Want To Get Well Quicker ?
When I was a cheffing in the late 80's (1986 - 1997), I was also recovering from a pre-cancerous bowel as well as counseling people with cancer and AIDS. I would cook food for some, teach some of them to cook for themselves, and the others would buy vegetarian or macrobiotic food from the best sources they could in hopes that their condition would improve.
However, there were a few critical 'Do's & Don'ts' - steps that I would always emphasize with each client in trying to get well. These involved very simple lifestyle and eating changes that were common sense suggestions which were extremely critical in a person's recovery. Steps that, if they weren't followed, would make the best organic food, the best quality supplements and treatments far less effective, if not useless.
I wanted to share them with you here:
Suggestion #1
NEVER have a meal or eat any food 4-5 hours before going to sleep. This is one of THE worst things you can do if you have cancer, or are in recovery from an illness.
Reason:
Your body regenerates and cleanses at night time when you sleep, and to eat a large or small meal before you go to bed is literally robbing yourself of that precious healing time. The body needs gravity to digest food properly, and, if you lay down, it takes 5 times the energy to push the food in your stomach through your digestive tract, and THAT TAKES ENERGY. Energy that would normally have gone to healing and regenerating yourself now has to go towards food that needs digesting.
Suggestion #2
ALWAYS drink a 12oz glass of room temperature water, before you get out of bed in the morning.
Reason:
Drinking this water immediately upon awakening initiates a cleanse in the bladder and bowels, and you will start your day off hydrated. While you were sleeping, your body had been regenerating and cleansing for the last 8 hours. You want to help this process by immediately eliminating the accumulated toxins via the bladder and colon. The water going into the stomach creates peristalsis reaction to the intestines, and evacuating the bowels first thing in the morning is essential.
Suggestion #3
NEVER put cold food or iced drinks into your stomach at mealtime, AND don't drink liquids of any kind during mealtime, only warm liquids after.
Reason:
Putting cold food or iced drinks not only paralyzes digestion, but (heat) energy has to come from your kidneys and adrenals to warm the cold stuff up. Plus, the cold liquid will solidify any oils that you have consumed with your meal. This results in the solid oily stuff being absorbed faster by the intestines than your actual meal, which will then line the intestines … and this is not good.
Drinking liquids of any kind during mealtime will disturb (paralyze) your digestion and dilute your digestive juices, which can result in belching and gas, ending up with you losing valuable regenerative energy.
Suggestion #4
NEVER EVER over-eat ! Rather, ONLY eat till you're 80% full. Leave the table still a little hungry.
Reason:
Relative to eating just before you go to sleep (laying down), it is even more taxing to the digestive system when a person over-eats, as this takes a lot of energy that is normally required to breakdown the large amount of food in the stomach, with little digestive juices to do it. This results in you being tired almost immediately after the meal, and probably wanting to lay down, which is even worse. Again, it robs you of the energy that would normally go toward healing, but can't now, since it will now be working overtime trying to digest a massive amount of food.
Suggestion #5
NEVER eat fruits too close to your main meal. Try to eats fruits 2 hours before or after a meal.
Reason:
When fruit is mixed in too close to your actual meal, the fruit sugar will stay for too long in the stomach and ferment and fruit contains simple sugars that require no digestion. Other foods, such as foods rich in fat, protein and starch, will stay in the stomach for a longer period of time because they require more digestion. This is why people experience digestive trouble when eating fruit too close to a meal.
Suggestion #6
NEVER eat a salad first, before your main meal. Have it last!
Reason:
There are a few reasons to eat salad last, the main reason is, you should always eat from yang to yin, heavy to light, or hot to cool. Also, since you have only so much digestive juices to break down your meal, and you should start eating THE most difficult to digest food first, which would be your animal or vegetable proteins. If you were to eat a salad first, you'd be wasting valuable digestive juices on the salad which would be better spent on the proteins. It makes better sense to end up eating a light dish like salad to finish off a meal, as a palette cleanser.
