Ann Lennan
Ann Lennan is typical of the patients seen at The Gilbert Clinic – highly motivated, successful in her career, and anxious for a medical solution that conventional medicine had been unable to provide. While the doctor/patient relationship prevents us from discussing the following cases in detail, all these patients have agreed to share with a wider audience the results of their treatment.

“My name is Ann Lennan and I’m a Vice President of the Society of Professional Benefit Administrators, a national trade association. Traditional medicine offered me unacceptable solutions to my medical problems and I was desperately seeking alternatives.

I was faced with a chronic problem that lasted for twenty-five years, and lately, just seemed to be getting worse. It hurt my energy level. It hurt my happiness level. It hurt my whole outlook on life.

At work, I found it difficult to concentrate, which had an impact on my productivity on the job. Add to that my concern, anxiety and the extreme discomfort around my condition, and the result was an emotional impact which made life all the more difficult.

The only answer I continued to receive from my traditional medical doctors was synthetic drugs that had given me no relief in twenty-five years. Dr. Blackman and Mr. Gilbert provided a gentle, non-invasive approach, with very positive side effects along with emotional support for my preferences. At one point I even needed emergency hospitalization, and Dr. Blackman and Mr. Gilbert helped me with that also.

I’m delighted with the outcome. I have more energy and the medical discomfort that I suffered with for twenty-five years vanished after only three months under the care of Dr. Blackman and Mr. Gilbert. And it’s just been going great ever since.

The difference in my life now is that before I had anxiety and pain. That has disappeared and my productivity and energy level has significantly increased.
I wanted to mention something else that’s important, and it has to do with the kind of care I got from traditional medicine. The time and patience provided by Dr. Blackman and Mr. Gilbert was a welcome change to the hurried and impersonal care I had been receiving. They considered my entire person, my stress points and my spirituality as well as my specific medical problems.

Before, I considered my health level to be at a one and now I’m a ten. I mean the problem that I had was actually life threatening, and it’s just gone away.”

Francene Engel

“My name is Francene Engel and I have a PhD in Political Science. Until about a year ago I had been a professor of Political Science, teaching constitutional law at the University of Michigan and at Baylor University. Right now I’m working as a consultant and I’m hoping to go back to teaching in the fall.

I’d started to get an arthritic-type of pain. Because arthritis is a big problem in my family, I was very concerned. I was tired all the time. I was in constant pain. I couldn’t sleep well from the pain. And I went to my primary care physician and I wasn’t getting any help because I would get five-minute appointments. But at the end of the appointment I didn’t feel like I was able to tell the doctor everything that was wrong with me. I couldn’t get into my family history because she was in and out within five minutes. So I never really felt like my medical condition was really getting addressed.

At my first appointment with Dr. Blackman, we talked all about my medical history. We talked about my life style, everything that was bothering me, how long it had been going on. I really felt like by the end of that appointment that all my questions and concerns were addressed.

When I left I was wondering whether this was really going to work because I’m used to the idea that you get this really powerful drug and that’s what is going to cure me. I was a little skeptical but I started noticing changes probably within a month and after 4 to 6 months I was really pain free.

In addition to being pain free, I’m generally much happier. I feel like I have my life back. I can pretty much do anything that I want to do.

Of course it cost me more than if I went to my primary care physician where I only pay a ten-dollar co-fee. But it’s completely worth the money because I’m so much better.

I feel like I’m living again. And I don’t have to take any prescription drugs.”

Frank Schwartz
“My name is Frank Schwartz and I’m a software engineer.
About three years ago I was involved in an accident and lost my leg. Coming out of recovery I started to have problems. I had the finest doctors in the state working on me. Basically, if I was just walking from, say, my house to my garage – 30 feet – I’d break out in a sweat. I knew I had a problem

So I went to a heart specialist and he wanted to give me another pill and I was already up to about six pills a day. I sensed that adding another pill wasn’t going to solve the problem. So it just happened that Dr. Blackman was on the radio.

Within two weeks of my initial visit with her, my sweating stopped. I could walk around again.

I got the weight down, and I never did have to take heart medicine. I figured my chemistry is all back in line, my system is back in order and I’m cruising. It was truly a success story.

If you look at my record it looks like a disaster from one end to the other. When I went in there my blood pressure was probably like 150 over 90 or 95 and now it’s just 128 over 80 like everybody else.

Dr. Blackman and Jonathan Gilbert changed my life. If I would have continued with ‘modern’ medicine alone, I would be taking a half a dozen pills a day, and the only solution they had was just to give me more pills. It just wasn’t working.

I’m an engineer. I’m trained that if you go down a path and it doesn’t work, then you go down another path until you find the one that works. And in this particular case conventional medicine didn’t work so I went down that other path and it worked. I think I’m a tough case because I’ve got a lot of things going on that they were able to solve.”

Ellie Antoine

“I’m Ellie Antoine. I am a program associate doing management and strategy consulting at a foundation.

I started working with Jonathan Gilbert as an absolute last resort. I had been suffering for about two to three years. And finally in the year prior to coming to see Jonathan I’d had about three or four surgeries. I had been to see many specialists and basically I was at the end of my rope and they were just about to schedule me for surgery. I was introduced to Jonathan and I’ve gone from not being able to go to work and not being able to walk and having low energy and being in chronic pain and on a constant dose of narcotics to control that pain to basically being on very minimal medication.

I couldn’t even do basic household chores. I didn’t have a social life because I couldn’t get out. I couldn’t walk and I was in constant joint pain. And I had a whole bunch of other problems that were brought on by the side effects of a lot of these medications. So I was basically living to medicate myself to control my symptoms.

Life is very, very different now. I can work effectively. My job requires a great deal of travel and I’m able to do that. I’m able to participate in life. I have leftover energy.

I’ve learned to listen to my body more. So instead of being at war with my body, I’m working to heal it. I guess I should have listened to it more when I was being given all these crazy medications and things were just not going well.

It really feels like waking up from a horrible nightmare. It’s a change from a hopeless situation to one that’s very hopeful. Now things feel like they’re back in balance as opposed to spiraling out of control.

I feel like I’m actually living.”

Deborah Stokes

“I’m Deborah Stokes and I’m a psychotherapist in private practice.

When I first got sick I was hit with a virus and had a fever of 102 for eight days. I couldn’t get out of bed for a month and a half. I felt totally weak. My head was clear but my body was very tired. I limped along for almost five years, spending tens of thousands of dollars on every kind of cure. But nothing helped.

Then I heard about Jonathan Gilbert.

He came highly recommended from another therapist who had sent him many people. And the second month into it, I’m cooking these herbs up every day and drinking them and not knowing what I’m doing. It looked like eye of newt, toe of frog and boiling it all up on a piece of tire from your car. Along about the second month I felt this energy in my chest just sort of growing and spreading out. I can’t explain it but it’s like a tingling, wonderful feeling. I felt like I was like ten years old again

In June it will be two years since that time. I’ve had one very brief relapse about a year ago. He gave me some powdered herbs for like a week and it kicked me right back to where I needed to be and I’ve been fine ever since.

In reading the research it seems like very few people get chronic fatigue who haven’t had a history of burning the candle at both ends. That was certainly me.
From the time I first got sick until I found Jonathan I would have to go home every day and nap for an hour and a half. But now I don’t have to do that at all.

I really thought I was dying so many times. I can understand why people become suicidal with chronic fatigue because I thought I was dying. If I didn’t have a good day once in a while I can’t imagine life. But this really gave me my life back.
Before, I was too weak to do yoga.

I remember crying and having to walk out of yoga class because my muscles were just shaking. Now I’ve been going to yoga twice a week for over a year and a half. I wouldn’t miss it.”

Julien Benichou

“I’m a conductor and I’m 35 years old and I’m in good health now but not then.

I met Jonathan Gilbert at the recommendation of a friend who had seemed absolutely transformed over the course of a year. After seeing her, I thought, ‘wow, what’s going on with her?’

She had been gray but now she was glowing with life. She gave me Jonathan’s number and so I made an appointment.

My symptoms were chronic pain on one side of my body and in the back in all the joints. I was in constant pain, but I thought to myself, 'I’m over 30 and I’m really old. That’s why I’m getting all this pain.' It seemed normal. I was putting ointments on all my joints every night before going to bed. I would go regularly for muscle therapy, which would relieve the pain for two days. I also tried all sorts of acupuncturists.

When I walked into Jonathan’s office and he diagnosed me, the thing that really struck me was the coherence of the diagnosis – how it just made sense as a system and how it explained the symptoms I was having. I felt like for the first time in my life I’m seeing somebody who is not just improvising. Here is a guy that knows what is going on and he’s working on it and then it works.

After two months of taking the treatment all the pains disappeared. Little by little my energy over the course of a year and a half just started to, I want to say ‘come back,’ but I actually have more energy than I did before.

When I tell friends that have a problem I say, ‘you should go see Jonathan Gilbert and they say things like, ‘oh no I don’t want to spend the money.’ And I’m thinking I would gladly get two hundred thousand dollars in debt for that treatment. But of course that’s only after I had the treatment. After I saw my friend being transformed, that was my hint that this guy must be good. And so since then my life is completely transformed. I’m another person. I feel like I’m living fully. I’m not just surviving.”