Why You Need to Super Charge Your Digestion

Now we're going to discuss another way that natural food improves your health. Also, we'll look at how foods should be eaten, something that is sadly unknown to most people today.

The first concept I'd like to give you is this:

ENZYMES

Raw vegetables have something in them called “ENZYMES” that are essential to proper, effortless digestion of foods and absorption of nutrients. In other words, a raw carrot has something in it that not only helps digest the carrot (if you eat it) but also helps to digest anything else you eat at the same time. So make sure you eat some raw vegetables often. (Enzyme products can be purchased in capsules or tablets. But . . . why not just get your enzymes from eating some raw vegetables?)

OK, let's suppose you eat high quality foods that aren't poisoned, preserved, processed or cooked beyond recognition.

How the digestive cycle should work.

Each bite we take should be chewed for 20 to 30 seconds, probably 40 or fifty chews per bite. During this time, our mouths will secrete saliva, which begins to break down the starches. But also, and almost more important, while the bite is in our mouth, our body's “computer” analyzes exactly what is in each bite so the next step of the digestive process will ready for it after that bite is swallowed.

After we chew each bite so thoroughly that it gets to be about the consistency of gravy, we can then swallow it and take another bite. We should be careful to not wash each bite down with a liquid, and I'll explain why in a moment. Ideally, our eating should be completed in less than half an hour, and then we should stop.

Once the meal is completed, the power that runs our body will direct the muscles at the top of the stomach to close the entrance. The stomach will then be told to secrete exactly the right acids and digestive enzymes to break down the meal. The reason we didn't want to drink a lot of fluids with out meal is because we don't want these secretions to be diluted. Then, as soon as the “batch” reaches the correct level of acidity and has been adequately mixed up, the valve at the bottom of the stomach will be directed to open and the mix will be pushed into the small intestine.

Once it is all in the small intestine, bile from the gall bladder joins the meal to break down the fats. Also, hundreds of billions of friendly bacteria go to work breaking everything down even more, and preparing the nutrients to pass through the wall of the intestine into the blood. If the mix isn't soupy enough, our bodies now add water and stir it up.

Ideally, all the building blocks that we need for energy and regeneration are gleaned from our food and get into our blood to be delivered to where they're needed. And last, the bulk and fiber that remains should scrub its way through your intestines to keep the walls free from build-up.

The American Diet

Here's the problem. The average American doesn't exactly eat the best food. In fact, it is common for our neighbors to eat 10, 15 and even 20 fast food type meals each week. McDonalds, Dunkin Donuts, Pizza Hut, Taco Bell, and all the rest are only just found around our intersections and strip malls, they're moving into our schools, factories, hospitals, airports and (of course) malls.

Besides all the chemicals in most all of this food, high levels of grease are also present. And it's not just any grease, it's the worst type of grease.

So let's say you go through the drive-up window at the local fast food establishment. You order a cheeseburger, fries and a super sized beverage.

Well, the bun may contain what was once wheat, but now it is a combination of highly processed foods and chemicals. The lettuce was likely soaked in a chemical to keep it crisp. The cheese is greasy and semi-fake. And the meat is about a third pure fat and loaded with hormones and antibiotics. The potatoes for the fries were grown on nutrient-depleted soil, pealed with a chemical similar to Drano, frozen, deep fried in indigestible grease and then heavily salted.

And then there's the drink: It is a combination of various chemical flavors, colors and preservatives. It is sweetened with either enormous amounts of sugar or with the artificial sweeteners that turn into formaldehyde as soon as they get about body temperature. This is all mixed with icy cold water laced with heavy doses of chlorine.

Not only is this food prepared FAST, it is typically eaten FAST. We take a big bite of the burger. Do we chew it forty times? Do we chew it five times? Or do we even chew it at all? I believe most people don't really chew it; sure they take a couple chomps at it with their teeth, but by what I've seen, I believe they are more maneuvering it than chewing it. As soon as it is pointed at their throats, they take a big slurp of the super sized phosphoric acid, high caffeine chemical toxin beverage through the gigantic straw, wash it down and then take another bite. They toss down a few fries and then they are back to gulping down more bites of burger.

When it is all done, the person is sitting there with big chunks of barely digestible pseudo-food floating around in a bath of embalming fluid-like beverage.

Our bodies don't know where to start. In order to get this mess broken down so it may be usable, it will take massive amounts of acids, the type that are likely to result in acid reflux. The body will have to rob enzymes from all over the place, enzymes that are needed for other body processes. The pancreas and liver become overworked.

Undigested Food

The partially digested carbohydrates and sugars get into our blood where they provide the perfect environment for large colonies of yeast.

The partially digested proteins make our red blood cells stick together into enormous clumps that are far too big to get through our capillaries. Now keep in mind, the capillaries at the point where oxygen and nutrients are finally dropped off to our brain, heart, and every other organ, gland, muscle, joint, bone and vessel are small. In fact, they are so small that the tiny red blood cells have to bend in half to get through them. Now if these tubes are that small, what exactly do you think happens when a blob of a hundred thousand red blood cells, all stuck together, heads in that direction?

But it gets worse. In our blood are special white blood cells called macrocytes, a name that simply means “big cells”. These macrocytes are giant, blob-like cells with a special job. I have a dark field microscope which allows me to watch them in action, and they are really fascinating. When a macrocyte finds something in the blood stream that isn't supposed to be there such as a foreign particle that could harm us, it sneaks over to it, buddies up real close and then gradually wraps around it. It then chemically breaks down the stray thing it has found, lets out a good burp and goes looking for another.

But here's the problem. Because of the horrible food we eat and how we eat it, our blood streams are full of billions of undigested food particles. When you try to look for red blood cells, it is like trying to find a mailbox in a blizzard. The macrocytes look at this mess and say, “I don't know what this stuff is but it sure isn't normal.” In desperation, the macrocytes that are supposed to be protecting us from infections and invaders attempt to break down all these particles of undigested foods. They're too busy trying to finish breaking down our lunch to be much good at protecting us from invaders.

These macrocytes attempt to remove the blobs of fat from the blood flow, but its a real mess. They cannot keep up. If you want to have healthy blood vessels or have a heart that will live for a few years, it would be far better to eat fats and oils that were meant to be eaten, make sure they're not processed and then eat them right.

Everything I've just described concerning how foods are processed, prepared and eaten contributes to all sorts of unwanted conditions, including cancer, Alzheimer's, heart disease, stroke, acid reflux, pancreatitis, arthritis, constipation, clogged arteries, allergies, diabetes, irritable bowel, blood cell diseases and many of the autoimmune conditions that are so common today.

What's the answer?

Eat foods that are digestible.

Focusing on grains, seeds, nuts, beans, vegetables and berries that have been grown without poisons. Make every effort when possible to get fruits and vegetables that are grown locally and picked ripe, so that they contain more of the phytonutrients (the thousands of special plant substances that promote health) and glyconutrients (the special plant sugars that make cell to cell communication possible).

Don't over-cook your foods, and in fact, eat a lot of them raw. Fish, poultry, meat, dairy and eggs may be important parts of your diet, but try to find ones that are grown under natural, chemical-free conditions. Farmed fish and factory-grown poultry and eggs are truly bad. Drink lots of water that has no chlorine or fluoride, but don't drink it with your meals. Especially avoid chemical drinks that are cold and contain phosphoric acid (that's the fizzy part of soft drinks). Everything about these drinks is destructive to your health and bad for your digestion. Chew every bite well, and when you're done with each meal, stop eating!

When almost everything we eat is horribly difficult to digest, our bodies are forced to try their best to utilize this stuff and get some good out of it. But it takes a long time, so all that we've eaten works its way very slowly through our digestive tube, and as it does so, some of it gets lodged inside us, where it could stay for weeks, months, years or even decades.

Let me paint a little picture of what this is like: Suppose you got a jumbo blender, and into it you put milk, coffee, pop, a hamburger, some steak, fish, chicken, pancakes, scrambled eggs, pasta, a taco, bacon, green beans, a salad, corn, a couple donuts, a candy bar, some ice cream, a couple bananas and apples, some catsup and maple syrup, and a peanut butter sandwich.

Then you turn on your blender and mix it until it's good and soupy. And then, turn your home thermostat up to 102 degrees and leave on vacation with this mix still sitting in the blender. When you come back in three weeks, what's the first thing you'll notice as you enter your house? That's right. It would smell like something crawled under the kitchen sink and died. Do you think that if we took some of this stuff out of the blender and looked at it under a microscope, we might see some little crawly things? Do you think there might even be some big crawly things?

Now, suppose you were offered money to drink a large glass of this rancid, putrefied mix for $500? Would you do it? $1000? $3000? You can't have your stomach pumped. Do I hear $5000?

Have you ever had food poisoning, you ate some bad meat down at taco John's clam house, and you got so sick you wished you would die but you didn't? Well, when you eat things that don't digest properly and they stay inside you for ages, it's moist in there, about 102 degrees, it does in you exactly what it did in our blender example. And you get a type of food poisoning, only it comes on gradually and unless you do something to change the situation, it can stay there permanently.

Now here's what most people don't know about how this stuff hides inside you.

Perhaps you've always pictured the inside of the intestine as being smooth, like the inside of one of the balloons that the clowns tie into poodles and giraffes. Well, it's not. It's rough on the inside, and goes in and out and has all sorts of groves and ridges, bumps and dips. Because of these, your intestine has roughly the surface area of a tennis court rather than that of a coffee table. There are literally millions of tiny places where decomposing food can hide.

The second way this stuff can stack up inside you is this: In almost any area of your intestine, and especially in the large intestine, the tube can get over filled and stretched out to twice, three times, even four times its normal size, and get filled up with ten, twenty, thirty or more pounds of decomposing matter. By the way, this makes a perfect habitat for parasites. But, either way, you have all the toxic substances plastered to the wall of your intestine.

And it gets worse. Do you happen to remember how wall paper paste was made in the old days before vinyl adhesives were available? That's right . . flour and water were mixed together to make the glue. So let me tell you what this glue is doing inside your body.

Lets' say you eat a donut, and wash it down with some coffee. The flour and water make a layer of glue, producing a barrier that traps the poisons against the walls of your intestine. The grease from the donut forms another layer. Then you eat a hamburger and get another layer of grease and one more layer of glue. Then pizza, then bacon.

Layer after layer, the grease and glue build up. It gets like a varathane. You could paint it onto the hull of your boat to keep the barnacles off. The problem is, this plastic-like layer traps the toxic byproducts that are plastered onto the inside of your intestine. The microorganisms and poisons from it are constantly polluting your blood. Meanwhile, this same layer of grease and glue keeps nutrients from getting to the surface of your digestive tube where they could be absorbed. So here we go again, poisons go in, nutrients stay out.

So, what are the ill effects of this challenge, the digestive systems that are in trouble? Well, besides abdomens sticking out and constant bloating and indigestion, toxins are constantly forced into out blood stream while nutrients are kept out. And that's not exactly what we want, is it.

Fiber

This situation would correct itself to some degree if we ate lots of fiber and fruits every day, because they would help scrub down the intestinal walls. But most people don't.

It would help if the foods we ate were less processed and we chewed what we ate very well. But unfortunately, people are still in a hurry and don't do that too well either.

It would help if we had hundreds of billions of healthy, friendly bacteria living in our intestines, because they would help to break it up much the way bacteria help to decompose lawn clippings or fallen trees. But again, unfortunately most of the friendly bacteria have been killed by preservatives, antibiotics, pesticides, fluoride and chlorine. With them out of the way, they're not available to help break down all the garbage that has built up inside of us.

So . . what else can we do, dial 1-800-ROOTER? No seriously, I think those metal blades might hurt, and besides, there is a better method that you and everyone you know should utilize.

You will want to get some healthy fiber into your system. If you know you're really a mess, you may want to get a couple pounds of organically grown celery, clean it up and cut it into tiny slices. Then sit down with a long movie and eat the whole bucket full like it was a big box of popcorn. If you chew every bit of the celery well, it will go down through you like a big Brillo pad, cleaning things up as it goes.

Next, you should seriously consider getting a product designed to gently but effectively do a more complete cleaning of your intestine. These are commercially available from nutritional product companies and health food stores. Here are the most important components of a good intestinal cleaner:

Types of Fiber

First, there should be several types of fiber. The fiber provides roughage, and it's best if one or two of the types of fiber used soak up water and swell up, which increases the scrubbing action and helps keep things moving along faster so things don't get stuck. Other types of plant fiber naturally absorb toxins so they can be gotten out of your body.

Gut Bacteria

The second important component of a good intestinal cleanser is friendly bacteria, also called “probiotics.” Remember, we are all supposed to have billions of friendly bacteria inside us, but in most people, they were killed by chlorine, antibiotics and preservatives, and bad bacteria took their place. So when the cleanser product contains billions of friendly bacteria, they re-colonize the intestine with the good guys and the bad guys get crowded out. These good bacteria start breaking down the debris much the way bacteria break down lawn clippings.

While there are other ingredients that can enhance an intestinal cleansing product, last important component that I'm going to mention now is plant enzymes.

Remember how I mentioned the raw carrot and how it had enzymes that help to break down foods? You can get plant enzymes in capsules (sometimes they are combined with the intestinal cleanser). If you take them when you're eating a meal, they will help you digest that meal. However, if you take them at a time when you're not eating a meal, it will help break down the foods that you ate when Kennedy was in office.

It is said that most Americans have several pounds of undigested meat in their lower intestine. As a result, all of them are constantly receiving a low-grade food poisoning. Don't let it happen to you.

All that we've discussed will also help you end or prevent acid reflux, irritable bowel, colitis, constipation, ulcer, diarrhea or diverticulitis. We've been given some really lousy advice on digestive problems. Of course, you'll find that most of the bad advice trickled down from the industries that stand to profit the most when we're confused the worst, which of course in this case are the food and pharmaceutical industries. Their profits are HUGE. People today spend billions of dollars treating digestive problems with drugs, so no wonder they don't tell us how to avoid these problems.

Well, I hope you better understand now why the old timers always said, “Death begins in the gut.”