About Health & Medicine

Beverly Mehta came to me after reading in a popular sports weekly about my treatment of golf professional Billy Caspar. Miss Mehta was a singer and a teacher, but multiple, unexplained health problems were interfering with both of these activities. She often ran a low-grade fever of undetermined origin. She had rhinitis (runny nose). Above all, she suffered from physical and mental exhaustion and seemed to be unable to rouse herself to do anything. Because of the severity of her symptoms, she was hospitalized for diagnosis.

On the first day of her fast, a terrible headache set in. Her eyes became highly sensitive to light. On the next day she was listless, tired, and nauseated most of the time. Her head and legs ached. On the third day of the fast the symptoms started to clear. By the end of her five-day fast, she was feeling quite well—better than she had in a long time, she said.

Many foods, even in their chemically less contaminated form, caused unexpected symptoms. For example, lobster was followed by a hot, gassy sensation in her stomach. Her ears and eyes hurt, and two-and-a-half hours later her eyes were still visibly red, her glands swollen and painful.

Eating an orange was followed by a ringing sensation in the ears (tinnitus), itching, and chest pains. Carrots were associated with belching and sighing respiration. Potatoes made her feel hot and nauseous, with tremendous itching, perspiration, and sore throat. Her face became red and blotchy.

Wheat induced an equally dramatic reaction. First Miss Mehta felt warm and got transient pains in her fingers. She started sighing and complained that she felt as if “someone had given me knockout drops.” She said that she felt like crying, but couldn’t. These cerebral reactions were accompanied by belching, nausea, and coughing—and all this from some “innocent” wheat.

Coffee brought on “weepy” feelings. Corn and corn sugar caused a jump in her pulse rate from 90 to 135 beats per minute, a finding which Dr. Arthur Coca believed indicates food allergy.3

There were other foods to which Miss Mehta had no reactions. When some of these were given to her in a chemically more contaminated form, however, she had equally dramatic responses. Canned peaches were followed by huskiness in her voice and a chilled feeling which required her to be brought extra robes and blankets. She developed a sore throat, and her temperature rose to 100°F. “This is the way I feel at home much of the time,” said the young musician. “I simply sit in front of the television, with little desire to do anything. When I’m singing 1 slur my words at times like this.”

Athought she left the hospital in good condition, when she returned home she soon became sick again, with many of the brain-fag symptoms, although she had tried to follow the prescribed regimen. She told of feeling even worse at work.

I therefore decided to make a house call and I inspected her house and her place of employment for environmental sources of reactions. Her classroom was in the basement of a church. The janitor cheerfully showed me the plethora of chemicals used to clean the premises and to spray for insects on a regular basis. As I entered the room, I was immediately struck by the odor of solvent. The children in Miss Mehta’s class sat around a low table with big pads in front of them. Each child held an oversize marking pen of the solvent-based kind in his hand. The fumes from the pens filled the air. I also detected the odor of petroleum candles coming in from the church above. I suggested to Miss Mehta that this environment was helping to perpetuate her brain-fag symptoms and that she seek another job, which she did.

I did not hear from her for a number of years. Then one day she called: she had gone back to college, then to medical school, and was doing well. But she had gotten into the habit of drinking ten cups of coffee a day to keep up with the grueling amount of work. I helped her break this addiction. She finally graduated and became a physician.

This case illustrates very well most of the features of environmental disease. The patient did not have just one or two neatly defined symptoms, but many and varied complaints, physical and allegedly mental. Because of this, other doctors tended to dismiss her problem as “hysterical” in origin. The actual illness remained hidden from Miss Mehta, as it did from her physicians, because of nature’s own coverup of food and chemical susceptibility. It was only through the methods of clinical ecology that her many symptoms could be put into some recognizable framework (the plusses and minuses) and her particular problem could be worked out.

It turned out in this case, as in every other, that the particular causes of illness were unique for this teacher, just as they are unique for every allergic patient. There was no universal prescription or panacea for all such cases, no pill, potion, or drug which could really serve as a cure-all.

Beverly Mehta was fortunate in that her allergy was discovered and corrected, and she went on to have a useful and productive life. Many others have seen their ecologic illness progress to the final stage, the minus-four category.

In summary, one of the most commonly occurring symptoms in medicine, and especially in the histories of allergy patients, is chronic fatigue. Although fatigue may be the only manifestation of clinical ecology, it more commonly exists in conjunction with other manifestations. It occurs so frequently with brain-fag—especially among students—that the two conditions are best described together. Indeed, this combination is often a cause of students being accused of not working up to their measured expectations.

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Clean fitted carpets thoroughly two or three times a week using a powerful vacuum cleaner. Ordinary vacuum cleaners tend to force some of the mite’s droppings out into the air again, through the minute pores in the collecting bag. A special vacuum cleaner designed to eliminate this problem is now available. See p335 for the supplier. This machine comes with a detection device that shows when all dust has been removed from a given area of carpet.

Remember to clean under the bed. In extreme cases, it may be necessary to get rid of fitted carpets and have a polished or vinyl floor with small rugs. These should not have foam backing.

Pick up non-fitted carpets and rugs, beat them hard and leave to hang in the sun for as long as possible. This should be done once a week if you can manage it.

Get rid of all old duvets, quilts, eiderdowns, blankets and pillows. Buy a new quilt and pillows filled with synthetic materials. Shake these outside and hang in the sun as often as possible. Folded cotton sheets can be used instead of pillows, and cellular cotton blankets instead of woollen ones, for those who are sensitive to synthetic materials. Wash all new cotton goods first, as they are often treated with chemical preservatives.

If the affected person is sleeping on an old mattress, consider replacing it with a new foam mattress. A plastic covering will prevent the mites from building up within the mattress, although it is not entirely satisfactory – the bedclothes tend to slide off. It may be better to go over the mattress with the vacuum cleaner periodically.

Choose thin, smooth materials for curtains and upholstery. Velvet or thick, textured materials are potential dust-traps. Wash curtains every month or two.

Wash sheets, pillowcases and underblanket once a week. Do not keep unnecessary fabric items in the bedroom – cushions, upholstered chairs, dressing gowns, soft toys and items of clothing can all harbour mites. Hang clothing away in a wardrobe or keep it in another room if possible.

It may be difficult to part a child from its favourite teddy, even if this is harbouring millions of house-dust mites. Should you be faced with this problem, wash the soft toy as thoroughly as possible, dry it quickly (eg in a tumble-dryer) and hang it out in the sun for a day or two. Thereafter, the house-dust mites can be kept at bay by placing the teddy in a plastic bag and leaving it in a deep-freeze for one day each week.

Dust with a damp cloth regularly, remembering to do the tops of doors and cupboards. In the sitting room, vacuum all armchairs and sofas thoroughly each week, especially the arm-rests and head-rests.

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Kind, loving, caring, strong, patient, sometimes a bit self-effacing, she attracts leaners like a honeypot attracts bees. Seldom having a moment to herself as she always has visitors, most often girlfriends, who come to dump their problems on her, depart feeling temporarily better while leaving her drained. Earth Mother gives good, commonsense advice to leaners and is continually frustrated by the leaner’s tendency to keep repeating the same mistakes, despite her advice. Leaners phone at any time—meal time, TV-watching time and late at night—to dump. If she’s not counselling, Earth Mother is baking cakes, cutting out patterns or sewing up dresses for leaners. Not surprisingly leaners are often possessive of Earth Mother. Earth Mother is often a houseproud, conscientious parent, who somehow has to fit in attention to house, children, husband/boyfriend, parents and in-laws. Parents, husband/boyfriend and in-laws are sometimes leaners too. Earth Mother’s greatest stress is the guilt she feels when she’s finally blamed for all that goes wrong in the leaner’s life.

‘Work out your own salvation. Do not depend on others.’ (Buddha) Earth Mother has to recognise that her health and the kids are suffering as a result of the time and energy she’s putting into leaners. Furthermore, she is not really helping leaners by encouraging their dependency on her. Earth Mother has to acknowledge that sometimes the best kind of caring lies in encouraging others to stand on their own two feet and as much as she enjoys her role she has physical, mental and emotional limits.

The best course of action is to learn to say no. If you are an overstretched earth mother, get on the phone to everyone and explain to them that you need a rest and tell them why. If you explain that the demands everyone is placing on you has burnt you out, they will understand and back off. If you make up stories (because you don’t want to hurt their feelings) they won’t understand and resentment will develop on both sides. Tell them you’ll phone when you are feeling better. If you don’t feel up to phoning yourself get a parent, child, spouse or lover to do it for you.

Don’t waste precious energy fuming and stewing over the fact that leaners have reduced you to the point of having the shakes, or binge eating in lieu of time to yourself, or feeling prostratingly fatigued. Leaners are not bad people. They are everyday people who have allowed the normal human desire for some support and emotional nourishment to get out of hand. They are not mind readers and that is why they don’t know how you feel. Besides, you were always available and appeared to enjoy being so. This too is fine, and there is no reason to totally give up your supportive role when it’s just as easy to define your limits of tolerance and notify yourself and others of them. Any leaner who refuses to acknowledge your need for rest is best extricated from your life. Fortunately, these types are few and far between.

It is important for home-based earth mothers to reserve some quiet moments through the day to indulge themselves. Reading, listening to music, doing something creative, before the afternoon rush of driving kids to and from activities, supervising homework and preparing the evening meal. Career-based earth mothers can try and organise some time off work to do the same.

Male earth mothers do exist, though in much smaller numbers than their female counterpart. Like female earth mothers, they too have to learn to let go of leaners as much as leaners have to learn to let go of them.

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This is a preliminary exercise for those who are habitual shallow breathers and have trouble getting the air down into the lower lobes. Lie on your back with your legs out straight in front of you. Place a light book on your abdomen. Empty your lungs by slowly sucking in your abdomen. Now, breathe in deeply and slowly, concentrating on forcing the air down to your abdomen. As the diaphragm muscle descends with this deep, inhalation, the abdomen will distend and the book will rise. Concentrate on getting the book to rise up and down with each ‘in’ and ‘out’ breath. This may not come easily at first as you probably haven’t used your diaphragm muscle properly since childhood. (Next time you get the opportunity observe the belly breathing action of a baby.) Keep persisting. Breathe slowly.

Practise each day for ten to fifteen minutes. If you are still having trouble try pursing the lips and breathing through your mouth —suck the air in slowly through pursed lips. Normally it is better not to breathe through your mouth but for the purpose of learning to use your diaphragm properly (the strong dome-shaped muscle that’s attached to the lower ribs and separates the chest cavity from the abdominal cavity) it’s important that you do so. Pursing the lips produces an obstacle to breathing that necessitates a vigorous sucking motion to get the air in. This vigorous sucking requires the use of the diaphragm. You can practise this pursed lips breathing at intervals through the day while driving or at work. Don’t sit with a collapsed, forward hunched posture. This will make it difficult for the diaphragm to descend and will encourage shallow chest breathing.

You may notice that just as your belly breathing is progressing well, you will experience a sudden stalling as your chest muscles try to come into play and return you to your old shallow breathing habits. Don’t be discouraged if this happens. We are creatures of habit and if we habitually breathe with our chest muscles it’s perfectly natural that we involuntarily slip back into that habit while in the process of learning belly breathing. Besides, rib and chest expansion is normal during belly breathing but takes place only in the latter stages of the inhalation when the diaphragm is fully descended. If you experience a stalling in your breathing, concentrate even harder on pushing the book up with your abdomen. If you stall significantly and lose rhythm, relax and go back to the beginning—starting off with a new inhalation.

Chances are a lifetime of slumping in armchairs or at your desk, combined with shallow breathing, has left you with ribs that are tightly fixed to your spine and have lost their ability to articulate freely. If you are getting chest and back pains and/or repeatedly experience stalling in your breathing, it would pay to see your osteopath or chiropractor to have the ribs and thoracic/cervical vertebrae freed up. This will make all the difference.

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Stress can trigger allergies. Most people who develop allergies in adult life do so after a sudden, significant stress or a build-up of lesser stresses over a period of time. Allergies often develop after such stresses as a bad case of ‘flu, glandular fever, hepatitis, a surgical operation, pregnancy or termination of pregnancy. Over-work, loss of one’s job, divorce, death of a loved one, living with a drug addict or alcoholic, over-exercise, crummy jobs and bad relationships can also trigger allergies.

Not everybody subjected to these stresses develops allergies. Only those with a genetic predisposition to allergy or the existence of a low-grade allergy, develop the full-blown symptoms. Many people go through life with allergies that are so mild they exhibit no symptoms at all. These people are unaware of the low-grade (called subclinical by your doctor) allergies smouldering away inside of them, until the stresses of life begin to mount up. Accumulating stresses over time lower the body’s resistance to the point where out-of-the-blue allergies begin to appear.

For this reason all effective allergy treatments begin with the Metabolism-Balancing Program, to build up the body nutritionally, and a concerted effort, wherever possible, to lower any environmental and situational stresses that may exist. The deep breathing and mental relaxation exercises in this chapter help greatly to alleviate the latter two. Changing one’s attitude is singularly the most potent stress reducer of all.

If your stress levels are not reduced you will not receive a 100 per cent improvement on the allergy treatment regime outlined in this book. The only program to be on while under stress is the Metabolism-Balancing Program. Remain on this program until you have significantly reduced the stress. This will probably take

longer than six to eight weeks if you are getting over the loss of a loved one, going through a divorce, settling into a new city or country, grappling with the problems of living in an undesirable relationship that you are unable to extricate yourself from. If you are in one or more of these situations, be patient. Just concentrate on getting as much rest as possible, doing the deep breathing exercises and the mental relaxation exercises.

Work also on developing a positive attitude by not saying such things as ‘Why me?’, ‘It’s not fair!’. In time, with constant practice, you will be pleasantly surprised to discover your stress levels and the intensity of your symptoms will be reducing. If you have put yourself on the Anti-Candida/Anti-Allergy Program first and are not experiencing a reduction of your symptoms, you are almost certainly stressed. Stress prevents allergy cure.

The grieving process is both erratic and time consuming. It can take up to two years to get over a divorce or the death of a loved one. During this time, good and bad days will come and go for no apparent reason and to no set pattern. Be patient. Don’t lose heart if you go into a sudden erratic downswing at a time when you are feeling good. This is normal, just accept it. By not dwelling on the downswings, they will pass more quickly and in time will recur less frequently. Your symptoms might reappear during the downswings. Don’t lose heart and think the program is not working if this happens. Keep on persisting. Time will heal all.

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The thing that worries me is the number of allergic kids taking drugs. Getting these kids off drugs is next to impossible if the allergies aren’t treated at the same time. I’ve treated many drug-addicted young people over the years and the usual case history is as follows. As children they had obvious symptoms of allergy but never had them diagnosed. They always felt sick, tired, unwell and often hyped up, though nothing showed up in tests. They spent their childhood being taken from doctor to doctor. Because none of these could hang a definitive diagnosis on them, they were accused of being attention-seeking malingerers looking for excuses to get out of school. Diagnosis is often supported by low achievement at school and varying degrees of antisocial behaviour. The children go through life in a state of quiet desperation, often suffering from depression, which frequently manifests as quarrelsomeness as it is combined with frustration. The children don’t know whether the doctors are right or not but know they don’t want to feel like this forever.

Feelings of lethargy, low self-esteem, disenchantment and inability to cope leads kids into mood-altering recreational drugs in an attempt to elevate their spirits and physical disposition. Drugs don’t prove to be the full answer but do give them temporary respite for the time they’re on them. Marijuana is usually the choice of the hyperactive young person (often described as ‘hyped up’ or ‘hypertensive’ by them or their parents). Heroin tends to be the choice of those suffering from ‘the blues’.

The other scenario is the child who had enough of the commonly recognised symptoms of allergy (sinusitis, hayfever, skin rashes, eczema) for the doctor to prescribe antihistamines. Antihistamines aggravated the symptoms of mental and physical sluggishness which were never associated with allergy by the doctor. A childhood spent on antihistamines has the teenager feeling worse than ever before, not only do they still have their allergies, they have these foreign chemicals in them as well. Drugs are sought as the only way out as ‘anything’s got to be better than feeling like this’.

It’s significant that among the most popular and widely abused drugs of young people are those of the amphetamine family. In these synthetic stimulants so many of today’s kids are trying to find the innate vitality of youth that has been denied them by the allergies that afflict them—allergies that have cither never been treated or worse than that, have been suppressed by potent tranquillising drugs (antihistamines). Kids that have been raised to believe they need synthetic drugs to get through childhood can’t be condemned for thinking they need still other synthetic drugs to get them through adulthood. They’ve been conditioned to think that drug taking is part of normal living and that’s a crying shame. Some take amphetamines to boost their energy levels and marijuana to calm their hyperactivity (prolonged hyperactivity brings with it chronic fatigue).

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On vitamins only (Formula Six)—no anti-allergy treatment. Dena’s case is very interesting as she was found to be suffering from a low-grade glandular fever that had gone undiagnosed for some time. My experience with treating slow learners and under-achievers has taught me that the vitality-sapping effects of low-grade (your doctor will refer to it as sub-clinical) glandular fever is often the cause of slow learning and under-achieving. These low-grade glandular fevers can drag on for years undiagnosed. It’s not surprising then that so many adults are suffering from chronic fatigue syndrome (CFS). The Epstein Barr virus that is involved in many of the cases of CFS also causes glandular fever. The only way to beat glandular fever, as with any viral infection, is to rest, drink plenty of fluid, breathe deeply using the lower lobes of the lungs and take supplementary vitamins and minerals along with a well-balanced diet.

Dena was put on Formula Six only and responded quickly. Her immune vitality rose dramatically and in no time she had fought off the low-grade glandular fever. After four weeks her mother reported that her energy and inquisitiveness had increased significantly, she questioned things a lot more and surprised her mother by choosing to read the advanced and more detailed books her older (Grade 7) sister was reading. At her monthly spelling test she got only eight words wrong out of ninety-five, a major breakthrough. Her artistic skills had improved, with neater writing and better drawings.

Her before and after assessment by the educational psychologist were summarised as follows:

11 July 1988—age 9 years 3 months—Grade 5. Comments: ‘Dena is currently functioning at a Grade 4 level in mathematics.’

Nine months later the same assessment which included the Wechsler Intelligence Scale for Children (Short Form), the Woodcock Johnson Mathematical Calculation Test and (he Basic Arithmetic Screening Test, were summarised as follows: Comments: ‘The mathematical tests indicate that Dena has made significant improvement over the last nine months, she is now functioning up to age and grade levels.’

Dena is a typical example of what modern-day diet and living habits are doing to so many. The borderline malnutrition Dena was suffering from lowered her resistance enough for her to contract a low grade glandular fever but not enough to catch a full-blown, easily diagnosed glandular fever. The addition of the Formula Six multi-vitamin and mineral tablet to her everyday diet got rid other glandular fever, giving her the energy to cope with life. I shudder to think how many other borderline malnourished kids there are. Without the addition of dietary supplements these kids will struggle through life denied the chance to reach their full potential as human beings.

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In my twenty-two years of clinical practice I’ve noticed a direct correlation between allergy, heart and circulatory impairment in most of the people I’ve treated for heart-related problems. The research of leading allergists corroborates my own observations.

The allergic reaction involves the release of histamine by the tiny red blood cells known as the blood platelets. Histamine makes the blood vessel walls more permeable which allows the leakage of fluid and protein substances from them into the surrounding tissue. This fluid in the tissues gives rise to the swelling that accompanies allergic reactions. Over time an excess of histamine can cause tissue damage if it’s continually released into a given area. It’s highly probable that in some people artery-lining damage is caused this way.

The experts also agree that the artery walls, for some reason, become permeable to fat and cholesterol. Fat and cholesterol get in behind the artery lining pushing it out into the hollow centre of the artery. This little bump with its roughened (damaged) surface makes an ideal fat and cholesterol trap—catching more of both as they pass. The more fat and cholesterol there is in the blood the easier it is to catch some and so build the little bump up. The further the bump pushes out into the hollow of the artery the easier it is to trap passing fat and cholesterol. So the bigger the bump grows the faster it grows.

The little blood platelets that release the histamine are very sticky by nature and many of them collide with and stick to the bump as well. Platelets love to clump together. Indeed one of their roles is to form clots (clumps) to prevent bleeding from damaged blood vessel walls. Perceiving the artery lining as damaged they willingly form a clot around the roughened area (and/or developing bump) which only adds to the size and stickiness of it.

To lower the fat/cholesterol levels of the blood is only part of the story. Stopping blood platelets releasing histamine at a given area is the only thing that is going to stop those same platelets forming a clot around the area of roughened artery lining. By continuing to damage the tissue around it the bump continues to grow in length and width as well as depth.

As dramatic as this sounds it must be remembered that the body is very tough and its powers of regeneration excellent. For this reason it takes years for lumps (atheromas) to grow to artery-blocking proportions.

There’s no doubt the allergy factor is the reason some people still die from heart attack despite being on strict anti-cholesterol diets.

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Coachaline is a cream used by equestrians to condition their saddles and other leather riding gear. Rubbed in, it keeps the leather in excellent condition. Rubbing it on psoriasis helps too. Coachaline contains minerals and trace elements needed by the skin to help it heal itself and rebuild deteriorating tissue. The dry, scaly patches of psoriasis are the result of mineral-deficient dead and damaged tissue. Rubbing Coachaline on your psoriasis patches morning and night helps speed the healing effect of the program and is not as far fetched as it probably sounds. Leather, when all is said and done, is skin. Coachaline is available at any saddle shop but is not to be applied to open wounds, weeping wounds or cuts. Check with your doctor if in doubt.

Limited exposure to the sun stimulates new skin growth and speeds the healing of psoriasis but only if you drink extra fluid to offset that lost by the increased evaporation exposure to the sun causes. Too much sun makes psoriasis worse. If your doctor wants to send you to ultra-violet radiation treatment, go with it. Make sure you increase your fluid intake while under that treatment.

Although the main cause of psoriasis is allergy there is a definite vitamin and mineral deficiency factor involved. So in addition to the supplements recommended on the Anti-Candida and Metabolism-Balancing Programs, add the following:

1 X 20 mg beta-carotene tablet

1 X 500 mg L-cysteine tablet

2 X 1000 mg lecithin tablets

2 X 50 mcg selenium tablets (script, from doctor, obtain from chemist)

Increase the evening primrose oil capsules to 6 x 1000 mg and the MaxEPA to 4 x 1000 mg and have 1 teaspoon of linseed oil (Melrose brand is best)

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Stress will significantly aggravate acne. Inflammatory emotions and feelings such as anger, resentment, hostility, rage, fury, embarrassment and frustration, especially if they are bottled up and not expressed, will inflame the skin. If these feelings arc intense they cause antidromic (aberrant and reverse) nerve impulses to pour down the sensory nerves from the brain to the skin. When these antidromic nerve impulses arrive at the skin they cause the ends of the sensory nerves to release a chemical called ‘neurokinin’. Neurokinin is a potent inflamer of the skin. While it is in the skin, diets won’t work. Any existing skin condition, be it acne, eczema, psoriasis, rosacea, hives, dermatitis, urticaria, itchiness or flushing will be aggravated by neurokinin.

The only exception to this rule is in those stubborn cases that have not responded to the combination Anti-Candida/Anti-Allergy Program. If, after six to seven months of slicking strictly to the program, and vitamin and mineral supplements, Nystatin or garlic as well as getting adequate rest and sleep and significantly reducing stress you are still experiencing outbreaks of red bumps with yellow (pussy) heads, antibiotics may be used. However, you must continue to take the vitamins, minerals, Nystatin/garlic and Lactobacillus acidophilus tablets to prevent aggravation of the yeast infection. At this point a short course of antibiotics is usually enough to gel rid of the problem.

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