Health Overview

It's May 12th 2026 and I'm slowly recovering from a viral infection and walking pneumonia. I have a slight protuberance in my umbilicus and a slight swelling in my right groin area, indicative of incipient umbilical and inguinal hernias. For this reason, I've suspended all stretch exercises. After all the stretch exercises to strengthen my leg muscles, my reward is an incipient inguinal hernia. The upper body stretch exercises seem to exacerbate the discomfort in my sternum. All I'm doing now is trying to walk a couple of kilometers each day. This all I probably will ever do. Any exercise seems to lead to injury. Any stress to my umbilicus or groin area could aggravate the hernias and really cripple me.

The important thing is to keep mobile, hence the walking. By walking, I mean walking on the streets not on a treadmill. It was after I stepped on a treadmill for the last time that I noticed discomfort in a my right groin area. My hearing in my left ear has gotten noticebly worse after my efforts to drain fluid from my eustachian tubes by external massage. This is the reality of old age and I need to meet it head on. I know something can be done for my blocked eustachian tube as the audiologist explained it to me briefly. I need to use AI to find out more.

Here is what Gemini had to say:

Dealing with a blocked Eustachian tube and the resulting muffled hearing can be highly frustrating and disorienting. When fluid becomes trapped in the middle ear—a condition medically known as Otitis Media with Effusion or serous otitis media—the eardrum cannot vibrate properly, which deadens the incoming sound.

Since a hearing specialist has already confirmed the presence of fluid, restoring your hearing involves clearing that fluid and addressing the underlying inflammation keeping the Eustachian tube closed. Here is a comprehensive overview of how this is medically managed, ranging from home techniques to medical interventions.

Immediate Relief Techniques (Auto-insufflation)

These physical maneuvers are designed to force air up the Eustachian tube to pop it open, allowing the trapped fluid to drain down into the back of the throat.

• The Valsalva Maneuver: Pinch your nostrils shut, close your mouth, and gently blow out as if you are trying to blow your nose. This creates pressure in the back of the nose that can force the tube open. It is crucial to blow gently to avoid damaging the eardrum.
• The Toynbee Maneuver: Pinch your nostrils shut and swallow. Swallowing pulls open the Eustachian tubes, while the pinched nose changes the pressure dynamics, often helping to clear the blockage.
• Passive Techniques: Chewing gum, yawning widely, or drinking fluids can trigger the muscles at the back of the throat that naturally open the Eustachian tube.

Medications

If physical maneuvers are not enough, medications are used to reduce the swelling in the nasal passages and the Eustachian tube itself, opening the pathway for the fluid to drain.

• Nasal Corticosteroid Sprays: Sprays like fluticasone (Flonase) are often the first line of medical treatment. They reduce inflammation in the nasal passages and the opening of the Eustachian tube. They need to be used consistently for several days to a few weeks to show full efficacy.
• Decongestants: Over-the-counter oral decongestants (like pseudoephedrine) or nasal decongestant sprays (like oxymetazoline) can rapidly reduce swelling. Note: Nasal decongestant sprays should not be used for more than three consecutive days, as they can cause severe rebound congestion. Oral decongestants can also elevate blood pressure, so they should be used with caution if you have hypertension.
  
• Antihistamines: If the blockage is driven by an underlying allergy, antihistamines can help dry up the fluid and reduce the allergic response causing the tube to swell shut.

Medical Procedures

If the fluid is stubborn and does not clear after several weeks of conservative management and medication, an Ear, Nose, and Throat (ENT) physician—also known as an otolaryngologist—may recommend a physical intervention to drain the fluid.

• Myringotomy: An ENT doctor makes a microscopic incision in the eardrum. This allows the trapped fluid to be suctioned out immediately, instantly restoring hearing. The tiny hole usually heals on its own within a few days.
• Tympanostomy Tubes (Grommets): If fluid build-up is a chronic issue, the ENT may perform a myringotomy and then insert a microscopic tube into the incision. This tube acts as an artificial Eustachian tube, continuously equalizing pressure and allowing fluid to drain out until the underlying issue resolves. The tubes typically fall out on their own after several months to a year.
• Eustachian Tube Balloon Dilation: In this newer, minimally invasive procedure, a doctor guides a tiny, deflated balloon through the nose and into the Eustachian tube. The balloon is inflated for a few minutes to stretch the tube open, then deflated and removed. This provides a long-term widening of the pathway.

Next Steps Because a hearing specialist (such as an audiologist) can diagnose the fluid but cannot prescribe medications or perform surgeries, the standard next step is to consult with an ENT physician. They can examine the exact state of the eardrum, determine how thick or stubborn the fluid is, and implement the specific treatments needed to drain it and restore your hearing on that side.

I'm not in a position financially to do much at the moment but clearly the local option or the do nothing option are my only options from a conservative medical perspective. Of course, what I need to do is try all the manual methods for unblocking and see if some of them help the problem. Surgery is the last resort.

Here is what I'll try first at Gemini's suggestion as it is simple and straightforward:

To achieve your goal of softening the fluid so that massage is effective, here is the exact protocol you should follow.

The Warmth and Massage Protocol

To safely apply heat to the area and promote drainage without putting liquids in your ear canal, combine steam inhalation with external heat and targeted massage.

Step 1: Steam Inhalation Instead of putting liquid in your ear, you need to get warm moisture to the back of your throat where the Eustachian tube opens.

• Boil a pot of water, remove it from the heat, and lean over it with a towel draped over your head to trap the steam.
• Breathe deeply through your nose for 10 to 15 minutes. The warm, moist air travels directly to the Eustachian tube opening in your throat, which helps thin and soften the stubborn, sticky mucus.

Step 2: External Warm Compress While the steam works from the inside, you can apply heat from the outside to relax the muscles and promote blood flow around the ear.

• Soak a washcloth in comfortably hot water and wring it out completely so it is damp but not dripping.
• Hold this warm compress against the side of your face, covering your left ear and the jawline directly beneath it, for 5 to 10 minutes.

Step 3: Targeted Drainage Massage Once the area is warmed and the mucus is softened by the steam, you can perform a gentle massage to encourage the Eustachian tube to drain downward.

• Find the soft area just behind your earlobe and in front of the upper neck muscles.
• Using your index and middle fingers, apply firm but gentle pressure and drag your fingers straight down the side of your neck, following the line from the back of your earlobe down toward your collarbone.
• Repeat this downward stroking motion for several minutes. The steady, downward pressure helps coax the softened fluid out of the tube and into the back of your throat where it can be naturally swallowed away.

Gangrenous Cholecystitis

I came across this interesting tweet today:

Father-of-two Edd Langmead, 44, from Oldham dropped six stone on Mounjaro fat jabs he bought privately online, then on March 19 what he thought was just trapped wind pain hit him hard, he tried over-the-counter remedies but within three days the agony left him doubled over on the floor barely able to speak, his terrified partner rang an ambulance as he feared he was leaving his kids without a dad, doctors diagnosed gangrenous cholecystitis – his gallbladder had turned septic with tissue dying and infection spreading fast, he needed emergency surgery to have the organ removed and surgeons told him he was lucky to survive, the dad is now recovering with pipes hanging out of him, unable to walk or lie down properly, feeling like he's in his nineties, Edd is warning others the rapid weight loss triggered the life-threatening complication and to never buy these jabs privately without GP blood tests.

However, as someone replying to this tweet said:

This of course is exactly what happened to me back in 2016 after I lost about 14kg over a few months, dropping from 77kg to 63kg. Here are Gemini's comments:

The Mechanism of Gallbladder Stress

When a person loses weight very quickly—whether through extreme dieting, fasting, or bariatric surgery—the body’s metabolism shifts in ways that directly impact the gallbladder:

• Cholesterol Supersaturation: During rapid weight loss, the liver secretes more cholesterol into the bile. If the ratio of cholesterol to bile salts becomes unbalanced, the bile becomes "supersaturated," leading to the formation of gallstones. 

• Reduced Gallbladder Motility: When caloric intake is severely restricted, the gallbladder does not contract as frequently as it should to empty bile. This stasis allows sludge and stones to build up, increasing the risk of infection. 

• Inflammation and Necrosis: If a stone blocks the cystic duct, the resulting pressure and inflammation can cut off the blood supply. This leads to ischemia (tissue death), which is the defining characteristic of gangrenous cholecystitis.

If only I'd known. Anyway, I'm still alive but minus a gall bladder. Life goes on.

Walking

I've been walking on the treadmill these past few days for 30 to 40 minutes. Today I came across this tweet that affirms the benefits of such activity:

Twenty minutes of walking triggers measurable brain rewiring.

That timeframe should terrify every person chained to a desk. Twenty minutes. Not twenty days, not twenty weeks. In the span of a single episode of a TV show, your brain begins physically restructuring itself at the cellular level.

Neuroscience research reveals that this brief window of rhythmic movement activates gene expression patterns that had been dormant. Within those twenty minutes, your hippocampus starts manufacturing fresh neurons. Your prefrontal cortex begins strengthening synaptic connections. Blood flow to regions governing memory and executive function increases by 15 to 30 percent.

The implications destroy every excuse you've ever made about not having time.

Most people spend twenty minutes scrolling social media, watching random videos, or sitting in traffic. During that same period, they could literally be growing their brain. The opportunity cost is staggering. Every twenty minute block you remain sedentary is a twenty minute block your neural architecture remains static, aging, shrinking.

Researchers tracked office workers who took twenty minute walking breaks versus those who remained seated. The walkers showed immediate improvements in attention span, working memory, and creative problem solving that persisted for hours afterward. Their brains generated more alpha waves, the electrical patterns associated with calm focus and insight. The sitters showed declining cognitive performance throughout the day.

The twenty minute threshold reveals something profound about human neurobiology. Evolution wired our brains to expect regular movement. Our ancestors walked 5 to 10 miles daily while hunting, foraging, and traveling. The modern sedentary lifestyle represents a radical departure from the movement patterns that shaped our neural development over millions of years.

When you walk for twenty minutes, you're not just exercising. You're activating the biological programs that built human intelligence. The rhythmic gait pattern synchronizes brain waves across multiple regions. The increased oxygen delivery feeds neural tissue that's been starved by prolonged sitting. The gentle stress of movement triggers adaptive responses that make your brain more resilient.

Psychology studies reveal that twenty minute walks reduce cortisol levels more effectively than meditation apps, therapy sessions, or pharmaceutical interventions. Cortisol, the chronic stress hormone, shrinks the hippocampus and impairs memory formation. Walking doesn't just lower cortisol. It reverses the brain damage that elevated cortisol causes.

It's found that people who sit for more than 8 hours daily show brain patterns identical to patients with early stage dementia. Their hippocampi are visibly smaller. Their white matter is less organized. Their processing speed declines measurably with each passing year.

Twenty minutes of daily walking can prevent and reverse these changes.

The research suggests that sedentary behavior isn't just bad for your heart and muscles. It's a form of accelerated brain aging. Every hour you spend immobile, your cognitive capacity degrades in ways that compound over time. The good news is that those changes aren't permanent. The brain retains remarkable plasticity throughout life. But you have to activate that plasticity through movement.

Silicon Valley executives have started conducting meetings while walking. They report better decisions, more creative solutions, and clearer thinking. They've accidentally rediscovered what Aristotle knew 2,400 years ago: the best ideas emerge when the body moves and the mind follows.

Your brain evolved to think while moving. Sitting still for hours violates the fundamental architecture of human cognition. Every step you take sends electrical signals through your nervous system that say: stay sharp, build connections, generate insights.

Twenty minutes. That's all it takes to begin rewiring decades of neural stagnation.

While this is encouraging for me, it's important not to get too carried away by the tweet's hyperbole and interesting to read Gemini's response when I asked it to comment on the tweet. 

This tweet is a classic example of taking legitimate, peer-reviewed neuroscience and aggressively over-sensationalizing the timeline and magnitude of the effects to drive engagement.

To give you a complete picture, I will work through all aspects of the tweet's claims. While the author is entirely correct that walking is profoundly good for your brain, their specific biological claims are a mix of verifiable facts, wild exaggerations, and physical impossibilities.

Here is the breakdown of what is accurate and what is fiction.

The Fiction and Exaggerations

• Claim: "Within those twenty minutes, your hippocampus starts manufacturing fresh neurons."
  The Reality: This is biologically impossible. Neurogenesis (the creation of new neurons) does occur in the adult hippocampus, and aerobic exercise does stimulate it. However, you do not manufacture fresh neurons in 20 minutes. The process of a neural stem cell dividing, migrating, differentiating, and integrating into a neural network takes weeks.
  What actually happens: A 20-minute walk does trigger the release of BDNF (Brain-Derived Neurotrophic Factor), which acts like fertilizer for the brain. This creates a chemical environment that supports future neurogenesis, but it does not instantly spit out new cells.
• Claim: "Sitting for more than 8 hours daily shows brain patterns identical to patients with early-stage dementia."
  The Reality: This is a massive, fear-mongering exaggeration.
  What actually happens: Research (such as a notable 2018 study from UCLA) has found that highly sedentary behavior is correlated with a thinning of the medial temporal lobe, a brain region involved in memory. Prolonged sitting increases your risk for cognitive decline later in life. However, a sedentary person's brain is absolutely not "identical" to an early-stage dementia patient's brain, which is characterized by the severe buildup of amyloid plaques, tau tangles, and significant brain atrophy.
• Claim: "Twenty minute walks reduce cortisol levels more effectively than meditation apps, therapy sessions, or pharmaceutical interventions."
  The Reality: This is highly irresponsible to state as a universal fact. While walking is a fantastic, evidence-based way to lower cortisol and manage mild stress, claiming it broadly outperforms clinical interventions (like therapy or medication) for chronic anxiety, trauma, or clinical depression is scientifically unfounded and potentially harmful.
• Claim: "In the span of a single episode of a TV show, your brain begins physically restructuring itself at the cellular level."
  The Reality: Synaptic plasticity—the strengthening or weakening of connections—is an ongoing process, but meaningful structural rewiring of the brain takes consistent, repeated effort over time. A single 20-minute walk changes your brain's chemical and electrical state, but it does not structurally remodel your neural architecture on the spot.

The Accurate Claims

• Claim: Blood flow to memory and executive function regions increases.
  The Reality: This is true. Moderate aerobic exercise increases cerebral blood flow. Your heart beats faster, pumping more oxygen and nutrient-rich blood to the brain, specifically activating the prefrontal cortex (responsible for executive function, focus, and decision-making).
• Claim: Immediate improvements in attention span, working memory, and creative problem solving.
  The Reality: This is entirely accurate. A famous 2014 study from Stanford University found that walking increases creative output by an average of 60%. The rhythmic, bilateral movement of walking occupies the motor centers of the brain just enough to let the executive centers relax and make novel connections, which is why we often get "aha" moments while walking.
• Claim: Evolution wired our brains to expect regular movement.
  The Reality: Spot on. Evolutionary anthropologists broadly agree that the human brain evolved in tandem with our need to navigate complex terrain, track prey, and forage over distances of 5 to 10 miles a day. Our cognitive functions were optimized for a body in motion.
• Claim: Alpha wave generation and immediate cognitive benefits.
  The Reality: Also true. A brisk walk shifts your central nervous system out of a sluggish state and can increase alpha and beta brain wave activity, leading to a state of calm alertness.

The Bottom Line

The tweet's core message—that taking a 20-minute walk is a staggering upgrade over sitting at your desk—is absolutely true. The cognitive benefits of taking a break to move are immediate, measurable, and profound.

However, the author ruins a great message by forcing it into a sensationalist "biohacker" framework. Walking doesn't magically print new brain cells in 20 minutes, nor does sitting instantly give you dementia. The real magic of walking isn't instantaneous anatomical restructuring; it's the immediate rush of oxygen, the shift in brain waves, and the chemical foundation it lays for long-term brain health.

Blood-letting

Another example of how everything old is new ago and how modern medicine ignores the wisdom of the past.

Blood-letting, long deprecated, may be about to make a come back according to this tweet:

As a medical school professor, I've taught about blood transfusions for decades. But this study from Aging Cell just showed that removing blood may be even more powerful.

Researchers performed periodic phlebotomy -- drawing just 6% of blood volume every two weeks -- on aging models.

The results were staggering:

• Memory and cognition restored to youthful levels
• New neurons grew in the hippocampus
• Liver, kidney, heart, skin, and bone all rejuvenated
• Inflammatory senescence proteins (SASP) dropped dramatically
• Klotho (the longevity protein) levels restored

The mechanism? Phlebotomy rebooted bone marrow stem cells, shifting blood production back from the inflammatory myeloid bias of aging to a youthful pattern.

This is metabolic dysfunction in reverse. Aging bone marrow floods your blood with pro-inflammatory signals. Remove some blood, and the marrow resets.

A technically simple procedure with profound anti-aging potential.

Full breakdown coming on the Health Longevity Secrets podcast.

Probably not an option for me as I very much dislike having my blood taken but it's an interesting piece of research published on the 2nd of February 2026. It can be found at this website. Here is the abstract:

Aging is the primary risk factor for numerous chronic diseases, making the identification of safe and effective anti-aging strategies a critical focus in biomedical research. Heterochronic parabiosis by blood exchange shows that the exchange interaction between young and old plasma can exert anti-aging effects through exchange of bloodborne factors. However, the limited plasma source greatly affects clinical translation. Here, we demonstrate that periodic therapeutic phlebotomy in D-galactose-induced aging models exerts significant and comprehensive anti-aging effects, which is reflected by a notable improvement in aging-associated behavioral deficits and neurogenesis, a significant decrease in the level of circulating senescence-associated secretory phenotypes, and an obvious mitigation of aging-associated structural degradation and molecular alterations within the muscle, bone, liver, kidney, and nervous systems. Mechanistically, periodic therapeutic phlebotomy induces bone marrow microenvironment restoration through functional rescue of mesenchymal stem cells and endothelial cells, thereby reestablishing balanced hematopoietic homeostasis. This hematopoietic revitalization subsequently drives systemic improvements in peripheral blood composition and function. In conclusion, our work provides preliminary evidence suggesting that periodic therapeutic phlebotomy exerts anti-aging effects by restoring bone marrow function and mitigating aging phenotypes, subsequently driving peripheral blood functional restoration. Given its technical simplicity and safety profile, this periodic therapeutic phlebotomy strategy will hold potential to pave the way for clinical translation.

A New Culprit: Chiron

I don't think that normal bread is the "culprit" that I accused it of being in my earlier post titled Looking For the Culprit. I stopped with the bread and for a short while I seemed better but then my GIT disturbances reemerged with renewed intensity. It's something else that's the cause or there may be no irritant at all, my system may be imbalanced in some way.

Currently transiting Chiron is sitting right on my Ascendant and it has a cycle of a little over 50 years. Looking back to when it was last in that position, I noticed that the date was March 3rd 1976. It was around this time that I was stricken with a serious disturbance of my GIT that saw me lying mainly on the bathroom floor for a couple days. I don't remember the exact date but I remember the episode vividly because I'd not experienced anything like it before or since. At the time, I was a young man in good health and my collapse was not caused by alcohol or drugs. I was simply struck down.

I'll discuss the astrological details in my Astrowatch blog but it's interesting that Chiron is prominent in my chart on both occasions. I asked Gemini the following:

Astrologically can you find any evidence that the transits of Chiron across a person's Ascendant can be associated with a cleansing of sorts, either psychically or physically.

This was the response: 

In the realm of astrology, there is a very strong, well-documented association between Chiron transiting the Ascendant and a profound period of "cleansing."

While it is always important to ground this by noting that astrology is a symbolic framework and belief system—meaning there is no empirical, scientific evidence linking planetary movements to human health or psychology—within the astrological tradition itself, this specific transit is viewed as a major catalyst for deep purging and healing.

To understand why this transit triggers both physical and psychic cleansing, it helps to look at the two astrological components involved.

The Astrological Mechanics

• Chiron (The Wounded Healer): In astrology, the comet Chiron represents our deepest, most sensitive wounds, our vulnerabilities, and the holistic healing that comes from finally addressing our pain rather than suppressing it.

• The Ascendant (The 1st House Cusp): This point in the birth chart represents the physical body, vitality, outward appearance, and the fundamental sense of "Self" or personal identity we project into the world.

When transiting Chiron crosses the Ascendant, the archetype of the "Wounded Healer" makes direct contact with the "Self" and the "Body." Astrologers widely interpret this as a time when any toxic, unhealed, or suppressed energy can no longer remain hidden. It must come to the surface to be cleansed.

Here is how that cleansing typically manifests across both the psychic and physical planes.

The Psychic and Emotional Cleansing

The Ascendant often functions as our social mask or our defense mechanism. When Chiron crosses this point, it initiates a psychological detox by stripping away any superficial layers of identity.

• Shedding False Identities: If a person has built an identity around being "invulnerable," "perfect," or entirely self-sufficient, this transit often breaks that facade down. The psychic cleansing happens by forcing the person to embrace their vulnerability and authenticity.

• Surfacing of Old Wounds: Repressed psychological baggage, insecurities, or childhood dynamics often bubble up to the conscious mind. The cleansing process here isn't usually gentle; it is often likened to emotional surgery. It requires acknowledging the psychic wound in order to finally release its hold on the person's identity.

• A Shift in Self-Perception: The "purge" ultimately leaves the individual with a highly refined, more compassionate sense of who they are, stripped of the ego-defenses that were secretly draining their energy.

The Physical Cleansing

Because the Ascendant literally governs the physical vessel, Chiron’s transit here very frequently correlates with events centered around the body.

• Somatic Manifestations: Astrological practice frequently notes that during this transit, emotional or psychic blockages that have been ignored will manifest as physical symptoms. The body begins keeping the score in a very loud way.

• Health as a Catalyst for Change: It is common for people to experience a depletion of vitality, strange flare-ups, or physical vulnerabilities that force them to stop, rest, and completely re-evaluate how they treat their physical form. The "wound" appears in the body to force a lifestyle change.

• Literal Detoxification: People under this transit often feel an overwhelming, instinctual urge to physically cleanse. They may suddenly drop bad habits, adopt rigorous new health regimens, seek out holistic therapies (like acupuncture, somatic experiencing, or dietary overhauls), and actively work to purge toxins from their daily lives.

Ultimately, astrologers view the transit of Chiron over the Ascendant as a holistic detox. It is a demanding transit that brings vulnerabilities out into the open, initiating a necessary purging of physical neglect or psychological baggage so that the individual can move forward with a more authentic, integrated, and healed sense of self.

So it may well be that there is no external irritant at all and that my condition is the result of a purging. If so then it's best to let the process run its course and my symptoms should dissipate as Chiron moves away from my Ascendant. Time will tell.