Fantasy or Reality?
February 2025
Fireflies
February Wondering
Deeper into the Unknown and the Known:
An attempt to figure out what happened
that could create the bizarre alternation
of the fluid/pain symptomatology
that was triggered on that fateful day,
June 4, 1996, in a southern California orthodontic office.
What does speculating and thinking ‘outside the box’ mean?
Vision or Illusion?
Fantasy or Fabrication?
Creativity or Conjecture?
Theory or Thought?
Over the past forty years, I have consulted with many doctors across the country. I have never encountered anyone who was challenged and wanted to discern and resolve the WHY and the WHAT of the Unknowns that my case presents…until NOW. For this I am grateful; I am of the same persuasion. And my Santa Cruz Osteopath comes with an added blessing: as she processes in my presence, she voices her inspirations and speculations. And we enter into an exchange. This reciprocity is precious to and for me – in this in-between world we walk in together between the Known and the Unknown.
Where does my perseverance originate? Why don’t I just ‘give up’ and ‘accept’? The years, the money, the hope that has been transformed into groundlessness, the determination that somehow overrides the despair that creeps in around the edges of my Soul….all of the ups and the downs. From the depths of me a stream continues to circulate and radiates courage, grace and fortitude to persevere. And for this I am grateful as well as incredulous.
Am I living in fantasy or illusion? Can fantasy become reality in the liminal space of In-Between the Unknown and the Known? Is there a difference between fantasizing and vision? I’m living in the Liminal Space where all potentiality lies.
And when despair and frustration creep in, I return to this Space of all Potentiality – the place between the Known and the Unknown. And I am no longer alone in the In Between of the Liminal.
Somewhere In Between
This is where I now reside… somewhere in between the Known and Unknown.
And I have surprisingly added more to the Known – after 30+ years!
More Seeking
Discovery and Questioning leads to The Known
The Pterygomandibular Ligament ‘Raphe‘ lost his anchor, the hamular process,
during a surgical procedure called a hamular resection (1998).
He has been floundering in the tissue of my oropharynx for twenty-seven years.
Raphe
During December, I had discovered that ‘Raphe’ was attached to the Pterygoid Hamular Process.
This attachment anchored ‘Raphe’, the ligament, that descended from the hamulus
at the back of the palate to the lower jaw behind the third molar.
I was unaware of this anatomical attachment in spite of previous years of research.
Raphe had jumped off the page …but proceeded to be forgotten.in the excitement and the aftermath
of my filling popping out of Tooth #3 in the motel in Santa Cruz.
In January, I mentioned my discovery to my Santa Cruz Osteopath, Dr. Turzo.
She was also unaware of this superior attachment; we didn’t go beyond her statement of “I don’t think so”.
I emailed her before my February appointment and brought in more information.
We fully discussed the ramifications of this ‘anchor’ loss of Raphe in the oropharyngeal tissue.
Our dialogue was a refreshing relief; we brainstormed together – give and take.
Her receptivity and our interchanges are a large part of my healing process.
The ‘spasm’ in the superior constrictor muscle that both she and my Phoenix Osteopath had palpated now made sense.
Raphe had no home on his superior surface and he had been floundering for many years.
How can we help him?
Maybe next month will reveal more of this Unknown.
The Pterygomandibular Raphe (pterygomandibular ligament) is a tendinous band of the buccopharyngeal fascia, attached by one extremity to the hamulus of the medial pterygoid plate, and by the other to the posterior end of the mylohyoid line of the mandible.
Temporalis Trigger
Image from SpringerOpen
The Known and the Unknown
Next month did not come.
More of the Unknown was revealed during February in Phoenix!
“Hey…this has moved!”
These words of surprise came from my Phoenix Osteopath as he palpated deep on the left side of my throat.
He as well as my Santa Cruz Osteopath had originally identified a spasm in the left constrictor muscle.
However, he was now finding the trigger at the junction of the coronoid process and the temporalis tendon.
My eyes doubled in size as did my groaning to confirm that he was definitely in the right place.
Three Jones Counterstrain techniques released the tissue as I closed my eyes, opened them and looked up, down and left. There was a shift in the pain. Definitely something was wrong in this area that he palpated.
Exosomes
New Frontiers in Regenerative Medicine
I kept my appointment in February with the IV clinic for my second Exosome infusion in spite of the LifeWave patches. Their regenerative goal is similar. LifeWave stimulates your body to produce it’s own stem cells. According to Stanford Cardiovascular Institute, exosomes are “the components made by cells that hold much of the stem cell’s regenerative capacity.” Stanford Medicine (2023)
Stanford Medicine, (2023) Mayo Clinic News Network (2021), and Nature (2024) provide information about this revolutionary regenerative medicine therapeutic. Investigation of exosomes proves most frustrating in this day of information overload. What to believe? Where is Truth? However, I am most fortunate to be under the care of a doctor who has worked with Exosomes for fifteen years or more in tandem with a dentist. And she is using Kimera Labs Exosomes in her clinics, which are in Phase I/IIa IND (Investigational New Drug) Clearance for its MSC Exosomes Human Study.
The regenerative capability for neurologic and musculoskeletal conditions has proved to be astounding for my doctor over the years. And she personally has had infusions as well.
A Week of STRESS
Homecoming Overload
February 18, 19 and 20
Where does the drainage problem originate in the oropharyngeal tissue?
What is the source of the ice-pick sharpness in my throat?
and/or….
Is there an artifact in the tissue?
I’ve claimed there is something embedded deep in the throat tissue for twenty-nine years.
Meet The UNKNOWN