Day thirteen begins

Almost two weeks now!

I am still losing weight slowly. My pace has slowed down. I will be happy with 2 to 3 pounds per week at this point.

I had a smoothie last night similar to my other smoothies. I am now eating a bowl of oatmeal with a little soymilk and a spoonful of flaxseed. I like the nuttiness of the flax.

I slept very well last night. My lesions continue to clear.

Ruth and I decided to be lazy today. We are not going to either yoga or church. We are just sitting around computing, reading books, and talking. I will freshen up the lentils for lunch later. We will also have a large salad. I will try to get to the gym at some point today.

Basically, I am taking today off. Not off the diet, but off of anything other than health and relaxing.

I have been reading the book The China Study. This is another political manifesto, similar to the fasting book by Dr. F. It points out again what is screwed up in our society and why we are dying from within.

Unless there is a radical change in the way we live, our society is doomed. That's for damn sure. Given the exponential rate of increase in chronic lifestyle diseases of all kinds, and given the potential for health care costs to completely bankrupt our economy, we are facing a potential crisis which could make the Great Depression look like a walk in the park. I don't think the potential for this crisis has been recognized adequately in the books I have read so far.

The band aids being proposed by the politicians, pundits and policy makers do not address the basic issue: Health quality and disease prevention. Making the health care system (which is of course a misnomer) more available does not begin to address the problem. We will wipe out the profit of our entire economy and go into a cash flow loss position if health care costs continue to rise unabated. At that point it is simply a matter of time before the economy simply collapses.

We are talking major social and economic upheaval here.

I am still struggling with how to behave in the light of this information. It certainly boggles the mind that we as a society have not woken up to the implications of the findings described in the China Study and Dr. F.'s books. (As well as Dean Ornish, MacDougal, Pritikin, and the rest.)

In a previous post, I promised to describe the theories on the causes of psoriasis. Here goes.

First, if you go to a medical doctor, especially a dermatologist, he or she will tell you "We have no idea what causes psoriasis. There seems to be a genetic component. Diet may be a factor, but we have not been able to show anything consistent. We can treat the symptoms, but there is no cure."

These are all very ignorant statements. We have many theories on what causes psoriasis, and all of the probably have some validity. Diet is certainly a factor. Yes, it does run in families. (My father would have died of psoriasis if cancer had not gotten him first. And my son Samuel has it as well.)

First, is the "leaky gut" theory. In this theory, unfriendly bacteria and other microbes (most notably the fungus candida albicans) infest the gut and cause it to become less effective. There is a barrier in the small intestine that allows only nutrients to cross into the blood. Nutrients include things like sugars, lipids and amino acids. They do not include entire strands of protein. However, the infestation of the gut causes this barrier to become less effective. At that point, particles of intact food pass into the blood. This includes partial strands of protein, containing hundreds of thousands of amino acids in a chain. These are recognized by the body as being foreign invaders and antibodies are formed against these proteins. Later, the body attacks any similar looking proteins. If the proteins are contained in organs of the body, then the body attacks these proteins as well. This can include skin cells, in the case of psoriasis, joint cells, in the case of rheumatoid arthritis, and so forth.

Next is the glyconutrient theory. This states that all cells are coated with a set of glycoproteins (a protein base with a sugar on top). These glycoproteins form a communication network whereby the cells communicate with the immune system. The cells are able to send various messages to the immune system, such as "restore me", "I am under attack", "I am fine", "leave me alone", and so forth. In an autoimmune disease, this pathway breaks down. The message of "I am under attack" goes through, but the message "I am fine" does not. As a result, the immune system commences to heal a cell, but then does not stop doing so. This leads to the "repeated injury" syndrome whereby an area of the body that suffers a repeated injury (including fairly mild injuries) becomes subject to an autoimmune disease.

I have tried treating psoriasis with both of these theories with minimal effect. Dr. F. endorses the leaky gut view but believes the solution is to heal the gut. In the meantime, sending proteins across the leaky pathway that have minimal resemblance to your own tissues (in other words animal protein) helps to stop the antibody creation process. This seems to be working in my case.

Fasting will eventually heal the gut by causing the infestation to die. I saw some of that during my fast in which I had a huge increase in symptoms and toxic bad breath. I will probably take another layer off in my next fast.

More later.