Digestive Health

Before I started studiing nutrition seriously, I began reading Bernard Jensen’s, Tissue Cleansing through Bowel Management. This remarkable book made me think differently about the disease process. Having been trained in conventional Western medicine as a nurse, I was taught to treat disease. More specifically, we have been taught to treat symptoms of disease. What I’ve learned from this book and other classes is that the root of many diseases actually comes from autointoxication. This is when toxins from food or environment are not eliminated from our bodies and in turn make us sick. Secondary to that, if the intestines are blocked or backing up, it makes absorption of vital nutrients more difficult. Blood to the colon begins to pick up toxins, or poisons from the bowel wall and deposit them back into the bloodstream. Constipation is the main culprit in autointoxication. Most people, including physicians think that if one stools once every one to two days, that this is sufficient. The fact is, that it is extremely important to eliminate after every meal one eats. It takes 18 hours from the time one eats a meal for it to go through the entire digestive process and be eliminated. Food or warm water in the stomach stimulates the bowel and assists in elimination. That’s why it is very important to drink warm lemon water upon waking in the morning, to stimulate undigested food in intestines and assist in elimination, before putting more food in the system. Another major problem with most people’s bowel is the lack of proper intestinal flora. Meat, coffee, sugar, alcohol, and many processed foods kill lactobacillus acidophilus (which need an acidic bowel) and feed bacillus coli (which love an alkaline bowel). In a normal healthy bowel, one should have 80% lactobacillus acidophilus and 20% bacillus coli. Most people on a western diet are the exact opposite, opening up a window for disease. In Bernard Jensen’s years of study, he found that people whose diets included fermented milk or yogurt (containing acidophilus), lived the longest. Having read this book, I did implement changes in my diet. Of course, every morning, I start off drinking luke warm purified water, at least one glass. A couple times per week my breakfast consists of a cup of Kefir (type of yogurt containing a higher protein, lower carbohydrate than regular yogurt). I sprinkle ¼ cup of ground flax seed on this drizzled with Agave nectar for sweetness. Alfalfa tablets may be taken after meals to provide natural fiber bulk. We should attempt to drink two liters of water everyday. For exercise, try to walk at least three times a week and the other days do stretches. Dr. Jensen is a firm believer in slant board exercises which get blood to your head and take some of the pressure off the bowel. When doing stretching, try poses which get the feet up in the air. Dr. Jensen’s book also discusses the benefits of colonics, fasting, juicing, broths, and enemas. Overall, it is important not to overlook our intestinal health.