What Causes Disease? How are we getting sick?
Disease happens on a cellular level. All disease is ultimately a breakdown in function of the body’s cells. When this happens, it creates “fertile soil” for the dis-ease process. This breakdown is accomplished by less than perfect eating habits, stress, stuffing emotions, eating too many cooked foods and too much sugar, salt, caffeine, drugs, vaccines, tension, depression, lack of proper sleep, lack of exercise, environmental contamination of the air/water/food and the retention of metabolic wastes (constipation, lack of sweating, blocked lymphatic channels). The only effective way to “cure” disease is to eliminate the causes.
Disease does not attack a healthy body because the body has very effective resistance mechanisms which handle many of the above situations. The body’s natural state is health. When the body is exposed or overloaded with stressors, the immune system loses its resistance and becomes “toxic”. Toxic cells do not function properly so the body’s metabolism gets sluggish and overworked. This leads to an overall decrease in resistance allowing disease to take hold.
Disease can be expressed in terms of signs or symptoms. When we express how we feel and what we feel, we are describing a symptom. When we look at the patient for abnormalities (like in the veterinary profession) and determine subjectively what we think to be “not right or abnormal” that is labeled a “sign”.
Let’s take the simple cold as an example. The symptoms of a cold are merely and expression of the body’s effort to “clean house”. By producing fevers, coughing, sneezing, and runny noses, the body is cleansing the excess toxins produced from sick cells.
Each time we suppress these symptoms with over-the-counter treatments and other drugs, we are driving the toxins back into the body. These toxins will travel through the bloodstream and lie quietly in an organ until the system becomes more toxic. So down the line instead of colds, flu develops which brings vomiting and diarrhea. This is uncomfortable, so we take something to stop the vomiting and diarrhea. This, in turn, drives the toxins even deeper into the system.
Over a period of time you may notice you don’t get colds or flu anymore. Instead, bronchial infections develop which we again treat which drives the disease deeper still. Things may be fine for a few years then one day you feel terrible and don’t know why. You go to the doctor and they diagnose a chronic degenerative disease such as cancer, fibromyalgia, chronic fatigue, lupus, diabetes or heart disease…true signs that your body is now entirely toxic. When does it end? When you stop the cycle and repair the damage or when you die an uncomfortable disease ridden, agonizing death?
Can we stop disease or reverse symptoms? Yes. How? We have to clean up our lives. Some chose the fast track on this and others take years to shift their thinking and patterns to better healthier habits. We can heal the body with optimal nutrition, special diets, cleansing programs, specific vitamins and supplements to correct deficiencies, by drinking fresh extracted juices and taking herbs and other natural therapies, which do not harm the body over time. We learn to change our living habits and the way we think. We find a balance between the physical, emotional, mental and spiritual aspects of our lives.
Nutrition is one of the most important factors in fighting disease. Nutrients are what the body has to work with in building and maintaining healthy cells, tissues, glands and organs. Nutrients are used in the operation of all bodily functions. The challenge is that most of the nutrients in our foods today have either been taken out or destroyed by processing. Cooked food is dead food. Only living foods can build healthy bodies. That is what most of our diet should consist of.
Please don’t misunderstand, drugs, surgery, chiropractic manipulations, acupuncture, etc. are all useful in the treatment of disease. Sometimes we do need to intervene with treatments to suppress a symptom or sign when our body is in jeopardy, but unless the corrective and supportive nutritional therapy is given priority, these attempts to correct illness will fail.
Helpful Links and References on What Causes Disease: