #3 - Anyone Ever Dare You to Eat Worms? How About PROTEIN From Worms... or Goats, Nuts, Peas and More! Here we'll look at types, both plant based and animal based, that I haven't tried. And after reading about some of these "unique" protein sources, you'll know why...

 

Issue #4 - The Ultimate Guide to Magnesium: Types, Benefits, and Best Supplements for Health You’ve heard of a Code Red, but have you ever heard of a Code Brown? Find out about the many different kinds of magnesium supplements, which ones to avoid and which ones to try. And, of course, you will read about the weird things that happened to me with certain magnesium supplements.

 

Issue #5 - Are Nightshades Contributing to Your Health Issues? Nightshades are more than the deadly poisons you see in the movies or read about in novels and Shakespeare's plays. They are plants from the Solanaceae family that we eat on a daily basis...

 

Issue #6 - Creatine...How and Why To Use it and Potential Side Effects If you aren't currently taking creatine, you've probably heard about it and wondered what all the fuss is about. People take creatine because it provides extra energy to your muscles so you can work out harder and longer. It helps to increase muscle mass and strength as well as reduces muscle fatigue and speeds up recovery.