Fasting: The only introduction you’ll ever need. Leon Chaitow, N.D., D.O.

hydrotherapy methods such as the ‘neutral bath’ (see Chapter 6), the use of non-specific bodywork (‘wellness massage’ and aromatherapy relaxation methods, for example) and employment of techniques which have a balancing, harmonizing, normalizing influence – including some herbal and acupuncture methods.

      None of these methods, in themselves, is ‘curative’, but all allow a healing potential to operate more efficiently because they offer the body–mind complex essential time, space and reduced demands, which encourages normalization and recovery, irrespective of whatever is wrong.

      This is not to say that problems can be completely removed in all cases, since in many instances the processes that have already taken place will have created so much change, so much damage, that the best that can be hoped for is that matters do not get worse, or that there is a marginal improvement. This is, nevertheless, an infinitely better outcome than a steady decline into ever more ill health.

      Trevor Salloum ND, a naturopathic practitioner, describes the benefits of fasting as:

      … decreased weight, clearer skin, increased elimination, tissue repair, decreased pain and inflammation, increased concentration, relaxation, plus spare time and savings in the cost of food. Perhaps the greatest benefit is the satisfaction that you are taking a major role in improving your health.¹

       FASTING’S ANTI-AGEING POTENTIAL

      Apart from having to constantly adapt to the stress of life, another inevitable factor is always at work which makes demands on our adaptive processes – ageing.

      There are a number of competing theories as to just what constitutes the mechanics of the ageing process, but there is increasing agreement that it is probably a combination of interacting elements – all happening at the same time. This was neatly summarized in Newsweek (5 March 1990) by journalists Sharon Begley and Mary Hager:

      One theory holds that the changes that accompany ageing are the inevitable result of life itself. DNA, the molecule of heredity, occasionally makes mistakes as it goes about its business of synthesizing proteins; metabolism produces toxic avengers (free radicals) that turn lipids [fats] in our cells rancid and proteins ‘rusty’. This damage accumulates until the organism falls apart like an old jalopy…