Arthritis

Categories: The Analysis of Disease States: Helping the Body Recover
Sources: How And When To Be Your Own Doctor

Some years back my 70 years old mother came from the family

homestead in the wilds of northern British Columbia to visit me at

the Great Oaks School. She had gotten into pathetic physical

condition. Fifteen years previously she had remarried. Tom, her new

husband, had been a gold prospector and general mountain man, a

wonderfully independent and cantankerous cuss, a great hunter and

wood chopper and all around good-nat red backwoods homestead

handyman. Tom had tired of solitary log cabin life and to solve his

problem had taken on the care and feeding of a needy widow, my mom.

He began doing the cooking and menu planning. Tom, a little older

than my mother, had no sense about eating but could still shoot

game. Ever since their marriage she had been living on moose meat

stews with potatoes and gravy, white flour bread with jam, black tea

with canned milk, a ritual glass of brandy at bedtime, and almost no

fresh fruit or vegetables.



In her youth, my mother had been a concert pianist; now she had such

large arthritic knobs on all of her knuckles that her hands had

become claws. Though there was still that very same fine upright in

the cabin that I had learned to play as a child, she had long since

given up the piano. Her knees also had large arthritic knobs; this

proud woman with a straight back and long, flowing strides was bent

over, limping along with a cane. She was also 30 pounds overweight

and her blood pressure was a very dangerous 210 over 140, just

asking for a stroke.



Instead of a welcoming feast, the usual greeting offered to a loved

one who has not been seen for a few years, I immediately started her

on a juice fast. I gave her freshly prepared carrot juice (one quart

daily) mixed with wheat grass juice (three ounces daily) plus daily

colonics. She had no previous experience with these techniques but

she gamely accepted everything I threw her way because she knew I

was doing it because I loved her and wanted to see her in better

condition. She also received a daily full body massage with

particular attention to the hand and knees, stimulating the

circulation to the area and speeding the removal of wastes. Every

night her hands and knees were wrapped in warm castor oil compresses

held in place with old sheeting.



I did not use any vitamins or food supplements in her case. I did

give her flavorful herbal teas made of peppermint and chamomile

because she needed the comfort of a hot cupa; but these teas were in

no way medicinal except for her morale.



In three weeks on this program, Grannybelle, as I and my daughters

called her, had no unsightly knobs remaining on either her knuckles

or knees and she could walk and move her fingers without pain within

a normal range of movement. The big payoff for me besides seeing her

look so wonderful (20 years younger and 20 pounds lighter) was to

hear her sit down and treat us to a Beethoven recital. And her blood

pressure was 130 over 90.