Deborah Wotherspoon is a high math and science teacher, with a B.Sc. from Simon Fraser University and a B.Ed. from University of British Columbia. Before going into education she worked 10 years on preventing tobacco use, including advocacy, policy and lots of health and neurotransmitter research.
March 25, 2015 her sister’s neurologist told her sister to research ALS. Her sister also got the results of an EMG that had been done in December that another neurologist had said either early onset bulbar ALS or atypical variants of motor neuron disease or a focal myopathic process. The alternatives were ruled out and her diseased moved on to include muscle spams and cramps and whole body twitching. Her neurologist wanted to wait until her next appointment to give a diagnosis.
Ms Wotherspoon and her sister chose to not wait and immediately embarked on a holistic journey to develop a treatment plan as in 10 months not only had the doctors not shared the possibilities early, they had also not offered any treatments or strategy to treat the disease. Four weeks into the holistic approach her sister was noticing less cramps and spasms and an easier time eating and swallowing. At eight weeks her sister noticed she was able to clear some food at the top of her mouth with her tongue, something she had not been able to do since November.
Ms Wotherspoon started to write a blog 4 days into this journey to help her learn about the disease and in April 2015 started a facebook group for a holistic approach to the disease using supplements and diet.