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Say No To Drugs - Say Yes To Herbs

Back in the primitive days of medicine, doctors used to administer poisons like stricknine and mercury to people to "get them well." Well, that seems ridiculous now because stricknine is used as a poison to kill rats. And mercury was used in hat making and was known to make the hatters go crazy. Remember the mad hatter in Alice and Wonderland? He was mad because he inhaled too much of the mercury fumes.

The reason doctors used these is because it got rid of the symptoms of a fever or other symptomology that was known to kill people. What they were actually doing was trading one symptom for another, and then one disease for another less dangerous disease, they thought.

Do you know what a healing crisis is? It is the point at which the body generates enough energy to overcome the sickness by fighting it with a heating of the body (or a fever), or with a runny nose or sweating toxins out of the pores of the skin, and other actions we would call symptoms. These "symptoms" are good signs that the body is strong enough to fight the disease.

Well, doctors knew that mercury suppressed the immune system. It would cause the body to quit heating up to kill the disease. In other words, it would kill the fever, but the fever is what would actually kill the disease. So, the disease was just suppressed and it would manifest in another way in the body. Then, the doctors would treat that symptom, and it would manifest in yet another way, until the patient would finally die after all the doctor had done. This method is still practiced in modern medicine today.

Eli Willey, the founder of one of America's foremost drug companies, said "All medicines are poisons and any drug which is not a poison is not a good drug." William Cook in the Physiomedical Dispensary says that the art of medicine is to know how much poison you can give a person without killing them. In other words, there is a certain dose of a poison you can give a person to relieve the symptoms, but if you give them too much it will make them sicker or kill them. And he says that's the whole skill of the physician. That's kind of scary when you think about it.

Now, there were doctors on the other side of the fence who believed that you should support the symptoms and the body would heal faster. In fact, there still are some doctors who believe this way. And this is the way herbalists work, as well.

Do you know what this replacing one disease with another is called? "Side effects" or "risk versus benefits ratios." This is common terminology used in the pharmaceutical industry.

(Pharmacia (witchcraft)
Since all drugs have side effects, in other words, since all drugs have new diseases or new discomforts, when you give a person a drug, you may suppress one symptom but you will get a side effect - or a new disease which replaces the old one. The risks versus benefits notion is the idea that you have to decide if the risks that are proposed by the side effect are less than the risks proposed by the symptom that the person already has. The doctor gives the medicine only when the risk of the side effect is less than the risk of the current symptom.

This is the same sort of thinking that was present in the 1800's with the use of mercury, arsenic, stricknine and so forth. It shows up very clearly in our modern treatment of cancer. Since the cancer cells are present in the body, the medical doctor views the cancer cells as the disease, and, therefore, the cancer cells have to be killed because they are going to kill the patient. So, they give the person chemotherapy, because the risk of the cancer cells is greater than the risk of the chemotherapy. However, the side effects of the chemo, such as losing your hair, having your esophagus turn into hamburger or depressing your immune system is considered to be less of a risk than the presence of cancer cells in the body. And that's the "risk versus benefits ratio."


The problem is that cancer is a deficiency of the immune system. And chemotherapy drugs are targeted poisons that kill fast growing cells. Now, do you know which of the cells in the human body are some of the fastest growing cells? Which are our good fighter cells? The white blood cells. So, chemotherapy actually further reduces immune system function by killing our fighter cells. It also destroys many of the cells lining the digestive tract, because they are also fast growing cells. The cells that line the micro villi of the small intestines that absorb nutrients are also fast growing cells, and chemotherapy will often destroy them and then you can't assimilate your nutrients. The very thing that caused the cancer to be there in the first place is actually helped along by the chemotherapy. It further depresses the immune system and weakens the person's body by interfering with their ability to assimilate nutrients.

Maybe what we should be doing is giving the person herbs and nutrients and putting them on a program that will REBUILD their immune response, so that their immune system will take over and begin to fight the cancer and destroy it. That would make more molecular sense. This would be nourishing and supporting the natural function of the body. Whereas, a poison comes in and interferes with the natural function of the body. One contains the process of life; the other one contains the process of death.

These two approaches to medicine were called the antipathetic and the sympathetic approaches. Antipathetic means "against the symptom." Sympathetic means "with the symptom." So, the antipathetic approach to medicine is to suppress symptoms. This is done by giving diluted doses of poisons or other things which interfere with the natural function or metabolism and interfere with the symptoms. Whereas sympathetic medicine is nourishment. It is giving things which nourish and support the natural function of the body, so that the body is supported in what it is trying to do to eliminate the disease and is better able to heal.

Now, that doesn't mean that antipathetic medicine is never to be used. Sometimes a disease or condition has gone so far that the sympathetic approach will not turn it. As a last ditch effort, you may have to go to an antipathetical medicine. For example, if you have a large tumor in the body that is starting to obstruct some major organ and you're in a serious life-threatening situation, by all means go have surgery and let them cut out the tumor and get rid of it. Because you may not have long enough for your body to fight it off. If it cuts off a main artery or shuts down your digestive tract so that nothing can pass through, you've got big problems.

What needs to happen in the beginning is that we need to care for the body in such a way that it never gets in this kind of shape that it has to go through such drastic measures. The whole idea of natural healing is not to try and combat disease. It's to support the natural function of the body and allow the body to go through the process of healing itself.

To understand this better, I'll give you a mental picture. You might think of the stomach as the body's furnace. As the body takes in the food and digests it, it produces the heat or energy necessary to run all the life processes of the body and keep the body alive and help it to repair and maintain itself and perform all of its natural functions. By constantly receiving into the stomach food that is not suitable for the best nourishment, the stomach becomes foul, so that the food is not well-digested. This causes the bones to ache and the appetite to fail, and the man is sick in every part of the whole frame. In other words, we overtax the digestive system, and this causes the body to be burdened down; and the digestive process begins to shut down; and it produces a lot of waste, which begins to clog our organs that eliminate, just as the stove-pipe on a chimney might fill up with soot and the firebox fill up with ashes and clinkers which are no longer being removed. This causes the fire or the life process or the energy to diminish in the body. And this diminishing is what is at the root of all disease, because the body no longer has sufficient energy to perform the healing work that is necessary.

You know, when we get sick, usually one of the things we do is lose our appetite. The body gets plugged up and it can no longer digest or handle food properly. Little children, when they are feverish, generally have no appetite. The body goes into a mode of trying to destroy what is obstructing it and to get rid of this irritant.

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A good way of handling illness is the ABC concept: Activate, Build and Cleanse. Activating is like fanning the fire to get the spark of life, or the heat or energy of the body, back on line. (Enzymes) Building is like refueling the fire - putting in good wood that is dry and will burn easily. (Glandular system) And Cleansing is like removing the ashes and clinkers and sweeping the chimney clean so that there are no obstructions to the process of eliminating the waste from the body as it burns or utilizes the food.

(Cleanses like Tiao He, Ivy's and Jack's Cleanse)
So, it is as simple as ABC.

Now, many people think of herbs as being a very mystical thing like drugs and medication. And we think that it takes a lot of extreme knowledge and skill to be able to use herbs. But, what it really takes is an understanding of what herbs are doing. Herbs are not like drugs. Now, there ARE herbs that are drugs. (There are herbs that are poisons). But, the herbs that are in common use in herb trade are not poisons. Instead, what they are is wild vegetables. Herbs like dandelion, yellow dock, burdock are edible wild plants. You can eat them. Our bodies and taste buds are now accustomed to eating the more bland, sugar-sweetened, salted, buttered food of a pampered society. Wild vegetables are very strong. Their flavors come from their
nutritional density. Nutritional density means that for the amount of calories you're taking in, you are getting a higher amount of vitamins, minerals, enzymes and other accessory nutrients that are present in the food.
We have artificially bred all of our vegetables to be bland and very low in flavor. Anyone who has ever grown an organic garden with carrots, spinach or other vegetables will notice a big difference in the taste of this organic
produce. It is much stronger in smell and flavor because there is more nutritional density in them. Have you noticed the smell when you opened a bottle of herbs.

So, today in herbology, we wind up giving dandelion, yellow dock, burdock and so forth as medicines. But these were things that were actually eaten by tribal peoples as foods on their tables.

Sometimes taking these wild nutritious vegetables that our bodies are not used to, will produce a healing crisis. That is, it will go in and strengthen the body, and in the process the body will say, "Ah, time to do house cleaning." And it will produce a little diarrhea, or it will produce a skin eruption or some other symptom. And the person will say, "This herb is making me sick." The truth is that the herb is not making them sick. It is
cleansing their body.

Now, you CAN cleanse too fast. You can push the body too hard. So, I don't like to produce intense healing crises in people. If a person does take an herb and has a symptom, I'll try to find a milder herb in the same class or have them cut back on the amount of that same herb that they're taking and build up to the original amount again. This will let the body gradually clean out. The important point is that the herbs are wild vegetables.

For example, when someone eats a lot of cherries and gets diarrhea, it isn't that the cherries caused the diarrhea. What the cherries do is nourish. They strengthen the liver; they strengthen their bowel, and the body takes advantage of that nourishment to generate enough energy to create a crisis, in order to push something that was irritating out of the body.

So, let's say that you have problems with sinus and respiratory congestion, and your body is trying to eliminate material through that avenue. And because you don't understand that's what is taking place, you take antihistamines, decongestants and antibiotics, which are continually suppressing or interfering with this process in your body. That's like corking up the chimney - plugging it up further so that it functions less
efficiently. And when that's the case, the body then diverts that waste that it was trying to get rid of through the sinuses and lungs, and maybe it will try to get rid of it through the kidneys. So, then you may wind up with some
kidney problem. Then, you'll take a new drug to suppress the symptomologies of the kidney problems. And then, maybe when the kidneys get so burdened down that they can't serve as an effective means of eliminating that waste anymore, the body will try to eliminate it through the skin. So, you'll develop some kind of skin condition. Then, you'll go to the doctor and take some kind of medication that starts suppressing skin function.

This is that process we talked about earlier of replacing one disease with another. See how it works? If you block the body's efforts to heal in one area, it will endeavor to heal through a different avenue. And if you block it in that avenue, it will go to a different one. I really believe that a lot of the chronic, degenerative diseases that we suffer today are actually the result of taking these drugs over a period of years, that so depress our immune system and our body's ability to fight off disease, that it is left with no avenue to effectively eliminate the things which are irritating it. And there you get into a whole host of diseases. One of the hardest things I
find to do is to get a person who has come to that point to realize that they are going to have to back track through all the diseases they've suppressed, in other words through all the symptomologies they've suppressed, in order to heal. That is called Herring's Law of Cure. Herring was a homeopath and he defined this law of natural healing. Part of it is that the body heals in reverse order of symptoms suppressed.

For instance, you may know someone who has had asthma and respiratory problems all their life and they finally get it under control. Amazingly, all of a sudden maybe they come down with something serious like lupus. Well, then they break down and go to a naturopath and start on an herbal program. Then they get their allergy and asthma symptoms back and they start taking their previous drugs for that and get that under control, but their lupus symptoms come up again. Well, you've got to see the connection between these two things. It is the suppression of the respiratory problems that is leading into the other disease. And you've got to work backwards through all the symptoms before complete healing will come.

So, in natural healing, as one strengthens and nourishes the body, the current symptoms may disappear and a previous symptom that was suppressed will come to the surface. And, at that point, the person has to be willing, then, to continue to strengthen their body, so that their body is able to generate the crisis necessary to push that irritant out of the body, and then it goes to the next level and they gradually recover.

Now do you see that drugs and herbs work two different ways? One way works against the symptom and the other works with the symptom. So, if a person has a cough, instead of giving them something that suppresses a cough, I may give them herbs that loosen phlegm and strengthen the ability of the lungs to expel phlegm. They're called expectorants. If a person is having frequent urination, I don't give them something to suppress urination. I give them herbs that will strengthen the kidney function and tell them to drink more water, so that they will flush the irritants out of the body, so that the body no longer has to generate that symptom to get rid of the irritants. In all cases, if you want to use herbs effectively, you use them so that they support what the body is trying to do to eliminate disease. That enables the body to reach that point at which the crisis occurs more quickly, instead of trying to retard the process.

Let's take food poisoning, for example. If you could take a medication that would stop nausea and vomiting, would it help you get better faster? Or would it slow recovery? The answer is that it would slow recovery. Because the disease is not the nausea and vomiting. Those are the body's efforts to eliminate the toxic food that is sitting on the stomach. So, instead, if you do get food poisoning and you want to speed recovery, the ideal medicine is something that would strengthen the stomach and increase the body's ability to throw up the poison - so that you accelerate the crisis and bring it to fruition more quickly.

You may find that when you have sinus trouble or hay fever, the longer you take antibiotics, antihistamines and decongestants, the more frequently you become sick. The more serious your illnesses become. But, if you use the natural approach and support your body in its efforts to eliminate the CAUSE
of the disease, instead of to suppress a symptom, you'll find that your body becomes stronger and you'll get sick less often and less severely. Your immune system then will become more robust and you will respond much more quickly to herbs as your body gets stronger.

70% of all diseases are self-limiting. That is to say, if you went to bed and drank plenty of pure water, the body would generate the healing crisis, get rid of the disease and you would recover. You could speed that recovery if you knew a few herbs or foods that would enhance what the body is trying to do and get over it. But even if you do nothing, your body would recover in about ten days. But, instead, what we do is suppress the symptoms with all these antibiotics and pain killers.

Did you know that pain killers are the most commonly used medicine in the entire word? But, when people use them, they are not getting rid of the source of the pain. They are merely deadening the nerves (hear that word "deadening") so they can't feel it. Now, I know that there is a place for pain killers, especially if you're going into surgery or in other trauma situations. But, for the common everyday headache, we need to take a look at our lifestyles and make some changes. It isn't sufficient just to kill the nerves. And the longer one takes a pain killer, the worse the real problem becomes. Because he is avoiding facing whatever it is in his life that he
needs to get rid of - whatever is causing the headaches.

So, I encourage you to first try home remedies. Then go to the doctor as a backup if those don't work. By all means, get x-rays when you need them. Go to the doctor for his evaluation if you don't know what is wrong. Now that you know more about both ways of healing, you can make a better judgment about which way you want to handle the health problem.

BASIC NUTRITIONAL THERAPY
You may ask, "Where do I begin?" There are so many different supplements to learn about. Well, you can start out with just a few, because I have found that certain basic problems contribute to the majority of what people are experiencing as their illnesses and diseases they're having. I want to talk about 4 Basic Underlying Causes:

Digestion
No other part of nutritional therapy is going to work if your digestive system does not digest, assimilate and utilize the nutrients you're taking.

Dr. Pottinger's study-- 5 groups:
1 - raw milk, raw meat scraps and cod liver oil (control group)
2 - raw milk but cooked all the meat scraps
3 - raw meat but various kinds of cooked milk

1st group received pasteurized milk
2nd group received canned milk
3rd group received sweetened condensed milk

In the control group, the cats reproduced healthy kittens generation after generation. Few problems with fleas, disease - basically very healthy.

All cats that received cooked food (either cooked milk or meat) showed signs of deterioration. They developed many of same diseases we have in modern society: arthritis, tooth problems, asthma, allergies, parasites, etc.

Human beings are the only creatures on the face of the earth that cooks their food before they eat it. All others eat their food raw. Does that tell us something? Raw food contains natural enzymes, which aid in the process of digesting the food. EX: Bird takes seeds into gizzard, it gets warm and seeds sprout. About 1/3 of digestion takes place without any of the body's secretions being needed when one is eating raw food. Because most of us eat predominantly cooked food, our body has to produce ALL of the enzymes necessary to digest the food, because the first part of the digestive process, using the enzymes naturally occurring in the food, is missed. This causes a tremendous stress on the enzyme reserves in our body.

In fact, it has been shown that when we eat a meal of cooked food, the amount of white blood cells increase in the blood stream, as the white blood cells deliver enzymes from the rest of the body TO the digestive tract, in order to help digest the food we just ate. These enzymes which are being diverted to the digestive tract are needed by the body for detoxification and immune system function. So, it is depressing the enzyme levels in the body every time we eat a meal of cooked food.

So, one of the things we can do, since most of us are not likely to turn around and start eating a diet of raw food, is to take enzyme supplements with the food we eat. Digestive enzymes can help to make up for this
deficiency in the cooked food we are eating and can help prevent a wide variety of disorders and help heal our bodies.

Some of these enzymes are:
Amylase - breaks down starches into simple sugars
Protease - breaks down proteins into their component amino acids
Lipase - helps break down fats
Lactase - breaks down sugars in milk
Cellulase - breaks down cellulose,
And so forth

What happens when we eat a meal is that first the food goes into the upper part of the stomach, where it sits for as long as 15 to 20 minutes, allowing the naturally occurring enzymes to do their job of predigestion. Then, it drops into the lower part of the stomach, where the stomach secretes its own hydrochloric acid and pepsin to break down proteins.

When the stomach has finished its job, the food is transferred down to the small intestine, where enzymes from the pancreas and bile salts from the gall bladder combine with the food to complete the process of digestion. By taking the digestive enzymes with your food, they go into the upper part of the stomach and, like I said, as much as 1/3 of the digestive process will take place even before the body begins to do its work. These enzymes, therefore, can help with problems such as bloating, gas, stomach distress and general weakness of the body. Most people who are suffering from chronic degenerative diseases are deficient in enzymes and need to take enzyme supplements to help them build up their immune system and assimilate their
nutrients properly.

Obesity may also be linked to a lack of enzyme function in the body. Since the food is not digested properly, it is basically being shunted into storage, since there is not enough enzymes to break down the fats. A weak immune system can also be a problem with enzyme deficiency. It is a lack of enzymes and a lack of digesting food properly that also causes the colon to become toxic, and that leads to a wide variety of illnesses formed in the body.

Here are some supplements that I have found that work as good digestive aids:
PROACTAZYME - a general enzyme supplement that contains the protease, amylase and lipase necessary to digest the proteins, fats and carbohydrates.

LEGUZYME - helps digest the starches and sugars in beans and other vegetables like cabbage, that cause gas and bloating.


For persons who have had their gall bladders removed, they are going to have a problem digesting fats because of the lack of bile salts. Taking a high LIPASE enzyme can help take the stress off their liver and their digestive tract by performing much of the fat digestion PRIOR to the time the meal enters the small intestines.

Many people also find that they are intolerant of dairy products. Things like ice cream or milk produce gas and intestinal distress. This is because they lack the enzyme LACTASE, which breaks down the sugars in milk. Dairy products are not good for humans anyway, but on those occasions when these people want to indulge in a bowl of ice cream or cheese dip, they would enjoy it more if they took an enzyme containing LACTASE.

Anyway, my recommendation is that everyone ought to be taking enzymes with every meal of cooked food they eat. You won't believe how much better you will feel. Your food digests more easily, it doesn't sit in your stomach as long, you don't get as much bloating, gas and indigestion when you take the enzymes, and in general you have a lot more energy, because your body's enzyme reserves aren't being depleted by eating cooked food.

Lack of Trace Minerals
Another underlying cause of disease is a lack of TRACE MINERALS in our food. Even if you are buying high quality produce (fresh fruits and vegetables), and you're eating whole grains, you're not over-consuming your meat and dairy products, and you're not eating a lot of refined and processed foods, you're
still going to be malnourished in our society.

The reason is that our foods lack nutritional density. Dr. Weston Price (dentist) did studies from all over the world to compare the foods of indigenous people and people of civilization. He took samples of the food
people were eating and sent them back to the states to be analyzed for nutritional content. He also took measurements of the teeth and general health of the people that were eating these various kinds of foods. He found that the foods of civilization lacked trace minerals and that this was responsible for high levels of tooth decay, poor tooth development, wisdom teeth becoming impacted, and a host of other dental problems. But, he also found that this caused a general decline in health and made people susceptible to a wide range of diseases. Our food here in the states is severely lacking in trace minerals.

Research from the records of the Dept. of Agriculture about 12 years ago showed that our food at that time contained only about 10% of the trace mineral content as food grown in 1900. And our mineral reserves have continued to decline each year since then.

Of course, organically grown food is going to have at least 10 times the mineral content of food grown commercially that you find in most grocery stores, and sometimes even 30 to 40 times more, depending on which food it is. For example, the content of iron in spinach can be 100 times higher in organically grown spinach than in commercially grown. (Albertsons is beginning to carry organic produce.)

Minerals are the spark plugs which trigger enzyme systems. Enzymes not only help to digest our food, but they also help run all the biochemical processes of the body. Every enzyme has a particular mineral that kicks that enzyme in gear and makes it work. So, any mineral we are deficient in means that certain enzyme functions will shut down in our body. And as a result, those functions will not operate properly. Since our food is deficient in trace minerals, many of our enzyme systems are shut down. And this is the reason for the high amount of chronic and degenerative disease we are experiencing in our society. It is possible that every disease involves some sort of mineral deficiency of the body.

The best form of getting minerals is through plants, because plants naturally raise minerals into a colloidal suspension. A colloidal suspension is a micro-fine suspension of minerals in a liquid solution. In their natural
form, minerals form salts or crystals, which don't assimilate very well in the digestive tract. Small amounts of minerals may break off because of the action of the hydrochloric action in the stomach, but basically they aren't
utilized very well by the tissues. Minerals in colloidal form have free-floating molecules in a liquid solution that are separated by an electrical charge. This allows them to attach to an amino acid in the digestive tract and be transported into the body and used by the tissues. So, the best form of minerals is in a liquid colloidal form or naturally as found in plants. For example:

Alfalfa - King among herbs for trace mineral content. It sends a root system down deep into the soil (sometimes 30 ft) and picks up trace minerals that other plants leave behind.

Yellow Dock is a great source of iron, instead of taking a straight iron supplement.

A Toxic Colon Is a Third Underlying Cause
It is important to do a periodic cleanse of the colon because the body creates different illnesses from a toxic colon and digestive tract.

In the book Food is Your Best Medicine by Dr. Henry Byler, he gives an outline of lines of defense in the human body. The first line of defense is the intestinal tract. Its mucus membrane is designed to be selective in what nutrients it absorbs and what poisons it rejects, so that it acts as a first line of defense to help prevent the body from assimilating things that should be rejected.

There is some information coming available from the medical community about something called "leaky gut syndrome." Have any of you heard of that? That's a way of saying, basically, that the first line of defense isn't doing its job anymore. What is happening is that the mucus membrane has become so irritated and the bowel movement is so sluggish, that the intestinal membranes are leaking toxins into the blood and lymph. They are going into the bloodstream instead of being rejected and filtered away. This is believed to contribute to a wide variety of health problems, including allergies, immune system deficiency, arthritis and many others.

In Dr. Byler's work, the liver becomes the second line of defense from the digestive tract. All of the nutrients that are absorbed into the bloodstream off the digestive tract are taken up to the liver, where they break down into a bed of capillaries, and the liver becomes a second filter. It tries to neutralize any poisons that have gotten past the first line of defense and dumps those poisons into the gall bladder to be eliminated back into the
colon and eliminated from the body.

A case of the flu is actually a case of liver stress, where the liver has become so overloaded with poisons that it can no longer effectively handle or neutralize them. So, it dumps these poisons into the digestive tract through the gall bladder to produce nausea, vomiting and diarrhea to clear the digestive tract of pollutants. So a case of stomach flu or food poisoning is actually a case of liver stress.

The liver has other functions, as well. It has over 5,000 enzyme systems which have the ability to take on a wide variety of chemical substances and break them down into simple or compound so that they can be neutralized or eliminated from the body. The liver has to deal with food additives, pesticide residues, and any other waste material that gets past the first line of defense.

Now, when the liver loses the ability to do its job, then the pollutants get past the liver and into the general circulation. The trace minerals we talked about earlier are vital to liver function, since every one of those
5,000 enzyme systems in the liver require some trace mineral to kick it into gear.

Once the liver has been bypassed as the second line of defense, the third line of defense kicks into gear, and this is the endocrine (or glandular) system. For example, the thyroid forces elimination through the skin and
mucus membranes along the lungs and sinuses; whereas, the adrenal glands force an elimination through the kidneys and, in women, through the menstrual cycle. Uneliminated waste in the body can accumulate in the woman's abdominal area just prior to menses for elimination. This causes irritability, menstrual cramps, nausea and other symptoms associated with PMS, which are relieved once menstruation begins, because these poisons are then dumped out with the blood.

The problem with this is that the toxins being eliminated through the female organs can irritate them, producing vaginal problems, cysts or other reproductive difficulty. Further, hot flashes and other symptoms of
menopause occur because when the woman no longer produces a period at the time of menopause, these unaccumulated toxins in the body have nowhere to go, and they have to find another way to discharge them through the body. Then, you get the symptoms of menopause.

Lymphatic system would be engaged as a fourth line of defense if these other ways have not worked. It can store toxins, or the body can also stores toxins in the fatty tissues. That way these poisons are shunted off and kept in storage if they fail to be eliminated. Now, this gives us a whole host of problems that are arising simply because the intestinal membranes are overloaded. If the colon gets sluggish and backed up, it causes the lymph system to be backed up, and pretty soon it starts to cause sinus drainage and elimination of wastes in other parts of the body (sort of like a kitchen sink being plugged up and water starting to fill up and overflow.

The colon should move and empty itself after every meal. Here's how it should work. After a meal, the food goes into the stomach. The stomach does its job, dumps the meal into the small intestines. Then, the stomach cleans itself out to prepare itself for more food. Meanwhile, the meal in the small intestines completes the process there, and then it is transferred to the colon. Now, the stomach is ready for more food and the next meal comes down into the stomach. And then for the meal in the colon - the water and nutrients are absorbed out of the material in the colon, and the colon is ready to evacuate and empty itself. So, basically, what you have is three meals acting like railroad cars. One goes into the stomach, one goes into the small intestine and one into the colon. The one in the colon empties out; material from the small intestines goes into the colon; and the material from the stomach goes into the small intestines.

This isn't what is happening with most civilized Americans. In most North Americans, the colon transit time is approximately 72 hours. That means that nine meals are backing up into the digestive tract before the last one is being eliminated. That's way too long! That uneliminated waste is irritating the lining of the colon, causing it to loose its ability to become selective in rejecting toxins and absorbing nutrients. This causes this
problem we talked about earlier of the leaky gut syndrome, so that poisons migrate up to the liver; the liver then becomes overburdened; and then you get symptoms of hypoglycemia, PMS, migraines or other headaches, general stiffness, irritability, food allergies, respiratory congestion, skin eruptions and so forth.

One of the common symptoms of the liver being overburdened is that a person will have a hard time going to sleep at night. And then in the morning they'll feel very groggy and sluggish, and won't wake up feeling refreshed after their night's sleep.

The whole picture begins in the colon. Of course, the colon wouldn't likely get toxic in the first place if it weren't for poor digestion. So, it is important to take digestive enzymes to help keep the food digesting
properly, if you are deficient in enzymes in your body and are not eating enough raw food to make up for it.

Meanwhile, we can go on what is called a colon cleanse, a means of cleaning out the bowel, so that we can get things moving along the way they should, so that the first line of defense functions properly. This shores up all of the other lines of defense, and it's amazing how many health problems can disappear just by doing a colon cleanse.

The first thing one needs in order to cleanse the colon is a source of water-soluble fiber. Psyllium hulls is the major one used as a bulk laxative to bulk out the stool and push the material through. They should be taken
with LOTS of water, so that they will swell up and form a gelatinous mass that lubricates the colon and helps push things out. This gelatinous mass also absorbs the toxins, so that instead of being taken across the intestinal
membrane to go up and bombard the liver, they are soaked up and carried out of the body. This mass also takes the bile salts from the gall bladder and absorbs them, so that it absorbs excess cholesterol from the body and lowers the cholesterol levels and helps to clean out the liver. But, if you don't drink enough water, or the psyllium hulls can dry out in your intestinal tract and actually constipate you more.

Another thing you want to do is to take something that stimulates your bowels to move. Cascara Sagrada is great for this. It works in harmony with the natural cycle of elimination in the body. Used properly, it is not habit forming. It stimulates the flow of bile, which is nature's natural laxative. This bile flow causes peristalsis, or a squeezing action, of the intestines to move the food through to evacuate the bowel. This usually occurs about 8 to 12 hours after you take it, so it is best taken in the evening before going to bed.

If a person has a spastic colon, however, if they don't take magnesium with it, they become dependent on the Cascara or other stimulant laxative. If they take the magnesium, it keeps the muscle cramps from forming and eventually their bowel should normalize itself, providing they are improving their diet to have enough fiber and liquid to keep the bowel moving properly.

In doing a cleanse, you should also take something to purify the blood and cleanse the liver, which is your second line of defense. A good product for this is Chlorophyll. Chlorophyll is the life blood of a plant, and this
particular chlorophyll product comes from the alfalfa plant.

I have a recipe for a very good but mild cleanse. You can use this cleanse and be comfortable going to work or whatever activities you have planned. I recommend that everyone do a cleanse at least twice a year. The best times to do a cleanse are in the spring and in the fall when the weather is in transition. This helps your body to adjust to the difference between the hot and cold seasons and all that they bring. These times of the year are often when people get sick because the body is trying to adjust itself. Doing a cleanse at those times may help keep you from getting sick.

Low Immune Function Is Another Underlying Cause
A great answer to low immune function is to use ANTIOXIDANT nutrients. They scour up free radicals, which are oxygen compounds or other chemicals that get into our body and damage membranes and the cell nucleus and are believed to be responsible for cancer, hardening of the arteries and aging. Research
has shown that Vitamins A, C, E and the minerals selenium and zinc, as well as substances called pycnogenols, help fight free radicals and enhance our immune system function. They may even have an anti-aging effect.

There are also some immune stimulating herbs that are useful for helping to boost immune response. Can any of you tell me one of the chief ones? We hear of it a lot on TV and radio. Echinacea causes a nonspecific immune response. In other words, it boosts the number of white blood cells and antibodies, but it doesn't do it against any particular microorganism. It does it for the body as a whole and protects against any form of microorganism that may be attacking the body.

A similar herb in Chinese herbology is ASTRAGALUS. Have you ever heard of that one? It helps with fatigue, frequent colds and infection, and is something that you can take if your immune system is run down.

Reishi mushrooms are very beneficial for helping the immune response to pick up.

Adaptogens
Another category of herbs that are closely related to immune enhancers are adaptogens. They also can help us to cope with this stressful world we live in. Adaptogens normalize the body functions when the body is subject to stress. Some of these herbs would include: schizandra, licorice, ginseng and gotu kola.

One of the signs that a person needs one of these is that when a person is very tired and when they go to sleep, they do not sleep soundly. They have restless dreams and wake up several times during the night and get up to go to the bathroom. Or they may, after four or five hours of sleep, wake up and not be able to go back to sleep. This is a sign that the glands of their body are burning out under stress. And if this keeps up, the person is
likely to get sick, because their body is going to wear down. I have found that herbal combinations that contain licorice root and ginseng are great for helping the body adapt to stress, as well as the water soluble Vitamins C and B complex.

As society continues to demand more out of us and as problems continue to grow. I believe it becomes more and more important for us to keep our immune system and glands in good working order by taking these kinds of herbs on a daily basis, or at least periodically throughout the year, to give us a boost to these systems of the body.

So, in summary, everyone in America could benefit from doing these four things we've just discussed:
1) using digestive enzymes to help improve digestive function;
2) taking trace minerals to make sure we're getting the minerals that are lacking in our food and that will help us to have more energy;
3) doing a periodic cleanse to keep the bowel in good working order and keep the body from having to back toxins up through the other lines of defense;
4) Plus, keeping the immune system and the glands in good working condition with immune stimulants and adaptogens.

This would be a good place to get started if you are wanting to begin an herbal program for yourself and your families. These are things you can do that will help you to notice a difference in the way you feel in as little as a week or two.

Home Medicine Chest
(15 Products not to be without)
Tei Fu Oil - talk about a little first aid kit in a teeny little bottle - that's what Tei Fu Oil is. It's a blend of aromatherapy oils, made by distilling water through herbs. Contains: wintergreen, camphor and menthol,
along with some other oils. Has a wide variety of uses - can be rubbed into sore muscles or cramps in the legs. (my testimony) It's also an excellent remedy in taking down the swelling and removing the pain in bites and stings. It also can help remove bruises. You can inhale it for drying up or opening up the sinuses.

Tea Tree Oil - A natural antiseptic and disinfectant. And it also promotes the healing of cuts and injuries. You can apply it to burns, cuts and scrapes and it will promote tissue healing. Now that's not true of most antiseptics that you get at the drug store. They kill not only the bacteria in the injury but also the healthy cells around it. So, they slow the repairing process of the wound. Tea Tree Oil actually stimulates the growth
of tissue around the edges and speeds the healing of the wound. And because it doesn't sting and is very easy to apply, kids like to put it on themselves without any complaint. It also has antifungal properties, so it is good for
treating athlete's foot and other fungal problems. It can be used internally diluted in water for yeast overgrowth, or candida.

Distress Remedy - A combination of Bach Flower remedies plus arnica, calendula and comfrey. This is a homeopathic remedy, so it works on an energy level to help heal the body from emotional or physical shock or trauma - car accidents, divorce situations, etc. It amazingly helps you get over emotional shock with ease, and it also helps injuries to heal. Arnica, for example, one of the ingredients, is an incredible healer of bruises and swelling. Calendula does a similar thing for cuts. So, it can be applied topically in those cases.

Garlic - This is something I would never be without - it's my natural antibiotic and has been called "nature's penicillin" by some herbalists. Garlic is not only more effective than commercial antibiotics in getting rid of most infections faster, but it also has antifungal and antiviral properties. The best way to use it is to take small, frequently repeated doses, such as 2 to 4 capsules every 2 to 4 hours. You can squeeze the oil into the ear to fight ear infections; you can rub it on the chest to relieve respiratory congestion. Garlic can be applied to wounds to prevent them from becoming infected. It also helps with blood pressure, circulation, digestion and expelling parasites.

Activated Charcoal - I would especially have this in my home if I had children. It can be taken internally in cases of food or chemical poisoning. It helps to absorb any irritants that have been ingested. It is one of the
safest anti-poison remedies that you can have on hand. Of course, if someone gets chemical poisoning, you should call Poison Control first to verify it is okay to use it. But, charcoal absorbs some of the widest ranges of poisons known. But that's not all - charcoal is extremely good for getting rid of intestinal gas and diarrhea in both adults and children. It absorbs the irritants that are causing the diarrhea, and it even absorbs the gas. Charcoal can be applied externally as a poultice to a bee sting or insect bite. It helps to dry out the venom - even out of poisonous spider bites when applied every hour. You may not need charcoal very often, but when you
do need it, there is no better remedy for the purposes than that one.

Aloe Vera Gel - I bet you've all used aloe vera gel at some time. It's the greatest burn remedy around - perfect for sunburn, even the severest of burns. It takes the pain away and causes the burn to turn tan in nothing
flat. You can even add a few drops of tea tree oil to it for more effectiveness and take Vitamin C internally for an even better result. Aloe Vera gel can also be used on scrapes and cuts. It stimulates the tissues and keeps them lubricated to help them heal.

The next 2 remedies I am going to talk about together - Lobelia and Capsicum Extract. These are kind of cure-all remedies. Cayenne pepper, or capsicum, stimulates blood flow wherever you apply it. And Lobelia helps to relax the nerves in a very powerful way and helps to open up the lymphatic channels.

Lobelia by itself has several good uses. One is, you could take small doses and it will help your muscles to relax and help you unwind. It can also be used similar to Epicac to help someone throw up and get something poisonous out of their system. Of course, here again, you need to call Poison Control and make sure it is safe to throw up a particular poison. But, if it is safe, give in large repeated doses a few minutes apart, along with warm
water, to induce vomiting. Lobelia also acts as a bronchial dialator, stopping asthma attacks and clearing congestive lymph nodes, as in sore throat and tonsillitis. It helps relax the stomach and improve digestion. It helps relax bowel spasms in the case of a spastic colon. It helps get rid of an earache if you take it internally, as well as putting a tiny bit in the ear with warm water. Lobelia helps pull stings out of insect bites in 5 to 15 minutes.

Cayenne pepper is useful for colds and takes the pain out of sore throats if you gargle with it. It stings for about 30 seconds and then it takes the pain away. At the onset of a cold, if you take repeated doses of 2 capsules every hour, you can knock it out in a few hours.

The two of these together, though, are really a powerhouse team. You can apply them topically to help relieve pain. If you have a sore throat, you can mix them together and massage your throat lightly with it for about 15 minutes and it will take the pain away and the swelling out of the lymph nodes. If you gargle with a little bit of it combined, it will help even that much faster.

You can massage them into the neck, shoulders and spine to relax the muscle spasms that cause headaches and backaches. It brings the blood to nourish the area where it is rubbed in. Then, if you put the Tei Fu Oil on after that, it helps drive it in. I do this for my husband at night before he goes to sleep. He says it helps him sleep and he wakes up more rested in the morning. Also, he's not needing to go to the chiropractor nearly as often now. You can do this on joints, also, if you have arthritic pain. (Capsaicin Gel - capsaicin is the constituent in the cayenne that gives it that heating sensation. Stimulates blood flow to the joints and helps with healing.)

ALJ - one of the best respiratory decongestants and expectorants around. It comes in liquid, tablet and capsule forms. Remember, when you get respiratory congestion, you don't want to suppress the congestion. Because that would drive the problem deeper into the body. What you want to do is help the body get it out quickly. And that's what ALJ does. It breaks up the congestion and helps the sinuses to drain and helps the body to cough out the congestion. It is invaluable when used with garlic to clear the body of all kinds of respiratory problems - even pneumonia. The secret is to take small, frequently repeated doses - anywhere from 2 to 4 capsules every 2 to 4 hours. It also helps settle the stomach. And that is often where some of these respiratory problems come from - from poor digestion in the stomach.

Licorice Root - Promotes stamina and endurance by helping the adrenal glands to function better. It has a wide variety of uses. It especially helps with blood sugar problems. Many people in our culture, and especially children, have blood sugar problems because of the high quantities of refined sugar we are eating. Blood sugar problems lead to instability in our energy levels. One of the major symptoms is a late afternoon fatigue that settles in about 2:00 or 3:00 when you start to feel sluggish and sleepy. So, licorice root helps to stabilize the blood sugar. In fact, it helps to overcome cravings for sugar. It helps with dizziness, fatigue, lack of endurance, prevents mood swings. It is also a mild decongestant and expectorant. So it can actually soothe a cough, particularly a dry, unproductive cough. It helps a tickle in the throat by using the extract in a little water or by opening the capsule and just sucking on the capsule for awhile. It tastes sweet like the licorice candy.

It also helps with inflammation in the body. The adrenal glands are supposed to produce a natural cortisone to help keep inflammation down in the body. So, when inflammation is present, you can use licorice root capsules to help build up the adrenals to increase their own anti-inflammatory response. It can also help soothe ulcers.

Acidophilus - This is needed because most people in our society have damaged their friendly flora, or friendly bacteria, by use of antibiotics. So, acidophilus helps to keep the colon in good working order and helps build the immune system. Anyone who uses any kind of antibiotic needs to replace their friendly flora by using acidophilus. It helps bring down yeast levels, helps with elimination, helps elevate your immune response.

Liquid Chlorophyll - Chlorophyll is the green liquid in a plant that captures the energy of the sun and transforms it into carbohydrates and the life process of the plant. It is a natural deodorizer. It helps take away body odor from the inside out, so that a person doesn't need to plug up their pores with antiperspirant deodorants. It can also help with smelly feet and bad breath. Chlorophyll is a blood builder. It increases the oxygen supply in the blood. I heard a story about another herbalist, Debra Starnes. When her dad was in the hospital with low oxygen levels in the blood, whenever his oxygen levels would dive, she would rub liquid chlorophyll on the bottoms of his feet. She couldn't give it to him internally because he had a tube down
his throat. But when she rubbed it on his feet, the oxygen levels on the monitors would rise. Chlorophyll has an ability to enhance the blood's ability to take up oxygen. So, it is very useful for helping people with anemia and people who are very tired.

Chlorophyll helps women when they are going through labor. They often get very fatigued and their oxygen levels drop. When they take the chlorophyll along with Vitamin C, their energy level picks back up again. It can also help replace blood that was lost. It helps your body make new blood quickly. It helps disinfect injuries and helps them to heal better. It helps alkalize your blood stream. Many of us are eating too many acid-forming foods - too many meats and grain and not enough fresh fruits and vegetables. And chlorophyll can help establish the alkaline balance in the body rather quickly. So, liquid chlorophyll, to sum it up, is good to have on hand for loss of blood, for anemia, for building up iron levels, fighting infection, a quick
energy pick-me-up. It also comes in gel caps.

Echinacea - herb which has a nonspecific immune-stimulating effect. In other words, it doesn't fight any particular infection; it helps the body fight all infection. It stimulates the body to produce more white blood cells and antibodies. It helps keep an infection contained instead of spreading. It works best taken in small, frequently repeated doses and just 10 days at a time.

Golden Seal - It works against a wide range of bacterial infections. It also tones the gastrointestinal membranes and improves digestive function. It also lowers blood sugar levels, so it is useful for diabetics. However, people with hypoglycemia will probably want to take OREGON GRAPE, which is similar, instead of Golden Seal (or take Licorice Root with the Golden Seal) in order to keep it from lowering their blood sugars too much. It also helps injuries to heal. When applied topically, it stimulates healing much the same way that Tea Tree Oil does.

So, the combination of Golden Seal and Echinacea together is probably one of the most powerful antiseptic, immune stimulant combinations you can get.

Peppermint Oil - This is a volatile oil like the Tei Fu Oil and Tea Tree Oil. Any of these three oils can be used on canker sores, or cold sores. At first, it stings but then it numbs it, and repeated applications help it to
heal. Peppermint is a milder oil and safer for internal use, but one of the major uses is to settle an upset stomach. It is excellent for dispelling gas, allaying nausea, calming the stomach and promoting mental alertness. You can put a drop into warm water and sip it or just put a drop of it on your finger and apply it to the back of your tongue. For a child who has an upset stomach, it would be better to rub the oil right onto the stomach instead of taking it internally.

Vitamin C - It's a great daily preventative, but I'm going to talk about its use for therapeutic purposes when certain things happen. Vitamin C is one of the very best neutralizers of toxins that there is - a really great free radical scavenger. If you take about 1,000 mg every hour, it can help neutralize poisons get into the blood stream; it alleviates sunburn, bites and stings, and helps you get over colds.

These are not only good remedies to keep on hand at home but they are some great things to take with you in your first aid kit when you travel. -Steven Horne