L-glutamine, 1,000 milligrams thirty minutes before mealsSEVERAL YEARS AGO, A PETITE YOUNG WOMAN NAMED BETTY * CAME to my office. She had the worst case of toxicity I’ve ever seen in a cancerfree person. Her skin was ashen gray. Her long, light brown hair was thin, dull, and as brittle as straw. Dark black shadows encircled her sunken, lifeless eyes. Her body looked swollen and puffy, and she complained of feeling absolutely awful and tired all the time. Although only twenty-eight years of age, she was in quite a lot of pain from rheumatoid arthritis and looked much older than her age.
I realized in just a few minutes of examining her that if she didn’t begin to detoxify, she’d probably be back to see me with possibly another autoimmune disease, cancer, or some other degenerative disease.
As I questioned her about her lifestyle, Betty painted a picture of a fairly ordinary American diet. It was unhealthy, centered on pizza, Big Macs, sodas, and fries with very little fruit and vegetables. She drank little water and instead polished off an entire pot of coffee every day, which she prepared with lots of sugar and heavy cream. She was, no doubt, somewhat dehydrated. But even this awful diet couldn’t totally explain her toxic state.
I probed further, asking about the functioning of her GI tract and colon. As she shared her story, I began to understand why she was so ill.
She traveled often, and each time she left town she’d become a bundle of nerves. As a result, her colon would seemingly just stop. She would go for days on end without a bowel movement—sometimes for an entire week.
Because of her diet of fats and refined sugar and her lack of adequate water and fiber, her food would sit in her colon while many of the dangerous toxins in the stool were reabsorbed back into her body. She was in trouble from toxicity, and if she didn’t begin to have daily bowel movements, she would eventually be even sicker. This young woman desperately needed toxic relief.
This woman’s toxicity wasn’t due to her liver. As a matter of fact, her liver seemed surprisingly strong considering the state of her health. No, her toxicity was mainly a result of an unusually slow and poorly cared for intestinal tract.
This young woman’s condition is not at all uncommon, which is why we must carefully examine the main avenue for elimination, which is the intestinal tract or small intestines and colon.
Finding toxic relief is a little like the old song that tells us we have to “eliminate the negative.” In order for your body to efficiently eliminate its toxic buildup of chemicals, toxic fat, and other poisons, you must first get your intestinal tract in top condition. Without both a healthy, wellfunctioning liver and a healthy intestinal tract, your body will continue to labor under a dangerous burden of toxins.
The liver processes and detoxifies the toxins. However, the intestinal tract is responsible for removing the majority of the toxins. The liver excretes the toxins through the bile. If the bowel function is sluggish or if there is insufficient fiber in your diet, the toxins will usually be reabsorbed by the intestines and further burden the liver and entire body with excessive toxins.
Before you start this program of detoxification, you will need to get your colon in shape. So, let’s get started.
Every team has a first-team player who seems to dominate the game while others sit on the bench waiting for their special skills to be called upon. Your intestinal tract never sits out the game. It is definitely a powerful player in your defense against toxicity.
It’s important to have a good understanding of how this amazing system works. Let’s look.
Imagine that your skin suddenly turned to glass so that you could see everything going on inside of you. You would quickly see that your intestinal tract is, stated simply, a long tube. As a matter of fact, it is a continuous tube that’s more than twenty feet long. It connects your entire digestive system together. Your food enters the tube on one end and exits on the other.
In between, your food undergoes a miracle of processing. The mouth starts the process and connects with the esophagus. The esophagus connects with the stomach. The stomach connects with the small intestines. The small intestines connect with the large intestines, and the large intestines connect to the rectum, and finally end at the anus. If digestion and elimination proceed smoothly and unhindered, then toxins are eliminated daily, and good health is achieved.
Poor digestion and elimination, as in Betty’s case, is one of the main causes of toxicity in your body. Digestion actually begins when your brain signals that your body needs food. For instance, it’s nearing lunchtime, and you start thinking about the wonderful colorful salad and whole-grain sandwich that you packed yourself for lunch. Your brain signals your digestive tract to begin producing the necessary enzymes and components for digestion.
The next step occurs when you smell and see food. You open your lunch box and smell the delicious salad and sandwich, the fresh garlic and parsley. Your mouth begins to water. Sight and smell stimulate your salivary glands to produce saliva. Saliva contains the enzyme amylase, which breaks down starches.1 Saliva contains epidermal growth factor, which is produced in the salivary glands. It helps to stimulate the growth of cells in the liver.
The sight, smell, and taste of the food trigger the process of digestion so that the stomach is prepared when the food arrives. The digestion of food in the stomach usually takes between one and four hours. A healthy stomach has a pH between 1.5 and 3.0 due to hydrochloric acid, which is secreted by the stomach. Hydrochloric acid is strong enough to burn a hole through the carpet or to melt the iron in a nail. You can see how this powerful acid forms the first line of defense against bacteria, parasites, and germs. Its acidic pH makes it a strong sterilization system against such invaders from our food.
You’ve enjoyed chewing and swallowing your satisfying salad and sandwich. It has traveled to your stomach where this powerful acid breaks it down.
It’s important that stomach acid retain its full strength. However, many people dilute this acid by chewing their food only a couple of times and washing it down with a giant gulp of ice-cold soda or iced tea.
Cold foods and cold beverages decrease circulation in the stomach and intestines and slow down the digestive process. Cold drinks also wash out digestive enzymes. Ideally, it’s best to drink your beverages about thirty minutes before eating a meal. The best beverage to consume is alkaline water at room temperature. You may drink 4 to 8 ounces of water with a meal.
Poor posture also affects digestion. While eating, try to sit up straight to take the weight and the burden off the digestive tract.
Stress also affects digestion by shunting blood away from the GI tract to the muscles to fight or flee. As a result one typically has impaired digestion due to inadequate secretion of hydrochloric acid and pancreatic enzymes. Medications for acid reflux also affect digestion by decreasing HCL secretion. (See my book The Bible Cure for Heartburn and Indigestion.)
Now, your digested salad and sandwich leave your stomach. It exits in a semi-liquid food form called chyme. Then it moves into the small intestine, which measures about eighteen to twenty-three feet in the average adult. That is about four times longer than you are tall.
The small intestine is divided into three sections. The duodenum is the first area of the small intestine that receives the partially digested salad and sandwich from the stomach. Then your lunch travels to the jejunum, where most of the nutrients are absorbed into the blood. Your delicious and nourishing sandwich completes its visit in the small intestines in the ileum, the third and final portion of the small intestines. Here the remaining nutrients from your lunch are absorbed before it moves into the large intestines.
For the nutrients from your lunch to be absorbed into your body, they must first come in contact with a sea of special cells in your intestines. These cells contain thousands of tiny fingerlike projections called villi. About twenty thousand villi are found on every square inch of your small intestines. These little fingers sway back and forth constantly, stirring up your now liquefied lunch to remove its nutrients.
Your sandwich has now been broken down into such small particles that they can pass into the villi, where they can be taken up and absorbed by very small blood vessels called capillaries. These capillaries transport your lunch to your liver. All the nutrients from your sandwich are absorbed through the intestinal walls. Minerals are absorbed mainly in the duodenum. Carbohydrates, proteins, and water-soluble vitamins are absorbed mainly in the jejunum, and fat and fat-soluble vitamins are absorbed mainly in the ileum.
Now your sandwich can be used to fuel your body in the many thousands of wonderful ways in which the vitamins, minerals, and other nutrients it contains can do. But if you’ve ever built a fire in your fireplace or driven behind a bus, you know that fuel cannot be burned without also creating smoke, or waste products. Your body’s elimination is similar in that the intestine absorbs nutrients and excretes the waste.
The waste products of this process are then propelled mainly into the colon. There they usually remain for one to two days, and in some patients seven days or longer. They are then expelled by a bowel movement. The last few inches of the colon make up the rectum, which is a storage site for solid waste. The waste is then expelled through the anal opening.
The first half of the colon absorbs the fluids from this waste and recycles them into your bloodstream. The second half of your colon condenses the waste into feces. It also secretes mucus, which binds the substances together and lubricates them to protect the colon and ease its passage.
There you have it! The entire GI system of taking in the nutrients your body needs and excreting the waste.
Of the two to two and one-half gallons of food and liquids taken in by the average adult each day, only about twelve ounces of waste enter into the large intestine. Feces is made up of about three-quarters water. The remainder is protein, fat, undigested food, roughage, dried digestive juices, and cells shed by the intestines along with dead bacteria.
When this system of expulsion works quickly and efficiently, toxins are expelled without the opportunity for your body to reabsorb them. But when your diet is made up of too many refined sugars and processed foods, you can throw this amazingly efficient process into a tailspin. Toxins can actually sit in your colon for days on end where they are constantly being reabsorbed by your body. When this situation occurs over a long period of time, your body, and especially your fatty tissues, can become over burdened with toxins.
Natural Diet vs. American Diet
Years ago, Dr. Dennis Burkett, a famous English physician, examined the digestive differences of rural Africans who ate a natural, fiber-rich diet that was packed with fresh fruits and vegetables, complex carbohydrates, and little meat. He compared the diet of the naval officers whose diet was basically meat, white flour, and sugar, similar to the basic American diet.2
The Africans had large, effortless stools approximately eighteen to thirty-six hours after they ate. In comparison, the English naval officers experienced small, difficult, compact, hard stools seventy-two to one hundred hours after eating.3
The naval officers also developed hemorrhoids, anal fissures, varicose veins, diverticulitis, diverticulosis, thrombophlebitis, gallbladder disease, appendicitis, hiatal hernia, irritable bowel syndrome, obesity, high cholesterol, coronary artery disease, high blood pressure, diabetes, hypoglycemia, colon polyps, and colon and rectal cancers.
The Africans only experienced these things after they converted to a British diet consisting mainly of meat, white flour, and sugar.
As you can see, what you eat makes all the difference in the world when it comes to healthy and efficient GI elimination.
Not only does diet play an enormous role, but also your GI tract must face challenges from many other factors that can significantly influence how well it digests and detoxifies your food. Let’s take a look at a few of them.
The efficiency of your GI tract is being challenged every day. One of those challenges comes from a deficiency of those incredibly powerful digestive juices.
If you’re over fifty years old, you may be among the many middle-aged individuals who begin to experience a reduction in the hydrochloric acid that is so essential to digestion. When the levels of this acid become depleted, digestive problems follow.
If stress plays a major role in your life, you probably don’t need me to tell you that it affects digestion. It’s not unusual for stressed-out individuals to have acid-suppressing medications strewed all around their workplace and car.
If you are stressed, you are probably not only deficient in hydrochloric acid, but you may be deficient in pancreatic enzymes as well. The lack of these vital pancreatic enzymes causes poor digestion of proteins, fats, and carbohydrates. When this happens, bits of partially digested food can putrefy and travel through your GI tract, leading to bacterial overgrowth in the small intestines, food allergies, food sensitivities, and so forth.
As you can imagine, food that is not completely digested creates an onslaught of problems for your body. An enormous stream of dangerous toxins is created that can overload and overwhelm your liver. Partially digested proteins can be absorbed directly into your bloodstream, causing disturbing food allergies or sensitivities. Partially digested food particles also may lead to the overgrowth of unfriendly bacteria, which may produce endotoxins and other dangerous toxins in the GI tract.
Relax . . . Breathe . . . Take a Minute
Don’t eat when you’re stressed. Before you pick up your fork, take a brief moment to relax a bit. It’s extremely important. If you tend to eat on the run or when you’re upset, angry, or fearful, such negative emotions will have an effect. They will stimulate the sympathetic nervous system, which will result in a decreased secretion of hydrochloric acid. This, in turn, reduces your secretions of pancreatic enzymes, making it very difficult to digest food.
Therefore, when you sit down to eat, take time to thank God and to meditate on all His goodness and provision. Release any negative emotions, bless the food, and then begin to eat.4 Chew your food thoroughly. This is important. Each bite should be chewed twenty to thirty times to mix enough saliva thoroughly with your food.
When your computer gets overloaded with files, programs, and unnecessary junk, what happens? It goes slower and slower until it finally stops working altogether. Your GI tract may do a similar slowing down.
When people overeat and stuff themselves until they are full, they put an enormous strain on the digestive tract. And it’s even worse if you overeat late at night before bedtime when the digestive system needs to rest.
The small intestine functions as an organ of digestion and absorption. It also functions as a barrier to keep your body from absorbing toxic materials and large molecules of undigested food.
A healthy small intestine allows absorption of some substances—such as triglycerides from the digestion of fats, sugars from the digestion of carbohydrates, and amino acids and di- and tri-peptides from the digestion of proteins. But it seals out compounds that would likely cause harm, such as partially digested bits of food, toxins, and heavy metals.
Nevertheless, if you consume too much alcohol or if you take antiinflammatory medicines or aspirin, they can irritate and inflame the lining of your intestines. This can lead to microscopic openings and holes in the small intestine. These holes will allow partially digested foods to pass directly through the intestinal wall into the bloodstream. This is called increased intestinal permeability.
It can also cause food allergies or food sensitivities, inflammatory bowel disease such as ulcerative colitis, Crohn’s disease, celiac disease, rheumatoid arthritis, psoriasis, schizophrenia, and chronic skin problems.
Increased intestinal permeability allows undigested or partially digested food molecules, bacteria and bacterial toxins, yeast, yeast toxins, heavy metals, and food antigens as well as other toxic substances to leak into the bloodstream. These toxins are then free to go directly into the liver. There, they wreak havoc, undermining detoxification and triggering the release of free radicals, which may damage the liver as well as other organs and tissues throughout the body.
A main cause of increased intestinal permeability is food allergies and sensitivities. Common food allergies include allergies to egg, dairy products, corn, wheat, peanuts, fish, shellfish, soy, etc. Gluten—found in breads, crackers, pasta, all kinds of flour such as rye, barley, and wheat, gravies, and many soups, breadcrumbs, pies, and cakes—is one of the most common proteins people are sensitive to and especially patients with irritable bowel syndrome.
Increased intestinal permeability is usually present in the following diseases: chronic fatigue, fibromyalgia, migraine headaches, eczema, hives, psoriasis, Crohn’s disease, ulcerative colitis, celiac disease, irritable bowel syndrome, rheumatoid arthritis, lupus, schizophrenia, autism, and attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder.
If you suspect this might be an issue for you, get a food sensitivity test. (See Appendix D.) If you are sensitive to gluten, select another form of grain for your daily diet, such as brown rice bread, millet bread, quinoa, kamut, or amaranth. Buckwheat is also gluten-free, so you can still have buckwheat pancakes.
To repair your small intestines, you must improve your digestion. You should also reinoculate the bowel with friendly bacteria. (We will discuss this later.) Bowel transit time must be improved. Decrease stress, especially when eating, by eating in a relaxed, peaceful atmosphere.
Do this on a regular basis daily. Vegetarians usually have a healthy GI tract, but most Americans do not and are in a desperate need for repair of the GI tract.
Supplements to Help Repair the GI Tract
L-glutamine is an amino acid used to feed the cells of the small intestines. I recommend taking 500–1,000 milligrams of L-glutamine thirty minutes before eating your meals for at least three months if you have increased intestinal permeability. They can be found at any health food store. If you have Crohn’s disease, colitis, celiac disease, and so forth, you may need to take this for a year or longer. To find out if you have increased intestinal permeability, see a nutritional doctor or have your doctor order Intestinal Permeability Testing. (See Appendix D.)
Zinc carnosine is a combination of zinc and L-carnosine and was developed in Japan to treat ulcers. It has also been found to be very effective in repairing a leaky gut and easing GI inflammation. I usually recommend one tab containing 16 milligrams of zinc and 75 milligrams of zinc carnosine two times a day between meals. (See Appendix D.)
Another nutrient that is extremely effective to the GI tract is gammaoryzanol. This is found in brown rice. Eat plenty of brown rice, brown rice bread, rice bran, or rice bran oil. Or you may take gamma-oryzanol in pill form, 100 milligrams three times a day. Again I recommend the tablet thirty minutes before meals for three months, or just eat plenty of brown rice.
DGL is actually a kind of licorice that helps to heal the GI tract. It is best to take a chewable form (approximately 380 milligrams) three times a day, thirty minutes before meals.
Finally, aloe vera juice soothes the lining of the stomach and intestines. It can be taken several times during the day.
For the majority of patients, L-glutamine, 1,000 milligrams, or one to two tablets thirty minutes before meals for three months, is adequate to repair the GI tract. The other supplements should be added if you are not improving. After identifying the foods you are sensitive to, then remove these foods from your diet for six weeks and rotate the other foods by choosing different foods every day for four days and then start over. Eating the same food every day such as dairy, wheat, and eggs is a major reason people develop food sensitivities. (See Appendix D for Food Sensitivity Testing.)
In addition, stop drinking alcohol, avoid aspirin, and avoid antiinflammatory medicines such as Advil. Identify all your food allergies and avoid those foods or follow a rotation diet.
The intestinal lining is one of the fastest healing tissues in your body. As a matter of fact, it can be replaced approximately every six to ten days. For more information on this topic I recommend my book The Bible Cure for Candida and Yeast Infections.
Good Bacteria, Bad Bacteria, and Yeast
About a hundred trillion bacteria reside in the large bowel, weighing in at about three pounds. More than four hundred different species of bacteria live there. Fortunately, most of these bacteria are extremely beneficial; you wouldn’t want to try to live without them. They are responsible for many different functions, such as synthesizing vitamins and breaking down toxins. They also digest fiber by changing it into short-chain fatty acids that provide the main nourishment for your colon’s cells.
Bacteria and Your Immune System
Believe it or not, most of your entire immune system—about 60 percent—is located in the lining of the small intestines. Good bacteria improve your immune response. Bad bacteria, of course, do not. So there’s a very delicate, extremely important balance of power that must be maintained at all times.
It’s really not much different from the balance of power that exists between the branches of our government.
The US Supreme Court, the president, and the Congress all share the power in our country. The system is set up so that no one branch is more powerful than the others. This careful and delicate balance has made it possible for us to enjoy the most powerful and influential government system in the entire world. But what would happen if an evil president got into office and decided to take over the military and overthrow the other two branches? We’d have anarchy, and our form of government would be destroyed.
Well, when bad bacteria and yeast overrun the balance of government in your GI tract, anarchy and chaos reign in your body, and this sets the stage for disease.
This kind of chaos can happen with repeated or prolonged use of antibiotics. Overuse of antibiotics kills the harmful bacteria, but it kills the good bacteria too. Under normal conditions, good bacterial colonies, bad bacterial colonies, and yeast colonies exist together in a balance of power. Both the yeast and bad bacteria are held in check by the good bacteria.
But when overuse of antibiotics kills both the good and bad bacteria, the yeast can start to grow so rapidly in the small and large intestines that the yeast grows out of control. Yeast overgrowth may be associated with many different diseases and symptoms such as psoriasis, eczema, irritable bowel syndrome, hives, diarrhea, bloating, gas, and other symptoms.
If you use antibiotics too often or for too long, eventually the bad bacteria in your intestines may actually become resistant to them. When this occurs, bad, or pathogenic, bacteria may also grow out of control.
When these bacteria run rampant in your body, they can create poisons called endotoxins that can damage and destroy the protective coverings (membranes) of cells. This leads to even more leakage of food across your intestinal lining, resulting in more food allergies and sensitivities, liver toxicity, and eventually systemic disease.
Counterfeit Proteins Running Amok
This overgrowth of dangerous pathogenic bacteria in your intestines can also fool your system and wreak untold damage. It does this through “antigenic mimicry,” which is simply when proteins from intestinal bacteria are absorbed right into the bloodstream by increased intestinal permeability. The intestinal bacteria have proteins that appear to the immune system as being very similar to human protein. That’s why it’s call mimicry. These bacterial proteins actually mimic or counterfeit true proteins.
That may not seem so dangerous to you, but these proteins were never meant to enter directly into your blood. Because these proteins are very similar to human protein, they may actually confuse the immune system into attacking itself. The immune system will finally recognize the proteins as counterfeit and form antibodies against them to destroy them, but because the proteins mimic human proteins, the antibodies also lead to inflammation of human tissue such as joint tissue.
Not only can the bacteria mimic true proteins, they can also cause fermentation in your small intestines—just the way that apple cider ferments. Have you ever bought a gallon of apple cider in the fall, only to have it ferment in your fridge? What happened to it when it did? It turned into an alcoholic beverage and released lots of gasses and other toxins in the process.
Think about two to three pounds or even more of bacteria overgrowth in your small intestines fermenting and causing the partially digested food to ferment and putrefy. This putrefaction creates substances called indoles, skatols, and amines, substances that can be measured in a urine indican test.
Bad bacteria also can produce enzymes that can break down your bile into toxins that can promote the development of cancer. Bacterial enzymes can also inactivate your own digestive enzymes, causing impaired digestion, malabsorption, diarrhea, bloating, and gas.
Good bacteria, or friendly bacteria, are the lactobacilli and bifido bacteria. These GI-friendly organisms preserve the balance of power and form the defense against the rampant overgrowth of bad bacteria and yeast. Therefore, they keep poisonous toxins at bay. Beneficial bacteria also help prevent damage to the lining of the GI tract, thus maintaining normal intestinal permeability. They also prevent the growth of bacteria that produce the dangerous enzymes that promote cancer. In addition, these friendly bacteria secrete chemicals that kill the bad, or pathogenic, bacteria.
Good bacteria, called lactobacillus acidophilus, are normally found in the small intestines. Bifido bacteria are normally found in the large intestines.
Foods for good bacteria, called fructo-oligosaccharides (FOS), are complex sugars that are found in high amounts in Jerusalem artichokes. FOS encourages the growth of the good bacteria and discourages the growth of the harmful bacteria. I recommend good bacteria daily, either in capsule or powder form, if one desires to keep a healthy GI tract.
If you are taking antibiotics, or if you have any of the symptoms of increased intestinal permeability, take at least fifty to two hundred billion colony-forming units of both acidophilus and bifido bacteria every day. (See Appendix D.)
If you have diseases associated with increased intestinal permeability, you should be on these supplements a minimum of three months and preferably indefinitely. Anyone who wants to maintain a healthy GI tract should take them regularly.
In addition, take at least 1,000–3,000 milligrams a day of FOS to feed the friendly bacteria. Take these at the same time that you take the acidophilus and bifidus. It is best to take all of these between meals. (See Appendix D.)
Many people believe that they can get enough beneficial bacteria from eating yogurt. However, many yogurts that claim they have live bacteria really do not. In addition, many yogurts contain lactobacillus bulgaricus, which lives in the intestines for only about two weeks. Therefore, I strongly suggest that you not try to rely on this method alone in supplying your intestines with friendly bacteria.
Lactobacillus plantarum and saccharomyces boulardii
When you take antibiotics, you should also continue using supplements of lactobacillus acidophilus and bifidus with FOS for about a month after stopping the antibiotics.
If you must take antibiotics over an extended period of time, take lactobacillus plantarum for a month also. This is one of the few lactobacilli that are not killed by antibiotics. Take one or two capsules a day. (See Appendix D.)
Saccharomyces boulardii (Sacro B) is a type of yeast that is a probiotic for treating and preventing diarrhea, including traveler’s diarrhea, infectious diarrhea, and diarrhea caused from antibiotics. Sacro B helps fight disease-causing pathogens in the GI tract, including bacteria and yeast. I recommend one or two capsules of Sacro B in the morning on an empty stomach.
Imagine having a large tick attached to your arm that continually sucks the blood out of your body. It lives there constantly, sapping your strength and injecting poisons into your skin that make you ill. On a molecular level, that’s what microscopic parasites do.
If you think that the only people who get parasites are those who travel and live in exotic, third-world countries, you’re wrong. Fact is, you may have parasites living inside your body right now!
There are three classes of parasites. Parasites are simply microorganisms that live off their host (you) and eventually cause damage to the host. Parasitic infections are fairly common here in the United States. In fact, the majority of the population of the world is colonized with parasites. That means you probably have had them at some time in your life and may have them right now. Let’s take a look at these unwelcome visitors.
Three main groups of parasites exist. The first are one-celled organisms called protozoa. They include amoebas, giardia, cryptosporidium, and blastocystis.
Giardia thrives in many of the lakes and streams throughout the United States, and it is often blamed for small outbreaks of diarrhea. When ingested, this parasite takes up residence in the small intestine, creating damage that leads to increased intestinal permeability. In fact, giardia can so damage the small intestine that, even after it has been eradicated, it can take months to heal. I had a giardia infection after skiing on a lake. Years ago, I went waterskiing with my son, Kyle, who is an excellent “wake boarder.” I decided to give it a try.
I got out there on this little wake board and tried to get up, but it didn’t work. My wife was driving the boat, and it seemed as if I were drinking the water in the lake instead of skiing. It was embarrassing. I tried again and again until I had blisters on my hands. I finally said, “Give me the skis!” My son still laughs about it.
About a week later I felt this little gurgle in my stomach. It became worse and turned into diarrhea. It would occur one day, be gone the next, and then it would return. Finally, I checked myself and found I had giardia, a microscopic parasite that lives in the small intestines. It is common in the lakes of Central Florida.
I treated myself with herbs, and the condition cleared within a few weeks.
In the 1990s the parasite cryptosporidium contaminated the water supply of Milwaukee, causing the largest epidemic of diarrhea in United States history. More than a hundred deaths occurred, and more than four thousand people developed diarrhea.
Blastocystis is another protozoa that commonly causes diarrhea. Other symptoms of being infested with this parasite include bloating and flatulence (gas).
Amoebas also cause diarrhea. They can so damage the lining of your intestines that they create leaky gut, burdening your liver.
The second group of parasites is classified as the helminths, which are worms. These include roundworms, hook worms, thread worms, tape worms, whip worms, and pin worms.
The third group is the arthropods, which include ticks, mites, lice, and so on.
If you suspect that you may be infested with parasites from your drinking water or other means, supplementing with garlic can help.
Garlic is a member of the allium family, which also includes onions, scallions, and leeks. Among these four, garlic contains the highest concentration of this powerful substance. Garlic has enormous powers to fight parasite infestations in your GI tract. It also kills bacteria, yeast, and viruses.
I recommend approximately 500 milligrams of garlic, two tablets, three times a day. You may take this if you have diarrhea that has persisted longer than a few days. If diarrhea persists, see your physician and have a stool specimen from three different stools examined for ova and parasites. Also have a giardia antigen test and a stool culture. (See Appendix D for comprehensive digestive stool analysis and parasitology.)
Other herbs, including oil of oregano, black walnut, artemesia, wormwood, pumpkin seed, cloves, and grapefruit seed, are beneficial for parasitic infections. Many products have a mixture of the herbs listed above.
As we saw earlier in this chapter, constipation is part of the price we pay in this society for our unhealthy diet. The pharmaceutical industry is making a fortune on our addiction to sugar and refined and processed foods and on our need for laxatives, antacids, and medications for bloating and gas.
Normal bowel transit time is approximately twenty to thirty hours. If your diet has plenty of fiber, your stools will be soft but formed. You will also have regular bowel movements—about one, two, or even three times a day.
A loose stool may indicate intestinal irritation. It could be caused by a bacterial or viral infection, increased intestinal permeability, food allergies or sensitivities, parasitic infections, yeast overgrowth, malabsorption, or poor digestion.
Normally, movements should occur about twenty to thirty minutes after eating. Under ideal circumstances, you should have one after every meal.
Avoid using over-the-counter chemical and herbal laxatives, for these may lead to a dependency on the laxative. Osmotic laxatives such as magnesium sulfate, magnesium citrate, magnesium glycinate, and magnesium aspartate (or magnesium malate) are much safer alternatives. Many people are actually deficient in magnesium. Osmotic laxatives simply draw water into the colon and make the stool soft. They usually do not irritate the bowels.
Taking higher doses of buffered vitamin C can also prevent constipation as well as provide antioxidant protection. I recommend 500 to 1,000 milligrams of buffered vitamin C, two to three times daily, even when off the detoxification program. Everyone should take vitamin C, but those constipated usually need more. You may purchase this at any health food store.
A chlorophyll drink such as Divine Health Green Superfood contains wheatgrass, barley grass, alfalfa, spirulina, chlorella, and blue-green algae. These powerful foods are full of phytonutrients and magnesium, which help to cleanse the bowels and prevent constipation.
Take one scoop each morning. Mix it with pomegranate juice for a delicious energy drink. If you are constipated, you may drink it two times daily. However, don’t drink it in the evening or too late in the afternoon, or it may give you too much energy and keep you awake. If you are still constipated, take all three supplements (magnesium, vitamin C, and Green Superfood) until the bowels are regulated.
All of these supplements are very helpful for constipation, but equally important factors for regularity include the following:
1. Drinking enough water—at least two quarts of filtered or alkaline water a day
2. Regular exercise
3. A high-fiber diet with at least 30 to 35 grams of fiber per day
Fiber is fantastic for your healthy GI tract. It acts like a broom, sweeping the colon lining, eliminating the toxins, and binding the toxins in the bile so that they cannot be reabsorbed back into your body. All of this activity is critically important in preventing disease. High-fiber diets also reduce the level of circulating estrogens by binding them and preventing them from being reabsorbed and recirculated through the liver.
Most of the chemicals that have been detoxified by the liver are contained in the bile, which is then dumped into the intestinal tract. This, as you know, is a major part of your body’s detoxification process. But if your GI tract doesn’t have enough fiber or is constipated, then much of that toxic bile will be reabsorbed back into your body. That’s why it’s so important to get plenty of fiber every day through your diet and to supplement with fiber regularly as well so that the toxins in your body will be bound and excreted. This will dramatically reduce your body’s toxic burden. Let’s take a look at this wonderful natural detoxifier.
Most of your fiber should come from your diet. Eat plenty of raw fruits, raw vegetables, whole grains, beans, legumes, and seeds.
Fiber comes in two varieties: water soluble, which means they can dissolve in water, and that which is insoluble in water. Foods high in soluble fiber include oats, oat bran, guar gum, carrots, beans, apples, ground flaxseeds, psyllium, and citrus pectin. Foods high in insoluble fiber include wheat bran, most root vegetables, celery, and the skins of fruits. Soluble fiber feeds the intestinal bacteria—especially the good bacteria. It also provides nourishment to the cells of the colon.
Intestinal bacteria cause soluble fiber to ferment and form shortchain fatty acids. This, in turn, nourishes the cells of the large intestine. These short-chain fatty acids help to prevent the growth of yeast and harmful bacteria. However, if you eat too much soluble fiber, such as too many beans or too much guar gum, you can develop an overgrowth of intestinal bacteria along with excessive bloating, gas, and abdominal discomfort.
Soluble fiber helps to lower cholesterol, control blood sugar, and create a sensation of fullness so that you will be less likely to overeat.
Insoluble fiber, on the other hand, inactivates many intestinal toxins. It also helps to prevent harmful bacteria and parasites from attaching themselves to the wall of your intestines by acting like a sweeping broom.
Since both forms of fiber are very beneficial, I strongly recommend that you eat food that contains a mixture of soluble and insoluble fibers. Rice bran, oat bran, legumes such as beans and peas, apples, pears, and berries contain both sources of fiber.
I do not recommend wheat bran since so many people are sensitive to the protein in wheat (gluten). Gluten-sensitive individuals may also need to avoid oat bran if the oats are from a mill that also processes wheat or other gluten grains. If you suffer with increased intestinal permeability and food allergies, eat plenty of other rice bran, forms of fiber such as brown rice, ground flaxseeds, etc.
Another excellent form of insoluble fiber includes microcrystalline cellulose. You can get this from a health food store or a nutritional doctor. Since many soluble fibers can produce bloating and bacterial overgrowth, I routinely use microcrystalline cellulose. Since it is an insoluble fiber and does not contain any wheat products, it tends to be well tolerated even by those with sensitive GI tracts.
Flaxseed, freshly ground in a coffee grinder, is one of the best ways to get your daily fiber. Simply put 1 to 2 tablespoons in a coffee grinder, and then pour the ground seeds into a smoothie or sprinkle it on your oatmeal, salad, or on any other food. It is good to take this two to three times throughout the day.
Flaxseeds contain lignans, which not only help to relieve hot flashes in menopausal women but also have antifungal, antibacterial, and antiviral activity. Lignan also blocks the activity of the enzyme that converts other hormones into estrogen.
Another very important fiber is citrus pectin. It is a water-soluble fiber that comes from the cell walls of citrus fruits. Animal studies have shown that modified citrus pectin inhibited the metastatic spread of cancer. In one study, the metastatic spread of cancer was reduced more than 80 percent!5 Citrus pectin also binds many heavy metals in the GI tract, including mercury, cadmium, arsenic, and lead.
The highest quality citrus pectin that I have found is PectaSol.
Take fiber each morning when you get up and again before you go to bed at night. Freshly ground flaxseed mixed with Green Superfood is one of my favorite ways to start a day.
Your amazing body is not only designed to detoxify itself but to heal itself as well. And just as you can play a significant role in helping and supporting your body’s own ability to detoxify itself, you can also do the same with healing.
Let’s turn and take a look at how detox fasting can play an exciting and powerful role in your body’s process of healing.
L-glutamine, 1,000 milligrams thirty minutes before meals
Probiotic, one to two in the morning on an empty stomach (See Appendix D.)
Fiber such as ground flaxseeds, 1 to 2 tablespoons one or two times a day
Green Superfood, 1 scoop upon awakening
* Fictitious character