I have a very persistent and intractable angina, and started noticing early signs of it about 8 years ago, at age 55.


Since I was in my early 30s, I started an ever more intense search for the good health that was absent from my life. At 30, I'd been smoking heavily, eating junk food, coffee, sweets, etc.; everybody knows this routine. I had severe, blinding migraines for which I was taking increasingly powerful pain-killers, my blood pressure was astronomical, I was severely underweight and mal-nourished, was deeply depressed and had constant digestive problems.


My hair was coming off in bunches on my comb, and when I showered, the drain trap would be covered with hair. One of the most difficult problems I had were really bad hives attacks, covering my entire back, up and down my arms and legs, huge swellings in my lips, and most frightening of all, a time when a hive formed in my esophagus, and started choking me. A friend drove me, straining for air, to a hospital. Luckily, the hive began to diminish in the waiting room.



At 32, I met someone that knew a bit about natural eating, who advised a visit to a country doctor,100 miles from L.A. By this time, I'd managed to stop smoking, partly because I'd had a bout of leukoplakia, pre-cancerous, white patches on the inside of my mouth, caused by smoking, which, I recently learned, much to my shocked surprise, was almost always fatal!


The country doctor, checked my urine and my reflexes. He typed up a diet for me, charged me 20 bucks for the visit, told me to exercise as much as possible, and sent me home.


Morning

freshly made carrot and/or Celery juice and optional fresh juiced apple an ounce of raw sunflower or pumpkin seeds
a handful of lettuce leaves
one serving of fresh fruit


Afternoon
a big salad with all the fresh vegetables and lettuces I wanted to add to it, a touch of olive oil.
another carrot and/or Celery juice
a few ounces of raw, unsalted nuts


Evening
another juice, if I wanted it
another big salad
some lightly steamed veggies
some brown rice, with some steamed veggies, or a yam + veggies



He told me never to eat, when I was upset, when I was very tired.

He told me to rest for a time, after eating. He told me to eat everything in strict moderation.


He told me to banish obsessively negative thinking. He told me
to get lots of sleep. He told me to try eating nearly nothing, one day a week, and just lay back and rest completely.



Two months after I started this diet: I was transformed into a different animal. I didn't recognize myself. I was in a state of shock. My hair stopped falling out, started growing back in, thickened, darkened. My nosebleeds stopped forever. My hives disappeared. I never had another migraine. I slept like a baby. My eyes cleared up. My Depression seemed like it never happened. I had the energy of a wild bull. I could work 12 hours straight without fatigue. My hypertension disappeared into thin air.
My digestion was "perfect." My weight spontaneously increased to complete normalcy. Best of all, I had an irrepressible desire to exercise!



I went back after those 2 months, to visit the country doctor, as he
requested, for a final urine test, for observation, for additional
information, but mostly to see if he would see evidence that I'd followed his advice.


He was pretty satisfied with the results, charged me another 20
bucks, and sent me home. I never saw him again. Recently, I saw a photo of this doctor in a magazine, published to spread the philosophy of health he uses, in his mid 80s, with a big grin on his face, holding up, over his head, what looked to be a 40 or 50 lb dumbell in one hand, still with all his original teeth showing through the grin, no glasses, nearly all of a full head of hair.

John Polifronio