Digestion vs. Indigestion An excerpt from Going Back to the Basics of Human Health INTRODUCTION FROM THE AUTHOR Chiropractic has had a great influence on my health and my life. It was a chiropractor who guided me through my first fast and encouraged me to do colonies. And, since I have lived many different places, there were other chiropractors who, with spinal manipulations, helped me to feel really good and to get over the epilepsy I developed in my teens. It was also one of those chiropractors who handed me my first bottle of Standard Process supplements. As far as Chiropractic's influence on the general population, it is probably inestimable. Chiropractic has led the growing Alternative Health Movement in educating people in wellness and a natural approach to health care. It is to the chiropractor's office that many people go when they want to know what to do about their health and to feel better without taking drugs. Unfortunately, there is a lot of "misinformation" in the "Age of Information". One can read all of the readily available books on nutrition and be totally confused, since many of them seem to contradict each other. The reason for this is because first principles, those unchanging truths that should prove themselves time and time again, have not been connected with. Even chiropractors who have led the natural health movement are searching for those nutritional principles that have stood the test of time. It was into this arena that I plunged when I wrote my book, Going Back to the Basics of Human Health-Avoiding the Fads, the Trends, and the Bold Faced Lies. Originally designed as a patient handbook, Going Back to the Basics is a compilation of books that the average person doesn't even know about, since the majority of these books are not displayed in bookstores or health food stores. But patients and well-informed, well-intentioned doctors really need to know the information and principles contained in these books in order to make decisions about natural health and health care. It is too much to expect patients to read these source books. I have made it easier for them to get all of this information right away without doing all that reading. Unless we understand what has happened, step by step, to our food supply, we are not going to truly grasp what we need nutritionally. Going Back to the Basics starts with the depletion of America's topsoil, how soil is actually a living substance, and moves into the chemicalization of foods. Why and how this has been allowed to happen is then explored historically. The difference between synthetic extracts and whole food complexes is, then, systematically explained. Lastly, the historical overview of low fat diets and the danger of hyper-insulinemia are tackled. Many patients leave a doctor's office with an extensive nutritional protocol addressing their complaints, but with nothing for digestion. One of the most overlooked health issues by doctors is digestion. What Going Back to the Basics says about this issue is best exemplified in the following section titled, Digestion Vs. Indigestion: "In order to digest food, stay immune from parasites, and avoid getting Candida, you must have plenty of hydrochloric acid (HCL) in your stomach. This 'arch-villain' in all the antacid commercials is really a good guy. In fact, your stomach is an acid machine! "When the stomach digests, it churns the food and mixes it with HCL, juices, pepsin, and enzymes. If there is no HCL, the food begins to rot and ferment. As it ferments, it then develops abnormal acids that are stinging and burning. Your stomach starts churning harder and harder, trying to digest the food in it, and sometimes some of these deviant acids, along with what little HCL remains, gets backed up into the esophagus. "What you really need is more HCL; and to take an antacid at this point makes sure that you have a mass of undigested food in your stomach. What your stomach doesn't digest, then, puts a burden on your liver and pancreas to get the job done, and they can't. Your body, then, begins to get toxic and full of poisons from this undigested matter. "Once again, Mother Nature designed the human body with a digestive assembly line to split open food molecules, break them down into vitamins, minerals, trace elements, fatty acids, amino acids, and enzymes. Then your body eliminates what is not used through the bowel. "With an undigested food mass decaying and travelling through thirty feet of the gastro-intestinal tract, all kinds of undesirable bacteria and viruses start scavenging this waste. Parasites, which could have been inadvertently swallowed and should have been destroyed by the HCL, are now finding a toxic environment to start living in. Candida Albicans, a fungus your body has in place to kill undesirable bacteria (remember the bacteria-fungus relationship in plants), starts to multiply in order to handle the ever larger volume of bacteria. "If this sounds disgusting, it is! The body is starting to break down through this continuous poisoning. 'If you have a concentration of bacteria living in some organ of the body, you have a staph infection or strep in the throat for instance, they are there because of unhealthy, devitalized tissue and unprocessed metabolic waste. Disease is not the presence of something evil, but rather the lack of the presence of something essential. So, eating correctly is important, and digesting it is just as important! Standard Process makes an excellent HCL supplement, Zypan, which also includes pancreatin and pepsin to help the stomach get the job done." I have been helped a lot by chiropractic. Initially, with my writing, I set out to help chiropractors with their patients, but the overwhelming response I have had from chiropractors who have said this book has meant a lot to them has astounded me. Many chiropractors have told me that my book has given them the foundation they have needed and that they have embraced the original source books. The loop is complete. Mary Frost has a B.A. in Journalism from the University of Texas, and a Masters of Philosophy from St. Johns College in Santa Fe, NM. She has; been actively involved in health and; nutrition for more than 15 years and brings her experience and studies to the fore as a nutritional journalist and researcher. Books are available individually, or in bulk discount to doctors, at the price of $7.95 each, 10 or more $4.49, and 100 or more $3.49. Shipping and handling costs are additional. You can order by mail to: Mary Frost, P.O. Box 17356, San Diego, CA 92177-7356, or by phone with a credit card at: (858) 274-9053, or FAX at: (858) 274-9077. ♦>
