Detoxification
Therapies
by Gary
Null & Barbara Seaman
Continued
from Part I
COLON
CLEANSING
Colon cleansing is an
ancient and time-honored health practice for rejuvenating the system; it
was used in Egypt over 4,000 years ago. Later, Hippocrates taught these
procedures in his health care system. The large intestine, or colon, is
healed, rebuilt, and finally restored to its natural size, normal shape,
and correct function.
Colon therapist Anita
Lotson explains the procedure and some of its physical and psychological
benefits: "There are several stages of therapy. The first segment
involves cleansing, a thorough washing of the large intestine. The colon
is irrigated by a technique whereby water is gently infused into the large
bowel, flowing in and out at steady intervals. Through this method, water
is allowed to travel the entire length of the colon, all the way around to
the cecum area. The walls of the colon are washed and old encrustations
and fecal material are loosened, dislodged, and swept away. This toxic
waste material has often been attached to the bowel walls for many, many
years. It is laden with millions of bacteria, which set up the perfect
environment for disease to take root and entrench itself in the system,
wreaking havoc. As this body pollution is eliminated, many conditions --
from severe skin disorders to breathing difficulties, depression, chronic
fatigue, nervousness, severe constipation, and arthritis -- are reduced in
severity, providing great relief, especially when augmented with dietary
changes and other treatment modalities.
"The next phases are
healing, rebuilding, and finally restoration of a healthy colon,
functioning at maximum efficiency for the final absorption of nutrients,
and the total and timely elimination of all remaining waste materials.
During the healing phase, we begin to infuse materials into the bowel that
will cool inflamed areas and strengthen weak sections of the colon wall.
"Flaxseed tea, white
oak bark, and slippery elm bark all soothe, lubricate, and introduce
powerful healing agents directly into the large intestine. These herbal
teas may be taken orally as well. Simple dietary changes have been made by
now, such as the addition of water. This simple measure spells the
difference between success and failure in alleviating many bowel
conditions. I ask all my clients to double their intake of water.
"I love to see
people's change in attitude from the time they come in to the time that
they leave. Sometimes people are very irritable when their bowels are
backed up. They're often depressed, and sometimes nasty. By the time they
leave, you can see a smile and a bounce in their step. It's a different
person altogether."
Detox Drink: An excellent
formula for colon cleansing is a drink made from ground flax seeds,
psyllium seeds, and bentonite, which is a liquid clay. "Clay absorbs
toxins," says Lombardi. "The seeds expand in the water and
become like a brush. They brush the interior tubing, our pipe system. When
the pipe system is completely clean, foods are absorbed through our
digestive system."
ENZYME
THERAPY
Nina Anderson, author of Over
Fifty, Looking Thirty: The Secrets of Staying Young, attributes
slow aging to sufficient enzyme levels: "Many scientists say that
people get old before their time due to enzyme exhaustion. Some people are
old at 40 because of the lack of enzymes, while others are young at 80
because of an abundance. Above all else, I would advise anybody who is
trying to avoid looking and feeling older as they get older to take
supplemental enzymes."
She goes on to explain
that enzymes allow nutrients to be used. For example, you have enzymes in
the heart that allow magnesium to be used. Without those enzymes,
magnesium cannot not get to the heart: "Enzymes are molecule
catalysts found everywhere in your body. In fact, there are over 1,300
different ones. They make everything happen. In my book I use this
analogy: minerals are building blocks of your body. They are the nose,
eyes, ears, bones, all the things that hold you together. Something has to
build this. Enzymes are the construction workers that facilitate
everything in the body going together."
Anderson recommends eating
more raw foods, mineral supplements, and digestive plant enzymes to
increase enzyme levels. Raw foods are loaded with enzymes. Fruit and
vegetable juices are filled with enzymes. When food is processed, the
first things taken out are enzymes. Why? Because the enzymes are what
allow the food to ripen. However, if the food becomes too ripe, it rots.
To stop it from ripening and rotting so that it can be sold longer, these
enzymes must be destroyed. But if you destroy the enzymes, you destroy the
food's life force. It will have carbohydrates, vitamins, fats, and
minerals, but not its life force.
"The mineral
supplements to take", Anderson adds, "should be in crystalloid
form, with electrolytes. The crystalloid form goes right into the cell
walls. This fortifies your body.
"Plant enzymes assist
in the digestion of food right on through the intestinal tract. You want
to help the digestive process for the whole length of the digestive tract.
With supplemental enzymes, you won't have an upset stomach anymore or feel
bloated and exhausted after a big meal. The skin will start to improve
too. The skin manifests everything that happens inside. If your inner
organs start to degenerate, if they are not functioning properly, this
kind of stress shows up on your face. The first thing people do when they
start getting older is look in the mirror and go, 'Oh my God, I've got
wrinkles.' They spend millions trying to get rid of them. But what they
have to realize is that wrinkles start from inside. You have to work on
the inside to get the outside to reflect that good health.
"Without the proper
enzymes, none of the other good things you do matter. For example, the
fat-soluble vitamins A, D, E, and K require fat for absorption. That fat
has to be broken down by an enzyme, lipase. If lipase is not present in
sufficient quantities, that fat will not be broken down. If the fat isn't
broken down, the vitamins will not be released. Therefore, you can spend a
fortune on vitamin pills, and if you don't have the proper enzymes to
release those vitamins into your system, they are just going to be flushed
out."
Enzymes can be used
externally as well as internally for youthful effects: "There are
amazing enzyme treatments for the skin. Papaya enzymes are wonderful. Or
you can mix a plant enzyme powder and put it on as a mask. Not only does
it take the lines out of your face, but it fills them in and builds up
collagen. It can also get rid of age spots and shrink moles. When you use
enzymes as a mud pack when you come in from the sun, it fights free
radicals that otherwise might foster melanoma."
EXERCISE
AND OTHER TECHNIQUES
When we exercise, we
detoxify as we sweat through our skin and exhale from our lungs. Some good
exercises include jogging or daily brisk walks, yoga stretches, and
jumping on a minitrampoline, which exercises every cell in the body.
Exercise slows down the aging process because it stimulates
detoxification.
Chiropractor Dr. Mitch
Proffman says that traditional cultures have appreciated the connection
between physical fitness and longevity, making athletic activities a part
of women's ritual ceremonies: "In traditional Navajo society women
would run three times daily as a formal part of the four-day rites of
passage after the onset of menstruation. The first run was at dawn, and
each subsequent run would be for a longer distance. It was believed that
the total distance a woman could run would determine her longevity."
He goes on to state that
recent research supports the connection between exercise and a longer
life: "The Journal of the American Medical Association has
reported that exercise increases people's life spans. Women walking forty
to fifty minutes, three to four times per week, live longer. The same
article claims that exercise decreases the chance of dying from all known
diseases. This can be attributed to the fact that most major diseases,
such as cancer, diabetes, and heart disease, are stress-related, and
exercise reduces stress.
"Another important
function of exercising is that people's mental abilities improve. In a
recent study at the University of Illinois, Dr. William Greenboro, Ph.D.,
studied four different groups of rats. One group led a sedentary life.
Another group played aimlessly on wood and plastic in their cages. A third
group was on a special motorized wheel, and a fourth group walked through
intricate mazes and ropes. The finding was that all rats that exercised in
any manner had more capillaries in their brains and better brain function.
This suggests that exercise fuels the brain with more oxygen and increases
natural growth factors, in humans as well as in rats."
Dr. Joseph Pizzorno, N.D.,
president of John Bastyr College of Naturopathic Medicine in Seattle,
Washington, says that strengthening exercises are the best defense against
the increased frailty women face as they age: "It turns out that the
majority of the debility of old age is simply due to people not using
their muscles. The full strength of what one had at twenty and thirty is
almost completely returned with weight strengthening exercises. There are
a lot of different weight training programs out there. I have been doing
some research. The one I find most effective, and am now using personally,
is something called Super Slow. Weights are used in a very, very
controlled, very, very intense way to get maxi- mum effects from the
exercise. I am quite impressed with what I have seen."
Continued in Part
III:
* Stress Release * Breathing
Exercises * Skin Brushing
* Saunas * Magnetic Therapy * Live Cell Therapy
 This
article was excerpted from For
Women Only! Your Guide to Health
Empowerment, ? 2000
by Gary Null & Barbara Seaman. Reprinted
with permission of the publisher:
Seven Stories Press. http://sevenstories.com
Info/Order
this book
This
article was excerpted from:
For
Women Only!
by Gary Null & Barbara Seaman
Info/Order
this book
More
books on Health.
 Gary
Null, Ph.D. is one of America's leading
health and fitness writers and alternative
practitioners. Trained as a nutritionist, he
is the author of dozens of books and
hundreds of medical articles. His one-hour
health radio program airs daily on WBAI in
New York City, and is carried weekly to 32
stations nationwide over the Virtual Radio
Network. Null is a former faculty member of
the New School for Social Research and a
National TAC Master Champion Racewalker.
Among his many best-selling books are Get
Healthy Now!, Healing Your Body
Naturally, and The Ultimate
Anti-Aging Program. He lives in New York
City.
 Barbara
Seaman has been cited by the Library of
Congress as the author who raised sexism and
health care as a worldwide issue. Her The
Doctors' Case against the Pill is
credited with influencing the FDA to require
informational inserts in packages of oral
contraceptives and other medicines. She also
wrote Free and Female and Women
and the Crisis in Sex Hormones. The New
York Times wrote that these three books
"triggered a revolution, fostering a
willingness among women to take issues of
health into their own hands." A founder
of the National Women's Health Network and a
contributing editor to Ms., Seaman lives in
New York City.
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