Stop the bleeding and heal the tissues

This is a healing programme for someone who has had chronic haemorrhoids and bleeding for a long time. Following an operation that was supposed to resolve the problem, the situation worsened, the bleeding increased, and consequently, they now have haematologic issues. The situation could quickly become critical.

Good morning,

In all likelihood, the cause of all the blood-related problems is the colon dysfunction, hemorrhoids, and most importantly the bleeding from the anus. This needs to be corrected before things get much worse. The basic strategy is to minimise bowel movements until the colon and anus have healed, and maximise the speed of healing and nutrient density specific to blood building. 

Eat no fibres

To allow the colon and anus to heal, we need to stop stressing their tissues, which means less bowel movements. This will be done by eating only animal foods and zero plant fibres. In your case, this means animal flesh, fat, and organ meat only (no eggs or dairy products). No matter what anybody you may talk to thinks about it, this is a perfectly healthy way to eat that eliminates all low density nutrient food sources, and is in fact used very successfully to treat and heal serious autoimmune conditions that do not respond to other kinds of treatments. It provides an extremely nutritious diet because all animal foods are concentrated sources of proteins and protein-bound nutrients, fats and fat-soluble nutrients, that are all easy to absorb and digest because the gut is free of intervening fibres that slow down or prevent absorption, and contain none of the natural toxins found in all plants to a greater or lesser extent. You can read many testimonials, some truly amazing, on Zero Carb Zen.

It is important to keep in mind that while protein is used for tissue building and repair, it is fat that is used for cellular energy production. Hence, you need to have plenty of fat and salt with your meals. You should have always have liberal amounts of the highest quality grass fed butter, extra virgin organic coconut oil, extra virgin olive oil, and unrefined sea salt.

Build blood with liver and chlorophyll

There is nothing more effective at building blood than liver from the animal food world and chlorophyll from the plant food world. So, you will have both. Liver should be grass fed veal liver, as it is one of the most nutritious. But other animal livers including chicken are also good. It is very interesting to note that chlorophyll is really like plant blood because it has the same structure as haemoglobin with the only difference being that its central component is Mg instead of Fe for haemoglobin.

I think that in order to accelerate healing, you should have liver every day, but in small amounts, like 50 g. The chlorophyll you will have with water. You can either have it more concentrated (in a single glass of water) and have it 2-3 times per day, or you can have it more diluted and have it over longer periods. The taste might be any issue, so you can see what works best for you. Also, you need to be cautious to not take too much as this will cause loose stools. You need to increase your intake gradually. Naturally, all zero-to-very-low sugar green juices are also excellent to have as much as you want. You should always add a little olive oil to your green juices to increase absorption of nutrients.

Supplements: Chlorophyll

Accelerate healing with amino acids and proteolytic enzymes

To maximize the speed of healing you will take amino acids that, as a supplement, are almost 100% absorbed without any inefficiencies related to compromised digestion. The first place they will be used it for tissue repair. Proteolytic enzyme are the specialised proteins that actually perform the breakdown of damaged tissue, as well as the repair and rebuilding of tissues throughout the body.

They should both always be taken on an empty stomach and at least one hour before eating anything. They can be taken several times a day, so I suggest 3-4 times, taking 3-5 amino acid tablets and 3 proteolytic enzyme capsules each time, first thing in the morning, one hour before the midday meal, one hour before the evening meal, and before bed. Vitamin A is also essential for tissue repair, but liver is one of the richest sources of it, so you don’t need to take extra.

Supplements: Amino acids and proteolytic enzymes

Moisturise skin with oil

The last thing is to help the tissue of the anus from the outside by putting some olive oil with a small amount of essential oils of lavender and geranium. The proportion is 3 drops of each essential oil for 30 ml of oil. Dip your finger only once in the small oil container, and moisturise the skin around the anus. Do this a few times per day, and always before and after a bowel movement.

Following these recommendations, you should see improvements very soon, but as is always the case, healing time is proportional to the time over which disease and damage has persisted. So, be consistent and patient.

 

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Lauri’s amazing story

This is guest post by Lauri.

It was a sunny day, not long ago. The phone rang. I did not recognize the caller. I answered. It was an endocrinologist calling about my test results. After relating them to me, he asked: “are you really not taking any drugs?” I said: “no, I’m not”. After this he asked specifically about each of the tests, and about the drugs usually prescribed to address the problems to which they are related, all of which I had. He asked over and over again: “are you sure you didn’t take this drug?” Each time, I gave him the same answer: “yes, I am sure. I didn’t take any drugs”. He had no choice but to give up. He gave a little laugh, and said: “well done!”.

As I was hanging up the phone, I realised that this time I had forgotten that the doctor was going to call me. Not  long ago, it was a very different scenario: each time I went to see a doctor, or was waiting for their call with the results, I felt like an animal in a cage, trapped, unable to run, just waiting for more bad news.

In that moment I felt the warmth of the sun on my face. And I felt good. I felt that life was good, that it was smiling at me. In that moment, there was no ill sensation, no aches, no feelings of discomfort, no signs of disease. How had I gotten here? How was I just a few years ago? Let’s take a look back and see.

As a kid, I had major issues with vomiting. But they went away when I reached the teenage years. Other than that I was generally pretty well. The “normal” yearly flu, little problems here and there, but who doesn’t? Life was pretty great. As a late teen, I enjoyed drinking and smoking as much as the next guy, but nothing excessive. 10 years later, I was smart enough to stop smoking. I thought I was living a very healthy life since then. Boy was I wrong…

I started to have troubles with my stomach. I was given drugs. And as they were prescribed, I remember being happy. I can now take drugs for free and all would be fixed. The problems did not go away. They were just starting. I started having headaches. I started having troubles with my eyes. They were drying up so fast that I felt I needed to use drops multiple times per day. I was stressed out all the time with no apparent reason. For the most part of the day, I had a very strange sensation, one that people usually describe as low blood sugar. Feeling of the floor under me would move, loss of balance and the sensation that someone would have screwed a giant clamp over my head. This only went away when waking up and going to sleep. I always thought that eating would make me feel better. But I never felt better. Time went on, and I just got used to it.

I was 27. Never had any problems with my heart, until one day, I woke up with a strange feeling. Something was not right: I was having fibrillations. Later that evening I was waiting for an electrical cardioversion. In the ER I had some time to think when they were hooking up the monitoring systems. To thought to myself: I should be at the peak of my life, and here am hooked up to a bunch of machines with heart palpitations. The diagnosis, after all the tests and examinations, was sarcoidose in the lungs, and most probably in other places as well.

It is after this event that the problems really started. I felt cold all the time, no matter what. I had never felt cold before, ever. I started to have such chest pains that I could not put a hockey stick to the ice, the shock went all the way through from the stick to the chest. I tried to lower myself at the level of my knees, and as soon as I did that, palpitations would start and continue for as long as I stayed bent over. I learned to sleep on my back since turning to one side would cause the heartbeat to go haywire, every time, and instantaneously.

The sarcoidose was causing hypercalcemia, hypothyroidism and hypogonadism. The entire hormonal system started failing. Almost all pituitary-controlled hormones going down, and as a man, anyone who has had almost zero testosterone knows what that feels like. Nearing 28, here I was. At the age I should have been at my peak, feeling like I could take on the world, I felt like a weak and crippled 90 year-old.

Sometime in the middle of this, I found Guillaume’s blog. I hadn’t read any blogs. I used to think they were just about people telling what they wore to work that day. I really was not in a place where I would stop listening to my doctors to follow a regime I found on some random blog somewhere online. I started to read it anyway. I remember I was searching for information on when to take psyllium husks. I read the article about that, and thought it was written in a special manner. I took the advice, and a few days later, read another article. That really was the turning point.

Written in such a way that somehow left me no choice but to read them all. When I was done, I thought back on the whole thing, and realized I did not remember anything. So, I read them again. After the second pass, I knew i was doing exactly the opposite all of the things mentioned. Then I started to break it down to little pieces. I took one article that I thought I could follow, and started following that. At the start, I was sure I could never live a life that fully implemented all of the recommendations. I remember thinking, it must be impossible to live like that.

But something in my mindset had changed. I noticed myself going back, rereading another article, and starting to follow that. A year later, I had implemented almost half of the changes. And a year after that, I was doing it all.

Our different lives, situations, places where we live, climate, wealth, all play a part on how we implement these teachings. But I think I understood the most important part. There is not one without the other. So that time I knew I had to do it all.

From the very start, Guillaume had the utmost confidence I would heal. And never during this process I felt like he would throw in the towel. On the contrary, I got regular updates and additional inputs based on my progress, and most importantly, an unwavering confidence and support.

After some months, I started to see something. I had a growing number of warts on my feet. And I mean had so much of them that there were almost no normal skin left. During all the years before that, no matter what we did with the doctors just aggravated the situation, and made them grow more. Over 15 long years, this was happening. And what did I see just in few months of alkalizing? They were clearing up! They were disappearing! And in really such short time after eliminating all sugars, grains and starches.

I also noticed a few months later that I had not used my eye-drops, which I used to put every single day. In fact, feeling like out-of-this-world was only for a few moments of the day, as before I only felt normal a few times a day. Hmm… I realized that all this time I thought I needed to eat every few hours to remedy this, it was actually the one causing it. The best thing when your body starts to shift to a fat burning is that you don’t need to eat all the time. And your mind stays clear throughout the day.

I was also diagnosed with pituitary related hypothyroidism. I had very low values of all the major thyroid hormones, I was cold all the time and if I turned to my side at bed I would lose a regular heartbeat. This condition we remedied with magnesium and iodine supplementation. It only took a few weeks to start noticing a difference, and I started to find it possible to duck and to sleep by my side again. Chest pain also started to fade. This was a starting point in the journey to regain my thyroid health.

Hypercalcemia was coming down very nicely as the sarcoidose became less and less active. We used Vitamin K2 as MK-7, to help to body pull out the extra calcium from the bloodstream and put it into the bones where it belongs.

In a year’s time, the heart palpitations were gone, magnesium and iodine were clearly working very well. But, a year is a long time. 365 days, day after day, after day, is a lot of days. Natural healing is the only true way to heal, but it is a slow process, and it cannot be rushed. Chest pains were only a slight twist here and now, stress levels started to normalize and I no longer needed any aid for my eyes.

Nevertheless, I was still experiencing overall fatigue, weakness, and no sexual energy. This was a tough time for me, as following the regime had gotten rid of so many of the things drugs could not, but at the same time, I had more of the troubles that I found hardest to live with. Many times I wanted to quit. Guillaume did not let me. I am truly grateful he didn’t, and really glad I didn’t.

From the start, he made it very clear that I would benefit hugely from juicing. It was too bad I could not afford a juicer at that time, but now, 2 years later, I finally got my juicer. Better late than never, but for you, if you can, start juicing right from the start. You won’t regret it!

The sarcoidose had caused the rare case of hypercalcemia and hypercalciuria. This was the only reason I had to be very cautious when supplementing with D3. Guillaume insisted many times that I start supplementing with the combo of vitamins A, D, and K2. I was hesitant, worried about the calcium levels in my blood, because hypercalcemia can become life-threatening very quickly, and even if it does not, it can do a lot of damage in a short time. Now, in retrospect, my opinion is that the root cause of the sarcoidose might actually have been the chronically low level of D3. This is what Guillaume thought, this is what he told me, and I think he was right, because things continued to get better, even if I was taking smaller doses than he would have liked me to take. If you have this rare condition, be sure to closely monitor your D-25, D-1,25 and all calcium levels when supplementing.

The sarcoidose had caused massive discomfort for a long time. It was time for it to go. Hormone levels reached rock bottom. Calcium levels started to normalize. And then, hormone levels started to go up. The sarcoidose went dormant, and the body was waking up. What it took was two years of life without carbs, alcohol, drugs or late nights. A strictly measured and timed daily regime of alkaline water, green smoothies, unrefined sea salt, loads of coconut oil, greens, nuts, animal protein and the most important supplements including vitamins A-D-K2, Iodine, Magnesium and B12. These crucial nutrients were the ones I was most deficient in. I hope when you read this, if you feel sting, start to change your life until it changes you.

Also something worth to mention is that common colds or flu’s, headaches and fevers are non-existent. I don’t even have any drugs at my home, not even for headaches that used to plaque me.

The reality is much more detailed and full of ups and downs. Following this protocol did not heal me in a day. Luckily, I had not damaged my body beyond it’s capabilities of repairing itself. I think the aim of the blog is to lead the reader to an understanding of how to give the body what it needs to function and repair itself. What I consider crucial is to get rid of the idea that drugs can help you in the long run. These writings contained a formula, but they only worked once I realized it was about me. I played a key role by letting myself get sick. The actual healing is done by the body when it is given what it needs, no matter what we think of it. The process continuously tries to find balance.

I had moments when I was going downhill so fast, that I thought what is the reason I am living according to some stranger, people around me joking about the lifestyle, thinking that I had read a blog, and had become completely insane. When I was doing it and still felt weaker, that was the crucial point as I did not give up. The route of healing is not always going for the better. Once you realize there are more good days than bad, you know you are going in the right direction. What I mean by this is that even when you are doing everything right, when you are sick, you will have bad days. But don’t give up!

I was tested many times with CT scans, MRI scans, blood testing, lung capacity testing, and all the medical procedures that are concerned with sarcoidose and other illnesses I used to have. And every time I felt better, the tests revealed the same. It was no placebo. By no means I am against medical treatment. After all, I had needed it myself. But now I understand they have their place when the situation is dire, but the actual healing process can only be done by your body. Even if you must take drugs, they usually just mask the symptoms. I hope after reading this you will understand you must be proactive with your health. Before my problems, I was living the lifestyle considered to be healthy. My story could have had a very different ending.

Writing this today, I just turned 30. So what has changed after I found this blog? Everything. I don’t miss any of my old ways. I don’t miss any of the old food I used to eat. I sure as hell won’t miss the problems that then plague my life. Two years ago I had a disease that most people spend the rest of their lives struggling with, a disease considered incurable by any medical intervention. Now I am the proud father of a little girl, who was just born a month ago! Guillaume’s help did not only save my life, it helped in the procreation of a new one.

This writing is a testimonial of this miraculous healing journey of mine. Amazingly, even I am now starting to forget all the problems I had, how crippling they were, and how difficult it was for me to live like that. For this reason, I want to share these details with everyone, so that you can know the incredible level of healing this way of life has given me.

I know saying thank you a million times are still only words. We all get a salary from our work, but when you love what you do, it is not about the money either. So what can I say or do to show my level of appreciation? Guillaume’s guidance has transformed my life. My healing process and health are the living proof of this. We have a saying in Finland: “talk is talk, action matters”. So I took action, and it has brought me freedom of the disease conditions so many people are desperately trying to get over. I too was desperate to get better. And, thanks to this blog and thanks to Guillaume, I succeeded.

So to you Guillaume, thank you. You were there for me when I was at my worst. You always had faith that everything would one day be fixed, that it was a matter of time and effort. And you were right. Not even in my wildest dreams could I have thought that this host of different problems could be fixed. I hold you in the highest esteem, and can only imagine the countless hours it has taken you to prepare and write these articles. Some of them must have taken you years of research and work. I really appreciate this. Thank you so much.

After reading this, if you decide to take the plunge, do it without hesitation. Do it before you get ill. Don’t give up if it doesn’t feel easy all the time, as life usually doesn’t. It is worth the effort. Schedule time to read all of the articles mindfully, and you will see what I mean.

All Guillaume ever wanted in return was for me to write about my experiences, to share these experiences with you. If Guillaume’s work has helped you, what I would like to ask of you, is that you help spread the word, share these articles on your social media, like, comment, subscribe and interact. Join me on Patreon, a crowdfunding site to show your support for his work. If we all help a little, together we can make a big difference.

Every word written above is true, and everything is described exactly as it happened.

If you think this article could be useful to others, please ‘Like’ and ‘Share’ it.

Intensive natural healing

It is always very difficult to find out what’s wrong, to find out what’s causing our health problems, to find out what is the reason for the stroke or the heart attack we just had, the diabetes or the cancer we were just diagnosed with. It is always very difficult as long as we think of the body in terms of a collection of separate parts pieced together; as long as we think that it is possible for the arteries supplying the brain or the heart to have a pathology that is not shared by every other organ and tissue; as long as we think that it is possible for the pancreas, the prostate or the mammary glands of the breasts to be defective in their function independently of every other cell throughout the body. The moment we see this, we recognise the absurdity of this point of view and the obviousness of the inter-relation of every cell to every other cell, tissue, organ and system.

There is only one whole body mind, and everything that happens to it affects everything else that takes place within it.

Looking at things from this new perspective, there are always only two possible alternatives: healthy or diseased, ranging from one to the other on a continuous scale with every possible point in between along the line. From this perspective, every medical intervention or treatment that is not intended to correct or remedy something acute—to fix a broken bone, to save someone whose kidneys or liver just failed, to stitch up a wound to prevent the loss of too much blood—but instead attempting to address a chronic disease condition—treating heart disease, diabetes, cancer, arthritis, Alzheimer’s, etc—is bound to fail.

The failure comes from the misunderstanding that stems from the misguided premise that views the body as a collection of parts working to specific ends more or less independently of one another. If we are to ever overcome our health problems and thrive throughout a long and happy life, it is this basic premise—this misguided and erroneous premise—that must be thrown out and replaced by the clear understanding that there is only one whole body mind, and that everything in it affects and is affected by everything else.

We are sometimes, maybe most often, faced with a major health issue that is acute because it is an end point to a degenerative disease condition that has been developing over decades throughout our entire life. Stroke and heart attack are good examples. Sometimes, maybe most often, it is these events that shake us up enough to move us into action, and if we have the luck to have been exposed to sensible information, we can have the chance to begin anew and change the course of the rest of our life, steering it towards recovery and optimal health.

When an event of this kind happens—when we have a stroke or heart attack—we must act fast to recover as quickly as possible and reduce as much as we can the possibility of having another one within weeks or months, something that could easily be fatal. The fact is that this is usually quite likely to happen, and it’s therefore important to take it to heart.

How can we take the most important and extreme measures to reverse this course of progressive degeneration and set ourselves on the course to recovery as quickly as we can? What would I suggest should be done with the greatest sense of urgency based on the understanding that it is our life that is at stake? What are the most important and effective ways to help the body heal and repair itself?

Cleanse, detoxify, heal the gut because everything that circulates in the body comes and goes through what circulates in the bloodstream, and everything that circulates in the bloodstream comes and goes through what enters the intestines. It is in the gut that everything about our health starts and ends, where all nutrients are absorbed and most metabolic wastes are discarded. This is why it must be the foundational focus of the healing process.

There is no better way to cleanse, detoxify and heal the gut than to drink fresh green vegetable juices while at the same time getting a series of colonics: the hydro-colon therapy cleans stuff out of the gut, the juice cleanses, alkalises and nourishes the blood and body. Doing these separately is very good. Doing them together is great. Give yourself two weeks—fourteen days—during which to do this. Every day drinking between two and three litres of fresh green vegetable juice, and every other day getting a colonic (on Monday, Wednesday and Friday, for example).

For the juice, you can make it or buy it, but it must be cold pressed in a slow masticating juicer, and it must be free of sugar, i.e., containing only green watery, fibrous and leafy vegetables. Any amount of sugar will fuel the proliferation of pathogenic bacteria and yeasts like candida, and one of the most important aspects of this gut cleansing and healing is the elimination of the candida which undermines the function and health of our gut and our entire organism. In many modern cities there are small cold pressed juiceries where it is possible to buy very good quality all-organic green juice. Doing it at home is less expensive but requires you to do the work. You can also make some yourself and buy some as well (that’s what I tend to do).

In addition to the juicing and hydro-colon therapy, there are three kinds of supplements that should be taken: probiotics (Prescript-Assist is what I take), L-Carnosine (Paradise Herbs is what I take), and enzymes (I’ve used pHi-Zymes by Baseline Nutritionals and Heal-n-soothe by LivingWell). The probiotics replenish and heal the flora, carnosine helps heal the lining of the gut and glycated tissues, and the enzymes promote accelerated repair of damaged cells. They should all be taken three times a day, morning, noon and late afternoon, always on an empty stomach. Take each time one capsule of probiotics and two of L-Carnosine.

To avoid being too hungry, but also to ensure an important intake of the miraculously healing coconut oil, you should have a coconut milk based smoothie, pudding or ice cream: a small glass, two or three times per day. And to make sure you have a good intake of salt and minerals, you should either put unrefined salt in the green juice or eat cucumber and celery sticks with salt, as much as you feel like depending on taste, once mid-morning and once mid-to-late afternoon. Sometimes you may want to drink salty green juice, and sometimes you may prefer to eat salty, crunchy veggies. Just follow your inclination.

(See the work of Dr Norman Walker for more details about the importance of colonics and juicing.)

Enzymes are proteins with specialised functions. They are the things that do stuff in the body. Most of us have heard that enzymes are made in the pancreas and are needed for digestion because they break down the nutrients into their constituents: starches are broken down into glucose by amylase, fats are broken down into glycerol and free fatty acids by lipase, and various proteins are broken down into amino acids by various proteases. These building blocks of foods can then be absorbed from the gut into the bloodstream and carried all over the body to where they are needed. But enzymes also do practically everything else that needs doing, and, in particular, heal and repair damaged cells and tissues.

All raw foods contain enzymes, some more than others. Fresh juices which contain a high concentration of minerals and nutrients, also contain a high concentration of enzymes. Because the more enzymes are available, the better it is for the body to heal and repair itself. Hence, our strategy for recovering from this stroke, heart attack we just had, is to flood the body with enzymes. The fact is that in western countries, most people live on processed junk food that is not only totally devoid of minerals and micronutrients, but also completely dead and devoid of enzymes. If we don’t survive on processed junk food, then we typically hardly ever eat anything raw. Therefore, even if the food we eat is not as bad as processed fast food, it is still cooked, dead and devoid of enzymes.

Eating this way leads to two major problems. The first is that the pancreas is continuously manufacturing enzymes in a desperate attempt to cope with the digestion of cooked and dead food, and over time, like within a few decades, begins to get exhausted and eventually becomes unable to produce any enzymes. It typically also stops being able to produce insulin at the same time, just because it is simply exhausted. The second is that because all enzymes are used for digesting processed and cooked dead foods, there are hardly any enzymes available for anything else that needs doing, healing and repairing.

In our healing programme, to flood the body with enzymes, we—in addition to drinking all this juice loaded with enzymes of all sorts—will supplement with more enzymes. There is no upper limit to the amount we can take, and the more the better. It is really just a matter of what we can afford and are willing to take on a short, medium and long term basis. It is important to start slowly and increase gradually. This is to allow the body to adjust to the presence of more enzymes, but also because they will immediately start their cleanup of the body, breaking down scared and dead tissues that inevitably accumulate over time, as well as both benign and cancerous tumours. The breakdown products are toxic and need to be eliminated quickly. Hence part of the importance of the initial 14 day juice cleanse with intensive hydro-colon therapy.

The amazing thing about enzymes is that they know exactly what to do, what to break down, what to build up, what needs help repairing and what needs help healing. This can be considered a miracle of nature. But it is just life: the self-organised life of living organisms that has been evolving and having its means and methods refining themselves over the 4.5 billion years of evolution on the planet. Self-organised, synergistic and symbiotic co-dependent emergence and evolution. Miraculous and amazing, but from the perspective of an enzyme, a chloroplast or mitochondria, it is utterly simple, obvious and straight forward: adaptation for improved survival.

(See the work of Drs Cichoke and Gonzalez for more on enzyme therapy.)

Iodine is an element that is needed in every cell. According to statistics from the WHO, 97% of the world’s population is iodine deficient. And according to David Brownstein, M.D., a physician who has spent a good portion of his medical career studying iodine, testing for it, and treating his patients’s deficiencies of salt and iodine, the figure is probably closer to 98 or even 99%. In any case, this means that we can conclude that everyone should be supplementing with iodine to ensure the body an appropriate supply.

Iodine is found in the highest concentration in the thyroid gland, mammary glands, and then other glands of the body. For all glands, but especially for the thyroid and breasts, it is simply crucial. Brownstein has treated with total success a large number of women suffering from fibrous cysts or cancerous tumours in the breasts, and a large number of both men and women suffering from thyroid-related dysfunctions using basically only iodine supplementation and dietary modifications (including, most importantly, increased unrefined sea salt intake). He states his belief that most if not all cystic breast disease and cancers, and that most if not all thyroid problems, regardless of whether they are hypo or hyper thyroid dysfunctions, are caused by iodine deficiency, and are always corrected with appropriate supplementation.

One of the reasons why iodine deficiency is so problematic is that because it is so important in its role in every cell, and because it is part of the halogen family of elements (F, Cl, Br, I, At), it is replaced in the cells by other much more abundant but toxic halogens like fluorine, chlorine and bromine. All of these being common industrial chemicals far too abundant in our environment, water and food, and that find their way into the body, slipping into those slots in the cells intended for iodine. It is only by supplementing and providing the body with the adequate amounts it needs, that these other halogens can be gradually replaced by iodine and excreted from the body.

Brownstein recommends using Lugol’s solution, which is sodium iodine and iodide dissolved in water. It is generic and inexpensive, as it has been around for almost 200 years (first made in 1829), and it is a safe and effective way to replenish iodine stores. For most people (as it was for Brownstein himself and for me) it will be necessary to take 50–100 mg per day for about a year. It should be taken in water or juice on an empty stomach. I took it with water for many months before starting to put it in the green juice, in which the taste cannot be detected. I use a 15% solution (18.75 mg per drop) and took between two and four drops per day (37.5–75 mg; two drops at a time, once or twice per day).

After almost a year, I felt two days in a row an immediate surge of energy and light butterflies in the stomach, which I knew were caused by the iodine stimulating the thyroid because I had read about it. Therefore, reacting to it with such sensitivity, I knew that I had finally replenished, after all these months, the iodine stores. Now, I take one drop in my green juice, which sounds like an infinitesimally small amount, but it is important to maintain supplementation because iodine is needed every day by all cells and it is water soluble making it easily excreted with the urine. It has been estimated by iodine researchers that the body needs a minimum of 12.5 mg per day. Therefore it is best to take a little more than that; one drop of 15% solution which provides 18.75 mg. Iodine is of fundamental importance. Supplementation with it is essential, especially in a detoxification and healing programme.

(See Brownstein’s book for more on iodine, and The Guide to Supplementing with Iodine, for additional details about supplementation)

Magnesium and sodium bicarbonate support the cleansing, detoxification and—very importantly—alkalisation of the gut, blood, tissues and organs of the body. The easiest and most effective way to get these into the tissues is to have a 60 minute bath with one cup of nigari flakes and one cup of baking soda. You should do this every other day (Sunday, Tuesday and Thursday, for example) for the first two weeks. This will help pull out accumulated acid, chemical toxins and heavy metals. It is very pleasant and relaxing to lie in a hot bath for an hour reading a book, listening to music or just lying there quietly, adding hot water to maintain a comfortably hot temperature. It is also an essential part of the detoxification programme. After the first two weeks, you can reduce the number of baths to one to two per week.

(See the work of Drs Dean and Sircus for more on magnesium chloride and sodium bicarbonate.)

Eating for rejuvenation and optimal health is a matter of choosing between health and life or sickness and death. After these first two weeks, you will start to eat more solid foods, keeping the juice as the pillar of your new way of nourishing and taking care of the body. In fact, every day the focus of the first half of the day will be to hydrate, cleanse and alkalise by drinking green juice, one litre in two 500 ml portions, at around 9–10 and then 11:30–12:30. Lunch around 14 will be a green smoothie made of avocado and/or coconut milk, together with other green leafy veggies (kale, celery, cucumber, spinach, etc), and coconut water for the liquid part. You can add salt, black pepper and/or cayenne, other spices, superfood powders or extracts, making the smoothie as nutritious and tasty as you can using your resourcefulness to come up with new ideas and recipes.

Having a smoothie of this kind provide lots of enzymes and nutrients, essential oils and excellent fats, together with the naturally occurring fibres but because they are chopped up and blended smooth, they are very easy to digest and thus cause very little digestive stress; this is second to juicing which removes all the fibres for maximum absorption of nutrients and minimum work by the digestive organs.

In the late afternoon, have another green juice if it’s possible. You should drink one to two litres of alkaline water per day, whenever you feel like it. (You can either buy it, making sure the pH is above 8, or you can add alkalising drops to your high quality filtered water. I use Young pHorever’s PuripHy.) Remember that water and juice intake must be balanced with salt in order to hydrate well and not dilute the blood sodium levels and causing the kidneys to excrete more water. We want to drink lots and eat lots of salt in order to super-hydrate. For each litre of water/juice you need about half a teaspoon of salt.

Stop drinking around 18 or so, approximately 45 minutes before dinner: a big leafy green salad of your choice (baby greens, baby spinach, romaine, oak leaf, kale, mixed lettuces and greens) with some nuts and seeds, plenty of cold pressed organic olive oil or some kind of nut or seed butter dressing, and with this big salad, have a small amount of grass fed meat or wild/organically raised fish every other night (one day on, one day off).

That’s it. This is how you should eat for all the months during which you are recovering until you are in perfect health and perfect shape. You can eat like this for the rest of your life. This is more or less what I do. Some variations, will include creamed vegetable soups with coconut milk in the winter (cauliflower, brocoli, celery, spinach), cold soups like gazpacho in the summer, different kinds of salads (celery-fennel, red cabbage, white cabbage, chopped up cucumbers, tomatoes and red peppers in the summer, soaked nut and seed parsley salad, etc), and different lightly steamed vegetables like brocoli, romanesco, cauliflower and green beans. Of course, you are welcome to experiment in this way depending on the season and on personal taste, mood and circumstances.

Supplements that you should take as soon as you start eating, some with lunch and some with dinner, are the following.

With lunch:
(2) Liposomal Magnesium (L-Threonate; Mercola)
(2) Liposomal Vitamin C (Mercola)
(2) Krill oil (Mercola)
(1) Astaxanthin (Nutrex Bioastin 12 mg)
(2) Turmeric extract (Gaia Herbs)
(1) Cinnamon extract (Stop Aging Now)
(1) Tulsi extract (Source Naturals)
(1) Vitamin B12 (Thorne Research Bio-B12)
(2) A-D-K (DaVinci)
(2) Niacinamide (Thorne Research)
(2) Synergy7 (Stop Aging Now)
(2) Zinc (Source Naturals OptiZinc)
(1) Ubiquinol (Mercola)
(1) Huperzine A (Source Naturals)

With dinner:
(2) Liposomal Magnesium (L-Threonate; Mercola)
(2) Liposomal Vitamin C (Mercola)
(2) Turmeric extract (Gaia Herbs)
(1) Cinnamon extract (Stop Aging Now)
(1) Vitamin B12 (Thorne Research Bio-B12)
(1) A-D-K (DaVinci)
(2) Niacinamide (Thorne Research)
(2) Zinc (Source Naturals OptiZinc)
(1) Ubiquinol (Mercola)
(1) Iron bisglycinate (Thorne Research; depending on blood test results)

You will have noticed the obvious absence of some classes of food products that are eaten by most people most of the time: there are no sugars of any kind and no starches, both of which are known to increase the probability of cardiovascular events by their instantaneous triggering of more than 300 inflammatory pathways, all of which cause the blood to thicken and become more viscous; there are also no dairy products, which are highly acidifying and usually the cause of negative immune responses from mild to severe intolerance or allergies; and there are no commercial foods or drinks, all of which should simply be avoided by everyone for their lack of nutrition and chemical toxic loads. These are detrimental to our health in several ways and therefore have no place in a healing programme or in a diet for optimal health and longevity.

You will also have noticed that there is a strong emphasis on green juices and green vegetables, coconut fat from coconut milk, and just enough healthy and clean animal protein and fats to provide the body with everything it needs to thrive. It is perfectly fine to have berries either on their own or with coconut milk, as well as 80-85% organic chocolate once in a while (and not later in the day than about 15). You can have organic green tea in the morning (until about 12), but stop drinking coffee (if you’re a big coffee drinker, you have to do this gradually). The adrenal glands—the very important stress and sex hormone producing glands—in this day and age are almost always overstimulated from our busy and stressful lifestyles, and therefore usually dysfunctional to a greater or lesser extent. They also need to be healed and for this, they need a break.

You should continue the probiotics, L-carnosine, and enzymes as long as necessary to regain total health. You can continue indefinitely. You should continue the iodine supplementation with 50–100 mg per day for a year (might be anywhere between 8 to 12 months), after which you should reduce to one drop of 18.75 mg, and maintain this indefinitely. You should continue all supplements for as long as the healing process continues, and will benefit from taking them to the end of your days, reducing the quantity to once per day instead of twice (dropping the evening supplements with dinner), and remembering that there are only benefits from taking more depending on the circumstances in your life and your body’s needs. Of course there are plenty of other supplements that we can be of benefit, but the ones listed are those that I consider most important.

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Such a simple and yet powerful natural anti-inflammatory

He knocks at the door, walks in to my office, and, barely capable of holding back his excitement and enthusiasm, says: “It’s amazing! The pain is completely gone! It’s just been six days since I started, and the pain is gone! I can’t believe it! It’s like a miracle!” I was very happy for him. “I’m glad to hear that”, I said, “and although it may seem like a miracle to you, it makes perfect sense to me. In fact, I would have been surprised if it hadn’t worked.”

About a month before that, we crossed paths in the bathroom. He was wearing a plastic and neoprene brace on one of his wrists. I had never seen him wearing it, and so I asked what had happened. He told me that about three years ago, he had injured his wrist and that it had never healed properly. Sometimes it hurt more, sometime less, but that it had been particularly uncomfortable for about a week, especially typing at the computer most of the day. He said physicians had prescribed anti-inflammatories of various kinds, and at different times, but none had helped in allowing the wrist to heal or making the uncomfortable pain and stiffness go away.

We hadn’t really talked much before that, him and I, and he said, rather jokingly: “Do you know what to do to help it heal?” To his surprise, I think, I said: “Of course I do!”, and then laughed, partly because it was a little funny to say that, but also to break the ice between us. This is what I then went on to say:

“Chronic pain like that, especially in or near a joint, is usually caused by the an excess of uric acid stored in the tissues. Uric acid is the primary metabolic waste excreted in the urine by the kidneys. Since most of us are deeply and chronically dehydrated, the blood becomes saturated with acid that cannot be eliminated in the urine because of the lack of water (and/or salt). But since blood pH cannot be allowed to drop, the acid is pulled out of the blood and stored in the tissues. Over time, all the tissues of the body become acidic. This makes us more susceptible to ailments and injuries of all kinds, and when something happens to cause damage to a soft tissue, like a sprain, for example, the injury does not heal, or takes an excessively long time to do so.”

“What do I need to do?”, he asked. “Do you drink water?”, “Very little: I have a small glass once in a while, with lunch, for example, but I hardly ever drink water, really.” “Well, you have a big part of your answer right here. You absolutely need to drink water. Otherwise, the kidneys cannot eliminate metabolic acids.”, I said.

“From now on, this is what you will do, every day: When you get up in the morning, drink half a litre of plain water. Thirty minutes before lunch, drink half a litre; and thirty minutes before supper, drink half a litre. That makes a total of one and a half litres of water, always on an empty stomach to ensure maximum hydration, and always about thirty minutes before meals to ensure good digestion.”

“Now, in addition to that, which is really the strict minimum amount of water anyone should drink, you will have to, and this is very important, drink one liter of water with the juice of two lemons, a teaspoon of unrefined sea salt, and a little bit of stevia to sweeten. You will do this either late morning, at least an hour before lunch, or late afternoon, at least one hour before supper. It is very important that you drink this lemon water on a completely empty stomach and wait about an hour before eating anything.”

“Doing this will hydrate the digestive system, the blood and the tissues; the lemon water with salt on an empty stomach will, in addition, alkalise the blood, and thus allow the tissues to release the stored acid back into the bloodstream; and these together will allow the kidneys to eliminate this accumulation of metabolic acid each time you pee. In a relatively short amount of time, your wrist will feel better, but everything else in the body will function a lot better as well. Inflammation is not localised; it is systemic. And to get rid of it, we need to get rid of it everywhere.”

“OK. I’ll do it.”, he said, “This is more water than I have ever drank in my life, and I don’t know if I’ll be able to actually drink that much, but I’ll try, and I’ll let you know.” One month later, exactly one week after he did start to drink more water and the lemon water with salt, the chronic pain he had in the wrist, the chronic pain he had had for about three years after the initial injury, the chronic pain for which he had been prescribed and taken a variety of different anti-inflammatory medications, and none of which had worked to help heal the injury, the chronic and long-standing pain was gone. It was completely gone, and it felt like a miracle to him; we can understand why.

I start every day with half a litre of plain water, at least. I usually drink a total of about one litre over the course of about 2 hours. About 1.5 hours later, around 10:00, I make myself a lemonade with one lemon, half a teaspoon of salt and a little stevia in a little more than half a litre (about 650 ml) of water. I drink it relatively quickly and then always rinse the mouth well with plain water in order to avoid any issue relating to the mild citric acid damaging the enamel of the teeth.

Then, I slowly drink my daily green juice over the course of about one hour. Around 12:00 I have another half litre of water, plain or with chlorella or evaporated green juice powder, salt and stevia. I eat around 14:00. For lunch I usually have my coconut milk pudding, but sometimes have a big green salad with some grilled fish at the canteen (once or twice a week).

After lunch, I wait at least two and usually three hours before drinking again, depending on what I ate, (high protein or not). I will usually have a good three quarters of a litre of plain water around 17:00. Then, around 18:00-18:30, I will prepare myself another lemonade with the juice of one lemon, half a teaspoon of unrefined salt and some stevia in a little over half a litre of water. I rinse the mouth with plain water, and usually leave work to ride back home on the bike. When I get there, I drink half a litre of plain water. We have supper about 30-45 minutes later. I usually don’t drink anything more after supper, except for a small glass before bed sometimes.

That’s it: lots of water, lots of salt, lots of lemon water, lots of green juices. A wonderfully simple, effective and powerful natural anti-inflammatory combination for you, your parents, your children, and everyone everywhere. I’ll be happy to hear from you if you want to share a personal story or experience that relates to this.

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A green healing protocol

The digestive system is at the centre of everything that relates to our health. As this is so, gravely ill persons generally also have gravely compromised digestive systems. I would go as far as saying that everyone suffering from any kind of chronic or degenerative health problem has impaired digestion. And the more severe the health disorder, the more compromised the digestive system is likely to be.

Furthermore, I would also go as far as saying that it is usually the dysfunction of the digestive system that comes first, and that it is the consequences of this dysfunction which, over time, lead to more serious complications, and more severe health disorders. Therefore, the most important and most fundamental in the healing process is the healing of the digestive system. This must always come first, before anything else, and everything else in the healing process can only but flow from it.

The proposed protocol is therefore intended for anyone suffering from any kind of chronic and/or degenerative disease condition, from the most gravely ill to those suffering only mildly, with the assurance that, given the absence of pharmaceuticals and invasive medical procedures, and the reliance on solely natural or naturally derived foodstuff, only benefits can come from it, and, as I strongly believe, immense potential for healing and recovery.

An obvious difficulty comes from the fact that in order to promote healing of the bodymind, it is necessary to provide it with the best, most appropriate nutritional support. But since everything that we may provide through eating or drinking goes through the digestive system in order to become available to the organism as a whole, when the digestive organs are compromised, this process is similarly compromised.

So, how do we do it? We do it by minimising as much as possible the work that the digestive system needs to do to extract the nutrients from what we consume, while at the same time providing the digestive system with what it itself needs for healing: We minimise digestive stress and maximise intestinal healing.

The two most crucial elements in digestive health are the intestinal flora, and the integrity of the lining through which absorption occurs from the intestine into the bloodstream. The two most damaging elements are antibiotics and chemicals that destroy the flora, and chronic intestinal acidosis and the accompanying inflammation and malabsorption that ensue, eroding and damaging the lining. It is therefore these two fundamental issues that must be addressed by replenishing the flora and alkalising the gut.

Probiotics to replenish the flora

The organism depends intimately and completely on the trillions of bacteria and other micro-organisms that populate and live in our gut; they outnumber our own human cells 9 to 1. This symbiotic relationship is as old as life itself. Most do not know this. And those who have heard it, probably tend to forget about it, but it is truly essential, because without this relationship, without these bacteria and micro-organism on which our life depends, there would never even have come into existence complex living entities, let alone humans. This is where we start the healing process.

For this, what we need to do is quite simple: we must supplement with the best, most effective and most biologically appropriate probiotics, intensely at first, and then less so, until the gut flora is perfectly established, at which point it will sustain and maintain itself without the need to supplement on a daily basis.

I know of two excellent probiotics on the market, both of which have demonstrated excellent results. One of them is soil-based (Prescript-Assist), and the other is spore-based (MegaSpore Biotic). I personally take Prescript-Assist, which I like very much, but am very interested in trying the other, which I will at some point soon.

Whichever one you chose, you cannot make a mistake. Read the information the manufacturers provide on their web site, get the one you feel more inclined to, and start taking one capsule three times per day: morning, noon and night. Do this for 4 weeks. After that period, you can decrease to two capsules per day, morning and night. Do this for as long as the healing process lasts, probably 3 to 6 months. Once you have recovered, take only one capsule in the morning to ensure a daily replenishing and maintenance of the gut flora. You can never go wrong by taking more probiotics: if they are not needed in the gut, they won’t have a noticeable positive effect, but it is sure that they will never have a negative effect.

Green juices to alkalise

Juicing and drinking green vegetables and grasses is the most effective way to provide the digestive system and the organism a wonderfully rich array of micronutrients of all kinds—minerals and vitamins, amino acids and enzymes, innumerable phytonutrients, and lots of chlorophyll—all of them immediately and easily absorbable, and made available in the bloodstream to the whole body literally within minutes: maximising nutrients, minimising digestive stress.

Juicing and drinking green vegetables and grasses is also the most effective way to alkalise the digestive system, the blood, and over time, all the tissues of which the bodymind is made. This is extremely important for everyone, but it is truly vital for the gravely ill. It is only by alkalising the digestive system that it can begin to recover for the state of chronic acidosis, and subsequently begin to repair itself to eventually heal. This must be crystal clear:

I firmly believe that there is no way to heal any degenerative chronic disease condition, no matter what it is, without healing the digestive system. And there is no way to heal the digestive system without alkalising it deeply and thoroughly, day after day, month after month, and in fact, year after year.

The reason for this is very simple: pathogenic intestinal microorganisms in general both thrive in and promote a highly acidic environment, whereas beneficial intestinal microorganisms much prefer but also promote an alkaline environment; pathogenic intestinal microorganisms thrive and depend on simple sugars that allow them to multiply and proliferate but also to produce ever increasing amounts of lactic acid from the anaerobic oxidation of the sugars that fuel them, whereas beneficial microorganisms do not.

Coconut oil to heal and nourish

Coconut oil is a miracle of nature: it is the richest known source in nature of lauric acid (about 50% of it), which is a natural and powerful anti-fungal, anti-viral and anti-baterial, proven to be so in the lab on a wide variety of common pathogens. At the same time, lauric acid is exceptional in terms of nutrition because it is a medium chain fatty acid that does not require bile to be emulsified, is easily released from the triglyceride structure of oil in the liver, and is then free to circulate throughout the body in the bloodstream to be used as cellular fuel, without being stored in fat cells as other longer chain fatty acids are.

If this was not enough to amaze and convince you that coconut oil is indeed a miracle of nature, it has been shown that coconut oil is great for thyroid health, naturally regulating down hyperthyroidism and regulating up hypothyroidism; great for cholesterol metabolism in regulating up or down lipoprotein production and balance; great for inducing and maintaining nutritional ketosis even when insulin-stimulating carbs are not completely eliminated, which is very helpful and beneficial for all those that must remain in this state of ketosis for their treatment of epilepsy and other kinds of nervous system disorders with seizures, but who would like to have some carbs sometimes; and finally, coconut oil (and the ketones derived from it) has been shown to help stop and reverse plaque formation in cerebral arteries, as well as degeneration of brain cells in Alzheimer’s and dementia patients.

These properties of coconut oil (and lauric acid) make it the absolute best oil to consume in general, for most of your needs in the kitchen, but most importantly for what concerns us here, the absolute best in promoting healing of the digestive system, while nourishing the body by providing the ideal cellular fuel.

Putting it all together

As explained above, to maximise global healing potential, we must maximise the healing of the digestive system. For this, we must replenish the intestinal flora with probiotics, while nurturing an intestinal environment that is beneficial to health-promoting micro-organisms but hostile to acid-forming and disease-causing micro-organisms. This is done my alkalising the intestinal tract, eliminating digestive stress, and maximising micronutrient supply and absorption by the intestines with green juices and coconut oil.

Therefore, this healing protocol in its most effective and also most radical form, relies on drinking only green juices, optionally augmented with a powdered superfood blend, to which is added a table spoon of melted coconut oil, blended into the juice, at least twice per day, but three or four times if necessary or preferred. Since the juice itself is both alkalising and alkaline, the oil can be blended smoothly into it perfectly well.

Adding the coconut oil enhances the benefits of the green juice by ensuring maximum absorption of all minerals and anti-oxidants that depend on the presence of fat in order to make it into the bloodstream. This is established for minerals and anti-oxidants, but it very likely also the case for other micronutrients: the concentration of these healthful micronutrients in the blood, appears to be more or less proportional to the amount of fat in the digestive tract.

A slightly less radical form would include eating of crunchy and watery vegetables like cucumbers, celery, kohlrabi with salt for snacks, and avocados as more filling, meal-like food.

The protocol

This programme that can be followed for a few days, a week, two weeks of more, up to several months, adjusting coconut oil intake to supply more fat energy if required. (People can sustain water healing fasts for up to 45 days, so this protocol can be sustained for months). You can also drink more mineralised water at any time.

There are minimal amounts of protein, and zero animal protein or fat. These are both important for human health, and therefore should be part of everyone’s diet. But they are also both highly acid-forming and the cause of digestive stress, especially the protein. This healing protocol excludes these to maximise alkalisation, cleansing and healing. It is nonetheless important that both animal fats and protein should be reintegrated into the diet afterwards, but always in relatively small amounts, particularly the protein of which we should not have more than about 25-30 g in one meal, and not more than 50-80 g per day, in two or three servings.

If you are interested in doing this for a long period of time lasting several weeks to several months, you should, after the first week or two, add more calories, still mostly from fat, but also from protein, by including a can of coconut milk in two servings, late morning and late afternoon, to make it sustainable on the longer term. Naturally, all these adjustments depend entirely on your condition, aims, and maybe most importantly, on your motivation and discipline. Here is the protocol:

  • Around 7 or 8: Wake up and put on magnesium oil on legs, arms, belly and back, and keep on for at least 30 minutes before showering (see Why you should start taking magnesium today for details).
  • Then slowly drink 1 litre of water with 10 drop of Concentrace minerals. Take the one capsule of probiotics, one capsule of tulsi extract for adrenal support, and optionally 5 small pellets of chlorella and 3 large pellets of spirulina for maximising detox and regeneration.
  • Around 10: Green juice with coconut oil (and superfood blend). Make about 400 ml of juice using a combination of cucumber, fennel bulb, celery with the leaves, lots of chard and/or kale, and/or lettuce, some parsley if you want, a little piece of ginger if you want, and one kiwi with the skin (you can brush off the hairs if you want). When its done, add 1 tablespoon of melted coconut oil (I exclusively use Dr Goerg’s), and blend for a few seconds.
  • Between 11 and 12 (optional): some crunchy and watery vegetables with salt.
  • Around 13: Green juice with coconut oil (and superfood blend), probiotics, tulsi, chlorella and spirulina
  • Around 16: Drink (slowly) 1 litre of water with 10 drop of Concentrace, the juice of two pressed lemons, half a teaspoon of salt, some stevia to sweeten, and two teaspoons of psyllium husks. Rinse your mouth with plain water between glasses of lemonade.
  • Around 18: Green juice with coconut oil (and superfood blend), probiotics, chlorella and spirulina, but no tulsi because it will probably keep you up at night, calm but awake.
  • Between 19 and 21 (optional): Crunchy vegetables and/or avocado with salt.
  • Before bed: Magnesium oil and keep for at least 30 minutes before showering.

B12 is vital

Finally, and extremely importantly, any and every healing protocol for the gravely ill, but also for the not-so-gravely ill, must absolutely include high-dose B12 supplementation that in the most extreme cases should be administered through daily (one week), then weekly (2 months) and then bi-weekly (as long as needed) injections of 1 mg hydroxocobalamin or methylcobalamin (better), but not cyanocobalamin. Alternatively, methylcobalamin patches can be used for fast and effective replenishing of B12 stores. Lastly, a high-dose (2000 microgram/day) methylcobalamin sublingual supplement can also be taken. There are zero known negative side effects of high-dose B12 supplementation.

Blood concentration of B12 should be brought up to between 1000 and 2000 pg/ml and maintained at that level until full recovery is achieved (or as close to it as can be hoped for). You can read more about it in B12 for absolutely everyone.

Final words

It is obviously not necessary to be ill in order to incorporate these healing tools into your daily routine. On the contrary, it is by doing so that we can prevent disease conditions from ever developing, nurturing the bodymind to optimal health.

My wife, our son and myself, for example, drink green vegetable juices with melted coconut oil, lemon water with salt, stevia and psyllium husks, green powdered superfood blends, and take probiotics, tulsi, chlorella and spirulina, together with a few other supplements including B12, on a daily basis. The difference is that in this protocol, all highly acid-forming and damaging sugars and starches are strictly eliminated, but also all other solid foods, all of which require at least some work, and in particular also highly acid-forming complex proteins that require intense work on the part of the digestive system. This is done in order to really maximise the benefits of the deep alkalisation and the state of partial fasting with powerful nutritional support and zero digestive stress.

Naturally, I strongly encourage everyone of you to also incorporate these elements of natural healing into your life, no matter how old you are or how healthy (you think) you are, but also to go further, and try following the strict protocol for 1, 2, 3 or even 5 or 7 days, every once in a while. You will really feel the difference.

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At the heart of heart disease

You are more likely to die from heart attack or stroke than anything else. Cardiovascular and cerebrovascular disease are the top two causes of death (Ref1), responsible for the death of about one third of people in the US and in most industrialised countries (Ref2). What is strange, however, is that not many people seem to worry or even care about this. Well, at least not until it hits them in the face. Have you ever thought about it? Has your doctor not mentioned this? Is that surprising? Well, not really, because they also die primarily of heart attack and stroke and cancer, like everyone else, and they have no idea why.

To be fair though, some people do care, and some people do know, even some doctors, but only very few. Those who do, however, are usually not those who most need to, and those who really do need to, usually don’t. Funny how that is. And funny how this seems to be the case for so many things. Anyway, it is important to realise and remember that heart attack and stroke are together the single most important cause of death in most of the world, and are responsible for about a third of all deaths in industrialised countries. That is a lot.

Something else which is important to appreciate, is that heart attack and stroke are two manifestations of exactly the same problem: damage to the arteries. Moreover, and rather unbeknownst to most, Alzheimer’s disease, responsible for about 5% of deaths in the US (but 7% in the UK and 10% in Australia), as well as dementia and senility, are yet often a third manifestation of the same problem. In this case, it is the accumulation of plaques in the smaller arteries of the brain that gradually obstruct or block the flow of blood to specific areas, causing the gradual withering and eventual death of these brain cells. B12 deficiency, however, growing more severe with the passing years, is also a major cause of dementia and neurological problems in older people, but also in the young and the middle aged.

Now somehow, because these conditions most commonly manifest themselves in older folks, usually in their sixties, seventies or eighties, the rest of us just tend to ignore these obvious facts, pretending the whole thing has nothing to do with us. Do you find this sensible? You know it’s not. So, what do we need to know, and what do we need to do?  Let’s paint a clear picture by asking a few basic questions, the few basic questions, answering them, and looking at the links between factors that emerge from this line of questioning.

Human-Heart-Organ-Faust-heart-symbolises

Why do plaques develop and accumulate in the arteries? Because the cells and tissues that are part of the artery get injured, and the body’s repair systems are activated to patch up and heal the injured tissue. The plaque, just like a scab that allows the skin wound underneath it to heal, protects and provides the necessary constituents for the healing and repair of the artery wall. And just like a scab falls off on its own when the wound has healed, there are specific mechanisms to deconstruct the plaque, and recycle its constituents when the injury has healed. If, however, damage to the artery occurs faster than the time it takes to heal and repair, the plaques accumulate. This is exactly what happens in most of us.

Where do plaques develop? In the places where the blood pressure and blood flow are greatest, and particularly at arterial junctions where there is an important change in the angle of the blood flow from one arterial branch to another. This is very important. Moreover, plaques form inside the artery wall, not on its surface. This is also very important. Why are these two little facts so very important? Because they are completely contrary to the standard picture held by practically everyone about the development of arterial disease.

We have been taught, and hence absurdly believe, that plaques are made up of cholesterol and saturated fat that circulate in the blood, stick to our arteries, and that over time, grow into large bulges of cholesterol and fat that block the arteries. Nothing could be further from the truth, and it is hard to imagine how a thinking person could have come up with a total failure of a pedagogical scenario as idiotic and absurd as this one. Still, this is what we believe. Isn’t this what you thought, at least at some point in the past, or actually even still think?

Firstly, neither cholesterol nor fats are water-soluble. Blood is 50% water and the plasma in which everything other than red and white blood cells is transported is 90% water. Therefore, neither cholesterol nor fats can circulate in the bloodstream on their own. They are carried around by lipoproteins of various sizes and densities that can be imagined as little spheres with a protein shell that hold fat and cholesterol on the inside (read more on this in What about cholesterol). These lipoproteins only open up and transfer their contents when they correctly latch onto a receiving gatekeeper on the surface of the cell, and this is so important that every cell has a lot of these ports to receive fat and cholesterol from the carrier lipoproteins.

Secondly, if it were the case that somehow fat and cholesterol floated and just stuck to the blood vessels, we would naturally expect to see a gradual appearance and accumulation of an evenly distributed layer of fat and cholesterol in all the arteries, as well as in all the veins. And this is not at all what we see: we see plaques in specific places and not anywhere else.

And thirdly, how in the world would the cholesterol and fat stuck to the blood vessel, somehow, magically, move from the outside to the inside of the artery wall without losing its structure or disintegrating? There is just no way. So please eradicate this erroneous notion from your conscious intellect, and spread the word to your family, friends and especially to your family doctor!

What causes injury to arteries? This is the million, or rather, the multi-billion dollar question, isn’t it? Because if we can answer this question, we can do what is needed to avoid arterial injury and damage. And no, it’s not cholesterol!  (I know, I know, you’ve gotten that point by now). Well, fortunately, we know what causes injury to arteries, and get to that very soon. Unfortunately, there are several causes, and they are intertwined into vines of interdependent factors, each of which must be considered in the context of the overall picture. It is through this second point that I distinguish myself from most experts whose books I’ve read on the topic, that almost inevitably focus on one particular underlying cause or problem at the expense of the others, and more importantly, the relationship between them. Here we go:

Chronic dehydration  is the most fundamental of all causes of arterial injury. Unfortunately, this is not generally recognised. But fortunately, it is the easiest to address and correct. Blood pressure is absolutely fundamental to all bodily processes and functions. The body has evolved an extremely finely tuned system for continuous control and refined adjustments of blood pressure, because everything depends on it. Since the circulatory system is pretty much a closed system (blood doesn’t go in or out), the pressure in the entire system is primarily a function of its water content (50%). Therefore, even a slight decrease in this water content, immediately translates to a drop in volume and thus pressure. This drop is sensed by many different types of cells in blood vessels, in some glands and organs, and in parts of the brain that continuously monitor the pressure in the system. This triggers a series of hormonal responses whose ultimate purpose is to raise the blood pressure back up to its optimal level, and maintain the precious balance that the organism and all of its parts require and strive for incessantly during every instant of their existence. And by the way, remember that none of these care about you, what you want, or what you like. They strive for optimal function and survival independently of you, for their own sake.

You can read more about this in The kidney: evolutionary marvel and in How much water, how much salt, and our amazing kidneys, but basically, it goes like this: drop in water content, drop in blood pressure: secretion of renin by the kidney, secretion of angiotensinogen by the liver, conversion to angiotensin I  by renin, conversion to angiotensin II  in the lungs, contraction of blood vessels in order to raise blood pressure; secretion of stress-response hormone vasopressin by the pituitary gland, more contraction of blood vessels, reabsorption of water and salt in kidney to raise blood pressure, secretion of glucose from the liver, secretion of blood clotting factors and platelets to thicken blood, secretion of stress hormone ACTH  to reinforce all of the above. Bad news. All of it. Don’t you think?

The solution is very simple, drink more water and eat more salt to maintain sodium concentration in the blood; always drink on an empty stomach: up to 30-45 minutes before meals (at the very least 500 ml 30 minutes before), and then wait at least 2-3 hours after meals. Simple, easy and inexpensive, but highly effective and absolutely fundamental.

Magnesium deficiency  is the second most fundamental cause of arterial injury. But once more, this is unfortunately not generally recognised either. Magnesium experts, (most probably unaware of the underlying problems caused by chronic dehydration), estimate that about 60% of all cardio-cerebro vascular events are attributable to magnesium deficiency. Why? Because magnesium is what allows muscles fibres to relax. It is quite straight forward: without enough available magnesium, muscle cells cannot relax; they contract and just stay contracted. This prolonged involuntary contraction is what we feel in the foot, calf or hamstring when we get a cramp. But the smooth muscle cells that line all of the blood vessels are much more sensitive to magnesium, extremely sensitive, in fact, because they are the mechanical means by which blood pressure is continuously regulated, moment to moment, in order to best adapt to the physiological conditions and needs in any given instant.

This function is far more important than the use of an arm or a leg, because it is vital to the survival of the organism as a whole, and therefore takes precedence in the body’s physiological hierarchy. Imagine if you experienced arterial spasms, and consequently, little heart attacks, as frequently as some of us experience muscle cramps in a foot, hamstring or calf? How disastrous! So the body’s physiological hierarchy definitely serves us also very well indeed. Nonetheless, even a slight deficiency in magnesium will cause dysfunction in blood pressure regulation by those smooth blood vessel muscle cells. Since the primary effect of magnesium deficiency is stiffening of muscle fibres, this will manifest in higher blood pressure, generally and in all circumstances, when relaxed or asleep, when exercising intensely or feeling stressed. Naturally, this does not get any better with time. Instead, degradation and dysfunction increase in severity at a faster rate with each passing day. The vicious cycle goes just like this: less magnesium, more stiffness; more stiffness, higher pressure, more arterial damage; more arterial damage, more plaques, more stiffness, higher pressure; and down and around it goes. Bad, bad news.

The solution in this case is also very simple: daily supplementation. You can read more about magnesium in Why you should start taking magnesium today. My updated recommendations for supplementation are as follows: use concentrated trace minerals in your drinking water, 20 drops per litre, which is just like drinking natural, mineral-rich water. This will result in 40 to 80 drops per day, and will provide 250 to 500 mg of magnesium, but also all the other trace minerals in their most natural ratio as found in sea salt (minus the sodium which is taken out). This is perfectly adequate, and over time will replenish magnesium in addition to all other mineral deficiencies that are usually just as bad but not as important or noticeable. This can take years, but that’s not a problem. Be patient and consistent.

Two or three times per week, (probably mostly in the winter), take baths with 2/3 to 1 cup of nigari (magnesium chloride) flakes. You have to soak for at least 30 minutes, and do not wash with soap or rinse off before coming out. In the summer, if you want to hasten the replenishing of your magnesium levels, you should use “magnesium oil” (concentrated solution of magnesium chloride and water; I recommend 20%, not more), and spray it on your arms, legs and body, avoiding sensitive areas because it stings a bit. In this case also, you must wait at least 30 minutes before having a shower to allow the skin to absorb the magnesium. I don’t recommend taking nigari solution orally because it irritates the intestines in the long run, especially the colon.

That’s it. And just like with good water intake, magnesium supplementation, especially using concentrated trace minerals in your drinking water, is also simple, easy and inexpensive, but highly effective and absolutely fundamental. We simply cannot be in good health without it, let alone in optimal health.

Simple and starchy carbohydrates  that stimulate the secretion of insulin from the pancreas, are without any doubt the most damaging and dangerous substances that we call and consider to be food. And once more, and again unfortunately, this is not generally recognised. Now, I know that the above statement about carbs is a very strong one which, in fact, can be interpreted to imply that simple and starchy carbohydrates should not be considered food, per se. But I hold to this, because I believe we should only consider as food those substances that are, on the one hand, essential for survival, and thus also for optimal health, and on the other, health-promoting and not the opposite. And whether you know this already or not, whether you chose to ignore this fact, or even whether you believe it or not, simple and starchy carbohydrates fail on both counts: we do not need any whatsoever for survival and certainly not for optimal health, and the ingestion of even the smallest amount causes damage to the body, its systems and its metabolism. The less is consumed, the lesser the damage; the more is consumed, the greater the damage. But there is a threshold effect, so that above a given amount, the damage that is sustained by the tissues and organs increases rapidly.

Fundamentally, the process of arterial damage, the subsequent plaque formation and the entire genesis of cardio-cerebro vascular disease is an inflammatory process. This means that anything which causes inflammation will make it worse, but also that inflammation is at the root of the problem. So, what does this have to do with carbohydrates? Absolutely everything! Volek and Phinney write in The Art and Science of Low Carbohydrate Living:

Inflammation causes our cells (specifically our mitochondria) to increase production of free radicals. Free radicals are like mini roadside bombs that interfere with normal cellular functions. So … : 1) dietary carbohydrate raises serum insulin; 2) insulin promotes inflammation … ; 3) inflammation increases cellular free radical generation; 4) free radicals attack any convenient nearby target; 5) ideal targets for free radicals are [cell] membrane polyunsaturated fats; 6) membrane polyunsaturated fats are important determinants of cellular function … (p. 82). Carbohydrate ingestion and … hyperglycemia activate a host of inflammatory and free radical-generating pathways. Some of these include: … activation of NF-kB which regulates the transcriptional activity of over 100 pro-inflammatory genes (p.186).

And to reinforce the case against insulin, Rosedale couldn’t be clearer on this in Insulin and Its Metabolic Effects:

If you drip insulin into the femoral artery of a dog, … , the artery will become almost totally occluded with plaque after about three months. The contra lateral side was totally clear, just contact of insulin in the artery caused it to fill up with plaque. That has been known since the 70s and has been repeated in chickens and in dogs; it is really a well-known fact that insulin floating around in the blood causes a plaque build-up. They didn’t know why, but we know that insulin causes endothelial proliferation. This is the first step as it causes a tumor, an endothelial tumor.

Insulin also causes the blood to clot … and causes the conversion of macrophages into foam cells, which are the cells that accumulate the fatty deposits. Every step of the way, insulin is causing cardiovascular disease. It fills the body with plaque, it constricts the arteries, it stimulates the sympathetic nervous system, it increases platelet adhesiveness and coaguability of the blood. (p. 7)

There we have it. Although tons more could be said, and indeed, has been said, tried and demonstrated many times during the last half century, the only thing that we really need to understand and remember, is that both insulin and glucose in the bloodstream are like corrosive agents that both cause direct damage to tissues and fuel inflammation throughout the circulatory system and the organism as a whole. We didn’t even mention glycation, but you can read more about carbohydrates if you wish by browsing the articles in that category.

The solution in this case is also very simple: just eliminate simple and starchy carbohydrates from your diet. This one, however, is definitely much more easily said than done. However you look at it, there are no alternatives. It is just a question of time and motivation, understanding and determination. At least until it becomes a question of necessity, and in the extreme, a choice not just between health and disease, but between life and death. Plainly said, it is impossible to gain and maintain optimal health without eliminating insulin-stimulating carbohydrates from the diet. It is important to emphasise that fibrous vegetables (everything except for starchy and potato-like) do not stimulate insulin secretion. These should constitute the bulk in volume of what we eat every day.

Polyunsaturated vegetable oils  are the other “food” substance that should be eliminated simply because they also promote inflammation and free radical damage. This includes all vegetable oils from seeds (sunflower, safflower, rape, etc), pulses (soya) and grains (corn) that are liquid at room temperature and in the fridge. You didn’t know that? Well, this is another one of those well established and demonstrated facts that most of us are unaware of. What else can I say? You can read about this in The Skinny on Fats by Mary Enigbut also in the books by Taubes, Volek & Phinney, Kendrick, Colpo and Ravnskov among others (see Bibliography).

Solution? Simple: olive oil is monounsaturated (you will notice that it solidifies in the fridge), and is the only one you should use in salads and dips; get high quality and use less. Otherwise, cold pressed, extra virgin, organic coconut oil and organic butter (unpasteurized is is much better if you can find it) are by far the best options for everything else.

Stress,  negative physical, psychological and emotional stress, especially if it is chronic, is probably the worst assault that can be imposed upon the organism. In fact, many health and stress experts maintain that stress is definitely the most potent poison with the most immediate and most deleterious effects on all bodily functions and systems. Kendrick makes this the main thesis of his book on cholesterol and heart disease, and he does make a very convincing case of it. Other medical scientist have shown how psychological stress increases all disease markers, from the propensity to catching colds and flus, to the increased probability to develop degenerative diseases like diabetes, heart disease, stroke, cancer, arthritis and multiple sclerosis. This seems amazing at first, but when we look into the details of what stress actually means, how stress manifests itself in our biochemistry, it becomes completely clear and obvious why it is so damaging. In addition, this is where we see how everything ties in together, and very explicitly at that.

One thing that should be clear is that any kind of negative stress induces the release of stress hormones. As we saw earlier, this triggers a bunch of reactions: contraction of blood vessels and rise of blood pressure, increased clotting, thickening and stickiness of blood, redirection of blood from digestive system, internal organs and brain, to large muscles in outer limbs, conversion in the liver of stored glycogen into glucose and subsequent release into the bloodstream, temporary insulin-resistance and thus inability to burn fat that also causes both blood sugar and insulin to remain in the bloodstream much longer than it rightly should. Temporary suspension and suppression of essential immune functions, increased magnesium needs as well as magnesium wasting are other really important immediate consequences of the presence of stress hormones in the system. Even though these biochemically mediated reactions are all very important when we need to fight or run for our lives, it is really bad in every other possible circumstance we may find ourselves in. And I am pretty confident that most of you rarely find yourselves facing a tiger or raging bull, but frequently feel that characteristic tightening of the breath, those butterflies in the stomach, the rush of blood to head, the wave of heat that seems to come out of nowhere, and all the other sensations associated with the surge of stress hormones through the body. In fact, you probably feel this much too often.

Now imagine this state of psychological and emotional stress, with all of its biochemical effects and metabolic consequences, as chronic: as how we live our life from one day to the next. What a disaster! We simultaneously induce and exacerbate all of the effects of chronic dehydration, of magnesium deficiency, of eating simple carbohydrates, and this, throughout the day, from morning to night. What an incredible disaster! So, no wonder we find that the more stress we feel, the more colds and flus we catch, the fatter we get, the more metabolic syndrome and diabetes we develop, the more heart attacks and strokes we suffer, the more cancers we grow and die from. And if that isn’t enough, sustaining such daily stress over an extended period will inevitably lead to adrenal fatigue, because the adrenal gland sitting on top of the kidneys that are continuously stimulated to secrete ever increasing amounts of stress hormones, just get exhausted. And then our cortisol and insulin levels are all screwed up, we can’t sleep at night, we can’t get up in the morning, we can’t concentrate, we cry for no reason, we forget things we shouldn’t and don’t want to, we are confused about everything and everything confuses us. Is that enough? Is that black enough a picture?

Is there a solution? Of course there is. First and foremost, it is crucial to recognise that the bulk of the stress that we impose on the bodymind is caused by the physiological assault at the cellular, metabolic and hormonal levels of the previous four factors: chronic dehydration, magnesium deficiency, insulin-stimulating carbs and polyunsaturated oils. Therefore, the most important thing to do to reduce our overall stress, is to do what is needed to take care of the first four factors, and to stop drinking coffee which always induces a stress response by stimulating the adrenal glands directly. Doing this will go a very long way in reducing and maybe eliminating stress almost completely. The first thing that everyone who adopts the green, mostly raw, alkalising ketogenic diet I promote, is how calm they feel after just a few days. And this calm becomes how you are in general. Why? Because stress hormone levels drop dramatically and quite quickly. And note that this is solely due to the biochemical and hormonal effects of this type of diet. Therefore, the importance of what we eat and drink on the overall stress levels cannot be understated: it is the most important! Unfortunately, as with many things I point out and underline, this is not generally recognised either.

Once you have done that, you will feel an entirely different person. Then, secondarily, for the psychological aspects, you really have to relax, take it easy, and take it slow. This may sound silly: telling someone who is stressed out to relax is almost as useful as telling someone who’s clothes are on fire that they should put out the fire before they get burnt. But, in many ways it is hard to say anything else: almost all the emotional and psychological stress we feel is self-induced. We simply work ourselves up. And that’s a fact.

We might very well invoke and attribute our stress to a thousand and one external circumstances and people and places and things to do and family problems and on and on, but in the end, the fact is that stress is self-induced. It is our response to all these things, these events, these circumstances, all of these things that are just our life, nothing more and nothing less. And it is our response that is either highly stressful, mildly stressful or not stressful at all. In other words, it is our attitude, our disposition towards what happens, that determines if we will feel stressed or not.

As soon as you understand and recognise this, the stress will ease up on its own: you will relax. You really have to just let go and relax. Change your attitude towards things. Just be cool and things will cool down for you. Just be calm and things will be calm. Take your time: walk slowly when you are going somewhere, speak slowly and listen to the person that is talking, leave early so that you don’t have to rush, just take your time in everything you do. This will help enormously. And you really have to do this, not just sometimes or for a while, but as the way you do things from now onwards. You will really feel the difference.

Biochemically, it is absolutely essential to optimise your B12 (aim for 800 pg/ml) and D3 levels (aim for 80 ng/ml). Both are really important for everything physiological and everything psychological. You can also use some natural helpers like tulsi (holy basil) as a tea (we start each day with that), or in extract; it is very effective at helping to calm down and it directly supports the adrenal glands, those that secrete the stress hormones. Valerian and melatonin are excellent non-addictive aids to sleeping soundly without side effects.

Maybe what is worth underlining at this point is the relationship that all of these variables have with each other, and particularly with stress. What I mean by this is that stress stimulates the release of glucose from the liver and leads to hyperglycaemia followed by insulin secretion, but ingesting sugar that directly causes hyperglycaemia and insulin secretion, induces stress on the system. Stress wastes and depletes magnesium, but magnesium supplementation reduces stress. Chronic dehydration triggers a comprehensive and full blown stress response, but a plentiful intake of high quality mineralised water and salt puts a stop to all of this and naturally suppresses the stress response. And although I haven’t mentioned this yet, it’s the same for food: all food that is eaten that induces stress on the digestive system—processed, chemical-laden, refined, overcooked or otherwise dead food—induces stress on the organism, a lot of stress. On the contrary, all food that instead provides enzymes, minerals and other phyto- and micro-nutrients—all raw veggies, nuts, seeds, coconut milk, superfoods—nourishes the body and its systems, and very effectively eases the stress on the organism as a whole. This is very important.

Free radicals,  regardless of how they come to be in circulation in the first place, reactive oxygen species or free radicals are the source of a lot of damage, and this to all cells, tissues and organs. Naturally, they are also the cause of accelerated ageing, and consequently, promote the development of degenerative diseases. We now know that free radicals abound with high blood glucose, high insulin, high polyunsaturated oil intake, and chronic stress which combines and exacerbates all problems. So, in addition to implementing all previous solutions comprehensively, especially loading up on raw fresh vegetables and green juices every day, it is also really good to supplement with anti-oxidants. Obviously, it is intelligent to find and take only the best ones. In this regard, what I take and recommend is astaxanthin (Bio-Astin from Nutrex I think is the best on the market) and turmeric in capsules (from Organic India), at night after dinner.

Infectious viruses, bacteria and pathogenic microforms  that circulate in the bloodstream have also very clearly been found to cause direct damage to blood vessel tissues. Ravnskov makes this his primary thesis in his book on cholesterol, fats and heart disease. And even though he does make a convincing case of it, with plenty of evidence and logical deductions, I am of the opinion that the terrain—the internal environment of the body—is ultimately what matter most, and in fact, if it is in optimal balance and health, then pathogens simply cannot either exist there, or if they do, cannot cause any harm. So, instead of looking for ways to kill and eradicate these, my focus is on attaining and maintaining a perfectly healthy and alkaline terrain such that there is no need to worry about pathogenic microforms, almost all of which thrive in acidic, oxygen-deprived environments. And this without saying anything about the Bechamp’s, Enderlein’s, Rife’s and Nassens’ observations and theories of the pleomorphic nature of microzymas or somatids, and their metamorphic cycle with three health-promoting and thirteen disease-promoting states. This fascinating story will be for another time.

Elevated free iron  is very tightly correlated with increased incidence of cardiovascular events. It is well established that men tend to die about 5-10 years earlier than women. The fact is, though, that they tend get a lot more heart attacks with rates increasing with age up to about 50. But following menopause, women’s rates of heart attack steadily grow to reach those of men by the time they are 65-70.

This is due to excess free iron that is always much lower in women during their reproductive period, but that grows steadily after menopause. And it is well established that iron is definitely essential and actually also works as a potent antioxidant when it it in optimal concentrations, but that it switches to being a potent oxidant and irritant in the blood vessels in high concentrations. For men who do not exercise, iron concentration just grows with time, just as their risk and rates of heart attack. If you exercise, iron is used up and therefore stays around optimal levels naturally. For women who love blood every month, iron tends to be ok, although sometimes too low. So this needs to be monitored.Hi

Elevated Homocysteine   is considered by some researchers as the most serious risk factor for both cerebrovascular and cardiovascular disease. It is a amino acid breakdown product that is either recycled back into the amino acid methionine or destroyed by the liver. However, both of these homocysteine clearing mechanisms depend upon vitamin B12, B6 and folic acid. Since it is B12 that we tend to be most deficient of, it is also the weakest link in the chain. Fortunately, it is pretty simple to keep low levels of this toxic animo acid breakdown product low: we just need to keep B12 levels high, i.e., above 600 pg/ml.

Recommendations

Is there a need for a conclusion? I don’t really think so: you have everything you need. But if I were asked to summarise everything I wrote in this article, or better still, everything I know that relates to artery disease in a few recommendations, I would then say this:

  1. Drink plenty of clean alkaline water (3-4 litres/day), at least 30 minutes before and 1-2 hours after, for a total of 3-4 litres each day. Green juice and lemon water are excellent.
  2. Avoid simple and starchy carbohydrates.
  3. Avoid polyunsaturated vegetable oils.
  4. Do not take statins, cholesterol-lowering drugs, or any other drugs, really.
  5. Minimise stress: first physiological and then psychological, and sleep well. Do everything you can to make this happen: take tulsi or tulsi extract during the day, and take melatonin and/or valerian root extract at night if necessary.
  6. Eat plenty of animal fats, coconut oil and grass fed butter, all of the highest quality.
  7. Eat good amounts of high quality animal protein from animal flesh and organ meats; eggs and high quality dairy only if you are not intolerant (though many people are).
  8. Eat plenty of unrefined sea salt with your meals (1-2 teaspoons per day).
  9. Eat raw fresh veggies, lots of salads with greens of all kinds (kale and spinach are most nutrient dense).
  10. Avoid alcohol (it’s quite toxic; that’s why the liver try to filter it out of the blood.)
  11. Supplement with iodine, magnesium, vitamins B12, A, D3 and K2 to maintain optimal levels of these essential vitamins. Take other supplements as needed.
  12. Exercise and go outside in the fresh air and under the sun’s rays. Do high intensity functional resistance training; Pilates or yoga to strengthen, align, and balance the core, the posture, and the body as a whole; lots of stretching and self-massage to release accumulated tensions.
  13. Supplement with sodium bicarbonate and potassium to keep a good alkaline balance.
  14. Take Magnesium-Bicarbonate baths (if you can): 1 cup nigari flakes, 1 cup baking soda, 45 min.

If you do these things, and you are not exposed to some dangerous environmental toxin, you will, in all likelihood, never have to worry about cardio-cerebral vascular disease, never have to worry about degenerative, immune, or metabolic diseases, and in fact, never have to worry about any other kind of disease at all. Of course, I can’t really guarantee this. But I’m betting my life on it.

If you enjoyed reading this article, please Like and Share on your social networks. This is the only way I can know you appreciated it.

Detoxification

Do you know why cattle raised industrially, either for meat or for dairy, need to be on various drugs and antibiotics? Because they’re sick. Do you know why they’re all sick with viruses, bacteria, infections, tendonitis, chronic inflammation, arthritis, atherosclerosis, diabetes and cancer? (sounds familiar?) Because their intestines are chronically acidic. Do you know why their intestines are chronically acidic? Because they are fed a high-carbohydrate diet based on corn.

Do most people know this? No, they don’t. But is this a well-known problem in the industry? Of course. Is the cause of this problem also well-know? Of course it is. Industrial veterinarians say so themselves: “If these animals grazed on grass, we would be out of our jobs!” (from The Omnivore’s Dilemma).

And why is that: why is it that if cattle were to eat grass—as they always have, not just for the last ten thousand years since our ancestors domesticated them, but for millions of years along the slow evolutionary path—they would not get sick? Because they are meant to eat grass: they are herbivores. Yes. But that doesn’t explain why. The reason that they would not get sick is because their intestinal tract and their blood would be alkaline. 

Now, the most important question is the following: why is a chronically acidic intestinal tract the root cause of so much sickness and disease in cattle? The answer is simple, relatively speaking: Cattle are herbivores. This means they have evolved eating grass. Dark green, chlorophyll-rich, fibrous grass loaded with minerals is not only excellently nutritious for them (and for us), but it yields in the intestines an alkaline residue after digestion, sometimes referred to as ash in analogy to something that has been consumed by fire.

The pH of the entire length of the intestines is meant to be and remain alkaline. (Recall: 7 is neutral, below that is acidic, and above is alkaline.) Unlike the stomach in which the environment must be acidic (from mildly to highly depending on its contents) in order to break down proteins into simple amino acids, and that for this reason has cells that secrete mucus to form a thick layer that protects the lining from the corrosive acid also secreted by cells in the stomach in response to the presence of proteins, the delicate lining of the intestines does not have such a protective coating of mucus. The mechanism intended to protect it is the secretion by the pancreas of a strongly alkaline sodium bicarbonate solution into the small intestine in order to neutralise the acid following the transfer of the contents of the stomach into the duodenum.

However, even though this process does take place more or less efficiently depending on many factors like pancreatic and kidney function but especially on hydration status (see Why you should drink water before meals), the final stages of digestion and breakdown of the foodstuff—the now pH-neutralised chyme that came from the stomach—leave either an alkaline or an acidic ash depending on what it is, and on how well this entire digestive process takes place.

Now, if you didn’t already know this, the digestion and breakdown process is not done by “us” or by the intestines themselves: it is done by the trillions of bacteria, yeasts and fungi that live in our gut. These microscopic inhabitants that make up our intestinal flora depend on us for their survival, but we also depend on them for ours. This is the definition of a symbiotic relationship.

As you may have guessed, some are beneficial and essential, while others are detrimental and pathogenic. What is it that regulates the proliferation and lifecycle of all these microscopic inhabitants of our intestines, different kinds throughout, depending on the section and specificity of the cells and nutrients that are absorbed in that particular stretch of the long tube that is our gut? It is the environment, the surroundings, the medium in which they live. And what determines the characteristics of that medium? The foods we eat, and when we eat them; the drinks we drink, and when we drink them. Makes perfect sense, doesn’t it?

When the intestines are chronically acidic, the pathogenic yeasts, fungi and bacteria thrive and proliferate: their metabolic by-products, their eliminations—that are highly acidic—make the environment increasingly more acidic, the lining of the intestinal wall is gradually corroded, and eaten away by the acid. Once it is thin enough the yeasts’ and the fungi’s tentacles and outgrowths pierce through the intestinal wall and spill out their toxins and themselves into the bloodstream and outside the gut, spreading throughout the body, multiplying and proliferating in every other place where the environment is suitable, and given that in the crushing majority of people, most tissues are already quite acidic, that’s not hard to find.

The result? inflammation, yeast infections, urinary tract infections, vaginal infections, fungal overgrowth, generalised candida all over the place, inside and out. This is what causes the cattle to be sick. This is what causes all of the diseases from which they suffer, from which they need to be treated with drugs and antibiotics, and from which they need to be treated by the vets. Why? Simply because they eat corn instead of grass. Once more: is this known by most people who gingerly go to the supermarket to get a their meat for dinner? Sadly, no, it isn’t. But is this known by the vets in the meat industry? Sadly, yes, it is.

What does any of this have to do with us? It has everything to do with us because exactly the same thing happens in our own gut (see Sick and Tired). You’ve certainly heard of the so-called leaky gut syndrome. Well, this is it: exactly it. But what you probably haven’t heard is that this is what is happening in your intestines, and in those of almost everyone you know, and, in fact, almost everyone everywhere, to a greater or lesser extent.

Why? Because we all eat lots of simple and starchy carbohydrates, because all simple and starchy carbohydrates make the intestines acidic, and because all the pathogenic inhabitants of our gut thrive on the sugar and starch it is fed, and in the increasingly acidic environment this promotes.

What does any of this have to do with detoxification? It has everything to do with detoxification because the metabolic by-products and eliminations of the pathogenic yeasts, fungi and bacteria thriving in our gut are by far the most important source of toxins from which the body is sickened, but also of which it is desperately trying to detoxify itself.

Furthermore, all toxins resulting from the natural and normal digestion and metabolism of proteins are also highly acidic. And what is generally the case for most of us—here again, almost everyone everywhere—is that every tissue in the body is overly acidic, every cell that needs an alkaline environment to function properly is desperately trying to survive in this acidic medium. And so, exactly like the cattle, we are all sick, we suffer from viruses, bacteria, infections, tendonitis, chronic inflammation, atherosclerosis, arthritis, diabetes and cancer, and everything else you care to add to this list.

What happens when we stop eating simple and starchy carbohydrates? It’s simple: the pathogenic micro-organisms in the intestines are starved because they cannot survive without a constant supply of sugar, and consequently begin to die off, massively. The beneficial ones do not. In addition, there is a quick metabolic adaptation and shift to using fat instead of sugar as the primary source of cellular fuel: nutritional ketosis is triggered within about 48 hours, takes about 4 weeks to be well established, and about 8 weeks to be completely established (from The Rosedale Diet and The Art and Science of Low Carbohydrate Living).

This keto-adaptation causes a fast and sudden activation of fat-burning stimulated by the drop in blood sugar and insulin levels, thus releasing into the bloodstream the heavy metals and chemical contaminants stored in the fat cells. This causes the spilling out of toxins all at once and from all directions that can manifest in a variety of ways: headaches, stomach aches, diarrhea, vomiting, boils, rashes, anxiety, insomnia, as well as asthma-like or other allergy-like reactions, to mention the most common.

But all of these are signs of detoxification and are therefore good, very good, extremely good. The only thing is that depending on the initial state of the body, the process may be more or less extreme, more or less painful, more or less prolonged, and more or less stressful. In some cases, we may want to do it more gradually in order to avoid an extremely fast, and thus intense detox phase that can sometimes actually make us sick(er) for a while. But no matter what, everything that manifests is a positive and encouraging sign that we are moving towards a healthier state of body and of mind, for sure. There are several things that help in the process of detoxification.

The first, that you will have read or heard about anywhere you encounter mention of detoxification, is to drink a lot of water. What you will not have read or heard about, however, and that I will add to this recommendation, is that it is essential to take plenty of unrefined sea salt to accompany all the water. Without the salt, you will quickly dilute your blood sodium and chloride concentrations and consequently dehydrate instead of hydrating. The ratio is 1/2 to 1 teaspoon of salt per litre of water, depending on how much you eat, and how much salt you take with that food. The more you drink, the more salt you need, and it is particularly important if you don’t eat for an extended period of time. Drops to make the water alkaline is also very helpful; just make sure you don’t do this just before, during or after having complex proteins, as they require a highly acidic stomach.

The second is that since you can consider all the toxins being released as acidic waste, it is extremely helpful to alkalise as much as you can to neutralise as much of the acidity as possible. So, drink green juices and chlorophyll, either fresh or in powdered form, and eat cucumbers, celery, kohlrabi and huge dark green salads with avocados, and fresh parsley and basil as often as you can. All of this is also true every day and always.

Third and also crucial are psyllium husks, to help clear out the toxins from the intestines as efficiently as possible. A good way to take them is to dissolve in a 1 litre bottle of water, 1 heaping teaspoon of green juice powder, 1/2 teaspoon of unrefined Atlantic salt, and two teaspoons of psyllium husks (aloe vera juice to enhance cleansing and a tiny bit of stevia to sweeten and counter the salty taste are optional). Also good is with lemon water (1 litre, 2 lemons, stevia, salt and psyllium). Make sure you let it sit for some time so that the psyllium husks are well hydrated before you start drinking, and shake well every time before drinking.

You should have at least one litre per day (I do this every day, drink relatively slowly typically between 10:30 and 12:30, always on an empty stomach), and two litres during the acute detox phase would be excellent (mid-morning and afternoon). This will clean out the entire length of the intestines very effectively but also very gently.

Remember to always start the day with a 3/4-1 litre of plain, room temperature, alkaline water, drank over the course of at least 30 minutes. Or, alternatively or in combination, you can also start with a litre of tulsi herbal tea. Tulsi or Holy Basil is a powerful anti-stress and adrenal support that is soothing and relaxing without inducing sleepiness, and that over time helps the adrenal system recover from the very commonly encountered state of partial or nearly complete adrenal exhaustion. I usually to do both the water (between 1/2 and 1 litre) and tulsi tea (also from 1/2 to 1 litre) for a total that is always between 1 and 1.5 litres, typically taken over the period from 7 to 9, first thing in the morning.

Finally, it is very useful to soak in a hot bath with 2 to 4 cups of baking soda or epson salts (magnesium sulphate), or even better, 1 cup of nigari flakes (magnesium chloride). This will help relax the muscles, alkalise by pulling out acids from the tissues, and promote maximum detoxification through the skin. Magnesium chloride is also a powerful detoxifying and metal-chelating agent on its own. Make sure to supplement with it both orally and through the skin (see Why you should start taking magnesium today). Putting food-grade, virgin coconut oil, scented with a little essential oil of lavender or geranium on the skin is excellent. (Melt the coconut oil at low temperature, add the essential oils in the ratio of 10 ml per litre, seal, shake well and put in the fridge to cool quickly. Then take it out and keep it a room temperature.)

The acute phase can be hard to get through, but it is relatively short (a few to several days), and you will really start to feel a lot better after all these toxins have been cleared out of the body: all the pathogenic micro-organisms starved off and eliminated together with their acidic metabolic byproducts.

The process of healing the intestines, the blood and the tissues takes a long time, but on the way there, you will feel better with every passing day. Regular green juice fasts are an excellent way to accelerate the process of healing and then to maintain health.

It is essential to remember, however, that beyond the initial acute detox phase, optimal health depends entirely on a continual process and perpetual cycle of cleansing, detoxification and alkalisation followed by nourishing, repairing and rebuilding, carried out every day, and day after day. The profound systemic detoxification and healing process that results from the complete elimination of sugars and starches from the diet is without any doubt the most important and powerfully healthful change you could ever make.

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