At 78 hisfriends, worried about how thin he was (doesn’t it always seem that it is your so-called friends who always ruin a natural cure) persuaded him to increase his dailyration by two ounces a day. His delicate and weak digestive system, which hadoperated perfectly for many years, was unable to deal with the additional twoounces, and he became very ill after a very short period of over eating. Worse, his recent indulgence had even further damaged the organs of digestion
and to survive Cornaro had to cut his daily ration to eight ounces of solid foodand eleven of liquids. On this reduced dietary he again regained his health andlived to be 100. Cornaro wrote four books on the value of abstinence or “soberliving” as he called it, writing the last and perhaps the most interesting at 96 yearsof age. Had my patient Jake been able to confine his food intake to the level of hisbody’s ability to digest, he might still be walking and enjoying life. But try as Imight I could not make him understand. Perhaps he enjoys doing penance in hiswheel chair more than he would enjoy health and life. Tissue Losses at Death By Starvation*
Fat 97%
Muscles 31Blood 27Liver 54Spleen 67Pancreas 17Skin 21Intestines 18Kidneys 26Lungs 18Testes 40Heart 3Brain and Spinal Cord 3Nerves 3Bone 14
* From Keys, Ancel, Joseph Brozek , Austin Henchel, Olaf Mickelson and
Henry L. Taylor, (1950) The Biology of Human Starvation. Two V ols. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press. Starvation
It is true that ethical medical doctors use the least-risky procedure they are
allowed to use. But this does not mean there are no risks to allopathic treatment.The medical doctor justifies taking the risks by saying that the risk/reward ratio isthe best possible. Any sick person is already at risk. Life comes with only oneguarantee: that none of us gets out of it alive. Compared to the risks of allopathic medicine, fasting is a far safer method of
treating disease. The oft-repeated scare stories medical doctors and their alliescirculate about fasting are not true, and it is important to remember that none ofthese people portraying fasting as evil and dangerous have ever fastedthemselves—I’ll put money on that one. Or, on the slim possibility that someonetelling fasting horror stories did actually not eat for 24 hours (probably becausesome accident or acute illness prevented them), they had a terrible experiencebecause they didn’t understand the process, were highly toxic, and were scaredto death the whole time. Or worse yet they fasted for a short period with an “open mind”—a very
dangerous state in which to approach anything new. I have found throughconsiderable experience with people professing to have open minds that their useof the expression “I’m open minded” usually means they have already made uptheir mind and new data just passes straight through their open mind—in one earand out the other. Or sometimes, the phrase “open mind” means a person thatdoes not believe any information has reality and is entirely unable to make up theirmind. The most commonly leveled criticism of fasting is that in its efforts to survive
self-imposed starvation the body metabolizes vital tissue, not just fat, andtherefore, fasting is damaging, potentially fatally damaging. People who tell youthis will also tell you that fasters have destroyed their heart muscle or ruined theirnervous system permanently. But this kind of damage happen only when a personstarves to death or starves to a point very close to death, not when someonefasts. There is a huge difference between fasting and starvation. Someone starving is
usually eating, but eating poorly and inadequately, eating scraps of whatever isavailable such as sugar, white flour, rancid grease, shoe leather, or even dirt.Frequently a starving person is forced to exercise a great deal as they struggle tosurvive and additionally is highly apprehensive. Or someone starving to death is
confined to a small space, may become severely dehydrated too and is in terror. Fear is very damaging to the digestive process, and to the body in general; fearspeeds up the destruction of vital tissue. People starve when trekking vastdistances through wastelands without food to eat, they starved in concentrationcamps, buried in mine disasters, they starve during famines and starve while beingtortured in prisons. Until water fasting goes on past the point where all fatty tissues and all
abnormal deposits have been burned for fuel and recycled for the nutritionalelements they contain, vital muscle tissues and organs are not consumed. And aslong as the body contains sufficient nutritional reserves, vital organs and essentialtissues are rebuilt and maintained. In fact the body has a great deal of intelligencethat we don’t give it credit for. It knows exactly which cells are essential tosurvival, which ones are not. The body knows which cells are abnormal deposits,and it goes to work to metabolize them first. For example, the body recognizesarthritic deposits, cysts, fibroids, and tumors as offensive parts of the landscape,and obligingly uses them for foods in preference to anything else. A starving (notfasting) body also knows precisely in what order of priority body cells should bemetabolized to minimize risk of death or permanent disability. After a starving body has reached skeletal condition, or where some small
amount of fat remains but nutritional reserves (vitamins and minerals) areexhausted and there is insufficient nourishment forthcoming, the body begins toconsume nutrient-rich muscle and organ tissue in a last-ditch effort to stay alive.Under these dire circumstances, the least essential muscles and organs from thestandpoint of survival are metabolized first. For example, muscles in the arms andlegs would be consumed early in the process, the heart muscle used only towardthe very end. The very last part of the body to be metabolized when one isstarving and as has come very close to death would be the brain and the nervoussystem. Starvation begins where fasting ends, which is when real hunger begins. If the
return of hunger is ignored whenever it takes place, whether it is in 30, 60, or 90
days depending upon body weight and type of fast, at that point exactly, not a daybefore, starvation begins very slowly. Usually it takes a considerable period oftime after that before death occurs. It is important to note that this discussionapplies only to the abstention from food, not water. Death takes place veryquickly in the absence of water. The chart on the previous page shows numerically the phenomenal ability of
the body to protect the most essential tissues of the body right up to the time ofdeath. If a person fasted for 30 days, the average time it takes for the return ofhunger in a person that is not at all overweight, and then ignored the return ofhunger, and continued to abstain from food—if the person could avoid forcedexercise, keep warm, and had enough hydration, it could take as much as anadditional 20 to 60 days to die of starvation! At death the body would haveexperienced losses of 40 to 60 percent of its starting body weight. (Ancel Keys etal, 1950) A emaciated person can not afford to lose nearly as much weight as anobese person, and death under conditions of starvation will occur earlier. In allcases of starvation the brain, nerves, heart, lungs, kidneys and liver remain largelyintact and functional to the very end. During a fast, it is almost impossible todamage essential organs, unless of course the person creates the damage by fearsabout the process, or by internalizing the fears of others. If those fears arepresent, the fast should not be attempted. Weight Loss By Fasting
Loss of weight indicates, almost guarantees, that detoxification and healing is
occurring. I can’t stress this too much. Of all the things I find my patients seem tomisunderstand or forget after being told, it is that they can’t heal in a rapid mannerwithout getting smaller. This reality is especially hard for the family and friends ofsomeone who is fasting, who will say, “you’re looking terrible dear, so thin. Yourskin is hanging on your bones. You’re not eating enough protein or nutrient food
to be healthy and you must eat more or you’re going to develop serious
deficiencies. You don’t have any energy, you must be getting sicker. You’re doingthe wrong thing, obviously. You have less energy and look worse every day. Goand see a doctor before it is too late.” To succeed with friends like this, a fasterhas to be a mighty self-determined person with a powerful ability to disagree withothers. Medical personnel claim that rapid weight loss often causes dangerous
deficiencies; these deficiencies force the person to overeat and regain even moreweight afterward. This is largely untrue, though there is one true aspect to it: afasted, detoxified body becomes a much more efficient digester and assimilator,extracting a lot more nutrition from the same amount food is used to eat. If, afterextended fasting a person returns to eating the same number of calories as theydid before; they will gain weight even more rapidly than before they stated fasting.When fasting for weight loss, the only way to keep the weight off is to greatlyreform the diet; to go on, and stay on, a diet made up largely of non-starchy,watery fruits and vegetables, limited quantities of cooked food, and very limitedamounts of highly concentrated food sources like cereals and cooked legumes.Unless, of course, after fasting, one’s lifestyle involves much very hard physicallabor or exercise. I’ve had a few obese fasters become quite angry with me forthis reason; they hoped to get thin through fasting and after the fast, to resumeovereating with complete irresponsibility as before, without weight gain. People also fear weight loss during fasting because they fear becoming
anorexic or bulimic. They won’t! A person who abstains from eating for thepurpose of improving their health, in order to prevent or treat illness, or even onewho fasts for weight loss will not develop an eating disorder. Eating disordersmean eating compulsively because of a distorted body image. Anorexics andbulimics have obsessions with the thinner-is-better school of thought. Theanorexic looks at their emaciated frame in the mirror and thinks they are fat! Thisis the distorted perception of a very insecure person badly in need of therapy. A
bulimic, on the other hand stuffs themselves, usually with bad food, and then
purges it by vomiting, or with laxatives. Anorexics and bulimics are notaccelerating the healing potential of their bodies; these are life threateningconditions. Fasters are genuinely trying to enhance their survival potential. Occasionally a neurotic individual with a pre-existing eating disorder will
become obsessed with fasting and colon cleansing as a justification to legitimizetheir compulsion. During my career while monitoring hundreds of fasters, I’veknown two of these. I discourage them from fasting or colon cleansing, and refuseto assist them, because they carry the practices to absurd extremes, andcontribute to bad press about natural medicine by ending up in the emergencyward of a hospital with an intravenous feeding tube in their arm. Cases Beyond The Remedy Of Fasting
Occasionally, very ill people have a liver that has become so degenerated it
cannot sustain the burden of detoxification. This organ is as vital to survival as thebrain, heart and lungs. We can get along with only one kidney, we can live with nospleen, with no gallbladder, with only small parts of the stomach and intestines,but we can not survive without a liver for more than a day or so. The liver is themost active organ in the body during detoxification. To reach an understanding ofdetoxification, it helps to know just what the liver does for us on an ongoing basis. The liver is a powerful chemical filter where blood is refined and purified. The
liver passes this cleansed blood out through the superior vena cava, directly to theheart. The blood is then pumped into general and systemic circulation, where itreaches all parts of the body, delivering nutrition and oxygen at a cellular level. Onits return flow, a large proportion of the depleted blood is collected by the gastric,splenic and superior and inferior mesenteric veins that converge to form the largeportal vein which enters the liver. Thus a massive flow of waste from all the cellsof the body is constantly flowing into the liver. The huge hepatic artery also entersthe liver to supply oxygen and nutrients with which to sustain the liver cellsthemselves. The liver is constantly at work refining the blood. It is synthesizing, purifying,
renovating, washing, filtering, separating and detoxifying. It works day and nightwithout stopping. Many toxins are broken down by enzymes and their componentparts are efficiently reused in various parts of the body. Some impurities arefiltered out and held back from the general circulation. These debris are collectedand stored in the gall bladder, which is a little sack appended to the liver. After ameal, the contents of the gall bladder (bile) are discharged into the duodenum, theupper part of the small intestine just beyond the stomach. This bile also containsdigestive enzymes produced by the liver that permit the breakdown of fatty foodsin the small intestine. Sometimes a large flow of bile finds its way into the stomach by pressure or is
sucked into the stomach by vomiting. Excessive biliary secretion and excretioncan also result from overeating, which overcrowds the area. Sometimes colonicsor massage can also stimulate a massive flow of bile. Extremely bitter andirritating, when bile gets into the stomach the person either vomits or wishes theycould. And after vomiting and experiencing the taste of bile, wishes they hadn’t. When no food at all enters the system, the blood keeps right on passing
through the liver/filter just as it does when we are eating. When the liver does nothave to take care of toxins generated by the current food intake, each passagethrough the liver results in a cleaner blood stream, with the debris decreasing inquantity, viscosity, and toxicity, until the blood becomes normalized. Duringfasting, debris from the gall bladder still pass through the small intestine and intothe large intestine. However, if the bowels do not move the toxins in the bile arereadsorbed into the blood stream and get recirculated in an endless loop. Thistoxic recycling makes a faster feel just terrible, like they had a flu or worse! The bowels rarely move while fasting. During fasting only enemas or colonics
permit elimination from the large intestine. If done effectively and frequently,enemas will greatly add to the well being and comfort of the faster. Many timeswhen a faster seems to be retracing or experiencing a sudden onset of acute
discomfort or symptoms, these can be almost immediately relieved by an enema
or colonic. A person with major liver degeneration inevitably dies, with or without fasting,
with or without traditional medicine. Significantly impaired kidney function canalso bring about this same result. Mercifully, death while fasting is usuallyaccomplished relatively free of pain, clear of mind and with dignity. That often cannot be said of death in a hospital. There are much worse experiences than death. Fasting is not a cure-all. There are some conditions that are beyond the ability
of the body to heal. Ultimately, old age gets us all. Dr. Linda Hazzard, one of the greats of natural hygiene, who practiced
Osteopathic medicine in the 1920s, had a useful way of categorizing conditionsthat respond well to fasting. These she labeled “acute conditions,” and “chronicdegenerative conditions.” A third classification, “chronic conditions with organicdamage,” does not respond to fasting. Acute conditions, are usually inflammationsor infections with irritated tissue, with swelling, redness, and often copioussecretions of mucous and pus, such as colds, flu, a first time case of pneumonia,inflamed joints as in the early stages of arthritis, etc. These acute conditionsusually remedy in one to three weeks of fasting. Acute conditions are excellentcandidates for self-doctoring. Chronic degenerative conditions are more seriousand the patient usually requires supervision. These include conditions such ascancer, aids, chronic arthritis, chronic pneumonia, emphysema and asthma.Chronic degenerative conditions usually respond within a month to three monthsof fasting. The fasting should be broken up into two or three sessions if thecondition has not been relieved in one stint of supervised fasting. Each successivefast will produce some improvement and if a light, largely raw-food diet isadhered to between fasts the patient should not worsen and should be fairlycomfortable between fastings. If there has been major functional damage to an organ as a result of any of
these degenerative conditions, healing will not be complete, or may be impossible. By organic damage, I mean that a vital part of the body has ceased to function
due to some degenerative process, injury, or surgery—so badly damaged that thecells that make up the organ can not be replaced. I once had a twenty five year old man come to my spa to die in peace because
he had been through enough diagnostic procedures in three hospitals to know thathis liver was beyond repair. He had been working on an apple farm in betweenterms at university when he was poisoned several times with insecticide from anaerial spray on the whole orchard. He absorbed so much insecticide that his liverincurred massive organic damage. When he came to me his body had reached the point where it was incapable
of digesting, and because of lack of liver function, it was incapable of healingwhile fasting, a condition in which death is a certainty. He was a Buddhist, did notfear death and did not want to be kept alive in agony or in prolongedunconsciousness by any extraordinary means, nor did he want to die with tubes inevery orifice. I was honored to be a supportive participant in his passing. He diedfasting, in peace, and without pain, with a clear mind that allowed him toconsciously prepare for the experience. He was not in a state of denial or fear,and made no frantic attempts to escape the inevitable. He went quietly into thatstill dark night with a tranquil demeanor and a slight smile. Fortunately, in my many years of practice I had the pleasure of seeing the
majority of the people totally regain their health or at least greatly improve it bymeans of the fasting and healing diets. Many cancer patients watched withamazement as their tumors disappeared before their eyes, many arthritics regainedtheir function, serious skin conditions such as psoriasis disappeared, mentalconditions improved, addictions vanished, fatigue was replaced by energy, and fatdissolved revealing the hidden sculpture beneath. I will talk more aboutprocedures and the particular reasons bodies develop specific conditions in laterchapters. Social/Cultural/Psychological Obstacles To Fasting
Numerous attitudes make it difficult to fast or to provide moral support to
friends or loved ones that are fasting. Many people harbor fears of losing weightbecause they think that if times were really tough, if there was a famine or theybecame ill and lost a lot of weight they would have no reserves and wouldcertainly perish. These people have no idea how much fat can be concealed on aneven skinny body, nor of how slowly a skinny body loses weight while fasting.Substantial fat reserves are helpful as heat-retaining insulation in those rareaccidents when someone is dropped into a cold ocean and must survive until therescue boat arrives. Being fat might keep a person alive longer who is lost in thewilderness awaiting rescue with no supplies, no means of procuring food, and nomeans of keeping warm. On the other hand, fat people would have a far hardertime walking out of the wilderness. And extensive fat deposits are merely fuel anddo not contain extensive nutritional reserves. An obese person fasting withoutsignificant nutritional supplementation would begin starving long before theybecame really skinny. On the balance, carrying excess weight is a far greaterliability than any potential pro-survival aspects it might have. There are other attitudes associated with weight loss that make it difficult for
people to fast. People hold rather stereotypical notions about what constitutes anattractive person; usually it involves having some flesh on one’s bones. Hollywoodand Hugh Hefner have both influenced the masses to think that women shouldhave hourglass figures with large, upthrust, firm breasts. Since breasts are almostall useless fatty tissue supporting some milk-producing glands that do not give abreast much volume except when engorged, most women fasters loose a goodpercentage of their breast mass. If the fast is extensive, there should also developan impressive showing of ribs and hip bones; these are not soft and cuddly.Husbands, lovers, parents, and friends frequently point out that you don’t lookgood this way and exhort you to put on weight. Most people think pleasantlyplump is healthy. Skinny men, especially those who had lost a lot of weight during an illness, are
pressured by associates to put on weight to prove that they are healthy. I had aclient who was formerly a college varsity football player. Before his illness he hadlifted weights and looked like a hunk. His family and friends liked to see him thatway and justifiably so. Then he got seriously ill. On a long extended healing diethe lost a significant amount of weight and seemed downright skinny, causing allwho knew him well and cared about him to tempt him with all kinds ofscrumptious delicacies from the best of kitchens. But this case was like LuigiCornaro, a man who never again could look like a hunk. His “friends” made anabsolutely necessary change in life style and appearance far more difficult than itwas already. My client was torn between a desire to please others, and a desireto regain and retain his health. This problem a sick person doesn’t need. If you have the independence to consider following an alternative medical
program in a culture that highly values conformity and agreement, you are alsogoing to have to defend your own course of self-determined action based on thebest available data that you have. But fasters are usually in fragile emotionalcondition, so I advise my clients who are subjected to this kind of pressure to begtheir friends and associates to refrain from saying anything if they can’t support thecourse of action you have chosen. After this, if friends or relatives are stillincapable of saying nothing (even non-verbally), it is important to exclude themfrom your life until you have accomplished your health goals, have regained someweight and have returned to eating a maintenance diet, rather than getting skinnieron a healing one. The very worst aspect of our culture’s eating programming is that people have
been wrongfully taught that when ill they must eat to keep up their strength.Inherent in this recommendation is an unstated belief that when the body isweakened by a disease state, the weakness can somehow be overcome withfood, and that the body needs this food to kill the virus, bacteria, or invadingyeast, and uses the protein to heal or rebuild tissue. Sadly, the exact opposite is
the case. Disease organisms feed and multiply on the toxic waste products of
misdigestion, and the body is unable to digest well when it is weak or ill.
There’s an old saying about this: “feed a cold, starve a fever.” Most people
think this saying means you should eat when you have a cold. What the sayingreally means is if you feed a cold then you will soon have to starve a fever.Chcken soup? Protein foods especially are not digested by a diseased body, andas mentioned before, the waste products of protein indigestion are especiallypoisonous. That is all the body needs when it is already down, another load ofpoison which it can’t eliminate due to weakness and enervation. Weight loss is usually associated with illness, as it should be! In times of acute
illness an otherwise healthy body loses its appetite for food because it is pro-survival to stop eating. It is very hard to coax a sick animal to eat. Their bodies,not controlled by a mind full of complex learned responses and false ideas,automatically know that fasting is nature’s method of healing. Contrary to popularunderstanding, digestion, assimilation, and elimination require the expenditure ofconsiderable energy. This fact may contradict the reader’s experience becauseeveryone has become tired when they have worked a long time without eating,and then experienced the lift after eating. But an ill body cannot digest efficientlyso instead of providing energy extracted from foods, the body is further burdenedby yet another load of toxic material produced by fermented and putrefied food.This adds insult to injury in a sick body that is already drowning in its owngarbage. Worse, during illness most available vital force is already redirected into
healing; it is not available for digestion. It is important to allow a sick body toproceed with healing and not to obstruct the process with unnecessary digestionor suppress the symptoms (which actually are the healing efforts) with drugs. Ifyou have an acute illness, and you stop all food intake except for pure water andherb teas, and perhaps some vegetable broth, or dilute non-sweet juice, you haverelieved your body of an immense effort. Instead of digesting, the body goes to
work on catching up on healing. The body can and will almost inevitably heal itself
if the sick person will have faith in it, cooperate with the body’s efforts by allowingthe symptoms of healing to exist, reduce or eliminate the intake of food to allowthe body to marshal its energies, maintain a positive mental attitude and otherwisestay out of the way. Many people intensely dread missing even one meal. These folks usually are
and have been so toxic that their bodies had been stashing uneliminated toxins intheir fat for years. They are usually so addicted to caffeine, cigarettes, alcohol,and so forth, that when they had fasted, even briefly, their bodies were forced todip into highly-polluted fat reserves while simultaneously the body beginswithdrawal. People like this who try to fast experience highly unpleasantsymptoms including headache, irritability, inability to think or concentrate, blurredvision, profound fatigue, aches, etc. Most of these symptoms come from lowblood sugar, but combined with the toxins being released from fat and combinedwith going through multiple addictive withdrawals, the discomforts are more thanmost people are willing to tolerate. Fasting on juice is much more realistic forcases like this. It is little wonder that when a hygienist suggests a fast to improvehealth, this type of case asserts positively that fasting is quite impossible, they havetried it, it is absolutely terrible and know that they can’t do it. This rejection is partly due to a cultural expectation (one reinforced by western
medicine) that all unpleasant symptoms should be avoided or suppressed. Tovoluntarily experience unpleasant sensations such as those mentioned above ismore than the ordinary timid person will subject themselves to, even in order toregain health. They will allow surgery, drugs with violent and dangerous sideeffects, painful and invasive testing procedures and radiation—all unpleasant andsometimes extremely uncomfortable. These therapies are accepted becausesomeone else with authority is doing it to them. And, they have been told that itthey don’t submit they will not ever feel better and probably will die in the nearfuture. Also people think that they have no alternative, that the expert in front of
them knows what is best, so they feel relieved to have been relieved of the
responsibility for their own condition and its treatment. Preventative Fasting
During the years it takes for a body to degenerate enough to prompt a fast, the
body has been storing up large quantities of unprocessed toxins in the cells,tissues, fat deposits, and organs. The body in its wisdom will always choose totemporarily deposit overwhelming amounts of toxins somewhere harmless ratherthan either permit the blood supply to become polluted or to use secondaryelimination routes. A body will use occasions when the liver is less burdened toeliminate these stored toxic debris. The hygienist’s paradigm asserts that themanifestation of symptoms or illness are all by themselves, absolute, unassailableproof that further storage of toxic wastes in the cells, tissues, fat deposits, andorgans is not possible and that an effort toward elimination is absolutelynecessary. Thus the first time a person fasts a great quantity of toxins will normallybe released. Being the resident of a body when this is happening can be quiteuncomfortable. For this reason alone, preventative fasting is a very wise idea. Before the body becomes critically ill, clean up your reserve fuel supply (fat
deposits) by burning off some accumulated fat that is rich in toxic deposits andthen replace it with clean, non-toxic fat that you will make while eating sensibly. Ifyou had but fasted prophylactically as a preventative or health-creating measurebefore you became seriously ill, the initial detoxification of your body could havebeen accomplished far more comfortably, while you were healthy, while your vitalforce was high and while your body otherwise more able to deal withdetoxification. Each time you fast, even if it is only one day, you allow your body to go
through a partial detox, and each time it becomes easier and more comfortablethan the last time. The body learns how to fast. Each time you fast it, your bodyslips into a cleansing mode more quickly, and each time you fast you lighten the
load of stored toxins. Perhaps you have already eliminated the caffeine your body
had stored, which frequently causes severe headaches on withdrawal, not tomention fatigue. It certainly helps to have this behind you before you go on to theelimination of other irritating substances. Many people have gone through alcoholor tobacco withdrawal, and understand that it is very unpleasant, and also that itmust be done in the pursuit of health. Why not withdraw from the rest of theirritating and debilitating substances we take into our system on an ongoing basis,and why not grit your way through the eliminative process, withdraw, from foodaddictions such as sugar or salt, and from foods that you may be allergic to likewheat, dairy products or eggs. It is very wise to invest in your own insurance plan by systematically
detoxifying while you are still healthy. Plan it into your life, when it is convenient,such as once a week on Sunday, or even once a month on a quiet day. Take afew days of vacation, go to a warm, beautiful place and devote part or all of it tocleansing. Treat yourself by taking an annual trip to Hawaii, fasting at a hotel onthe beach—do whatever it takes to motivate yourself. And consider this:vacations are enormously cheaper when you stay out of restaurants. If you have accustomed your body to 24 hour fasts, then you can work on 48
hour fasts, and over time work up to 72 hour fasts, all on a continuum. You mayfind it becoming increasingly comfortable, perhaps even pleasant, something youlook forward to. Fasting a relatively detoxified body feels good, and peopleeventually really get into the clean, light, clear headed, perhaps spiritually awarestate that goes along with it. By contrast, fasting when you are sick is much more difficult because your
vitality or vital force is very low, you already have no energy, and probably haveunpleasant symptoms that must be dealt with at the same time. There may be theadded stress of being forced into a cleanse because you are too nauseous to eat.Most people let their health go until they are forced into dealing with it; they aretoo busy living, so why bother. The truth is that our body does age, and over time becomes less able to deal
with insults; the accumulated effect of insults and aging eventually leads most of usto some serious degenerative illness. Normally this begins happening around age50 if not sooner. Some of us that were gifted with good genes or what I call “agood start” may have reached the age of 60 or 75 or even 90 without seriousillness, but those people are few and far between. Why not tip the scales in yourfavor by preventing or staving off health problems with systematic detoxification atyour own convenience. Climb into the drivers seat and start to take control and gain confidence in
your own ability to deal with your body, your own health, and your own life.When it gets right down to the bottom line, there is really only one thing in theworld that is really yours, and that is your life. Take control and start managing it.The reward will be a more qualitative life. Chapter Four
Colon Cleansing
From The Hygienic Dictionary
Autointoxication . [1] the accumulations on the bowel wall become a breeding ground for unhealthy
bacterial life forms. The heavy mucus coating in the colon thickens and becomes a host forputrefaction. The blood capillaries to the colon begin to pick up the toxins, poisons and noxiousdebris as it seeps through the bowel wall. All tissues and organs of the body are now taking on toxicsubstances. Here is the beginning of true autointoxication on a physiological level. Bernard Jensen,Tissue Cleansing Through Bowel Management. [2] All maladies are due to the lack of certain food
principles, such as mineral salts or vitamins, or to the absence of the normal defenses of the body,such as the natural protective flora. When this occurs, toxic bacteria invade the lower alimentary canal,and the poisons thus generated pollute the bloodstream and gradually deteriorate and destroy everytissue, gland and organ of the body. Sir Arbuthnot Lane. [3] The common cause of gastro-intestinalindigestion is enervation and overeating When food is not digested, it becomes a poison. Dr. John. H.Tllden, Impaired Health: Its Cause and Cure,  1921. [4] a clogging up of the large intestine by a
building up (on) the bowel wall to such an extent that feces can hardly pass through. autointoxicationis a direct result of intestinal constipation. Faulty nutrition is a major underlying factor inconstipation. The frequency or quantity of fecal elimination is not an indication of the lack ofconstipation in the bowel. Bernard Jensen, Tissue Cleansing Through Bowel Management. I am not a true believer in any single healing method or system. I find much
truth in many schools and use a wide variety of techniques. The word for myinclination is eclectic. The most effective medicine in my arsenal is water fasting followed closely in
potency by other, less rigorous detoxifying diets. Colon cleansing ranks next inhealing power. In fact it is difficult to separate colon cleansing from fastingbecause detoxification programs should always be accompanied by coloncleansing. Further down the scale of efficatiousness comes dietary reform to
eliminate allergic reactions and to present the body with foods it is capable of
digesting without creating toxemia. Last, and usually least in effectiveness in myarsenal, are orthotropic substances (in the form of little pills and capsules)commonly known as vitamins or food supplements. Interestingly, acceptance of these methods by my clients runs in exact
opposition to their effectiveness. People prefer taking vitamins because they seemlike the allopaths’ pills, taking pills demands little or no responsibility for change.The least popular prescription I can write is a monodiet of water for severalweeks or a month. Yet this is my most powerful medicine. It is possible to resolve many health complaints without fasting, simply by
cleansing the colon and regaining normal lower bowel function. Colonics take littlepersonal effort and are much easier to get people to accept than fasting. So I canfully understand how perfectly honest and ethical naturopaths have developedobsessions with colon cleansing. Some healers have loudly and repeatedly (andwrongly) proclaimed that constipation is the sole cause of disease, and thus, theonly real cure for any illness is colon cleansing. Even though it is possible to have a lot of successes with the simple (though
unpleasant to administer) technique of colon cleansing, degenerated lower bowelsare not the only cause of disease. I prefer to use bowel cleansing as an adjunct tomore complete healing programs. However, old classics of hygiene and even afew new books strongly make the case for colonics. Some of these books areentirely one-sided, single-cause single-cure approaches, and sound convincing tothe layperson. For this reason, I think I should take a few paragraphs and explainwhy some otherwise well-intentioned health professionals have overly-advocatedcolonics (and other practices as well). Most Diseases Cure Themselves
If you ask any honest medical doctor how they cure diseases, they will tell you
that most acute disease conditions and a smaller, though significant percentage
(probably a majority) of chronic disease conditions are self-limiting and will, given
time, get better all by themselves. So for most complaints, the honest allopathicdoctor sees their job as giving comfort and easing the severity of the symptomsuntil a cure happens. This same scenario, when viewed from a hygienist’s perspective, is that almost
all acute and many chronic conditions are simply the body’s attempt to handle acrisis of toxemia. For two reasons the current crisis will probably go away byitself. The positive reason is that the toxic overload will be resolved: the personchanges their dietary habits or the stressor that temporarily lowered their vitalforce and produced enervation is removed, then digestion improves and the levelof self-generated toxins is reduced. The negative reason for a complaint to “cure”itself is that the suffering person’s vital force drops below the level that thesymptom can be manifested and the complaint goes away because a new, moreserious disease is developing. I view this second possibility as highly undesirable because strong, healthy
bodies possessing a high degree of vital force are able to eliminate toxins ratherviolently, frequently producing very uncomfortable symptoms that are not life-threatening. However, as the vital force drops, the body changes its routes ofsecondary elimination and begins using more centrally located vital organs andsystems to dispose of toxemia. This degeneration producing less unpleasantsymptoms, but in the long run, damages essential organs and moves the personcloser to their final disease. A young vigorous body possessing a large degree of vital force will almost
always route surplus toxins through skin tissues and skin-like mucus membranes,producing repeated bouts of sinusitis, or asthma, or colds, or a combination of allthese. Each acute manifestation will “cure” itself by itself eventually. But eventuallythe body’s vital force can no longer create these aggressive cleansing phenomenaand the toxemia begins to go deeper. When the allopathic doctor gets a patientcomplaining of sinusitis, they know they will eventually get a cure. The “cure”however, might well be a case of arthritis. This unfortunate reality tends to make young, idealistic physicians become
rather disillusioned about treating degenerative conditions because the end resultof all their efforts is, in the end, death anyway. The best they can do is to alleviatesuffering and to a degree, prolong life. The worst they can do is to prolongsuffering. Thus, the physicians main job is to get the patient to be patient, to wait until the
body corrects itself and stops manifesting the undesired symptom. Thus comesthe prime rule of all humane medicine: first of all, do no harm! If the doctor simplyrefrains from making the body worse, it will probably get better by itself. But thepatient, rarely resigned to quiet suffering, comes in demanding fast relief,demanding a cure. In fact, if the patient were resigned to quiet suffering theywould not consult a doctor. So if the doctor wants to keep this patient and makea living they must do something. If that something the doctor must do does little orno harm and better yet, can also alleviate the symptoms, the doctor is practicinggood medicine and will have a very high cure rate and be financially successful ifthey have a good bedside manner. This kind of doctor may be allopathic and/or“natural,” may use herbs or practice homeopathy. The story of Dr. Jennings, a very successful and famous or infamous
(depending on your viewpoint) physician, who practiced in Connecticut in theearly 1800s exemplifies this type of approach. Dr. Jennings had his own unique medicines. Their composition was of his own
devising, and were absolutely secret. He had pills and colored bitter drops ofvarious sorts that were compounded himself in his own pharmacy. Dr. Jennings’patients generally recovered and had few or no complications. This must beviewed in contrast to the practices of his fellow doctors of that era, whose blackbags were full of mercury and arsenic and strychnine, whose practices includedobligatory bleeding. These techniques and medicines “worked” by poisoning thebody or by reducing its blood supply and thus lowering its vital force, ending thebody’s ability to manifest the undesirable symptom. If the poor patient survived
being victimized by their own physician, they were tough enough to survive both
their disease and the doctor’s cure. Typically, the sick had many, lengthycomplications, long illnesses, and many “setbacks” requiring many visits, earningthe physician a great living. Dr. Jennings operated differently. He would prescribe one or two secret
medicines from his black bag and instruct the patient to stay in bed, get lots ofrest, drink lots of water, eat little and lightly, and continue taking the medicine untilthey were well. His cure rate was phenomenal. Demand they might, but Dr.Jennings would never reveal what was in his pills and vials. Finally at the end ofhis career, to instruct his fellow man, Dr. Jennings confessed. His pills were madefrom flour dough, various bitter but harmless herbal substances, and a little sugar.His red and green and black tinctures, prescribed five or ten drips at a time mixedin a glass of water several times daily, were only water and alcohol, some colorantand something bitter tasting, but harmless. Placebos in other words. Upon confessing, Dr. Jennings had to run for his life. I believe he ended up
retiring on the western frontier, in Indiana. Some of his former patients wereextremely angry because they had paid good money, top dollar for “real”medicines, but were given only flour and water. The fact that they got better didn’tseem to count. If the physicians curative procedure suppresses the symptom and/or lowers
the vital force with toxic drugs or surgery, (either result will often as not end thecomplaint) the allopathic doctor is practicing bad medicine. This doctor too willhave a high cure rate and a good business (if they have an effective bedsidemanner) because their drugs really do make the current symptoms vanish veryrapidly. Additionally, their practice harmonizes with a common but viciousdramatization of many people which goes: when a body is malfunctioning, it is abad body and needs to be punished. So lets punish it with poisons and if thatdon’t work, lets really punish it by cutting out the offending part. However, if the physician can do something that will do no harm but raises the
vital force and/or lowers the level of toxemia, this doctor will have a genuine cure
rate higher than either of the two techniques. Why does raising the vital forcehelp? Because it reduces enervation, improves the digestion, lowers the creationof new toxins and improves the function of the organs of elimination, also reducingthe toxic overload that is causing the complaint. Techniques that temporarily and quickly raise the vital force include
homeopathy, chiropractic, vitamin therapy, massage, acupuncture andacupressure and many more spiritually oriented practices. Healers who use theseapproaches and have a good bedside manner can have a very good business,they can have an especially-profitable practice if they do nothing to lower the levelof toxemia being currently generated. Their patients do experience prompt reliefbut must repeatedly take the remedy. This makes for satisfied customers and arepeat business. The best approach of all focuses on reducing the self-generated level of
toxemia, cleansing to remove deposits of old toxemia, rebuilding the organs ofelimination and digestion to prevent the formation of new toxemia, and then, toalleviate the current symptoms and make it easier for the patient to be patientwhile their body heals, the healer raises artificially and temporarily the vital forcewith vitamins, massage, acupressure, etc. This wise and benevolent physician isgoing to have the highest cure rate among those wise patients who will accept theprescription, but will not make as much money because the patients permanentlyget better and no longer need a physician. There’s not nearly as much repeatbusiness. Colonics are one of the best types of medicine. They clean up deposits of old
toxemia (though there are sure to be other deposits in the body’s tissues colonicsdo not touch). Colon cleansing reduces the formation of new toxemia fromputrefying fecal matter (but dietary reform is necessary to maximize this benefit).Most noticeable to the patient, a colonic immediately alleviates current symptomsby almost instantly reducing the current toxic load. A well-done enema or colonic
is such a powerful technique that a single one will often make a severe headache
vanish, make an onsetting cold go away, end a bout of sinusitis, end an asthmaticattack, reduce the pain of acute arthritic inflammation, reduce or stop an allergicreaction. Enemas are also thrifty: they are self-administered and can prevent mostdoctor’s visits seeking relief for acute conditions. Diseases of the colon itself, including chronic constipation, colitis, diverteculitis,
hemorrhoids, irritable bowel syndrome, and mucous colitis, are often cured solelyby an intensive series of several dozen colonics given close together. Contrary topopular belief, many people think that if they have dysentery or other forms ofloose stools that a colonic is the last thing they need. Surprisingly, a series ofcolonics will eliminate many of these conditions as well. People with chronicdiarrhea or loose stools are usually very badly constipated. This may seem acontradiction in terms but it will be explained shortly. A century ago there was much less scientific data about the functioning of the
human body. Then it was easy for a hygienically-oriented physician to come tobelieve that colonics were the single best medicine available. The doctorpracticing nothing but colonics will have a very high rate of cure and a lot of verysatisfied clients. Most importantly, this medicine will have done no harm. The Repugnant Bowel
I don’t know why, but people of our culture have a deep-seated reluctance to
relate to the colon or it’s functions. People don’t want to think about the colon orpersonally get involved with it by giving themselves enemas or colonics. Theybecome deeply embarrassed at having someone else do it for them. People arealso shy about farts, and most Americans have a hard time not smiling or reactingin some way when someone in their presence breaks wind, although the politeamongst us pretend that we didn’t notice. Comedians usually succeed in getting alaugh out of an audience when they come up with a fart or make reference tosome other bowel function. People don’t react the same way to urinary functions
or discharges, although these also may have an unpleasant odor and originate
from the same “private” area. When I first mention to clients that they need a minimum of 12 colonics or
many more enemas than 12 during a fasting or cleansing program they areinevitably shocked. To most it seems that no one in their right mind wouldrecommend such a treatment, and that I must certainly be motivated by greed orsome kind of a psychological quirk. Then I routinely show them reproductions ofX-rays of the large intestine showing obvious loss of normal structure and functionresulting from a combination of constipation, the effects of gravity, poorabdominal muscle tone, emotional stress, and poor diet. In the average colonmore than 50% of the hastrum (muscles that impel fecal matter through the organ)are dysfunctional due to loss of tone caused by impaction of fecal matter and/orconstriction of the large intestine secondary to stress (holding muscular tension inthe abdominal area) and straining during bowel movement. The average personalso has a prolapsed (sagging) transverse colon, and a distorted misplacedascending and descending colon. I took a course in colon therapy before purchasing my first colonic machine. The chiropractor teaching the class required all of his patients scheduled forcolonics to take a barium enema followed by an X-ray of their large intestine priorto having colonics and then make subsequent X-rays after each series of 12colonics. Most of his patients experienced so much immediate relief theyvoluntarily took at least four complete series, or 48 colonics, before their X-raysbegan to look normal in terms of structure. It also took about the same number,48 colonics, for the patients to notice a significant improvement in the function ofthe colon. In reviewing over 10,000 X-rays taken at his clinic prior to startingcolonics, the chiropractor had seen only two normal colon X-rays and these werefrom farm boys who grew up eating simple foods from the garden and doing lotsof hard work. A typical diseased colon
A Healthy Colon
The X-rays showed that it took a minimum of 12 colon treatments to bring
about a minimal but observable change in the structure of the colon in the desireddirection, and for the patient to begin to notice that bowel function was improving,plus the fact that they started to feel better. From my point of view the most amazing part of this whole experience was
that the chiropractor did not recommend any dietary changes whatsoever. Hispatients were achieving great success from colonics alone. I had thought dietarychanges would be necessary to avoid having the same dismal bowel conditionreturn. I still think colonics are far more effective if people are on a cleansing diettoo. However, I was delighted to see the potential for helping people throughcolonics. For me, the most interesting part of this colonic school was that I personally
was required to have my own barium enema and X-ray. I was privately certainthat mine would look normal, because after all, I had been on a raw food diet forsix years, and done considerable amount of fasting, all of which was reputed torepair a civilized colon. Much to my surprise my colon looked just as mangledand dysfunctional as the others’, only somewhat worse because it had a loop inthe descending colon similar to a cursive letter “e” which doctors call a volvulus.Surgeons like to cut volvululii out because they frequently cause bowelobstructions. It seemed quite unfair. All those other people with lousy lookingcolons had been eating the average American diet their whole life, but I had beenso pure! On further reflection I remembered that I had a tendency toward constipation
all through my childhood and young adulthood, and that during my twopregnancies the pressure of the fetus on an already constipated bowel had made itworse resulting in the distorted structure seen in the X-ray. This experience madeit very clear that fasting, cleansing diets, and corrected diet would not reversedamage already done. Proper diet and fasting would however, prevent thecondition of the colon from getting any worse than it already was. I then realized that I had just purchased the very tool I needed to correct my
own colon, and I was eager to get home to get started on it. I had previouslythought that I was just going to use this machine for my patients, because they hadbeen asking for this kind of an adjunct to my services for some time. I ended upgiving myself over a hundred colonics at the rate of three a week over manymonths. I then out of curiosity had another barium enema and X-ray to validatemy results. Sure enough the picture showed a colon that looked far more normalwith no vulvulus. That little “e” had disappeared. What Is Constipation? Most people think they are not constipated because they have a bowel
movement almost every day, accomplished without straining. I have even hadclients tell me that they have a bowel movement once a week, and they are quitecertain that they are not constipated. The most surprising thing to novice fasters isthat repeated enemas or colonics during fasting begins to release many pounds ofundeniably real, old, caked fecal matter and/or huge mucus strings. The first-timefaster can hardly believe these were present. These old fecal deposits do notcome out the first time one has enemas or necessarily the fifth time. And all ofthem will not be removed by the tenth enema. But over the course of extendedfasting or a long spell of light raw food eating with repeated daily enemas, amazingchanges do begin to occur. It seems that no one who has eaten a civilized diet hasescaped the formation of caked deposits lining the colon’s walls, interfering withits function. This material does not respond to laxatives or casually administeredenemas. Anyone who has not actually seen (and smelled) what comes out of an
“average” apparently healthy person during colonics will really believe it couldhappen or can accurately imagine it. Often there are dark black lumpy strings,lumps, or gravel, evil smelling discs shaped like sculpted hemispheres similar tothe pockets lining the wall of the colon itself. These discs are rock-hard and may
come out looking like long black braids. There may also be long tangled strings of
gray/brown mucous, sheets and flakes of mucous, and worse yet, an occasionalworm (tape worm) or many smaller ones. Once confronted however, it is nothard to imagine how these fecal rocks and other obnoxious debris interfere withthe proper function of the colon. They make the colon’s wall rigid and interferewith peristalsis thus leading to further problems with constipation, and interferewith adsorption of nutrients. Our modern diet is by its “de-”nature, very constipating. In the trenches of the
First World War, cheese was given the name “chokem ass” because the soldierseating this as a part of their daily ration developed severe constipation. Eaten byitself or with other whole foods, moderate amounts of cheese may not producehealth problems in people who are capable of digesting dairy products. Butcheese when combined with white flour becomes especially constipating. Whitebread or most white-flour crackers contain a lot of gluten, a very sticky wheatprotein that makes the bread bind together and raise well. But white flour islacking the bran, where most of the fiber is located. And many other processedfoods are missing their fiber. In an earlier chapter I briefly showed how digestion works by following food
from the mouth to the large intestine. To fully grasp why becoming constipated isalmost a certainty in our civilization a few more details are required. Food leavingthe small intestine is called chyme, a semi-liquid mixture of fiber, undigested bits,indigestible bits, and the remains of digestive enzymes. Chyme is propelledthrough the large intestine by muscular contractions. The large intestine operateson what I dub the “chew chew train” principle, where the most recent meal youate enters the large intestine as the caboose (the last car of a train) and helps topush out the train engine (the car at the front that toots), which in a healthy colonshould represent the meal eaten perhaps twelve hours earlier. The muscles in thecolon only contract when they are stretched, so it is the volume of the fecal matterstretching the large intestine that triggers the muscles to push the waste materialalong toward the rectum and anus. Eating food lacking fiber greatly reduces the volume of the chyme and slows
peristalsis. But moving through fast or slow, the colon still keeps on doing anotherof its jobs, which is to transfer the water in the chime back into the bloodstream,reducing dehydration. So the longer chime remains in the colon, the dryer andharder and stickier it gets. That’s why once arrived at the “end of the tracks” fecalmatter should be evacuated in a timely manner before it gets to dry and too hardto be moved easily. Some constipated people do have a bowel movement everyday but are evacuating the meal eaten many days or even a week previously. Most hygienists believe that when the colon becomes lined with hardened fecal
matter it is permanently and by the very definition of the word itself, constipated.This type of constipation is not perceived as an uncomfortable or overly fullfeeling or a desire to have a bowel movement that won’t pass. But it has insidiouseffects. Usually constipation delays transit time, increasing the adsorption of toxinsgenerated from misdigestion of food; by coating and locking up significantportions of colon it also reduces the adsorption of certain minerals andelectrolytes. Sometimes, extremely constipated people have almost constant runny bowels
because the colon has become so thickly and impenetrably lined with old fecalmatter that it no longer removes much moisture. This condition is oftenmisinterpreted as diarrhea. The large intestine’s most important task is to transferwater-soluble minerals from digested food to the blood. When a significant part ofthe colon’s surface becomes coated with impermeable dried rigid fecal matter ormucus it can no longer assimilate effectively and the body begins to experiencepartial mineral starvation in the presence of plenty. It is my observation fromdozens of cases that when the colon has been effectively cleansed the person hasa tendency to gain weight while eating amounts of food that before onlymaintained body weight, while people who could not gain weight or who werewasting away despite eating heavily begin to gain. And problems like softfingernails, bone loss around teeth or porous bones tend to improve. The Development Of My Own Constipation
The history of my own constipation, though it especially relates to a very rustic
childhood, is typical of many people. I was also raised on a very constipating dietwhich consisted largely of processed cheese and crackers. Mine was acceleratedby shyness, amplified by lack of comfortable facilities. I spent my early years on the Canadian prairies, where everybody had an
outhouse, and not the fancy modern versions frequently seen on constructionsites. These are chemical toilets, quiet different than the ones I was raised withbecause somebody or something mysteriously comes along, empties them andinstalls toilet paper. The ones I’m familiar with quickly developed a bad-smellingsteaming mound in the center—or it was winter when the outhouse was so coldthat everything froze almost before it hit the ground in the hole below. (And myrear end seemed to almost freeze to the seat!) The toilet paper was usually an outof season issue of Eatons mail order catalogue with crisp glossy paper. Perhaps itis a peculiarity of the north country, but at night there are always monsters lurkingalong the path to the outhouse, and darkness comes early and stays late. When nature called and it was daylight, and there was no blizzard outside, the
outhouse received a visit from me. If on the other hand, when it was dark (we hadno electricity), and there was a cold wind creating huge banks of snow, I wouldjust skip it, because the alternative—an indoor chamber pot, white enamel with alid—was worse. This potty had to be used more or less publicly because thebedrooms were shared and there was no indoor bathroom. I was always verymodest about my private parts and private functions, and potty’s were only usedin emergencies, and usually with considerable embarrassment. No one everexplained to me that it was not good for me to retain fecal matter, and I neverthought about it unless my movements became so hard that it was painful toeliminate. Later in life, I continued this pattern of putting off bowel movements, even
though outhouses and potties were a thing of the past. As a young adult I could
always think of something more interesting to do than sitting on a pot, besides it
was messy and sometimes accompanied by embarrassing sound effects whichwere definitely not romantic if I was in the company of a young man. During twopregnancies the tendency to constipation was aggravated by the weight of thefetus resting on an already sluggish bowel, and I won’t foregt the discomfort ofstraining to pass my first hard bowel movement after childbirth with a tornperineum. Rapid Relief From Colon Cleansing
During fasting the liver is hard at work processing toxins released from fat and
other body deposits. The liver still dumps its wastes into the intestines through thebile duct. While eating normally, bile, which contains highly toxic substances, ispassed through the intestines and is eliminated before too much is reabsorbed. (Itis the bile that usually makes the fecal matter so dark in color.) However,reduction of food bulk reduces or completely eliminates peristalsis, thus allowingintestinal contents to sit for extended periods. And the toxins in the bile arereadsorbed, forming a continuous loop, further burdening the liver. The mucus membranes lining the colon constantly secrete lubricants to ease
fecal matter through smoothly. This secretion does not stop during fasting; in fact,it may increase because intestinal mucus often becomes a secondary route ofelimination. Allowed to remain in the bowel, toxic mucus is an irritant while thetoxins in it may be reabsorbed, forming yet another closed loop and furtherburdening the liver. Daily enemas or colonics administered during fasting or while on cleansing
diets effectively remove old fecal material stored in the colon and immediatelyease the livers load, immediately relieve discomfort by allowing the liver’s effortsto further detoxify the blood, and speed healing. Fasters cleansing on juice or rawfood should administer two or three enemas in short succession every day for thefirst three days to get a good start on the cleansing process, and then every other
day or at very minimum, every few days. Enemas or colonics should also be
taken whenever symptoms become uncomfortable, regardless of whether youhave already cleaned the colon that day or not. Once the faster has experiencedthe relief from symptoms that usually comes from an enema they become morethan willing to repeat this mildly unpleasant experience. Occasionally enemas, by filling the colon and making it press on the liver,
induce discharges of highly toxic bile that may cause temporary nausea. Despitethe induced nausea it is still far better to continue with colonics because of thegreat relief experienced after the treatment. If nausea exists or persists duringcolon cleansing, consider trying slight modifications such as less or no massage ofthe colon in the area of the gall bladder (abdominal area close to the bottom ofthe right rib cage), and putting slightly less water in the colon when filling it up. Italso helps to make sure that the stomach is empty of any fluid for one hour priorto the colonic. Resume drinking after the colonic sessions is completed. If you areone of these rare people who “toss their bile,” just keep a plastic bucket handyand some water to rinse out the mouth after, and carry on as usual. Enemas Versus Colonics
People frequently wonder what is the difference between a colonic and an
enema. First of all enemas are a lot cheaper because you give them to yourself; an
enema bag usually costs about ten dollars, is available at any large drug store, andis indefinitely reusable. Colonics cost anywhere from 30 to 75 dollars a session. Chiropractors and naturopaths who offer this service hire a colonic technician
that may or may not be a skilled operator. It is a good idea to find a person whohas a very agreeable and professional manner, who can make you feel at easesince relaxation is very important. It is also beneficial to have a colonic therapistwho massages the abdomen and foot reflexes appropriately during the session. Enemas and colonics can accomplish exactly the same beneficial work. But
colonics accomplish more improvement in less time than enemas for several
reasons. During a colonic from 30 to 50 gallons of water are flushed through thelarge intestines, usually in a repetitive series of fill-ups followed by flushing with acontinuous flow of water. This efficiency cannot even be approached with anenema. But by repeating the enema three times in close succession a satisfactorycleanse can be achieved. Persisted with long enough, enemas will clean the colonevery bit as well as a colonic machine can.
Be_your_own_doctor.txt
Summarize the following text section accurately and concisely. Maintain specific details and numerical information, and use anti-repetition mechanisms:

        At 78 hisfriends, worried about how thin he was (doesn’t it always seem that it is your so-called friends who always ruin a natural cure) persuaded him to increase his dailyration by two ounces a day. His delicate and weak digestive system, which hadoperated perfectly for many years, was unable to deal with the additional twoounces, and he became very ill after a very short period of over eating. Worse, his recent indulgence had even further damaged the organs of digestion
and to survive Cornaro had to cut his daily ration to eight ounces of solid foodand eleven of liquids. On this reduced dietary he again regained his health andlived to be 100. Cornaro wrote four books on the value of abstinence or “soberliving” as he called it, writing the last and perhaps the most interesting at 96 yearsof age. Had my patient Jake been able to confine his food intake to the level of hisbody’s ability to digest, he might still be walking and enjoying life. But try as Imight I could not make him understand. Perhaps he enjoys doing penance in hiswheel chair more than he would enjoy health and life. Tissue Losses at Death By Starvation*
Fat 97%
Muscles 31Blood 27Liver 54Spleen 67Pancreas 17Skin 21Intestines 18Kidneys 26Lungs 18Testes 40Heart 3Brain and Spinal Cord 3Nerves 3Bone 14
* From Keys, Ancel, Joseph Brozek, Austin Henchel, Olaf Mickelson and
Henry L. Taylor, (1950) The Biology of Human Starvation. Two V ols. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press. Starvation
It is true that ethical medical doctors use the least-risky procedure they are
allowed to use. But this does not mean there are no risks to allopathic treatment. The medical doctor justifies taking the risks by saying that the risk/reward ratio isthe best possible. Any sick person is already at risk. Life comes with only oneguarantee: that none of us gets out of it alive. Compared to the risks of allopathic medicine, fasting is a far safer method of
treating disease. The oft-repeated scare stories medical doctors and their alliescirculate about fasting are not true, and it is important to remember that none ofthese people portraying fasting as evil and dangerous have ever fastedthemselves—I’ll put money on that one. Or, on the slim possibility that someonetelling fasting horror stories did actually not eat for 24 hours (probably becausesome accident or acute illness prevented them), they had a terrible experiencebecause they didn’t understand the process, were highly toxic, and were scaredto death the whole time. Or worse yet they fasted for a short period with an “open mind”—a very
dangerous state in which to approach anything new. I have found throughconsiderable experience with people professing to have open minds that their useof the expression “I’m open minded” usually means they have already made uptheir mind and new data just passes straight through their open mind—in one earand out the other. Or sometimes, the phrase “open mind” means a person thatdoes not believe any information has reality and is entirely unable to make up theirmind. The most commonly leveled criticism of fasting is that in its efforts to survive
self-imposed starvation the body metabolizes vital tissue, not just fat, andtherefore, fasting is damaging, potentially fatally damaging. People who tell youthis will also tell you that fasters have destroyed their heart muscle or ruined theirnervous system permanently. But this kind of damage happen only when a personstarves to death or starves to a point very close to death, not when someonefasts. There is a huge difference between fasting and starvation. Someone starving is
usually eating, but eating poorly and inadequately, eating scraps of whatever isavailable such as sugar, white flour, rancid grease, shoe leather, or even dirt. Frequently a starving person is forced to exercise a great deal as they struggle tosurvive and additionally is highly apprehensive. Or someone starving to death is
confined to a small space, may become severely dehydrated too and is in terror. Fear is very damaging to the digestive process, and to the body in general; fearspeeds up the destruction of vital tissue. People starve when trekking vastdistances through wastelands without food to eat, they starved in concentrationcamps, buried in mine disasters, they starve during famines and starve while beingtortured in prisons. Until water fasting goes on past the point where all fatty tissues and all
abnormal deposits have been burned for fuel and recycled for the nutritionalelements they contain, vital muscle tissues and organs are not consumed. And aslong as the body contains sufficient nutritional reserves, vital organs and essentialtissues are rebuilt and maintained. In fact the body has a great deal of intelligencethat we don’t give it credit for. It knows exactly which cells are essential tosurvival, which ones are not. The body knows which cells are abnormal deposits,and it goes to work to metabolize them first. For example, the body recognizesarthritic deposits, cysts, fibroids, and tumors as offensive parts of the landscape,and obligingly uses them for foods in preference to anything else. A starving (notfasting) body also knows precisely in what order of priority body cells should bemetabolized to minimize risk of death or permanent disability. After a starving body has reached skeletal condition, or where some small
amount of fat remains but nutritional reserves (vitamins and minerals) areexhausted and there is insufficient nourishment forthcoming, the body begins toconsume nutrient-rich muscle and organ tissue in a last-ditch effort to stay alive. Under these dire circumstances, the least essential muscles and organs from thestandpoint of survival are metabolized first. For example, muscles in the arms andlegs would be consumed early in the process, the heart muscle used only towardthe very end. The very last part of the body to be metabolized when one isstarving and as has come very close to death would be the brain and the nervoussystem. Starvation begins where fasting ends, which is when real hunger begins. If the
return of hunger is ignored whenever it takes place, whether it is in 30, 60, or 90
days depending upon body weight and type of fast, at that point exactly, not a daybefore, starvation begins very slowly. Usually it takes a considerable period oftime after that before death occurs. It is important to note that this discussionapplies only to the abstention from food, not water. Death takes place veryquickly in the absence of water. The chart on the previous page shows numerically the phenomenal ability of
the body to protect the most essential tissues of the body right up to the time ofdeath. If a person fasted for 30 days, the average time it takes for the return ofhunger in a person that is not at all overweight, and then ignored the return ofhunger, and continued to abstain from food—if the person could avoid forcedexercise, keep warm, and had enough hydration, it could take as much as anadditional 20 to 60 days to die of starvation. At death the body would haveexperienced losses of 40 to 60 percent of its starting body weight. (Ancel Keys etal, 1950) A emaciated person can not afford to lose nearly as much weight as anobese person, and death under conditions of starvation will occur earlier. In allcases of starvation the brain, nerves, heart, lungs, kidneys and liver remain largelyintact and functional to the very end. During a fast, it is almost impossible todamage essential organs, unless of course the person creates the damage by fearsabout the process, or by internalizing the fears of others. If those fears arepresent, the fast should not be attempted. Weight Loss By Fasting
Loss of weight indicates, almost guarantees, that detoxification and healing is
occurring. I can’t stress this too much. Of all the things I find my patients seem tomisunderstand or forget after being told, it is that they can’t heal in a rapid mannerwithout getting smaller. This reality is especially hard for the family and friends ofsomeone who is fasting, who will say, “you’re looking terrible dear, so thin. Yourskin is hanging on your bones. You’re not eating enough protein or nutrient food
to be healthy and you must eat more or you’re going to develop serious
deficiencies. You don’t have any energy, you must be getting sicker. You’re doingthe wrong thing, obviously. You have less energy and look worse every day. Goand see a doctor before it is too late. ” To succeed with friends like this, a fasterhas to be a mighty self-determined person with a powerful ability to disagree withothers. Medical personnel claim that rapid weight loss often causes dangerous
deficiencies; these deficiencies force the person to overeat and regain even moreweight afterward. This is largely untrue, though there is one true aspect to it: afasted, detoxified body becomes a much more efficient digester and assimilator,extracting a lot more nutrition from the same amount food is used to eat. If, afterextended fasting a person returns to eating the same number of calories as theydid before; they will gain weight even more rapidly than before they stated fasting. When fasting for weight loss, the only way to keep the weight off is to greatlyreform the diet; to go on, and stay on, a diet made up largely of non-starchy,watery fruits and vegetables, limited quantities of cooked food, and very limitedamounts of highly concentrated food sources like cereals and cooked legumes. Unless, of course, after fasting, one’s lifestyle involves much very hard physicallabor or exercise. I’ve had a few obese fasters become quite angry with me forthis reason; they hoped to get thin through fasting and after the fast, to resumeovereating with complete irresponsibility as before, without weight gain. People also fear weight loss during fasting because they fear becoming
anorexic or bulimic. They won’t. A person who abstains from eating for thepurpose of improving their health, in order to prevent or treat illness, or even onewho fasts for weight loss will not develop an eating disorder. Eating disordersmean eating compulsively because of a distorted body image. Anorexics andbulimics have obsessions with the thinner-is-better school of thought. Theanorexic looks at their emaciated frame in the mirror and thinks they are fat. Thisis the distorted perception of a very insecure person badly in need of therapy. A
bulimic, on the other hand stuffs themselves, usually with bad food, and then
purges it by vomiting, or with laxatives. Anorexics and bulimics are notaccelerating the healing potential of their bodies; these are life threateningconditions. Fasters are genuinely trying to enhance their survival potential. Occasionally a neurotic individual with a pre-existing eating disorder will
become obsessed with fasting and colon cleansing as a justification to legitimizetheir compulsion. During my career while monitoring hundreds of fasters, I’veknown two of these. I discourage them from fasting or colon cleansing, and refuseto assist them, because they carry the practices to absurd extremes, andcontribute to bad press about natural medicine by ending up in the emergencyward of a hospital with an intravenous feeding tube in their arm. Cases Beyond The Remedy Of Fasting
Occasionally, very ill people have a liver that has become so degenerated it
cannot sustain the burden of detoxification. This organ is as vital to survival as thebrain, heart and lungs. We can get along with only one kidney, we can live with nospleen, with no gallbladder, with only small parts of the stomach and intestines,but we can not survive without a liver for more than a day or so. The liver is themost active organ in the body during detoxification. To reach an understanding ofdetoxification, it helps to know just what the liver does for us on an ongoing basis. The liver is a powerful chemical filter where blood is refined and purified. The
liver passes this cleansed blood out through the superior vena cava, directly to theheart. The blood is then pumped into general and systemic circulation, where itreaches all parts of the body, delivering nutrition and oxygen at a cellular level. Onits return flow, a large proportion of the depleted blood is collected by the gastric,splenic and superior and inferior mesenteric veins that converge to form the largeportal vein which enters the liver. Thus a massive flow of waste from all the cellsof the body is constantly flowing into the liver. The huge hepatic artery also entersthe liver to supply oxygen and nutrients with which to sustain the liver cellsthemselves. The liver is constantly at work refining the blood. It is synthesizing, purifying,
renovating, washing, filtering, separating and detoxifying. It works day and nightwithout stopping. Many toxins are broken down by enzymes and their componentparts are efficiently reused in various parts of the body. Some impurities arefiltered out and held back from the general circulation. These debris are collectedand stored in the gall bladder, which is a little sack appended to the liver. After ameal, the contents of the gall bladder (bile) are discharged into the duodenum, theupper part of the small intestine just beyond the stomach. This bile also containsdigestive enzymes produced by the liver that permit the breakdown of fatty foodsin the small intestine. Sometimes a large flow of bile finds its way into the stomach by pressure or is
sucked into the stomach by vomiting. Excessive biliary secretion and excretioncan also result from overeating, which overcrowds the area. Sometimes colonicsor massage can also stimulate a massive flow of bile. Extremely bitter andirritating, when bile gets into the stomach the person either vomits or wishes theycould. And after vomiting and experiencing the taste of bile, wishes they hadn’t. When no food at all enters the system, the blood keeps right on passing
through the liver/filter just as it does when we are eating. When the liver does nothave to take care of toxins generated by the current food intake, each passagethrough the liver results in a cleaner blood stream, with the debris decreasing inquantity, viscosity, and toxicity, until the blood becomes normalized. Duringfasting, debris from the gall bladder still pass through the small intestine and intothe large intestine. However, if the bowels do not move the toxins in the bile arereadsorbed into the blood stream and get recirculated in an endless loop. Thistoxic recycling makes a faster feel just terrible, like they had a flu or worse. The bowels rarely move while fasting. During fasting only enemas or colonics
permit elimination from the large intestine. If done effectively and frequently,enemas will greatly add to the well being and comfort of the faster. Many timeswhen a faster seems to be retracing or experiencing a sudden onset of acute
discomfort or symptoms, these can be almost immediately relieved by an enema
or colonic. A person with major liver degeneration inevitably dies, with or without fasting,
with or without traditional medicine. Significantly impaired kidney function canalso bring about this same result. Mercifully, death while fasting is usuallyaccomplished relatively free of pain, clear of mind and with dignity. That often cannot be said of death in a hospital. There are much worse experiences than death. Fasting is not a cure-all. There are some conditions that are beyond the ability
of the body to heal. Ultimately, old age gets us all. Dr. Linda Hazzard, one of the greats of natural hygiene, who practiced
Osteopathic medicine in the 1920s, had a useful way of categorizing conditionsthat respond well to fasting. These she labeled “acute conditions,” and “chronicdegenerative conditions. ” A third classification, “chronic conditions with organicdamage,” does not respond to fasting. Acute conditions, are usually inflammationsor infections with irritated tissue, with swelling, redness, and often copioussecretions of mucous and pus, such as colds, flu, a first time case of pneumonia,inflamed joints as in the early stages of arthritis, etc. These acute conditionsusually remedy in one to three weeks of fasting. Acute conditions are excellentcandidates for self-doctoring. Chronic degenerative conditions are more seriousand the patient usually requires supervision. These include conditions such ascancer, aids, chronic arthritis, chronic pneumonia, emphysema and asthma. Chronic degenerative conditions usually respond within a month to three monthsof fasting. The fasting should be broken up into two or three sessions if thecondition has not been relieved in one stint of supervised fasting. Each successivefast will produce some improvement and if a light, largely raw-food diet isadhered to between fasts the patient should not worsen and should be fairlycomfortable between fastings. If there has been major functional damage to an organ as a result of any of
these degenerative conditions, healing will not be complete, or may be impossible. By organic damage, I mean that a vital part of the body has ceased to function
due to some degenerative process, injury, or surgery—so badly damaged that thecells that make up the organ can not be replaced. I once had a twenty five year old man come to my spa to die in peace because
he had been through enough diagnostic procedures in three hospitals to know thathis liver was beyond repair. He had been working on an apple farm in betweenterms at university when he was poisoned several times with insecticide from anaerial spray on the whole orchard. He absorbed so much insecticide that his liverincurred massive organic damage. When he came to me his body had reached the point where it was incapable
of digesting, and because of lack of liver function, it was incapable of healingwhile fasting, a condition in which death is a certainty. He was a Buddhist, did notfear death and did not want to be kept alive in agony or in prolongedunconsciousness by any extraordinary means, nor did he want to die with tubes inevery orifice. I was honored to be a supportive participant in his passing. He diedfasting, in peace, and without pain, with a clear mind that allowed him toconsciously prepare for the experience. He was not in a state of denial or fear,and made no frantic attempts to escape the inevitable. He went quietly into thatstill dark night with a tranquil demeanor and a slight smile. Fortunately, in my many years of practice I had the pleasure of seeing the
majority of the people totally regain their health or at least greatly improve it bymeans of the fasting and healing diets. Many cancer patients watched withamazement as their tumors disappeared before their eyes, many arthritics regainedtheir function, serious skin conditions such as psoriasis disappeared, mentalconditions improved, addictions vanished, fatigue was replaced by energy, and fatdissolved revealing the hidden sculpture beneath. I will talk more aboutprocedures and the particular reasons bodies develop specific conditions in laterchapters. Social/Cultural/Psychological Obstacles To Fasting
Numerous attitudes make it difficult to fast or to provide moral support to
friends or loved ones that are fasting. Many people harbor fears of losing weightbecause they think that if times were really tough, if there was a famine or theybecame ill and lost a lot of weight they would have no reserves and wouldcertainly perish. These people have no idea how much fat can be concealed on aneven skinny body, nor of how slowly a skinny body loses weight while fasting. Substantial fat reserves are helpful as heat-retaining insulation in those rareaccidents when someone is dropped into a cold ocean and must survive until therescue boat arrives. Being fat might keep a person alive longer who is lost in thewilderness awaiting rescue with no supplies, no means of procuring food, and nomeans of keeping warm. On the other hand, fat people would have a far hardertime walking out of the wilderness. And extensive fat deposits are merely fuel anddo not contain extensive nutritional reserves. An obese person fasting withoutsignificant nutritional supplementation would begin starving long before theybecame really skinny. On the balance, carrying excess weight is a far greaterliability than any potential pro-survival aspects it might have. There are other attitudes associated with weight loss that make it difficult for
people to fast. People hold rather stereotypical notions about what constitutes anattractive person; usually it involves having some flesh on one’s bones. Hollywoodand Hugh Hefner have both influenced the masses to think that women shouldhave hourglass figures with large, upthrust, firm breasts. Since breasts are almostall useless fatty tissue supporting some milk-producing glands that do not give abreast much volume except when engorged, most women fasters loose a goodpercentage of their breast mass. If the fast is extensive, there should also developan impressive showing of ribs and hip bones; these are not soft and cuddly. Husbands, lovers, parents, and friends frequently point out that you don’t lookgood this way and exhort you to put on weight. Most people think pleasantlyplump is healthy. Skinny men, especially those who had lost a lot of weight during an illness, are
pressured by associates to put on weight to prove that they are healthy. I had aclient who was formerly a college varsity football player. Before his illness he hadlifted weights and looked like a hunk. His family and friends liked to see him thatway and justifiably so. Then he got seriously ill. On a long extended healing diethe lost a significant amount of weight and seemed downright skinny, causing allwho knew him well and cared about him to tempt him with all kinds ofscrumptious delicacies from the best of kitchens. But this case was like LuigiCornaro, a man who never again could look like a hunk. His “friends” made anabsolutely necessary change in life style and appearance far more difficult than itwas already. My client was torn between a desire to please others, and a desireto regain and retain his health. This problem a sick person doesn’t need. If you have the independence to consider following an alternative medical
program in a culture that highly values conformity and agreement, you are alsogoing to have to defend your own course of self-determined action based on thebest available data that you have. But fasters are usually in fragile emotionalcondition, so I advise my clients who are subjected to this kind of pressure to begtheir friends and associates to refrain from saying anything if they can’t support thecourse of action you have chosen. After this, if friends or relatives are stillincapable of saying nothing (even non-verbally), it is important to exclude themfrom your life until you have accomplished your health goals, have regained someweight and have returned to eating a maintenance diet, rather than getting skinnieron a healing one. The very worst aspect of our culture’s eating programming is that people have
been wrongfully taught that when ill they must eat to keep up their strength. Inherent in this recommendation is an unstated belief that when the body isweakened by a disease state, the weakness can somehow be overcome withfood, and that the body needs this food to kill the virus, bacteria, or invadingyeast, and uses the protein to heal or rebuild tissue. Sadly, the exact opposite is
the case. Disease organisms feed and multiply on the toxic waste products of
misdigestion, and the body is unable to digest well when it is weak or ill. There’s an old saying about this: “feed a cold, starve a fever. ” Most people
think this saying means you should eat when you have a cold. What the sayingreally means is if you feed a cold then you will soon have to starve a fever. Chcken soup. Protein foods especially are not digested by a diseased body, andas mentioned before, the waste products of protein indigestion are especiallypoisonous. That is all the body needs when it is already down, another load ofpoison which it can’t eliminate due to weakness and enervation. Weight loss is usually associated with illness, as it should be. In times of acute
illness an otherwise healthy body loses its appetite for food because it is pro-survival to stop eating. It is very hard to coax a sick animal to eat. Their bodies,not controlled by a mind full of complex learned responses and false ideas,automatically know that fasting is nature’s method of healing. Contrary to popularunderstanding, digestion, assimilation, and elimination require the expenditure ofconsiderable energy. This fact may contradict the reader’s experience becauseeveryone has become tired when they have worked a long time without eating,and then experienced the lift after eating. But an ill body cannot digest efficientlyso instead of providing energy extracted from foods, the body is further burdenedby yet another load of toxic material produced by fermented and putrefied food. This adds insult to injury in a sick body that is already drowning in its owngarbage. Worse, during illness most available vital force is already redirected into
healing; it is not available for digestion. It is important to allow a sick body toproceed with healing and not to obstruct the process with unnecessary digestionor suppress the symptoms (which actually are the healing efforts) with drugs. Ifyou have an acute illness, and you stop all food intake except for pure water andherb teas, and perhaps some vegetable broth, or dilute non-sweet juice, you haverelieved your body of an immense effort. Instead of digesting, the body goes to
work on catching up on healing. The body can and will almost inevitably heal itself
if the sick person will have faith in it, cooperate with the body’s efforts by allowingthe symptoms of healing to exist, reduce or eliminate the intake of food to allowthe body to marshal its energies, maintain a positive mental attitude and otherwisestay out of the way. Many people intensely dread missing even one meal. These folks usually are
and have been so toxic that their bodies had been stashing uneliminated toxins intheir fat for years. They are usually so addicted to caffeine, cigarettes, alcohol,and so forth, that when they had fasted, even briefly, their bodies were forced todip into highly-polluted fat reserves while simultaneously the body beginswithdrawal. People like this who try to fast experience highly unpleasantsymptoms including headache, irritability, inability to think or concentrate, blurredvision, profound fatigue, aches, etc. Most of these symptoms come from lowblood sugar, but combined with the toxins being released from fat and combinedwith going through multiple addictive withdrawals, the discomforts are more thanmost people are willing to tolerate. Fasting on juice is much more realistic forcases like this. It is little wonder that when a hygienist suggests a fast to improvehealth, this type of case asserts positively that fasting is quite impossible, they havetried it, it is absolutely terrible and know that they can’t do it. This rejection is partly due to a cultural expectation (one reinforced by western
medicine) that all unpleasant symptoms should be avoided or suppressed. Tovoluntarily experience unpleasant sensations such as those mentioned above ismore than the ordinary timid person will subject themselves to, even in order toregain health. They will allow surgery, drugs with violent and dangerous sideeffects, painful and invasive testing procedures and radiation—all unpleasant andsometimes extremely uncomfortable. These therapies are accepted becausesomeone else with authority is doing it to them. And, they have been told that itthey don’t submit they will not ever feel better and probably will die in the nearfuture. Also people think that they have no alternative, that the expert in front of
them knows what is best, so they feel relieved to have been relieved of the
responsibility for their own condition and its treatment. Preventative Fasting
During the years it takes for a body to degenerate enough to prompt a fast, the
body has been storing up large quantities of unprocessed toxins in the cells,tissues, fat deposits, and organs. The body in its wisdom will always choose totemporarily deposit overwhelming amounts of toxins somewhere harmless ratherthan either permit the blood supply to become polluted or to use secondaryelimination routes. A body will use occasions when the liver is less burdened toeliminate these stored toxic debris. The hygienist’s paradigm asserts that themanifestation of symptoms or illness are all by themselves, absolute, unassailableproof that further storage of toxic wastes in the cells, tissues, fat deposits, andorgans is not possible and that an effort toward elimination is absolutelynecessary. Thus the first time a person fasts a great quantity of toxins will normallybe released. Being the resident of a body when this is happening can be quiteuncomfortable. For this reason alone, preventative fasting is a very wise idea. Before the body becomes critically ill, clean up your reserve fuel supply (fat
deposits) by burning off some accumulated fat that is rich in toxic deposits andthen replace it with clean, non-toxic fat that you will make while eating sensibly. Ifyou had but fasted prophylactically as a preventative or health-creating measurebefore you became seriously ill, the initial detoxification of your body could havebeen accomplished far more comfortably, while you were healthy, while your vitalforce was high and while your body otherwise more able to deal withdetoxification. Each time you fast, even if it is only one day, you allow your body to go
through a partial detox, and each time it becomes easier and more comfortablethan the last time. The body learns how to fast. Each time you fast it, your bodyslips into a cleansing mode more quickly, and each time you fast you lighten the
load of stored toxins. Perhaps you have already eliminated the caffeine your body
had stored, which frequently causes severe headaches on withdrawal, not tomention fatigue. It certainly helps to have this behind you before you go on to theelimination of other irritating substances. Many people have gone through alcoholor tobacco withdrawal, and understand that it is very unpleasant, and also that itmust be done in the pursuit of health. Why not withdraw from the rest of theirritating and debilitating substances we take into our system on an ongoing basis,and why not grit your way through the eliminative process, withdraw, from foodaddictions such as sugar or salt, and from foods that you may be allergic to likewheat, dairy products or eggs. It is very wise to invest in your own insurance plan by systematically
detoxifying while you are still healthy. Plan it into your life, when it is convenient,such as once a week on Sunday, or even once a month on a quiet day. Take afew days of vacation, go to a warm, beautiful place and devote part or all of it tocleansing. Treat yourself by taking an annual trip to Hawaii, fasting at a hotel onthe beach—do whatever it takes to motivate yourself. And consider this:vacations are enormously cheaper when you stay out of restaurants. If you have accustomed your body to 24 hour fasts, then you can work on 48
hour fasts, and over time work up to 72 hour fasts, all on a continuum. You mayfind it becoming increasingly comfortable, perhaps even pleasant, something youlook forward to. Fasting a relatively detoxified body feels good, and peopleeventually really get into the clean, light, clear headed, perhaps spiritually awarestate that goes along with it. By contrast, fasting when you are sick is much more difficult because your
vitality or vital force is very low, you already have no energy, and probably haveunpleasant symptoms that must be dealt with at the same time. There may be theadded stress of being forced into a cleanse because you are too nauseous to eat. Most people let their health go until they are forced into dealing with it; they aretoo busy living, so why bother. The truth is that our body does age, and over time becomes less able to deal
with insults; the accumulated effect of insults and aging eventually leads most of usto some serious degenerative illness. Normally this begins happening around age50 if not sooner. Some of us that were gifted with good genes or what I call “agood start” may have reached the age of 60 or 75 or even 90 without seriousillness, but those people are few and far between. Why not tip the scales in yourfavor by preventing or staving off health problems with systematic detoxification atyour own convenience. Climb into the drivers seat and start to take control and gain confidence in
your own ability to deal with your body, your own health, and your own life. When it gets right down to the bottom line, there is really only one thing in theworld that is really yours, and that is your life. Take control and start managing it. The reward will be a more qualitative life. Chapter Four
Colon Cleansing
From The Hygienic Dictionary
Autointoxication. [1] the accumulations on the bowel wall become a breeding ground for unhealthy
bacterial life forms. The heavy mucus coating in the colon thickens and becomes a host forputrefaction. The blood capillaries to the colon begin to pick up the toxins, poisons and noxiousdebris as it seeps through the bowel wall. All tissues and organs of the body are now taking on toxicsubstances. Here is the beginning of true autointoxication on a physiological level. Bernard Jensen,Tissue Cleansing Through Bowel Management. [2] All maladies are due to the lack of certain food
principles, such as mineral salts or vitamins, or to the absence of the normal defenses of the body,such as the natural protective flora. When this occurs, toxic bacteria invade the lower alimentary canal,and the poisons thus generated pollute the bloodstream and gradually deteriorate and destroy everytissue, gland and organ of the body. Sir Arbuthnot Lane. [3] The common cause of gastro-intestinalindigestion is enervation and overeating When food is not digested, it becomes a poison.
Fasting is the intentional abstention from food, whereas starvation is a lack of access to food.
What is the main difference between fasting and starvation?
The liver is a powerful chemical filter that refines and purifies the blood, and it plays a crucial role in the detoxification process.
According to the text, what is the primary function of the liver?
The author believes that medical doctors prioritize their own financial gain over the well-being of their patients, and that they often use unnecessary treatments to prolong a patient's life rather than allowing the body to heal naturally.
What is the author's perspective on the role of medical doctors?
The author argues that this approach is incorrect, as it can actually worsen the condition and make the body's detoxification process more difficult.
What is the author's stance on the idea that "you should eat when you have a cold"?
Enemas are a less expensive and less effective method of detoxification compared to colonics, which can accomplish the same beneficial work in a shorter period of time.
What is the primary difference between enemas and colonics?