for all of us to adopt a diet that had in it all that the body needs. We wanted to keep ourselves and our patients from becoming deficient in the supply of body nutrients—and vitamins are some of those nutrients.
And I found that we can truly change our eating habits. If we dislike something, we can—with practice and the right attitude—learn to like it. I proved this for myself while in the Air Force. At the Officers’ Club they served shrimp as hors d’oeuvres nearly every evening. I had never in my life even faintly liked shrimp. But I saw these people consuming shrimp like it was going out of style. I finally realized I must be missing something. So I decided to make a sincere effort to eat some shrimp and taste it very carefully, without my former prejudice. After just a few boiled shrimp taken gingerly, I was convinced, then ate more and more, and I found that I could overcome a distaste for certain foods if I tried.
Some years ago a woman patient of ours who had scleroderma went on a very clearly defined diet, eliminating pork products, among others. Some three years after that, free of the scleroderma, she visited her mother, who wanted to know, “What can you eat now?” The answer came back, “I can eat anything I like!” Her mother served ham that night, and was rebuffed when the woman didn’t eat any. “But you said you could eat anything you like!” The answer came back, “That’s right, but now I don’t like ham!”
It was after our family relocated and established our base in Phoenix, Arizona, in 1955 that we learned of Edgar Cayce. A whole new world opened for me. Not only did Cayce teach me about diet and nutrition, but he also introduced me to the concept of reincarnation. Understanding that concept, I no longer find it strange to realize that I am a continuing spiritual being moving through time and space, appearing here at this time, but having had lifetimes in the past that helped to create attitudes and emotional reactions that helped chart the course of life I am taking this time around.
This helped me look at the whole human being as the center of my attention as I practiced medicine, and it moved me away from the concept of being only a specialist in the diseases that attack the body. This represented a drastic change in my thinking. Care for the body properly—and the body becomes normal. A normal body has no diseases. So why not direct our efforts to normalizing the body? It fascinated me as I realized that I had rediscovered an ancient truth that had once been mine in previous incarnations.
Late in the 1950s, we had adopted the practice of using only whole wheat bread. A friend had told us about the only place he knew where real whole wheat bread was available. Stoll’s Bakery was run by Mormons, who years ago recognized the value of whole wheat over the white, degerminated flour. It became a place we visited weekly. We would buy twelve to sixteen loaves to freeze and use for our growing family of six. In all of metropolitan Phoenix, this was the only place where we could find good, wholesome, naturally prepared whole grain bread.
At that point we took up one of our minor crusades—to make whole wheat bread more available for our patients and others throughout the Valley of the Sun. Each of our patients was given the same instructions: “Tell the manager or the check-out person at the grocery store you go to that you want some good whole wheat bread. And, if they don’t supply it for you, that you’ll go to another store.” Most store managers want to meet the desires of their customers, so gradually it happened.
Much has changed during the intervening years. Health food stores have flourished. Even the supermarkets put health foods on their shelves, provide good whole wheat bread, and sometimes have special health food sections.
More important than that, however, to me in my own practice of medicine, has been the growth of my own understanding of the nature of the human body—the variety of ways in which it works, which I learned from the Edgar Cayce readings.
I realized from the Edgar Cayce readings, for instance, that biochemically the body must have a stable acid-alkaline balance in all the body tissues, but most importantly in the bloodstream, the lymphatic system, the mouth, the stomach, the small and large intestines, the urinary tract, the vagina, and portions of the lower bowel. All of these locations carry slightly different levels of pH (hydrogen-ion concentration). Altering that acidity or alkalinity in any significant manner can spell disease. Even minor changes can bring about a state of disease, of feeling not just right—the beginning of an illness. Restful sleep or exercise can make the body more alkaline, while worry makes it more acid.
Food is by far the most important factor in maintaining an acid-alkaline balance in the human body, depending on the food’s acid or alkaline ash content. This was determined years ago. And the acidity or alkalinity manifests itself in the various fluids and tissues of the body, depending on how well balanced the body is in its state of health.
Thus, the food that we eat really gives us food for thought, doesn’t it?
The American Cancer Society had at one time a film available to loan entitled The Embattled Cell. Part of the research it portrays is the manner in which lymphocytes (white blood cells) move through the tissues of the body, attacking cancer cells and killing them. It also shows lymphocytes that have obviously been done in by the cancer cells. A war is constantly going on inside the body between the invaders and the defenders of the body.
It stretched our minds to realize that the awareness of the lymphocytes—as they sought out and destroyed the cancer cells—implied that all of the cells of our body must have their own type of consciousness, their own job to do in the physiology of the body.
Lymphocytes function normally in the slightly alkaline medium of the lymphatic stream. When the lymph becomes more acid, the lymphocytes cannot function normally. Thus they are liable to lose the battle. Much can be theorized about the effect of the acid-alkaline balance in the body regarding health and disease, but it has not been thoroughly researched, so there is no proof. A person does not need scientific proof, however, when good diet works astonishing changes in his or her own body.
As we studied what Edgar Cayce said about diet, we developed what we called a “Basic Diet”—one that will keep a person well adjusted as far as food is concerned. This is included later in the book.
As the years gave us more experience and as we worked with the concepts of physiology found in the Cayce material, we adopted what might be called a physiological approach to therapy. We found that the physiology of the body can be altered to move it toward more normal functioning.
It led us into a multilevel approach to diagnosis and treatment. We began to understand that poor absorption of foods in the upper intestinal tract does not stand by itself as a syndrome. Rather, other so-called “diseases” can arise as a result of the deficiency in food substances created by the malabsorption. The blood-forming organs may cease to function up to par, for instance, and the individual becomes anemic. A variety of secondary problems can arise from a lack of proper absorption or assimilation. To correct such conditions may require treatment of the intestinal tract, improvement of the diet, restoration of a better acid-alkaline balance, and changes in attitudes and emotional patterns—in short, the adoption of a new, more health-producing lifestyle.
Assimilation is the process that takes food through a multitude of steps. It begins with its entry into the mouth and its breakdown with the enzymes in the saliva. Then the food goes through the stomach and small intestine, where it is acted upon by the acids and enzymes and bile so that it is finally absorbed by the lining of the intestinal tract into the capillaries or the lymphatic stream. Finally it is taken by the lymphatics into the bloodstream, or more directly by the hepatic circulation through the liver, where it might undergo further change in preparation for utilization by the cells of the body where rebuilding of tissue can come about.
Then, when cells die in the metabolic process going on within the body, these remnants must be eliminated through the four eliminatory channels of the body—the liver/intestinal tract, the kidneys, the lungs,
