First I want to welcome all the new subscribers to this newsletter AND welcome back those who have been on-board for awhile.

I can hardly believe it is October. And I have so many things to share with you. I hardly know where to begin. I try to limit each newsletter to no more than 3 topics, so here goes.

1. Health. Although I have said this before I think it bears repeating. A few years ago they tested a group of patients over age 50 who were diagnosed as having ALS (amyolateral sclerosis/Lou Gehrig's Disease), Alzheimer's or Parkinson's disease and found that more than 80% of them had undiagnosed lyme disease or some of lyme's common co-infections such as Babesia. When the lyme and/or co-infections were treated, the symptoms that led to the original diagnosis disappeared.

Since Parkinsons and Alzheimers are 'diseases associated with the old' I think this information is very important. Many times lyme is missed because some of the tests used are not discriminating enough. There are a few labs, Igenix being one, that do use the most discriminating tests.

If you want to read more about this subject, here is a link with a variety of studies/papers including how lyme can lead to the same sort of plaque in the brain as Alzheimers:

http://www.samento.com.ec/sciencelib/medmain.html

2. Books - A few weeks ago I was reminded once again that May Sarton's AFTER THE STROKE is a helpful and encouraging book. This ,too, bears repeating.

A friend who had had a stroke gave me the book after I had a head injury in an auto accident. I found it helpful because the author KNEW what it was really like to have parts of her brain not working right. The book gave me courage and a belief that life could go on, that I could adapt and things would get better.

Since that time I have given Sarton's AFTER THE STROKE to a number of friends or friends of friends who had strokes. In each case the book was returned 9 months to a year later with note giving MUCH THANKS and hoping I could pass it on to someone else. Each persona said they had read the book more than once and found parts of it especially helpful.

Sarton had been publishing her journals for years - since her mid 40's. She was honest. Her bouts of depression, her run with breast cancer as well as her stroke were faced head on... she had a kind of resilience and an appreciation of daily beauties that is heartening. In her later years she also reflected on the joys and disappointments of getting old.

Sarton wrote SO engagingly that when I was younger I used to think of retiring to the coast of Maine - mostly because she made the ocean so much part of the journals. But when I turned 67 I realized that most of my friends were in the New York area and the lack of winter sun in Maine would be even harder on my mood than winter in New York so I stayed put. But I know of no author who has chronicled 'growing older' with more candor and hope than May Sarton.

Worth checking her out at the library. (If you can offer suggestions of other older writes, do let me know. I am always looking for a 'good read.')

3. Oh, and speaking of 'older writers' there is now a new section on the www.anti-aging-articles.com web site called, Senior Authors.

It lists titles and authors of books written by seniors. (In the last few months I have learned of a number of friends or friends of friends who have written books in their 60's, 70's, 80's. And now that Amazon allow you to upload ebooks so people can buy them for Kindle, I expect that there may be even more self published older authors.

The first person on the page is Bob Funk a reader of this newsletter and our web site. Bob turned poet in his retirement.(He writes Haiku. See: the Senior Poets page) He has just published a book of daily reflections and there is a link to it on the new Senior Authors page. Some of Sarton's journals are there too.

If YOU have published a book or know of a senior who has done so, do let me know so I can consider adding them to the site. I think others might be interested in reading such.

Well I have a whole batch of subjects 'ready to go' but I promised to keep these newsletters short so I shall save them til next month.

Be well, be happy and do check out the new Senior Authors page.

Kate