If you knew Andy Cutler, you probably just laughed at that subject line.
Andy could be blunt.
Okay, sometimes he could be spectacularly blunt.
If you came into one of his groups terrified because someone on the internet said something scientifically ridiculous was going to happen to you, there was a decent chance Andy wasn't going to spend fifteen minutes validating your fear.
He was going to tell you why it didn't make sense.
Possibly with the delicacy of a brick through a window.
And then, if you stuck around, he would explain the chemistry until you understood it well enough that you didn't need him to tell you what to think anymore.
That's the Andy I wish more people knew.
Because nearly a decade after his death, his name has become attached to a protocol. We talk about "ACC" and half-life and three-hour dosing and redistribution and all the rules.
But before there was an "Andy Cutler Protocol," there was a very sick chemist trying to figure out what the heck had happened to him.
Andy went from doctor to doctor without getting answers that made sense. Eventually, someone suggested mercury toxicity.
Most of us would have gone home and Googled it.
Andy basically went home and started a graduate seminar for one.
He dug into mercury chemistry. He studied the available chelators. He read pharmacology texts and obscure research papers. He tracked down studies in other languages. He talked to doctors. He talked to sick people. And, because he was also the unfortunate guinea pig in this story, he tried things himself.
Some went very badly.
He once described taking penicillamine and wondering if he was going to die.
Large challenge doses weren't much fun either.
And this is where I think people misunderstand how ACC developed.
Andy didn't sit at his desk, stare thoughtfully at a chemical structure and announce, "I HAVE INVENTED FREQUENT DOSE CHELATION."
He would have thought that was ridiculous.
He studied the science. He tried things. He watched what happened. He compared his experience with other people's experiences. When something didn't fit, he went back to the science and poked at it some more.
He once said he "didn't derive [his] protocol from on high."
That might be my favorite Andy quote.
Because for someone who eventually had thousands of people hanging on his recommendations, he was remarkably uninterested in being a guru.
He wanted you to THINK.
I once asked him about a pattern I thought I was seeing among parents. He could easily have given me a theory. Andy had theories about plenty of things.
Instead, he told me:
"If you can estimate numbers in different groups, I can poke at online statistical calculators to see if they appear significant."
That was Andy.
Before we spend an hour explaining why something might be happening, perhaps we should establish that the darn thing is actually happening.
And I think some of his legendary brashness came from that same place.
He watched sick people get paralyzed by fear, misinformation, and endless conflicting advice. He watched desperate parents chase things that hurt their kids. He wasn't interested in gently helping someone remain stuck there.
Sometimes he gave you a shove.
But behind that shove was an extraordinarily generous man.
He answered emails from complete strangers. He spent endless hours in online groups explaining the same concepts again and again. He even put his home phone number on his website.
People called him. And he helped them. When Andy died, the tributes weren't primarily about half-life or chelators.
People talked about his generosity. His curiosity. His patience. His music. His cooking. The elaborate meals he made for friends. The places he loved exploring.
They talked about the human being behind the protocol. That's why I wanted to write about how ACC actually came to exist. Because understanding Andy changes the way you understand the protocol.
He wasn't asking us to replace one authority with another and blindly follow Andrew Cutler instead. Quite the opposite.
He was saying: Learn enough that nobody gets to do your thinking for you. Read. Ask questions. Pay attention to what actually happens in real people.
That may be the part of Andy's legacy I value most. Well, that and the occasional verbal brick through the window.
Sometimes we needed one.
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