Clinic 108

Went to clinic Friday. Always hear stories and learn new things. Met a guy who was 5 ½ months out, but he had had complications and been in the ICU for 2 ½ months, then another 2 months in the transition unit. Surprisingly, he still was able to smile when I was goofing around in the waiting room. Then I met another guy who was 3 months out and already gone to 6 week intervals on his clinical visits. I may not get there as quickly, being in a study of familial living donor transplant patients, so watched closer. Cutting edge stuff.

I have made my position known to the team that being a vegetarian should minimize complications, as meat has so many toxins in it, and antibiotic residues that must mess with your system. One guy 4 years out said I looked good for 6 weeks out. I feel fortunate. For a discussion of transplants from a devotee perspective, visit Transplants and Transfusions. I wonder if any other devotees have had a transplant? Let me know if you have heard of any. For a look at what various religions think about transplants, visit Donation and Transplantation: Religious Views.

I have to get blood work weekly, so it is driving 1 ¾ hours to Pittsburgh or 30 minutes to Wheeling. One plus of going to Pittsburgh is stopping at an Indian store and buying bitter melon. I am in an e-mail discussion with the transplant team’s pharmacist concerning supplements, based on scientific studies. She is advising not taking Alpha Lipoic Acid, which was my mainstay, as it stimulates T cell production. Certain T cells attack the liver allograft – rejection. While there are millions of different kinds of T cells, no use taking chances. Bitter melon has been given the nod, but avoid extracts. One side effect of the anti-rejection drug, Prograft, is diabetes in people who are prone to get it anyway. ALA is good to use in that situation, but so is bitter melon.

I didn’t get the numerical results of my blood work because there was a power outage in the Oakland section of Pittsburgh and the hospital was on emergency generators. So here are some numbers to fill the void:

1 ¹ x 2 ² x 3 ³ = 108 (1x4x27=108) = mantras in a round. What happens if we go x 4 ⁴?

108 x 4 =432 “At the present moment we have just passed through five thousand years of the Kali-yuga, which lasts 432,000 years.” Bg 4.1

432 x 4 = 1,728, the number of mantras chanted if you do 4² (16) rounds.

1,728 x 4 = 6,912 which is 64 rounds of mantras. If nothing else it is a sequence of multiples of 3 -- 6,9,12. Of course, 9 x 12 = 108.

6,912 x 4 = 27,648 “The beads are chanted a minimum of sixteen rounds daily, or in other words, 27,648 Names daily.”
Letter to: Hanuman Prasad Poddar -- Los Angeles 5 February 1970