I was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis in 1994, after an MRI scan and a lumbar puncture.  My symptoms were dizzy spells, tingling, pins and needles, a dragging left leg, extreme fatigue and poor sleeping patterns.  I was also depressed and put on mild medication.  I spent a lot of money and a great many hours searching for  something that would halt the steady decline that I feared was inevitable.  Unfortunately, nothing seemed to really help and then in the summer of 1998, I suffered a relapse that started with retrobulbar neuritis in one eye, and the partial numbness and sensory loss down my left side.

At about that time a friend mentioned some nutritional supplements that MS sufferers were taking, reporting dramatic benefits and remission with some of their symptoms.  Needless to say I jumped at the opportunity to try them and started on the Usana mega antioxidants, chelated minerals and grapeseed extract, recommended by an American doctor whose website I consulted.  The Usana nutritional supplements were developed by a renowned  immunologist and microbiologist called Dr Myron Wentz.  He had been working with the human cell for 20 years and had the expert knowledge required to develop a supplement range providing the human cell with all that it required for health.  I was very impressed with the science behind the supplements; they contain 59 different vitamins, minerals, co-factors and trace elements, in an easily absorbed form that is balanced and bio-available.

It took three months for me to begin to feel any positive benefit, but once my body did start to respond, I noticed dramatic improvements in my energy levels, in particular.  I started doing thinks like gardening, cycling and swimming; no longer was the one mile walk into town an endurance test.  I was beginning to feel my old self, doing things I loved and enjoying life again.

I have been on the supplements for two years now and have not suffered any significant relapses in that time.  If I do feel a slight worsening of my symptoms I just up the quantity of grapeseed extract until it passes.  On the rare occasions when I have run out of the supplements, in particular the grapeseed extract, which contains high levels of proanthocyanidins, then almost immediately I feel my energy levels diving!  I know that the MS has not gone away, I still have partial numbness in my left hand, but my eyesight is 99% back to normal, my left leg is a lot stronger, I sleep like a baby most nights and my energy levels are sky high!  40-60 lengths of the pool, 3-4 times a week are a testament to that.

At the moment I am training to teach yoga and am doing a City and Guilds ceramics course.  I teach yoga to a small group of friends and cook and keep house for my husband and sixteen year old son.  Life is good, and I have my supplements to thank for that.  I really know that they have given me renewed energy and therefore in sense my life back.

Mary Smith, Lymington