A healthy excretory system is necessary.

Besides the skin which helps us to dispose of our toxic wastes, there is our excretory system which takes out what our body does not need, such as excess liquids and food.

When it comes to food, it goes into our stomach, the food is digested and the remainder that has not been used goes down to the colon either to stay there for a short while or a day or even two or three days, sometimes a week or more before it is eliminated from the body.

How long the food stays in the colon depends upon a number of factors. One is the habit of flushing all the feces down every morning, afternoon or evening. Another is the amount of fibres in your diet.

If you have a habit of visiting your 'pleasure chamber' first thing in the morning,then you have not much of a problem.But there are people who are not in the habit of going to the toilet everyday. Some of them can even last for a week without having to bother about flushing waste down.

If that is the case, have we ever thought what could possibly be happening to the waste accumulated there in the colon, rotting there, emitting all kind of gas and multiplying all kind of bacteria and increasing the amount of toxins as a result. Would the toxins leach back into the body through the walls of the colon into the bloodstream into our body? Would not that add problems to the immune system and our health. That is exactly the reason why we have to remove waste as soon as it reaches its terminal point.

So as to avoid such a terrible occurrence, the best move is to eliminate all waste at the earliest possible, just before or after the next meal. Then, there would be no possible contamination of our body with unnecessary toxins. I believe three times a day is best and I have been able to achieve that with the amount of raw greens that I take together with my major meals.

Excess liquids which are not too much can help dissolve some of the waste to be removed through the kidneys and the liver through the urinary organs. However it is up to us to prevent our oprgans from deteriorating by taking clean water and nutritional liquids which do not tax our organs too much.

When it comes to the kidneys, there are a number of sicknesses that can cause renal failure. Other than those illnesses, we should ensure that there is sufficient blood flow as it is through good blood flow that toxins and wastes are brought to the kidneys for elimination from the body. Poor blood flow could be due to dehydration. It could, of course come about as a result of serious injury, burns, bleeding or even through blood loss from surgery. Therefore we should drink sufficient water.

The liver is another eliminating organ of importance. Yet we never think if its health. It's always heart, heart and heart but never the liver. And because of that the drinkers would take as much alcoholic drinks as they feel they can withstand. What about the amount our liver can withstand? What about the amount that can cause what is known as a fat liver? What if the amount we can stand is enough to burn the liver?

Well, I admit I was an egoistic drinker once during my heady young days. Challenging others just because I was clever enough to know how high I can go and stupid enough to think that I could beat them by secretly drinking some water and urinating out the alcohol. I thought i was great until God showed me how wrong I was. Thank God for that! One day, while I was at the hospital I met a middle-aged policeman who was observing his own shaking outstretched hand with tear-drops in his eyes. I was so moved that i just had to ask him what the problem was. He had a burnt liver from drinking alcohol drinks every evening. Since then I understood that was not the way I intended to go. So, I stopped drinking. But stopping is not as easily done as said. It took me a lot of determination and fighting off the "I know you can drink." that my well-intentioned friends constantly urged. Glad to say I won that round.

Sugar can be also a problem when it comes to a fatty liver. Since a fatty liver can lead to many problems and diabetes, we have to be careful about using too much sugar in our food and fruit juices. Why add sugar to fruit juices anyway? Furthermore, sugar looks like such an unhealthy food. Of course, not all kinds of sugar are bad as research seems to find certain kinds of sugar such as cane sugar and sugar from berries good. Whatever it is, limiting sugar intake is apparently a good move.

Well, obviously, looking after our body and its organs is just as important as the type of food, exercise and rest that we are so aware of.

Sweating for health.

When I was young and desired greatly the company of beautiful girls, sweating was my worst problem as there just wasn't any way I could overcome it. So I faced it by remaining in the coolest places available and cooling down every now and then to remain dry.

Then I got married and my beloved wife accepted this wet guy with so much love that I forgot about the sweat and enjoyed ourselves. Sweating just became a part of me and was accepted. I just had to bathe and change clothes often besides using up lots of handkerchiefs. I also realised that my friends also accepted this hot sweating person as I was and am.

Looking back, I believe one of the reasons I have remained as healthy as I am is my ability to lose litres of water every day. In removing that amount of water, so much more toxic substances from the body is also expelled. And I think it is the largest 'removal organisation' in our body. Well, the skin has the largest surface to perform such a task. The more we sweat, the more we drink. And the more we drink, we either sweat more or create more urine. And the urinary tract with the help of the kidneys is another disposal unit we surely need to rid our body of those undesirable toxic substances.

Ah, before I go on, the man who drank too much water came to mind. There was this man who had kidney stones and went through an operation to remove the stones. The doctor advised him to henceforth drink more water. So, wherever he went he carried his bottles of water and, like the good patient he was, drank the litres of water throughout the day. He drank too much, urinated too much and landed in hospital. According to the doctor he was lucky to survive as too much essential minerals, especially potassium, have leached out in his urine. Without potassium, his heart could have stopped beating and that would mean the end of him. So, be careful! Drink enough water but not too much. Too much of a good thing can be, well, too much.

So those we sweat too much like me should include some dehydration salts in their water. However, I have read that sports drinks, those isotonic drinks may not be the best drink for us. What is suggested is sea salt or Himalayan salt. (I have been trying Himalayan salt but to this day I have yet to know how genuine are the Himalayan salts I have bought. I take it but cautiously. I am still reading up on it and hoping to find a brand in Malaysia which provides genuine Himalayan salt.) Sea salt and Himalayan salt are the natural salts found in the sea or in the Himalayans and are not processed like our white table salt.

Thus far, sweating has helped my body remove most of the dissolved toxic substances and through this I have remained healthy. Thank god for that. Of course, sweating is not the only way and so I will be returning to this removal of toxins in a future posting.

Incredible Prahlad Jani.

In my search for truth, inspirational people and knowledge, I have more than once come across incredible deeds; deeds so unbelieveable that I would not have given it a second thought if not for the verification made by professional people with qualifications we have no reason to doubt.

Lately, there was this 83 year old Indian holy man, Prahlad Jani, whom doctors and medical specialists wonder how he could have survived as he claimed to have lived more than seventy years without food and water, living a life of yoga and meditation.

Between April and May 2010, a team of more than 30 medical people and researchers did a study of this man's ability to survive for 15 days without food and water. The study was conducted in a hospital by the Defence Institute of Physiology and Allied Science. During the duration of the study, Prahlad Jani did not drink, eat, bathe or go to the toilet. To rinse his mouth once a day, Prahlad Jani was given a beaker of water in which he spat into after cleaning his mouth to show that none of the water entered his body. At the end of the study, doctors found Prahlad Jani as healthy as anyone half his age. They came to this conclusion after tests on his heart, lungs and memory capacity, and scans on his organs were made.

When I told my son, a science student and an engineering undergraduate, about this incredible man, he did not believe the feat possible. First, there was this claim that Prahlad Jani had not had food or water for seventy years since the age of eleven when he was blessed by the goddess, Amba, with special powers and was able to receive nutrients from the air, although some believe the nutrients could be from the brain, through a hole in his palate. Without food and liquids, he demanded to know how the body of a young boy could develop in size to that of a grown man. That, I must admit, is a valid question.

Then there was the question of dehydration. After more than four days without liquid, what would happen to the blood, its circulation (a cause for caution in dengue cases), and the organs of the body as dehydration of the body worsen?

However, it must be pointed out that Prahlad Jani went through a study with 24-hour surveillance with such aids as CCTV cameras as well as observation of a team of doctors and researchers. Tests were even made on his bladder, revealing that liquid moves in and out of it although no urination took place. As for the expected effects of starvation from not consuming any food, there was no muscle mass loss, no weight loss and no fatigue which was really incredible. How this man managed to stay healthy and maintain his body without damage or loss despite going through fifteen days without food and water is not only beyond us, but also the doctors in the study.

As it defies science and logical understanding, we have no alternative but to fall back on the only other possibility; that this man truly has been blessed by a goddess who had sustained his body by feeding him some kind of life-energy which is his claim.

In which case, the purpose of the study would not have been achieved as the doctors were hoping to discover some way to assist victims of natural tragedies and astronauts who often had to survive for long periods without food or water.

Actually, there was this belief that humans need not rely on food and water for sustenance. This belief is known as Breatharianism, in which it is claimed that the human can be sustained with prana, an energy derived from sunlight, which is similar to Ayurveda teaching.

Drinking water: good or bad (Part 2).

When my wife landed in hospital with Cushing Syndrome, her body fluids seemed to increase. So, doctors gave her pills to encourage the body to get rid of the fluids through urination. With a lot of water lost from the body in the process, a lot of minerals were lost too, exiting the body together with the urine.

One day, a doctor rushed to me and told me that my wife's body lacked potassium and needed potassium rich food. He suggested getting bananas and beef soup. I rushed out for the food. Upon my return, I was told that she had been injected with potassium as there was the danger of her heart stopping.

So, when lots of fluid is lost, many nutrients could also be lost. This could lead to dehydration and other problems such as the possibility of the heart stopping. That was when I learned the importance of having sufficient potassium in our bodies.I also learned that when too much fluid is leaving the body I have to be careful.

On further thought, could the loss of fluid from our bodies during sports bring problems? I have read and heard of long distance runners who have collapsed and died. Were these people dead because of the loss of potassium from their body? Did their heart stop because of that? Or was it dehydration? These are pertinent questions as these people who died were very fit, very healthy individuals.
I thought the knowledge on taking eight to ten glasses of water each day was excellent for health until I read in a newspaper about the person who collapsed because he drank too much water.

According to the report, he thought drinking a lot of water was good for his body. So that was what he did. Perhaps, here is a case of a little knowledge can be dangerous. He did not realise that excessive water intake would mean a constant need to drain the surplus amount. Each time he had to urinate, and it was so much more often for him because of so much water taken, more and more of the important nutrients such as the electrolytes were being drained from the body too. Here is. I believe, a case of lost potassium resulting in a lack of it.

Well, water is good for us, for the health of our body, our skin, our kidneys, our bladder and for losing weight. But like all good things, do not take it to excess. When our body has to remove excess, some nutrients are lost too and that loss could be fatal unless we know the need to supplement what our body lacks.

Drinking water-good or bad? (Part1)

In the year 2001, I was looking after my wife in a hospital when I met a young man with three or four bottles of water. Out of curiosity, I asked him why he was lugging so many bottles around. He turned to me with a serious expression on his face. “Do you know how important it is to have this water with me?”

Then, he explained, “Recently, I had a terrible pain at the lower abdomen. I came to this hospital for an examination and was told that I had stone in the kidney.

Fortunately, the doctor gave me a painkiller and some medicine to make it easier for the stones to pass out from my kidney. Then I asked the doctor why I had these stones in my kidney. According to the doctor, minerals and other metabolic substances such as oxalates and calcium are filtered from the bloodstream into the kidneys. In the kidneys these substances can crystalise and become solid deposits which can attach themselves to the walls of the kidneys. These crystals then grow to become kidney stones. These kidney stones cause pain at the left side of the body, the groin and the lower abdomen. Sometimes, there is blood in the urine.”

So, he asked the doctor for advice to prevent future occurrences.

“Young man, you must drink more water. You must drink eight to ten glasses a day.”

“But how much is that? Nowadays as things become more expensive, glasses are getting smaller and smaller.” He protested about the measurement used for the water.

The doctor thought about it before replying, “You have a point there. It is approximately two and a half to three and a half liters of clear drinking water. This amount of water can help to move the stones out with the urine. If your area has limestone caves, then you may have to consume water taken from another area as lime can crystalise easily and cause kidney stones to form. So can grapefruit juice. It can bring the risk of getting kidney stones.”

The young man protested again, “It’s so difficult to drink so much water. You know, my stomach would be bloated.”

“Young man, when you drink water from a glass, you are also gulping in a lot of air. That is what makes you bloated. Use a straw when you drink and you will find it easier to take in more water. Water is important for your health. Do you know that a lack of water in the body can cause problems to your health?”.

“So, do you understand now why I carry so much clear drinking water with me? I don’t want to have to suffer that pain again.”

Thus, it is important that our body have sufficient water.

Water is not just for preventing kidney stones. Approximately a month ago, my son returned for the Chinese New Year with fever, poor appetite and the urge to vomit each time food is swallowed. It was dengue. Dengue is a viral disease spread by the Aedes mosquito. The mosquito is a carrier and is not affect by the virus. Dengue patients usually die because of internal hemorrhage which leads to blood vessel collapse when dehydration occurs as a result of fluid loss during hemorrhaging.

To overcome the disease and prevent death, blood infusion may be necessary as platelets and red blood cells diminish and blood pressure goes down. So, blood tests are necessary. When platelets, red blood cells and blood pressure return to their normal level, the patient is out of danger.

Regarding fluid loss during hemorrhaging, lots of water is necessary. However, when there is fluid loss there is also minerals and salts loss. Therefore, if the patient can take water orally, it is advisable to drink some isotonic drinks. (Isotonic drinks are drinks formulated to replace fluids, energy and electrolytes. Electrolytes needed by our body are calcium, magnesium, sodium, potassium and chloride.)

From the above it is obvious that we must keep our body sufficiently hydrated always. Having our body sufficiently hydrated also implies that we maintain our body with a PH level of 9.9 which is alkaline. When our body is in an alkaline state, it is healthy and not conducive to diseases while an acidic state caused by drinking soda drinks, tea, coffee and beer is conducive to sickness.

Here is my own true story about how lots of water kept me sober. During my younger days, I was quite egoistic. What I am going to tell is nothing to be proud of as I am revealing a weakness. Nevertheless I am proud to inform that I no longer drink and was able to get out of those drinking situations with my dignity intact. It was tough, putting aside drink after drink when friends who know you can drink come after you to join them. Determination was the only way to exit.

Well, after each sporting event in which I officiated, there was a lot of liquor and food served. Challenged by some friends to take bottle after bottle of liquor, I learned very early that drinking lots of water, just as your head was on the verge of getting too high, too heady and flushed, was one method to bring down the effect of the alcohol. Then, it was a visit to the toilet to get rid of the diluted alcohol. This was followed by another round and the cycle continued. I survived to beat quite a number of them for a few years.

Then, one day, I realised the stupidity of my action when I saw a man with constantly unsteady shaking hands and fingers caused by drinking too much alcohol. I decided to immediately stop the damaging habit once and for all. Thanks to that man, I am still healthy today.