WARREN KING, L.Ac.

The Intestines
The Site of Digestion’s Last Chance Is a Barometer of Health

The large intestine or colon is the last part of the body that food comes in contact with, the final digestive organ. As with everything in our universe, the colon can be the source of pleasure and pain. No one can deny the pleasure of a smooth visit to the toilet. On the other hand, the discomfort and disruption of diarrhea need not be described.

The digestion of our food actually begins in our kitchens, since the first digestive organ is the pot in which our food is cooked. During cooking food reacts with the water, salt, or other ingredients and is physically broken down, chemically altered, and energized. The process is repeated three more times in our mouth, stomach, and small intestine, where the nutrients are finally absorbed into our blood.

After the small intestine completes its digestion, the large intestine takes over. The cells of the large intestine are not able to absorb any carbohydrate or protein, so what we usually think of as digestion should be completed by the time food reaches the colon. What, then, is the job of the large intestine in a normal, healthy body?

The most obvious things that the colon does are absorb water from leftovers and move the food out of the body. It also removes salt, adds potassium and bicarbonate to the partially digested food, and secretes mucus, which lubricates and binds the feces.

In carnivores the colon is short and simple because animal foods quickly rot and produce poisons. The longer such food stays inside the body, the more toxins are produced. The short, strong colon of meat-eaters is designed to take out this trash as quickly as possible.

Inside vegetarians, however, much of this transformation of vegetable-quality food into animal quality cells may naturally occur in the colon. But, as in the case of modern Americans who eat up to 60 percent animal foods, this natural process and ability may be dormant. The quality and amount of bacteria that live in the colon may indicate how readily we can transmute vegetables and grains into ourselves. Although it’s not a well known fact, we have as many bacteria in our large intestines as we have cells in our body, nearly 75 trillion. Together these bacteria weigh about three pounds. In addition to bacteria, there are many varieties of viruses, fungi, and yeasts. Altogether, we carry over four hundred species of bacteria and other microbes inside us. The quantity and types of bacteria that grow are determined by their food and environment-which itself is a product of our food.

There are, for example, certain kinds of bacteria that help decompose proteins, and if there is an abundant supply of dead animal matter delivered daily to the colon, these bacteria will flourish and other types will diminish. On the other hand, there are other bacteria that make vitamins out of vegetable-quality foods. This type of bacteria is scarce in modern colons. Research shows that small amounts of vitamin B2, B4, biotin, folic acid, and vitamin K continue to be manufactured in the intestines of modern people, although the amounts created are small. Much of our information about this process comes from studies of people eating large quantities of meat, dairy food, sugar, and refined, processed foods. People who have adapted to a natural grain and vegetable-based diet are ignored by these studies.

The bacteria in our large intestines are 99 percent anaerobic, which means they have to live in an oxygen-free environment. Bacteria in general come from a time in the evolution of life when there was very little difference between the emerging plant and animal kingdoms. Some bacteria, for instance, have the ability to seek their food as well as the ability to photosynthesize food using light. Because bacteria are a stage of life between plants and animals, our intestinal bacteria may be the essential means by which our vegetable-quality food is changed into our animal-quality bodies. As truly vegetable-quality people and their accompanying bacteria become more numerous and available for research, the modern understanding of the colon and its role may be reexamined.

Since practically all our food has already been digested and absorbed by the small intestine, what actually is delivered to the large intestine is a liquid mixture of intestinal secretions, water, dead and discarded cells from the intestinal surface, and the undigestible parts of food like cellulose, the tough material that encloses all grains and beans and is the supporting framework of plants. Cellulose is also called fiber or roughage.

The small intestine is about nine feet long and one and a half inches wide in a living person, though it can be stretched out to over twice that length after death. It begins at the bottom of the stomach and sits coiled on itself as it carries our food downward. The small intestine connects with the beginning of the large intestine at the top of our right hipbone, where a valve is located which opens to squirt its contents into the colon, especially during and right after eating. The small intestine actually connects with the colon about two and a half inches before the small intestine ends. At this point it is slightly enlarged into a two- by three-inch pouch called the cecum. Hanging down off the bottom of the cecum is the three-inch, worm-like appendix.

Because the appendix is designed for dealing with plant food, it is very sensitive to flesh and eggs. Generally only meat-eaters get appendicitis (inflamed appendix), which often develops after eating a big meal of meat, especially barbecued meat.

Modern medical professionals see no use for the appendix and will often take out a healthy appendix during an operation just to avoid possible future trouble. This shows great ignorance of nature’s flawless engineering. Throughout the universe compact things and expanded things are always alternated for maximum stability, balance, and harmony. The appendix is a small, short, compact organ which makes balance between two big, long, and hollower organs (the small and large intestines). When the appendix is removed, the strength and stability of the abdomen is weakened and consequently so is much of a person’s physical stamina. Probably few successful long distance runners have had appendectomies.

Beginning from the cecum and appendix, the colon rises along the right side of the belly (ascending colon) and turns just under the ribcage to travel across to the left side (transverse colon) where it turns again underneath the ribs and heads downward to the left hipbone (descending colon). The places under the sides of the ribcage where the colon changes direction are sometimes the cause of pains that develop during hard exercise. During strenuous physical activity, the blood flow to the intestine can be as low as 15 percent of normal, causing the intestine to stop moving and digesting. What doesn’t move, though, is gas, which may collect at these curves and stretch the intestine walls. This causes pain or a stitch in the side.

When this happens, one remedy is to keep moving but to breathe more with the belly than the chest. This will help massage the intestines and possibly move the gas. If that doesn’t help, pause for a moment and massage the colon. With proper diet and continued exercise this problem will quickly disappear.

At the level of the left hipbone the (descending) colon gets another new name (sigmoid colon) and travels back towards the spine where it becomes the rectum. The rectum is that last part of the large intestine. Both it and the sigmoid colon have extra surrounding muscles to squeeze out feces. which are also called stools. At the bottom of the rectum, which is four to five inches long, there are an inner and an outer ring of muscle, called sphincter muscles, which open and shut. The outer ring is the anus.

The surface of the small intestine looks like an endless series of soft, moving mountain ranges covered with thick, waving forests, while the surface of the large intestine is flat and barren but covered with bacteria. The colon can’t absorb carbohydrates or protein, but it does absorb water, salt, and some vitamins. What passes through the colon is slowly dried out, and the longer it stays in, the harder and drier it usually becomes. The stools that come out differ depending on the person’s diet, activity, and health. Even form day to day and form bowel movement to bowel movement they change. however, one study has concluded that the average American stool is nearly 75 percent water and 25 percent solid matter. This solid matter contains 30 percent dead bacteria, 10-20 percent fat, 10-20 percent inorganic matter, 2-3 percent protein, and 30 percent undigested fiber (roughage) and the dried ingredients of intestinal secretions like bile and sloughed off intestinal cells.

Stools are different in other cultures. For example, the time it takes food to travel the 15 foot digestive tract can vary greatly. The normal American time form eating to bowel movement is three days (72 hours). In countries where people eat only unrefined foods the time can be as short as four to six hours. One elderly English woman who was studied ate only pastries, sweets, and refined food and it takes more than a week for her food to pass out.

The average Englishman takes 77 hours to pass his food, while the average English vegetarian took 49 hours. The average traveling time for a rural African eating mainly corn and beans was 35 hours. In some extreme cases of constipation there have been no bowel movements for a whole year. During this time the blocked feces are building up inside creating what is called an ‘impactment.’ Strangely enough, there are often no major complications during this time except for the minor discomfort of carrying around a 50- to 100- pound ball of dung inside. These treasures usually end up being removed by doctors.

While most constipation is caused by an overly loose or overly contracted colon, occasionally it is caused by an object put into the rectum. It is a tribute to the flexibility of the human body that docto’rs have been called upon to remove objects ranging from a 40-watt light bulb to a tool case complete with tools.

The size and weight of stools will also vary according to one’s diet. In one study, the average weight of African’s stool’s was 17 ounces (one pound): the average for two groups eating a combination African-British diet was seven ounces (one-half pound), while the average Britisher managed only a humble four ounces (one-quarter pound). The large amounts of unrefined grains, beans, and vegetables eaten by the Africans may also explain the absence of colon disease among them, while the British diet of animal food, dairy, and refined foods is probably why they have ten times more bowel cancer than the rural Africans. Colon and rectum cancer is the number two cancer among men and women by the number of deaths and by the number of cases. Two out of three Americans have hemorrhoids.

Irritable colon syndrome or spastic colon may be unknown to many young readers. It is characterized by small, hard stool’s alternating with diarrhea. Often diarrhea is passed in the morning and then there are no bowel movements for the rest of the day. According to Symptoms: The Complete Home Medical Encyclopedia, ‘Irritable colon is a nervous disease that strikes the anxiety-ridden people of the world. Strangely enough, this ailment is hardly known, though everyone, at some time or another, has been indisposed by it. It is responsible for more than half of all disorders of the digestive system. Except for the common cold, it is the most common disorder of man.’

Diverticulosis is another common problem and occurs when small pockets about one half inch in diameter bulge out of the colon wall. About 30 percent of people over 45 have this and in one out of five of these the pockets become infected (diverticulitis). Aside from these colon problems, occasional or chronic constipation or diarrhea is universal. Americans spend over 200 million dollars a year on 800 different laxatives.

One problem common to all ages is pin worms, which are one-half inch long white worms that live in the colon. An estimated 40 million Americans are generously providing a home for these little freeloaders.

Although in general the medical establishment and public are in steadfast agreement that food is negligible in curing disease, the connection between colon problems and diet is beginning to be appreciated. Many doctors and health authorities are advising everyone to eat more whole grains and vegetables, TV ads are eager to proclaim the high fiber content of their cereals, and for a laxative ad to be able to say that it’s both gentle and natural means money in the bank.

None of these remedies can substitute for a natural diet based on whole, unrefined grains. Anyone suffering from colon problems could greatly ease their condition by changing their way of eating today. Since colon disorders afflict mainly middle aged or older people, younger, more flexible people who have discovered the benefits of a natural foods diet should pass on their knowledge to their elders.

The Heart-Diagnosis
Learn to Recognize Three Basic Body Types

When diagnosing a person’s tendency to heart disease we look for one of three basic body types. These three basic groups will also have related personality traits that are generally consistent for each group. Of course, human nature is never as clear-cut as writers would like it to be, and characteristics from one group will sometimes overlap the characteristics of another. However, using these suggestions as a basic guideline, you should be able to make quite a few interesting diagnoses the next time you’re in a crowded bus or subway.

The first group of people susceptible to heart disease are those who suffer from high blood pressure and are prone to heart attacks of a sudden, violent nature which often result in immediate death. Such attacks usually occur between the ages of forty and fifty, and the condition is often complicated by tendencies to atherosclerosis, or the clogging of the arteries because of the accumulation of fat. Clogged arteries would also lead us to suspect that other organs are suffering in similar ways, and this is indeed the case. The fats that accumulate in the arteries also tend to cause kidney stones, prostate cancer, appendicitis, hemorrhoids, cirrhosis of the liver, and cramps during menstruation.

When looking for people who might be developing these conditions watch for a red to pink skin color, an overly talkative nature, and a personality that is outgoing, socially oriented, confident, practical, and given to emotional outbursts, particularly anger. These people are generally shorter, broader, and tend to have thicker bones. Well-known examples of such persons include Leonid Brezhnev, W.C. Fields, Winston Churchill, and Bella Abzug. The facial features of this type of person tend to be close together; ears are large, the hands and tongue are square. In addition there will often be lots of body hair, although there is an inclination to baldness.

Such people are usually very concerned with appearance, and often express overt joy or anger which can conceal deep-seated fears. Their assertive, straightforward attitudes can make them disregard any incipient health problems they may have, so that you often hear them boasting that they were never sick for a day in their lives. This very stubbornness and self-assurance may prevent them from changing their diet or lifestyle until it is too late or until they have suffered a severe heart attack.

The most common dietary causes of this type of heart problem are excessive animal foods, especially beef and pork, salty food, sugar, and excessive intake of liquids. Such foods also weaken the kidneys, signs of which appear as bags under the eyes. Horizontal lines on the forehead show the intestines have also been weakened by these foods and indicate a predisposition to constipation.

The second group of people prone to heart disease are those who suffer from irregular or rapid heartbeat, heart murmur, arteriosclerosis (hardening of the arteries), and occasionally high blood pressure. Along with these symptoms there is a tendency to pancreatic cancer, jaundice, diabetes, low blood sugar, oily or dry skin, and alternating diarrhea and constipation.

Such people are often of medium height, build, and bone structure, with almost no body hair and often a cleft in the nose. (The nose is the area of the face that corresponds to the heart in traditional Oriental diagnosis. A cleft nose is a sign that the two sides of the heart were not strongly fused while the person was an embryo.) In diagnosing such people you should also look for a brown or yellowish skin color.

People of this type tend to be nervous and impatient, very talkative, sensitive, self-conscious, and giggly. Their personalities tend to be emotionally or intellectually oriented, while their thinking is often changeable and scattered. They can be excitable, worried, skeptical, and uncomfortable in crowds, although they often cannot stand to be alone. Notice also whether the pupils of the eyes are large and if their eyes blink excessively. Because of their nervous nature, these people are often shaking their legs or drumming their fingers. Their lips tend to be swollen and thick and they favor the spring and fall. A prominent figure who suffered from this condition was Anwar Sadat. Peter Sellers and the Shah of Iran also fell into this category.

Heart problems of this type are generally caused by over consumption of fowl, fish, eggs, cheese, fruit, fruit juices, and sugar. A recommended diet for this condition would consist of: 50 percent whole grains, especially millet and sweet corn; 25 to 30 percent vegetables, especially ground vegetables, squashes, and sweet root vegetables, moderate cooking with little or no salad; 5 to 50 percent beans and seaweed, especially aduki beans; 5 percent moderate miso or shoyu broth soup; moderate use of salt and oil; occasional animal food; no fruit desserts; and light bancha tea or roasted millet tea.

The last group are those who suffer from low blood pressure. These people can have many heart attacks and still survive. They are prone to anemia and leukemia, lung and respiratory ailments, diarrhea, sadness, depression, and fear.

Our first impression when meeting such people is that they are passive, tired, quiet, reclusive, lacking in confidence, and tend to get sick quite often. Their introversion makes them artistic and spiritually oriented. Constitutionally they are small in stature with long hands, delicate bones, moderate body hair, rounded tongue, small ears, long nose, and facial features that are spread apart. Their skin color is frequently pale, swollen, and watery.

The thinking of such people is usually altruistic and future-oriented. They enjoy the summertime best of all the seasons, since the warmth of the summer balances their cool, inward nature. You often see these people slouching with rounded shoulders, as though the effort of standing were too great and they would prefer to be lying down. Good examples of this kind of person are the Ayatollah Khomeini and Giscard D’Estaing.

The problems of this group are caused primarily by the over consumption of sugar (especially sugared drinks), tropical fruits, milk, butter, yogurt, drugs or medications, and loss of essential minerals.

The Heart-Body
The Road to a Billion Beats

Walk onto any busy street corner in America and look at the people passing by. Many of them are likely to have one big thing in common: heart disease. The symptoms will be as obvious as the noses on their faces.

Ironically, most of those who have heart disease probably don’t know it. Heart disease sneaks up on a person. The illness often begins to creep into a child’s heart and vascular system before he or she is ten years old; for the next 440 or 50 years, it slowly and insidiously becomes worse, until at the age of 55 or 65 the person is killed by a heart attack. Then the relatives lament that he or she wasn’t sick a day in their lives. The truth is that they were sick most of their lives and didn’t recognize the fairly obvious symptoms.

Before discussing how a traditional Oriental physician diagnosed a heart problem, let’s take a moment and look at what the heart does. The heart is a muscle about the size of a fist, placed in the center of the chest and leaning slightly to the left. It is made up of four chambers-the upper being the left and right atria, and the bottom the left and right ventricles. The principal function of the heart is to pump oxygenated blood to every living cell in the body, as well as to pump carbon dioxide-filled blood to the lungs, where it is cleansed and oxygenated.

By the 16th day of a woman’s pregnancy, her baby has already begun to form the incipient structure of the heart. By the 24th day, the primordial pump is beating. At that time, the entire embryo is no bigger than the period at the end of this sentence. Once the baby is born, the heart will beat at a rate of about 100,000 times a day-more than a billion times in a single lifetime.

All over the world, the heart has been associated with the emotions, particularly with love. He spoke from his heart, we often hear people say. What is meant by this ageless cliche is that one spoke what one firmly believed to be true. You cannot go against your heart without paying a heavy price, is another common aphorism, and again the meaning is clear: one must follow what is true. Thus, the heart is not only the center of love but the bearer of truth-high place of honor for a single organ.

In the Orient, the heart is associated with the self. It is the place where heaven’s and earth’s forces meet and collide, causing a rhythmic beating, an expansion and contraction, a movement and a rest. Oriental physicians and philosophers referred to this action as yin (expansion) and Yang (contraction), and the heart was the perfect metaphor for the way in which the universe operated. Since humankind is regarded in the East as the result of union between heaven and earth, between yin an yang, the heart was regarded as the most essential center of a human being; thus, it was associated with the self.

Traditional healers viewed the heart as the central headquarters for incoming information from other organs, such as the liver, spleen, lungs, and kidneys. These messages represented the balanced condition of the body, giving rise to the feeling of joy, or an imbalanced condition, which resulted in panic or hysteria. These two emotions-joy and hysteria- came to be associated with the heart, joy being regarded as the most superior emotion of all, since it was the result of a harmonious condition.

Traditional healers based their healing practices on the motion of ki energy, which is essentially electromagnetic energy that flows from the heavens (from the sun, stars, and moon) and from the earth’s rotation. This energy flow along certain pathways. or meridians, in the body according to a set pattern. Traditional healers recognized that there was a distinct relationship between the heart and the small intestine; when a physician treated the small intestine with diet, acupuncture, or some external application, for example, the heart also responded positively. On the other hand, when the heart was weak or troubled, the small intestine was suffering form some malady as well. This Janus-faced relationship between the heart and the small intestine that was both complementary and antagonistic was a fundamental recognition in their approach to healing.

Several aspects of this complementary relationship are: 1) their anatomical locations: central upper torso versus central lower torso; 2) structure: solid, compacted heart muscle versus hollow, expanded small intestine; 3) functions: absorption of food and creation of blood by the small intestine versus circulation of the blood by the heart, and 4) philosophical functions: the deep, internal, invisible transmutations of the small intestine compared to the out ward, superficial, and communicative activities of the heart.

A similar relationship was found to exist between the kidneys and the heart. This relationship is well established in Western medicine today. When the kidneys become overburdened by a diet rich i n saturated fat and salt, they can no longer cleanse the blood at the normal rate the body is used to. This balance is then thrown off and a kind of bottleneck takes place. The consumption of excessive amounts of salt and fat are major causes of this bottleneck; sodium causes the kidneys to contract, thus reducing their capacity to handle the normal quantity of blood coming in for cleansing. Naturally, the blood gets backed up and high blood pressure, or hypertension, results. This, of course, puts enormous stress on the heart. Also, toxins that the kidneys normally filter out of the blood remain within the body for longer periods of time and are often absorbed by cells, thus creating problems in other areas of the body.

When the kidneys are functioning well, the flow of blood is facilitated and the heart’s job is made easier.

Thus, Oriental physicians saw the need to create harmony within the system by treating the whole body. In the case of the heart, the proper functioning of the small intestine and the kidneys is essential if the heart is to do its job properly.

There are two types of heart disease, one being the result of foods high in saturated animal fat and cholesterol. This results in hardening of the arteries and in fat deposits surrounding the heart. The heart and arteries ultimately lose their elasticity and vitality, and the heart is forced to labor excessively in order to pump blood. Meanwhile, because of an excessive amount of fat surrounding the organ, the heart gets insufficient oxygen, further debilitating it. The second type of condition is an expanded heart, the result of an excessive amount of alcohol, sweet drinks and fruit juices, sugar, refined foods, and stimulants such as coffee. This condition causes the heart to swell and beat irregularly; eventually the heart becomes weak and fluttery. Both conditions make the body highly prone to heart attack and other coronary diseases such as palpitations and angina.

The traditional healer needed only a few minute to diagnose a heart problem. He or she needed neither x-rays nor invasive tests nor radioactive dyes. They needed only to look at the person’s face, listen to their speech, watch their physical movements, probe a few points on their bodies, and ask a few simple questions.

If the patient’s face was swollen or reddish in color, the traditional healer automatically knew that there was some heart problem at hand. Generally, a swollen face or one that bore a reddish color indicated an expanded and overworked heart. A red face also indicated the presence of high blood pressure. This is because high blood pressure results in expansion of the capillaries around the face, and particularly the nose, forcing the tiny blood vessels to the surface of the skin, thus giving the face a reddish color.

Some people have a purple color in their face or at the tip of their nose. This suggests that the person once suffered from high blood pressure, but over time the heart became extremely weak and lost much of its elasticity and strength. The result is low blood pressure and a heart that is tired and swollen. A purple hue to the face or nose usually suggests a more advanced and dangerous condition than simply a swollen face or reddish color.

A child’s stuttering or stammering speech problem is often the result of a heart murmur or hyperactive heart beat. When the heart is racing, a child’s speech responds in the same way, thus giving rise to an excited, hyperactive speech pattern. When there is a murmur, or irregular heart beat, the voice pattern may be more stuttering, filled with false starts, and unable to get on track.

In the same way that the voice gives us clues to the condition of the heart, so too does a person’s movements. Unstable, jerky kinds of movements-a person who can’t sit still or get comfortable, for example-are a reflection of a hyperactive and irregular heart beat. This is due less to impatience, a trait usually associated with a troubled liver, than to the inability of the heart to settle into a rhythmic, relaxed beating patter.

Recently I read that more than half of all heart attacks take place in the summer months and during mid-day. To som eone unfamiliar with traditional healing practices this information is puzzling. However, Oriental physicians noted that the heart receives its greatest stimulation, and thus the most stress, during the hours between 10 a.m. and 2 p.m., and during the summer months, particularly in July. When a person suffers from any kind of chest cramp, feels hyperactive, unsettled, or lethargic during these hours and months, this is usually a sign that a heart problem is at hand.

This rule of thumb also goes for the phases of the moon. During the full moon, the body experiences an increase in fluids, which puts more stress on the heart. As a result, the chances of heart attacks and the occurrence of other chronic cardiovascular problems are heightened during these periods.

As with the other organs, one can diagnose the condition of the heart by feeling the heart pulse, located on the left wrist closest to the hand on a man and on the right wrist in the same place on a woman (see illustration). If the pulse is excessively strong, heavy, and rapid, the heart is overworked and is suffering from a more contracted condition, the result of too many animal foods and fat deposits surrounding the heart. If, however, the pulse is weak or fluttery, it indicates an expanded condition, the result of too many sweets, soft drinks, fruit juices, and stimulants.

In the same way, you can check the heart meridian, which runs along the inside of the arms to the inside of the little finger. Have the person raise their arm above heir head and with your fingers feel along the meridian. If it is soft and gives a flabby feeling, the condition is more expanded; however, if the meridian is hard or stiff, this indicates a more contracted condition. Obviously, it takes practice and sensitivity to judge the differences, but with time and continued experimentation one is quickly able to recognize the two conditions.

A healthy pulse is unhurried, stable, and gives the feeling of being strong or full; a well-conditioned meridian is firm yet supple, and the muscle tissue returns quickly to its original position after being probed.

Finally, the Oriental healer gave a close examination to the patient’s nose. The nose, located in the center of the face, is regarded by the traditional healer as the complementary structure to the heart, which is located in the center of the chest cavity. Over the course of thousands of years of study, the traditional healers came to recognize that the condition of the nose-where it was swollen or red, or showed a waxy or irregular surface represented a similar condition of the heart.

Specifically, a swollen nose represents an expanded heart condition. When the nose is red and reveals expanded capillaries at the surface of the skin, this indicates that the heart is swollen, overworked, and lacking oxygen. The traditional healer immediately suspected high blood pressure when these signs appeared, as well as some coronary artery disease, such as atherosclerosis, a condition characterized by tat deposits clogging the arteries. In advanced cases, as was mentioned, the nose sometimes becomes purple.

The nose can show other specific problems with the heart. Sometimes there is swelling on just one side of the nose, indicating that the corresponding chambers of the heart are also expanded and overworked. Some noses have a distinct, almost waxy pallor, indicating the presence of fat deposits surrounding the heart. This is usually the result of an excessive amount of saturated fat in the diet, particularly from dairy products such as hard cheeses. This, coupled with a diet high in alcohol, refined grains, sugar, and stimulants such as coffee, puts enormous stress upon the heart and ultimately weakens this otherwise incredible muscle.

Although many people in America today are suffering form heart and artery disease in one form or another, these illnesses are relatively easy to prevent and even reverse. A diet that is centered around whole grains, cooked vegetables, seaweeds, and fresh fruits strengthens the heart and helps ward off serious illness. In addition, traditional physicians recognized that certain foods were especially strengthening for the heart, particularly red millet (corn is the Western staple that possesses the same heart-strengthening qualities), and bitter tasting vegetables such as dandelion, mustard greens, watercress, and burdock. Also, roasted sesame seeds, or such vegetables as turnips, radishes, onions, and scallions are all excellent for returning elasticity to the heart.

Moreover, one should eliminate virtually all fats, particularly saturated animal fats and cholesterol. In the case of a person who is suffering from a more expanded heart condition soups such as miso and tamari broth can be a little stronger. Also, the foods can be cooked for longer periods of time and there can be more pressure-cooking.

In the case of a person with a more contracted heart condition, the soups should be lighter and salt intake should be sharply restricted. The cooking should also be lighter, using more steamed and lightly boiled vegetables. One can use more ginger, daikon, and scallions for condiments; these foods have the effect of melting away fat deposits that surround the heart and clog the arteries.

The traditional Oriental healer also recognized that the person with heart problem suffered from some psychological difficulty with him-or herself, and with relationships in general. Perhaps we could all benefit by improving the condition of our hearts.

The Gallbladder: Don’t Underestimate the Importance of the Smallest Major Organ
by Rob Allanson

Hundreds of Thousands of Americans every year become more aware of their gallbladder when they are cut out in hospital operating rooms. Especially for Americans over 40, the gallbladder is the site of much pain and distress.

If you’d like to introduce yourself to your own gallbladder, first lean forward and breathe out. Now, take the four fingers of your right hand and push them firmly (but gently) up under the right side of your rib cage.

If you feel pain when you do this, you know two things: 1) that you have lots of company, and 2) that your liver and gallbladder are in less than ideal shape. Also, if you can’t fit your fingers in at least to the second knuckle, your liver is swollen, Your liver and gallbladder are partners. They live within the right side of your ribcage, grew up together, and are very attached. When one is happy, so is the other; and when one is sick, the other suffers also. The gallbladder’s main work is storing a liquid called bile, which the liver secretes, and then pumping the bile into the intestines as needed.

The gallbladder is our smallest major organ, a little three-to-four inch pouch attached to the bottom of the liver. Because it is mostly hidden behind the liver, the gallbladder is hard to feel unless it is swollen from sickness. A short tube (duct) leads from the lower, narrow end of the pouch to join with another bile-carrying tube from the liver. At this meeting the two become one larger tube that attaches to and empties into the first section of intestine below the stomach. The larger tube is called the common bile duct, while the first section of intestine is called the duodenum (either du-ah’-den-um or du-o-dee’-num).

In both their form and function, the liver and gallbladder are opposites. Like yin and yang, they are complementary/antagonists, which means that because they are totally opposite, they need each other, balance each other, and work well together.

The liver is big, the gallbladder small. The liver is solid, the gallbladder hollow. The liver filters and processes material, while the gallbladder stores it. The liver hardly moves at all, while the gallbladder contracts regularly. Also, some people like to eat levers, but my mother never served me a gallbladder when I was a kid.

Bile is a thick, yellowish, bitter, alkaline fluid. It is often described as greenish orange, although in sickness it may turn black. The Latin term was bilis, the old Anglo-Saxon word was galla, and the Greek word chole. Bile used to be called choler, then later gall. To be bilious or choleric means to be irritable, cranky, angry, or bitter. To have gall is to be impudent or impertinent. The liver and gallbladder have long been associated with these emotions. According to traditional Oriental facial diagnosis, the liver and gallbladder show their condition on the face between the eyebrows. Americans often have a vertical line in this space called a ‘liver line,’ which is commonly known to indicate a short temper.

Bile is made up of three main ingredients. Bile salts are the main active component and are made by the liver from cholesterol, which is a fatty substance used in many ways by the body.

Bile is needed for digestion and acts mainly on fats and oil. Fats and oils are chemically identical, the main difference being that fats are solid at room temperature and come mainly from animal foods, while oils are liquid at room temperature and come mainly from plants.

Fat and oil are not digested until they come into the duodenum from the stomach. In order to be absorbed through the intestinal wall into the blood, all foods must be broken down into small molecules. This process is called digestion. (In Latin di means two, and gest means movement, as in gesture. So digestion means to move apart, or split.)

When fat and oil enter the intestine they are in the form of large drops, which are conglomerations of fat molecules. These fat molecules must be broken down into o smaller molecules by enzymes, which are special protein molecules that act as catalysts and speed up chemical processes.

Our intestines contain special enzymes that split fat molecules, but these enzymes can work only on the outside of the fat drops. If the large drops are broken down into smaller droplets, the enzymes have an easier job. Bile dissolves the fat drops into thousands of tiny droplets that float around in liquid. This liquid is called an emulsion, and bile salts are an emulsifier that breaks up fats and oil on the skin and hair. If we refrain from taking in too much fat and oil, soap isn’t necessary.

Without bile, fat and oil can’t be digested or absorbed well. If for some reason bile flow is blocked, unabsorbed fat may come out with the stools, a condition called steatorrhea (stear: fat; rhea: flow). Eighty percent of the bile salts are reabsorbed at the end of the small intestine and returned to the liver to be used again.

Another function of bile is to activate enzymes, which are secreted in a dormant state. Opposites tend to stimulate each other, and the strongly alkaline bile activates some major enzymes which are acidic.

The second major component of bile is a pigment called bilirubin, a waste product that the bile carries to the intestines which remove it from the body. Bilirubin is a yellowish pigment although it can become greenish when acted on by certain bacteria in the intestines. Bile gives stools their familiar brownish color, but if bile flow is blocked they become grayish-white.

Bilirubin comes from dead red blood cells. We have around 35 trillion of these oxygen and carbon dioxide carriers in our blood, and each one lives for about four months. Old red blood cells are attacked and destroyed in the spleen by white blood cells, which also rid the body of armful bacteria.

Dead red blood cells are carried to the liver at the rate of about three million per second and salvaged for parts. The iron and protein parts are saved and used again, while the bilirubin is discharged into the bile.

If for some reason the bilirubin doesn’t make it to the intestines, it backs up into the liver and blood and turns the skin and eyeballs yellow. This problem is called jaundice and arises in one of three ways:

1. If the liver is sick, as in hepatitis (hepa: live; itis: inflammation), then it can’t process the bilirubin, which accumulates and enters the blood.
2. If the spleen becomes overactive, it may begin the wholesale slaughter of red blood cells, sending so many to the liver that the liver can’t handle them, and again the excess goes to the blood.
3. The third main ingredient of bile is a general load of waste and toxins (poisons) that the liver has filtered out of the blood. The liver is the body’s main blood purification center and is responsible for detoxifying and eliminating drugs, synthetic chemicals in our food, alcohol, caffeine, and many other harmful products.

The liver filters these pollutants from the blood by changing them into compounds the body can eliminate. Then it either puts them into the blood where they will be picked up by the kidneys and sent out with the urine, or it dumps them into the bile. When there is an overload of such wastes in the blood, the bile becomes very toxic and causes a host of problems.

The liver secretes between a cup and a quart of bile a day. Between meals some bile goes into the intestines, but most is stored in the gallbladder, which can hold about two ounces. When the acid contents of the stomach, especially fats and oils, enter the intestines, the gallbladder contracts and sends the bile into the intestine where it breaks up fats and oils into small droplets and activates enzymes.

Once we understand that the bile is made up mostly of cholesterol and that it deals mainly with digesting fats and oil, we realize that the condition of the gallbladder is directly dependent on our consumption of oil and fat.

The average adult American now eats about 300 pounds of dairy food each year. Not counting the water content, milk is 28 percent fat; yogurt, 15 percent; American cheese, 50 percent; and butter, 95 percent. Over 200 pounds of meat are also eaten. One thing that many people don’t realize is that flesh in general has at least as much fat as protein. Again, without counting the water, eggs are 43 percent fat; hamburger, 53 percent; bacon, 85 percent; chicken, 48 percent; tuna, 13 percent; and haddock, 5 percent. Added to these elements in our modern diet is about 35 pounds of pure fats and oil.

Besides being incomplete foods nutritionally, fats and oil are highly concentrated fuels, with a chemical structure similar to petroleum and rubber. When they are burned in the body they give off more than twice as much energy as either carbohydrates or protein.

A little goes a long way, and with the quantities being eaten today, it’s no surprise that there is plenty left over. This stored excess is the major reason why most people are overweight. To use all the fat and oil that most people are eating would require a vigorous and active life. Central heating, cars, television, and office work do little to encourage the burning off of excess food. These fats and oils eventually become acid in the body, producing waste products and contributing to an overall unhealthy condition.

The biggest problem that can happen with the gallbladder is gallstones. These are stones that form in the hollow of the gallbladder and vary in size from tiny sand-like grains to solid rocks that fill the entire organ.

The great majority of gallbladder sufferers have stones, whether ornot their problem is being caused directly by the stones. For instance, gallbladder cancer accounts for about 6 percent of all cancers and has a very high fatality rate. In 90 percent of gallbladder cancers, gallstones are also present.

Usually gallstones are almost solid cholesterol and will not show up on an x-ray. In order to detect them, dye is injected into the gallbladder to provide a dark background against which the stone will appear. In one out of four cases there is also calcium present with the cholesterol that allows the stones to show up on a regular x-ray without using dye. In such cases, we can suspect that the person has been eating dairy foods, which have much calcium compared to other fatty foods.

Cholesterol, like other fatty matter, does not dissolve in water, But thanks to the bile salts, warmth, and high alkalinity of the bile, the cholesterol is normally kept from solidifying in the gallbladder. However, if the composition of the bile becomes weakened or too overloaded with cholesterol, then stones may form.

A special word should be said here about cold liquids. The average American drinks two quarts of liquids a day, and aside from coffee, tea, or cocoa, most of this liquid is taken cold. The average refrigerator temperature is 40 degrees F., which means that most people, every day, are drinking at least one and a half quarts of liquid that is 60 degrees colder than their insides. When swallowed, liquids reach the inside of the stomach in about three seconds. Even with food in the stomach, it has been discovered that liquids will quickly pass around the food mass and settle at the bottom of the stomach and intestines.

We are all familiar with how butter and other fats harden in the cold and melt in the heat. Cold liquids and food have the same effect on internal fat and mucous deposits: they tend to harden and solidify these fats, encouraging the formation of stones. Especially affected are the organs that surround the stomach areas: the kidneys, pancreas, liver, and gallbladder.

An estimated 50 percent of the people who have gallstones will not notice any symptoms. When stones and the accompanying irritation of the gallbladder begin to interfere with the flow of bile, pain, belching, indigestion, and gas may begin to show up an hour or so after meals, especially high-fat meals.

The worst happens when a stone gets into the tubes leading from the gallbladder to the intestine. Then, when the gallbladder and tubes contract and try to expel bile, the pain that results is terrible. As one surgeon said, ‘…it is generally agreed that there is no pain more severe than that caused by stones.

If the stone does not pass through into the intestine, it can either block the flow of bile to and from the gallbladder, or, if it travels far enough, it will block the common bile duct. Since the common bile duct carries bile from both the liver and gallbladder to the intestine, no bile will reach the intestine if the common bile duct is blocked by a stone.

In such a situation the following results occur: fats go largely undigested; bile backs up into the liver and blood causing the eyes and skin to become yellow(jaundice); the bile stagnates and concentrates in the gallbladder, irritating the walls and causing inflammation and possibly gangrene.

Since M.D.’s know neither what causes gallstones nor how to prevent or dissolve them, they can only conclude that if they take out your stones, you’ll just make more and have the same problem later. This kind of reasoning in the dark is logical in this way and the same kind of logic says that it’s much safer to operate on a young person than on an old one.

What results is the only gallstone treatment available from modern medicine today-namely, removal of the gallbladder. People can still get around without their gallbladders, since the liver will, after a fashion, be able to supply enough bile on its own to keep things moving.

In 1975, 750,000 gallbladders were taken out in the U.S. It’s estimated that by the age of 40, one out of three women and one out of eight men now have gallstones. An estimated 30 percent of old people have them. Gallbladder trouble is the fifth leading reason for hospital admission, and gallbladder surgery is our third most common operation.

Women are four times more likely to develop gallstones than men, and the problem is especially likely to occur if they are taking either birth control pills (common practice before menopause) or female hormones (common after menopause). The typical gallstone sufferer is usually described in terms of the four F’s: fat, fair, female, and forty. Blonds, in this case, have less fun, since blonds and Caucasians are gallstone prone. The typical gallbladder patient is known to like rich, fatty food.

Doctors have rarely tried changing the patient’s diet in order to heal this sickness. They approach the body and its working on the chemical level alone. Yet what could possibly have a more powerful influence on the body’s chemistry than the three pounds and two quarts of food people take in every day?

Many people have cured their gallstones and other gallbladder problems simply by switching from the modern diet high in fats, oils, and cold drinks to a traditional diet centered around grains and vegetables. This change restores the body’s chemistry to a healthy state, and from this the body proceeds to eliminate all unwanted growths and correct any weaknesses that may have developed.

More specifically, to dissolve gallstones and restore the gallbladder to a clean and happy condition, the following can be recommended:

1. Eliminate fatty, sticky, and oily foods, including any foods that tend to create mucus like nut butters, sweet, and excessive use of flour.
2. Eat a diet close to the standard macrobiotic diet, with a slightly larger emphasis on longer cooking, more saltiness, and foods such as burdock root, pumpkin, and fall squashes.
3. To help dissolve stones, mucus, and fat deposits, apply ginger compresses regularly, eat daikon radish preparations, and drink mugwort tea.

In the event of pain when either a gallbladder or kidney stone is being passed, a hot pack such as a ginger compress, hot water bottle, or a towel soaked in hot water can be applied to the painful area. In addition, drink several cups of a hot, neutral liquid such as water, kukicha twig tea, or grain tea. Together these will increase circulation and open the tubes so that the stone can more easily pass.

Any troubles or pain we may have are just a kind message to us that we need to change our ways.