First Things First

Excerpts from "Coming Clean" by Steven Horne.
An excellent book - highly recommended! Easy to read, easy to understand!

When a little child "needs to go," many a parent has asked the question "Number one or number two?" referring respectively, of course, to the need to empty the urinary tract (#1) or the colon (#2). Well, when it comes to cleansing, these numbers need to be reversed. Unless there is a problem with renal failure, the colon is the primary organ people need to cleanse, which is why number two is number one in detoxification.

At one time, people understood the importance of being "regular" and the problems associated with being "irregular." Today, the importance of regular bowel eliminations, is largely ignored by common people and medical folks alike. However, being "regular" with bowel elimination is essential to health.

Although the colon is sometimes thought of as the body's sewer system, this really is not true. The colon is not just an organ of elimination, it is also an organ of assimilation. Here water and electrolytes are absorbed, making the material firmer. Certain minerals and B vitamins, especially B- 12 are absorbed here, too. Some nutrients may even be manufactured for our use by the action of friendly bacteria (bifidophilus) living there.

Whether we want to maintain or regain our health, the gastrointestinal (GI) system is central to our efforts. Our "guts" are equivalent to a plant's roots. It is in our intestines where we interact most intimately with our environment-where we literally transform materials from our environment into us! As the source of water and nourishment and our primary channel of elimination, they constitute our first line of defense against disease. In fact, sixty percent of our immune response is in our GI tract. It's easy to see how dysfunction of the digestive and intestinal system can be linked with so many chronic and degenerative diseases.

When the small intestine becomes inflamed, we are no longer able to process nutrients and absorb them properly. This gives rise to colitis and other inflammatory bowel disorders, including Crohn's disease, celiac disease, and ulcerative colitis. All of these diseases involve a breakdown of the intestinal mucosa due to inflammatory processes.

Inflammation and swelling in the intestines lead to an increased absorption of toxic materials into the blood and lymph streams, a condition known as leaky gut syndrome. This gut leakage creates a cascade of negative reactions that adversely affect every system of the body. But what causes this intestinal inflammation in the first place?

Factors Which Damage Colon Health

Here are some of the major "enemies" that breach vital lines of defense by causing intestinal inflammation and leaky gut syndrome.

Antibiotics

The intestines contain several pounds of friendly microorganisms that live in a symbiotic relationship with the body. Antibiotics upset the balance of these microbes and increase the risk of inflammation and gut leakage by promoting yeast overgrowth. Yeast exudes an aldehyde secretion that causes swelling (inflammation) in the lining of the small intestine.

Food Allergies

Each of us has our own unique genetic signature, which makes some foods compatible with our body chemistry and other foods incompatible.

Food allergies are very common and, although they are difficult to diagnose, you can learn to identify foods that cause digestive upset in your body and eliminate them simply by becoming more aware of how foods affect you. Common food allergens include dairy foods and grains containing gluten (wheat and many other grains, but not buckwheat). Other common food allergens include eggs, legumes (especially soy and peanuts) and nuts. A good place to start is to learn your blood type and avoid foods that are incompatible with it.

When one understands the information above, one can see that intestinal cleansing isn't just about getting the bowels to move. It's about eliminating sources of irritation which are causing intestinal inflammation and leaky gut syndrome. It's also about rebuilding the integrity of the intestinal mucosa and restoring a proper balance to the friendly flora which live in the intestines. Digestive function also plays a critical role in this process.

Assessing Colon Health

Years ago, I remember how shocked I was when some seasoned natural healers started a discussion about optimal bowel movements at a formal dinner during a Nature's Sunshine convention. Since that time, I've become comfortable with the subject of bowel movements and, while I don't recommend this as a subject for dinner conversation, learning to take note of the shape, type and frequency of your bowel elimination will help you monitor your progress with your health.

In the movie, The Last Emperor, the Chinese doctors were regulating the young Emperor's diet by examining his stool. You can do the same thing, but first, you need to know what an optimally healthy elimination should look like.

Frequency and Ease of Movements

For starters, most healthy infants (and wild animals) have one bowel movement for each meal they eat. Since most North Americans eat three meals per day, this would translate into three eliminations per day. So, if you have one bowel movement per day (or less) and you eat three meals per day, you are constipated.

Next, your stool should not be difficult to eliminate. You should be able to feel the urge to go, sit down and have the elimination come out in a smooth move. If you have to strain to eliminate, you are constipated.

Shape and Consistency

The shape of the stool is also important. Your colon is a long narrow tube, and the stool should come out in long, narrow pieces. Usually, healthy stools will be banana- or s - shaped, or shaped like a thick piece of rope. If the stool comes out in hard, dry balls, you are constipated and probably dehydrated, too. You are probably lacking in dietary fiber, as well.

The stool should be about the combined thickness of your pointer and middle fingers. If it is larger than this, then you are getting ballooning in the colon, a sign that the colon is lacking muscle tone, and a good colon cleanse is probably in order.

The consistency of the stool tells a lot about what is happening in the digestive tract. The stool should have form, but the form should be loose and probably break up a little on flushing. It should not be thick and fudgy (like peanut butter). If it is, you may not have enough fiber in your diet, or you may have an imbalance in the friendly microbes in the colon. If the stool does not have form and is watery, then you have got diarrhea. When I first tried taking All Cell Detox many years ago (when it was known as Special Formula #I) I thought I was getting diarrhea because I was having three and four bowel eliminations each day. Many of my clients think the same thing when they start taking cleansing herbs. But, if the stool has form, it's not diarrhea. You are just eliminating a backlog of waste. When there is a watery, unformed stool, the diarrhea can usually be remedied by dietary fiber or activated charcoal. Diarrhea is a sign of acute or chronic intestinal inflammation, which is due to the presence of toxins in the digestive tract (which may be the result of infection or parasites). The fiber absorbs the toxins, but there may also be a need for anti-inflammatory agents, anti microbial agents or a parasite cleanse. (See Chapter Eight for more information on infections and parasites.) Chronic diarrhea is often a sign of inflammatory bowel disorders and should be checked out by a doctor.

Please follow with "Understanding Detoxification"