January 11—Day 7
9:45 a.m. I got a little slower start this morning, compared to yesterday. Stormy weather conditions woke me around 2:00 and couldn’t fall back to sleep again until 4:30. I was groggy just out of bed, but my powder combo (after lemon/ginger tea) revved me up and I’m feeling great again today. Aside from preparing family meals, I’m going to try to get my mind off—and body out of—the kitchen today by finding somewhere to go. It’s a beautiful sunny day. Maybe I’ll go walk around town and go into a coffee shop for tea.
3:30 Ended up at Barnes and Noble for a dig into the latest editions of my favorite interior design magazines.
And, no, that’s not my usual mocha latte with one pump chocolate, whole milk, and no whip cream.
No, instead it was tea. Peppermint.
8:44 Just got in from church. After a little clean up (in the kitchen—where else?!?) I think I’m off to bed so that DAY 8 can get here sooner! (Really, this last day or two has been easier than the two before that.) It’s weird to think that I haven’t chewed anything for an entire week.
Talk to (at?) you guys tomorrow.
Oh, here's the next installment of my email series from last year. You're gonna love the topic!!
Hi Friends,
There is one other subject to cover before we move on to the mechanics of a short fast—a topic not often discussed, even among family. Certainly it is not the usual topic of conversation among “proper” folks, but knowledge about this aspect of our being is urgently needed and I ask you to keep an open mind and be thankful to better understand something so vital to our health and well being.
Most of society does not understand or appreciate the intricacies of bowel health and, accordingly, the implications of an unhealthy bowel. For instance, most medical literature defines constipation as anything less than 3 bowel movements per week.
My friend, if you have fewer than 2 per day you are suffering from constipation!! And I do mean suffering—in ways you cannot necessarily feel.
(At this time it is vital you go to the following Google Book link below –-yes, it’s a long one—and read pages 46 to the end of diagrams on page 51—please don’t skip this step! If the link fails, do a search for Dr. Jensen’s Guide to Better Bowel Care and go to the Google book result, again, finding and studying the pages given previously.)
Sadly, the medical system does not seem to understand the implications of this epidemic. The following list is typical of that given by traditional medicine as the only complications of constipation:
Although this condition is rarely serious, it can lead to:
· bowel obstruction / chronic constipation /hemorrhoids/hernia/spastic colitis /laxative dependency
It is a serious condition, and sadly absent from the above list is the most dangerous complication of all: Auto-Intoxication.
The following article--I only copied it and do not take responsibility for some grammatical weaknesses therein--is sourced at the end.
Auto-Intoxication
Death and Health Begin in the Colon
This realization is the foundation for holistic medicine which is increasingly being practiced here in the West and has been practiced in the in the orient for thousands of years...
There is an epidemic in our society, and it has to do with the gastrointestinal diseases we develop within us as a result of the food we eat. The human suffering and social, medical, and economic costs of gastrointestinal diseases and disorders that have become so common in the US and Canada are enormous, representing a huge share of our annual health care expenditure, as well as being responsible for a large loss of productivity.
Auto-Intoxication
When the elimination system of the human body is not in top-notch working order—particularly if it has become sluggish or clogged—it cannot properly process and eliminate food wastes and toxins. Medical science now acknowledges that up to 85% or more of all adult Americans suffer from some form of intestinal stasis [i.e., constipation, sluggish bowels, and etc.–Ed.]. Intestinal stasis sooner or later causes the wastes and toxic by-products from the foods we eat to build up to such an extent that they start to become putrefactive it In turn, this putrefactive build-up in the colon becomes a veritable breeding ground, encouraging the rapid growth of huge colonies of toxin-producing, disease-causing bacteria (e-coli) along with a host of known toxic chemicals and waste products... These conditions virtually guarantee toxic build-up in the colon which, over time, inevitably results in one or more forms of serious illness or chronic degenerative disease.
When the digestive and eliminative systems are not properly working to rid the body of this accumulating putrefactive build-up in the colon, the resulting toxins are then absorbed from the colon into the bloodstream, and are carried back into every part of the body. This process of self-poisoning is known as “auto-intoxication”. In a nutshell, because of intestinal stasis, the body ends up chronically poisoning itself with its own wastes and toxins instead of carrying out its designed purpose of eliminating them.
This process of continued self-poisoning inevitably results in candidiasis and a dramatically weakened immune system, which can lead directly to such common ill-health conditions as chronic fatigue and body weakness, nervousness, depression and mood swings, skin disruptions such as acne and eczema, ulcers and other gastro-intestinal disorders, headaches, arthritic joints, swelling of hands and feet, chronic allergies, bronchial problems, cardio-vascular irregularities (arythmias, high blood pressure, etc.), pathological changes in the breasts, premature senility, epilepsy, and many other serious and debilitating problems.
Health statistics also show that more North Americans are hospitalized due to diseases of the intestinal tract than for any other group of disorders. The medical cost of these diseases is estimated to be $20 billion or more per year.
The annual cost of prescription and over-the-counter drug products used for digestive tract diseases is approximately $2 - 2.5 billion dollars per year, and has grown at a steady rate of 10% over the last decade.
The following is an estimate of costs, and adequately demonstrates the fact that these diseases present a significant public health problem, which contribute substantially to our overall health care costs:
Laxatives | $900 million per year. |
Antacids | $1 billion per year. |
Antihemorrhoidals | $250 million per year. |
Anridiarrheals | $100 million per year. |
Cancer of the colon and cancer of the rectum are the second most common forms of cancer in North America, exceeded only by lung cancer. This year alone (2003), there will be approximately 150,000 new cases diagnosed, and approximately 60,000 related deaths. Perhaps as many as one out of every 10 North Americans will die of these two diseases.
The following are some of the other very common diseases and disorders that are directly related to the Colon: Constipation, Appendicitis, Diverticular Disease, Hemorrhoids, Benign Tumors, Irritable Bowel Syndrome, Ulcerative Colitis, and Crohn’s Disease.
Here are a few facts about these diseases:
It is estimated that more than 300,000 appendices are removed each year.
Diverticulitis/Diverticulosis is reported to be present in more than one-third of those in our population over the age of 40 - and in up to two-thirds of those who are over the age of 80.
Hemorrhoids are believed to be present to some degree in nearly half of all people over the age of 50.
Benign Tumors are reported to be present in one-third of all autopsies performed on patients over the age of 20.
Evidence suggests that all of these disorders were very rare in the Western world less than 100 years ago, and that each of these has greatly increased during the last 50 years. What’s more, for years now researchers such as Cleave, Trowell, Burkitt, and others, have known that all these diseases are almost unheard of in communities which still adhere to their traditional way of life.
In developing countries in Asia and Africa for example, documented evidence has proven the rarity of diseases such as diverticulitis, appendicitis, bowel cancer, adenomatous polyps, ulcerative colitis, varicose veins, hemorrhoids and hiatus hernias. In Africa, this has been the case with appendicitis, ishemic heart disease, diabetes, obesity, gallstones, varicose veins, venous thrombosis, and hemorrhoids.
As these countries develop and begin to adopt Western ways and customs, a rise in the frequency of these disorders follows almost as surely as night follows day.
They first appear and then become common in the upper socioeconomic groups, which are the first group of people to become westernized. In Africa, this has been the case with appendicitis, heart disease, diabetes, obesity, gallstones, varicose veins, and hemorrhoids. The same kind of thing happened in Japan after World War Two, especially in the urban communities.
In the past it was thought that the large intestine was not really too involved in absorption (the principal absorptive functions being to conserve water and electrolytes secreted into the gut during digestion). However, recent research has demonstrated that, among other things, the colon does in fact participate in protein absorption.
As it turns out, the result of the investigations by many over the years has led to a much more specific conclusion than merely some sort of ambiguous, or mysterious “environmental factor” which is somehow involved in the cause of these diseases and disorders. Rather, many have become far more specific about the cause, supporting what has come to be known as the “F(iber)-Hypothesis”.
This is extremely significant in as much as the colon is the major site of exposure to the bulk of endogenous bacterial proteins, enterotoxins, and breakdown antigens, which may be involved in the pathogenesis of a number of diseases, including ulcerative colitis and Crohn’s disease, food allergies and allergic gastoenteropathy, bacterial enteritis (from toxins produced by Escherichia coli, Shigella, Vibro cholerae, etc.), and certain extra-intestinal immune-complex diseases.
Even more important than protein absorption is the operation of the Autonomic Nervous System (ANS) in the colon. These are nerve endings that are attached to the colon wall and they provide nerve impulses to stimulate the operation of the various organs and glands within your body. The type of stimulation that the ANS is able to provide to your organs and glands is a direct reflection of the health of your colon
Next time we’ll cover the care of the bowel during a fast or cleanse. I know you can hardly wait!!
