--- Evolving Out of Anemia --- Herbert M Shelton

[Guest guest]

Evolving Out of Anemia

Herbert M. Shelton, N.D.

Nature's Path

October 1941

 

ON THE EVENING OF AUG. 1, I listened to a broadcast from the University of

Chicago which told, in a very dramatic manner, of the remarkable discovery of

the liver-diet cure for pernicious anemia. The doctor who made the

" discovery " was, himself, dying of diabetes, but he won before he died. It

was also admitted before the broadcast was ended that the liver-cure was not

a complete cure.

But even without this admission the official statistics, which show an

unabated death-rate in pernicious anemia, would continue to herald the

failure of this vaunted cure. To the observant individual the " liver-cure "

for anemia is like all the other efforts to cure without removing cause. Only

the most stupid can expect such " cures " to succeed.

 

THE DEPARTMENT OF PHYSIOLOGY IN a large Eastern university recently completed

a series of experiments with various foods to determine, if possible, which

foods are best for blood regeneration. Dogs were bled white and' then fed on

various foods and the progress of recovery carefully checked and recorded.

Liver

did rank high as a blood builder, but it will be realized at once, that in

these experiments, they were dealing merely with a loss of blood from a

traumatic hemorrhage and not with a true anemia. In pernicious anemia there

is an actual failure of the blood producing organs; the marrow of the long

bones does not turn out the red cells in a normal manner.

 

IN THE CASE OF HEALTHY DOGS, BLED white by surgical procedures, rest and

nutrition will bring about blood regeneration, for there is no actual

pathology present in any of the organs. In the anemic patient there is actual

pathology and back of the pathology is a long chain of causes and effects

that culminated in the anemia.

No diet will remove these causes. et us look at the experiments a little

further. Of the foods employed, soy beans gave the most rapid blood

regeneration and liver was second. But, as startling as it may have been to

the experimenters, it will not be startling to those of my readers who are

well informed, fasting resulted in a more rapid blood regeneration than any

food or combination of foods.

Dog flesh, or in man, human flesh, by absorption, forms the best diet out of

which to build new blood. By flesh, in this instance, is not meant the vital

tissues of the body, but the food reserves stored therein. It is less

wasteful of energy under certain conditions for the living body to draw its

stored reserves for nutritive support than to derive these from the raw

materials we know as food.

The well-balanced reserves of the body supply the needed vitamins and food

elements, while their autolytic analysis is less expensive than the laborious

process of gastro-intestinal digestion.

 

FASTING HAS ANOTHER DISTINCT advantage over the feeding program, an advantage

that is even more marked in pernicious anemia than it was in the induced

secondary anemia in the experimental dogs-namely it speeds up the elimination

of toxins from the body, and toxemia is the immediate cause of anemia.

It has long been known that fasting results in a rapid blood regeneration in

anemia. Two and three weeks of fasting are often enough to double the

blood-count, even in far advanced cases of progressive pernicious anemia. For

instance, a case of this kind with the blood count of 1,500,000 will often

show a count of 3,000,000 to 4,000,000 in two to three weeks of fasting.

Fasting will result in a marked improvement in the blood picture in the

anemia that accompanies advanced cancer.

 

PERNICIOUS anemia represents an end-result in a chain of causes and effects

that extend back even to the beginning of the life of the patient. Weakening

habits and influences have brought on and maintained enervation. Enervation

checks excretion and permits a retention of metabolic waste, producing

toxemia. Toxemia produces more enervation, thus placing an added check up

elimination.

Enervation and its consequent toxemia impair digestion, so that putrescence,

evolving out of the decomposition that goes on in the digestive tract, is

absorbed, complicating the toxemia. Both the toxemia and the putrescent

poisoning become chronic and slowly, gradually, but surely undermine all the

structures and functions of life.

The physiological rest that fasting affords releases energy to be utilized in

increased elimination and, at the same time, cuts off the source of

in-intestinal autointoxication. Rapid cleansing of the body and repair of

tissue follow. Regeneration, not merely of the blood, but of all the cells,

tissues and organs results. The blood making functions are restored, as are

the functions of other failing organs. Physiological rest (fasting) must, for

best and most certain results, be accompanied with physical, mental and

sensory rest. All stimulation, of whatever character and from whatever

source, must be discontinued. All nerve-leaks must be stopped. The whole life

of the sufferer must be ordered in a way to conserve nerve energy and to

avoid its dissipation.

 

ALL injurious habits and practices -dietetic, sexual, mental, emotional,

physical, sensory, etc. must cease at once and permanently. Unless all causes

of enervation are corrected nerve energy cannot return to normal and, hence,

function cannot become efficient. Enervating methods of treatment are great

offenders in this respect. Lulling both patient and doctor to sleep by the

transient palliation they afford, they lessen nerve energy and actually

produce great harm while they appear to be doing great good. Indeed, the harm

they actually do is commensurate with the good they appear to do.

After rest and a corrected mode of life have restored normal nerve energy and

fasting has occasioned a removal of toxins from the fluids and tissues of the

body and, as a consequence, functional efficiency and structural integrity

have been restored in all the organs and parts the body, a program of correct

eating, exercise, sun-bathing, emotional poise and daily rest and sleep will

build a state of positive health that will be the envy of the sick people

that surround us on every hand.

 

I DO not recommend special foods •or special diets in anemia. With the

restoration of nerve energy and functional efficiency, that comes from rest

and toxic elimination, the body will again be able to utilize the food

elements contained in a well-balanced diet, elements previously in the diet,

but not utilized because of enervation and toxemia. he program of feeding an

abundance of iron and copper in anemia, like that of feeding an abundance of

calcium in rickets and an abundance of iodine in goitre, has been tried long

enough and in a sufficient number of cases, to convince the most ardent

supporter of the " deficiency theory " of disease, that it is a failure.

Nothing is to be gained by stuffing more food into an organism that is unable

to utilize what it is already taking. Nor do we gain anything by over-feeding

one or two elements. The whole body, and not just one or two parts, must be

fed, so that the total diet must meet the ensemble of the body's nutritive

needs. The amount of any particular food element that is eaten can be

utilized in proportion to the amount of correlated elements present, so that

any excess of one element over the others will prove of no value.

 

RESTORE the nutritive powers of the body and it will be able to derive all

the needed minerals, vitamins, proteins, etc., from a well-balanced diet

(note that I do not say balanced meals) of Natural foods. Without the removal

of impairing causes and the restoration of normal nerve energy no diet will

give satisfactory results.

The most important thing in the diet is an abundance of fresh fruits and

green vegetables. Over-feeding on liver or any other form of flesh food, to

" build up " will be productive of harm. In fact over-feeding on any protein

food will produce harm. The proteins, fats and carbohydrates should be

consumed in moderation. Of equal importance to the food eaten are (1) proper

combinations, and (2) mental (emotional) and physical comfort when eating.

Wrong combinations and mental and physical distress favor putrefaction and

fermentation of the food eaten.

 

JUST as I do not recommend special foods and special diets for this

condition, so I do not favor the use of the many advertised iron-containing-

preparations for anemia. These are all based on the theory that anemia is a

deficiency disease i.e., that the iron deficiency is primary and that it

causes the anemia; whereas, the iron deficiency is secondary to other causes.

Suppose I illustrate this by reference to goitre. Goitre is claimed to be due

to iodine deficiency. I do not dispute the lack of iodine in the thyroid

gland in goitre, I only dispute that the deficiency causes the goitre. I

assert, on the contrary, that the impairment of the gland, renders it unable

to take up and utilize iodine; or, in other words, the goitre causes the

deficiency. Goitre itself is of toxic origin. The iodine treatment - whether

drug or nutritional - of goitre is a failure. But when toxemia is eliminated

and nerve energy is restored to normal, goitre gets well without additional

iodine; indeed it does so with less iodine.

In anemia, too, the deficiency is secondary to the general impairment of

nutrition and will end when nutrition, is restored to normal. Restoration of

normal nutrition depends upon the removal of the impairing causes and not

upon over-crowding an already impaired nutritive system with more food or

with food of a given kind.

 

WHEN once toxemia and its parent, enervation, are recognized as the real

cause of anemia, we will direct our attention to the removal of these things

and to correction of their causes and cease the present foolish efforts to

usurp nature's prerogative of cure.

Every hygienic factor that favorably influences nutrition, such as sunshine,

exercise in the fresh air, an abundance of rest and sleep and a cheerful,

hopeful disposition, will assist in regenerating, not merely the blood, but

the whole organism. Conversely, every unhygienic factor which adversely

affects nutrition, such as indolence, foul air, worry, fear, anxiety, a

spiteful disposition, lack of sunshine and sleep will add to the enervation

and toxemia and prevent recovery.

Methods of treating anemia are legion and have been tried for centuries, but

they are failures. The above plan, which is a plan of living rather than one

of treating, is as successful as the treating methods are unsuccessful.

I do not recommend that the fast be undertaken without expert supervision. It

should be continued as long as necessary to achieve results and the patient

will not know when to break the fast, nor how to break it. Best results may

be expected if the whole program is supervised by one qualified for such

work.