I followed ACC protocol for three years. Got up to 200 ALA per dose and 20 mg DMPS, did very little DMSA. This is a long review of my progress, frustrations and set backs.
Eventually I hit a brick wall. Didn’t get worse than before I got started but I certainly regressed to fatigue and exhaustion. Tried considerably lower doses but with same result.
Going to tell you the good things and the bad things, but first here’s a bit about my experience:
Some improvement in sleep and digestion and fatigue levels… ACC made me somewhat functional.
Here’s one of my last reports on the ACC Forum:
Today I celebrate the end of my first max ALA dose. I’m officially at 200mg and probably won’t go any higher. Also at 17.5 DMPS so will get up to 25mg in the next few rounds. My first year I went from 25mg ALA to 62.5mg. Second year I only managed to get to 75mg. Almost entire year with such small dosing progress! And then in a bit more than half a year I got up to 200mg. Total rounds by now 113. Like many of you, I could probably write a book on the ways I tried to support my body and mind during this process. I was very sensitive to most recommended supplements. Mostly did C, E, selenium, chaga. I had to quit zinc and magnesium (occasional epsom bath) a few months ago and I did all this without any adrenal support. Most of you might not believe me but my biggest support was not supplements but a special QiGong practice. I completely credit it for lack of major setbacks in dosages and relatively quick post round recovery. Also, lately I focused a lot on my gut health with a few other supplements. My biggest gain is energy levels, digestion and improved sleep (if I play my cards well). There’s a slight improvement in thiol tolerance. I still feel them but I recover much sooner than before. Gut issues have improved but not gone away. Still histamine and glutamate sensitive, still no cow dairy or wheat gluten (I’ll probably avoid it for the rest of my life anyways).
Overall, it was a long, grueling, and rough journey. The fatigue, the night waking, the fear…
THE POSITIVE
Thiol understanding was my biggest gift from ACC
Understanding the DUMP phase and setting appropriate expectations
Amalgam removal, specks, etc
Overall, how mercury impacts health and chelation process
AVOID LIST is helpful… less experimentation with dangerous supplements, although it is a double-edged sword…
Mods do their best and contribute a lot of their time and experience, most are very kind. A lot of advice was good, based on the best knowledge they had.
Cheap – relatively speaking.
**** Would not had been able to progress without Selenium!
THE NEGATIVE
- Not encouraging: some people, including mods have been chelating for years and years with some progress but still far from healing. So what we have is people who are struggling to chelate giving advice about chelation.
- 80k thousand and very limited success stories from that kind of crowd. The usual answer from admins: those who got better moved on but what they don’t say is that…. those that got worse also moved on.
- I’ve developed additional symptoms and imbalances from this protocol, very likely due to years of magnesium, selenium, zinc. Developed massive copper intolerance. I now have to take small doses of antihistamine and haven’t been able to quit since.
- The problem with DMPS, DMSA and ALA is that they also remove essential minerals. ACC does account for that with the “CORE FOUR” supplements but the problem is you usually already start the protocol with massive mineral derangement (ex. unbound copper load) and adding large doses of zinc, magnesium, synthetic vitamin C and E can only make things worse.
- Boyd Haley PhD says the DMPS and DMSA chelators do not have a strong enough bond and when they tested them on rats they saw that the compounds did dislodge mercury but moved them into kidneys and that caused renal failure. They were invented in 1930s and 1940s by Russians and Germans. That is almost a 100 years ago. ALA is a different story. Probably another video about it…
- Protocol is set in stone with Dr. Cutler’s passing… New advances and empirical evidence is not being integrated into the protocol.
- They are convinced this is the only safe method out there and they fervently defend that “Do another round” attitude
- “Off topic” comments are turned off. Anything that is not part of the protocol, not welcome.
- There is no recognition that if the protocol does not work for someone or makes them much worse they need to stop and try something else… not blindly continue for years without any improvements!
- Some people have attempted or committed suicide…
- Andy Cutler himself never finished chelation. He said it interfered with his work but how can you teach if you never healed yourself? How can you help someone heal when you are sick yourself? If anything, Dr. Cutler’s early passing should be a lesson to us all that prioritizing work over healing is a tragic mistake.
- Andy’s original protocol did not take into account how toxic some people will be using his protocol and even he was surprised by micro-dossers thinking much of the problem is in their heads;
- Occasional really silly advice: “I’m taking ACE and its not agreeing with me…” Moderator suggests: “It’s a sign that you need it.”
- ACC protocol HAS healed many people, but I am guessing it made just as many more sick or in my case…. STUCK. The FACT is it just does NOT work for everyone, and there are many possible reasons, which the Facebook group are mostly NOT open to discussing.
I was pretty desperate when I stopped the protocol as I thought I was doomed but the more I researched the more stories I found of people chelating in various different ways…
So my biggest question was to chelate or just forget about it? Other docs like Hal Huggins (Boo: All in Your Head) says about half oh his patients recover over years without doing anything… PROOF of this in my video about QiGong how I started recovering a year before I EVEN REMOVED AMALGAMS
Anyways, I am now using OSR:
- According to the inventor, it’s a super antioxidant and glutathione molecule and bonds to Mercury and I feel like I am being part of the experiment but then again, an experiment started when some idiots decided that it is safe to offer people filling composed of 50% mercury which half of which evaporates in the first 7 years.
- Easier, less fatigue, easier to manage.
- It’s not a guarantee for everyone as many do react to OSR badly too.
How am I doing … better and better, recovering more and more but in similar pace as before which makes me question efficacy of chelation as a whole….
I also managed to figure out the triggers and find ways of supporting my body – ANOTHER VIDEO.
MY ADVICE?
ACC does not have a monopoly on mercury chelation. The protocol is not perfect and could use someone with similar qualifications as Andy Cutler to keep developing it. Especially the redistribution part… Redistribution is inherent with chelation and ACC protocol minimizes it but there’s a need to study this further and develop ways to minimize it even further.
If was to continue with ACC, I would add to the protocol binders, would more effectively address redistribution via hepatic enteric cycle (bile re-absorption) and also finish all rounds with OSR.
ALSO do all you can to increase bile production BEFORE you start the protocol. TUDCA and any botanicals work for some. Looking back, at a point I was able to progress with less side effects I started using Chaga mushroom… I even noted it in my diary but I had no idea at that time that it was a bile booster. But I was on to it…
One needs to remember, ACC causes constant redistribution of metals and mineral imbalances. Many, like me, eventually get to the point where we can no longer take the ACC recommended chelators and either need to take a long break or quit.
OSR claims to make a permanent bond with those metals, it totally made sense to me to use it instead.
If this does not work try other things!
Mercury may not be the root cause but a chain down the cascade of events that usually start with the gut and microbiome, aka compromised detox pathways due to low stomach acid, infection, virus, etc. It is also true that mercury will invite all those conditions and develops a long term symbiotic relationship.
I am no longer blindly focused on heavy metals and instead taking steps to address my entire “terrain”, including bottlenecks in liver, bile, digestion and metabolism.
Bottom line…
This is a wild wild area of science. I just can’t believe that at this day and age we still can not properly clinically establish chronic heavy metal toxicity and do not know everything there is to know about effectively removing heavy metals from our bodies. I mean we are relying on the work of a couple of big ego PHDs, few profit hungry Functional Medicine doctors with very expensive products and advice on the forums which comprises of mostly anecdotal evidence, a ton of wild guessing and often plain dangerous suggestions.
So to summarize: I am grateful of what I learned from ACC protocol. Just observing how one reasons through it, works with it, troubleshoots made me learn a great deal about heavy metal chelation.
But especially I am grateful about the support on the forum. You need a tribe to go through with this. Now, there are several tribes, different philosophies and a growing number of functional medicine doctors who are able to navigate heavy metal chelation.
Key is to do your homework and keep a positive outlook.
