Navigating Copper Toxicity,
A Contractive State

It’s an honor to share this testimony with you of how I took my health into my hands, guided by the light of science. 

I was eating very clean and taking all the supposedly “right” supplements and educating my mind for many years before my health “crashed”. I had also been committed for years, to working on deep emotional healing through Heilkunst and a sequential based therapy using energetic medicine and delving deeply into treating inherited predisposition to disease. Yet, with adaptation after adaption to stress, I physically couldn’t seem to gain ground. When my mom was diagnosed with breast cancer in 2017, the emotional impact was profound.   

“…in its emotional function the psyche is completely dependent upon the functions of expansion and contraction of the autonomic nervous system.”

(Reich, 1973, p354)

I had been working with a tutor…

for several years who still tutors me today in my vocational studies.  She had suggested to me that I send off a sample of the newest hair growth to one of the original Hair Tissue Mineral Analysis (HTMA) testing labs.  She had introduced a book to me on HTMA, perhaps the previous year, but I hadn’t made the connection for myself to pursue the testing at that time. I guess this was how disordered things had to get for me to wake up to my real priorities.

I quickly sent the sample off to the lab and then I delved into research on HTMA. I re-read Dr. Paul Eck’s book, ‘Energy: How it affects your emotions, your level of achievement, and your entire well-being’. Dr. Eck was the founding father of HTMA.  As I continued to read the book, I was beginning to map out the red thread of symptoms that I had suffered, including bouts of depression since the age of 15.  I had concluded that I was “copper toxic” before seeing the test results.  Would the test data confirm this?   I had never heard of copper toxicity before but I was learning that it was part of an entire imbalance involving adrenal exhaustion, blood sugar regulation issues, anemia, depression, skin fungal issues, ovarian issues, and more, all of which I had suffered.  Copper has a direct relationship with estrogen. Could I eventually balance my hormones? Had this “copper toxicity” been contributing to angina and chest and arm pain?  

“When you are under excess stress, your body will sacrifice the production of sex hormones for the production of hormones which are necessary to combat stress. The body produces cortisone and other cortical hormones to defend against exhaustion. These hormones must take precedence over sex hormones.”

(Chatsworth & Eck, p 26)

Even though it was a harrowing time for me, the light of science guided me out of a really scary situation.  I remember looking at that first test and weeping with a sense of relief, despite my comprehension of how badly it reflected the level of biochemical and emotional imbalance.  True knowledge is powerful.  The data made it clear to me that it was serious and I had the knowledge now to take action with confidence, knowing that I could give my body what it needed, to prevent a pathological issue much harder to reverse, or even early death. I remember the calmness that came over me, knowing I wasn’t taking something I shouldn’t have been taking that could push this “teetering” situation over the edge.

“The numbers don’t lie.”

(Chatsworth & Eck, p 35)

I then pursued HTMA training and read Dr. David Watts’ book ‘Trace Elements and Other Essential Nutrients’. Dr. Watts was Dr. Eck’s protege and is the founder of Trace Elements, Inc., lab, located in Texas, which I use for hair testing.

With this test data, I now knew how to nutrify and select foods to start moving this incredibly imbalanced mineral profile into a better balance.  Indeed, the test data confirmed I was quite severely copper toxic and that I had quite an abnormally high level of tissue calcium referred to in the HTMA-world as a “calcium shell”. This severely imbalanced mineralogical profile reflected a deep level of armoring that had come up for navigation. Thank God I had the therapeutics to progress through this now. My calcium tissue levels had gotten so high in relation to magnesium that I was indeed at risk for a heart attack. The excess bio-unavailable calcium that my body wasn’t utilizing properly had been slowing down my metabolism and was also the reason for unbearable joint pain and stiffness that I’d been experiencing. The hypoglycemia that I’d been experiencing, further contributing to the exhaustion, was also related to this high calcium to magnesium ratio. The numbers reflected the sclerotic and contractive state that I had been experiencing!

Navigating Copper Toxicity

As I’ve navigated my experience with copper toxicity, and brought my education to bear, I understand the following.  Like other imbalances we see in a mineralogical profile, copper toxicity involves digestive and malabsorption issues, elimination issues, endocrine imbalance, nutrient depletions, adaptations to stress, and a loss of vital energy. At its deepest, the crux of the issue is what Dr. Reich called, “chronic sympatheticotonia.” This is a state of living in chronic contraction and relates deeply to the function of the autonomic nervous system.

“…the parasympathetic nervous system operates in the direction of expansion, ‘out of the self—toward the world,’ pleasure and joy; whereas the sympathetic nervous system operates in the direction of contraction, ‘away from the world —into the self,’ sadness and unpleasure.” 

(Reich, 1973, p 288)

I’ve observed for years in my clinical practice before I started HTMA testing, and with women especially, that adrenal exhaustion can reflect that a woman is living a life that involves more obligation than one that ‘nourishes’ her satisfaction. I’m not talking here about superficial happiness. I’m referring to a depth of self-knowledge that we have to go on a journey to discover. What does adrenal exhaustion do?  In a crude way, it slows women down so they have an opportunity to connect with their feelings, those that reside deep in the core. Getting underneath adrenal exhaustion and balancing out the mineralogical profile, becomes a journey of making contact with the love that is housed deep inside the will.  Certainly, this is what I’ve come to understand as I take myself through the recovery of the level of burnout that I had to “hit” to get into my body deeply, along with deep feeling content. The excess copper as a part of my journey through burnout represents a potential that wasn’t being utilized heretofore, you could say ‘owned’ or ‘conducted,’ that is, until I began to prepare this physical body to gradually hold more of the ‘charge,’ this innate drive I speak of above.

This challenge took me by the hand so I could develop a much deeper connection with myself. I confronted emotion that had been buried very deep but I was rendered very capable to “go there” each time those layers came up for navigation, due to the new level of energy and nutrients I had in place for the discharge. The layers of an old self (and the toxins and toxic metals that went with that) were released with much greater ease. With each toxic layer that was overthrown and as the calcium shell began to break up in my mineralogical profile as a reflection of a de-armoring process, receptivity for a renewed level of pulsation in my body happened and is ongoing.

A Perfect Storm Creates New Life

I am grateful that I’ve gotten underneath this “calcium shell” and the depression (which was reflecting a severe squelching of this orgonotic pulsation I mention above) and that my hormones are beginning to regulate and I’m confident that I can save my remaining ovary. I had an ovary surgically removed in 2008 after it ruptured from a large cyst.  My mother, who has now passed away from the estrogenic form of cancer that ravaged through her body, also had polycystic ovarian syndrome (PCOS) and after several surgeries in her thirties, ended up with a complete hysterectomy and had taken synthetic hormone replacement for decades.  My mom was often anxious and careworn about the health and wellbeing of her loved ones and certainly, in the last decade of her life, the state of chronic contraction was more evident. To even surrender to sleep was ever a challenge for her.

In Closing…  

…I continue to support my body at the level of functioning with metabolic balancing supplements and mineralogical ones for the mineralogical system, while monitoring my progress with HTMA testing. These support systems will continue to nourish this vitality. In doing what I can to support ‘aging gracefully,’ I continue to explore my potential. The idea of aging now feels wonderful. No more chronic sympatheticatonia.

1. Chatsworth, Colin & Loren/Eck, Dr. Paul.  Energy: How it Affects Your Emotions, Your Level of Achievement, and Your Entire Personal Well-Being. Sam Biser Press.
2. Reich, Wilhelm. (1973). The Function Of The Orgasm, Vol 1 of the Discovery of the Orgone. New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux.