This question has appeared from time to time and calls for a visit in the news of
today: Can our body's pH be too alkaline? A friend of mine who helps run a very good
health food store near me reported that she had been raw and had been alkaline for some
time when a person approached her and warned her that "there were diseases that could
come from being too alkaline too."
She experienced something I have taught a lot about, concerning how much our thinking
affects our health. She immediately became acidic (without changing anything) and has
stayed acidic since that time.
This calls for a questioning of the issue to see if we really should be cautioning anyone
to not get too alkaline.
My first step in such searching is to ask myself the question: What does nature suggest? Clearly, we have the
physiology and digestion of
frugivores and, as such, should be enjoying a delightfully alkaline state in our blood
most of the time.
The foods we would eat in a natural setting would leave us with an alkaline pH and in
cultures where they do not know about checking and worrying about their pH, they tend to
stay pretty alkaline if they are eating a natural diet and living a lifestyle close to
nature.
This establishes that alkaline blood is the natural state, but still does not establish
whether we can be too alkaline.
On a side note, I often wonder if perhaps we would all be better off if the whole pH
discussion (and many others) had only taken place in a few alternative healing schools
where they used it as a test to help them create health plans for their clients without
telling them anything new to worry about or mess up.
Some people just mess up anything they have the chance to think about. Fixing this human
failing requires learning that you can be wrong and still be loved; that you can take fine
care of your experience of life; that you are lovable whether you get it right or not.
Unfortunately, the love of many has "waxed cold" to quote a very old scriptural
prophecy about our time. The result has been that love is not felt or really given, in the
sense of absolute love. We do not share and impress that love in kindness, self-restraint,
discipline, effort and trust in each other in the life experience.
Well, let me get back to the point.
Theoretically, if one gets too alkaline, there will be as much malfunction as when someone
gets too acidic. From a purely theoretical standpoint, one could stop metabolizing key
nutrients if they are too alkaline. One could experience their blood not carrying oxygen
if too alkaline. One certainly could fail to get hydrated or use water efficiently if too alkaline. These
are theoretical possibilities, however, not empirical realities.
There are four key reasons for this:
1. Stress is the middle name of just about everyone in modern society. Stress always
results in immediate pH lowering to a more acidic state.
2. Sickness results in immune response which results in a state similar to stress, where
the blood gets thinner and more active and more acidic.
3. Modern diet and the toxic world around us tends to create clutter in the blood and
diminish the blood's ability to carry nutrients. This inefficient state of the blood will
inevitably result in the body becoming more acidic to try to speed the nutrient flow to
vital organs.
4. All known diseases today exist only when there is a pH that is slightly lower (more
acidic) than ideal. This means that no known disease occurs that is experienced while
being too alkaline.
There are two more things that should be noticed about this before going on:
First, if someone wanted to sabotage the health of the world it would be a crafty trick to
put things into the environment that would cause rapid shift to the too alkaline state. We
are not well prepared to handle this. Of course, as soon as people became afraid of dying
from it, our blood would shift right back to acid and we would be healed!
Second, the reality of being too alkaline (pH too high) exists as the product of, not the
cause of, a disease. Certain malfunctions in the body buffering systems (designed to keep
the pH stable and healthy) can result in a too alkaline state. Such a state would not be
the cause, however, but the outcome.
The conclusion, then, is that there are no diseases, under normal conditions, that are the
product of one's pH being too high. Having said that, there are a few principles to
discuss in connection with this that will help us care for our health more wisely.
Principle 1: Sudden alkaline shock
Sudden alkaline shock is what some professionals create when treating cancer. The healer might put the person
on a program that includes several very important things, but one of those is sudden
alkaline shock where the alkalizing foods and herbs and habits result in such a
dramatic shift upward in pH that the body goes too alkaline and often starts to oscillate.
By oscillate, I mean that the body becomes extremely alkaline and then overcompensates
back to acidic and then, because of the alkaline program, it goes to extreme alkaline
again. This is vital to get the body's immune system to clear out all
cancer (well, also what we think can cure cancer almost immediately). The immune system
functions higher when the body is slightly acidic and the extreme alkaline moments
actually reduce the size and virulence of the cancer. Many healers seem to use this system
very effectively for treating cancer.
This can be induced unwisely on certain health programs and accidentally in certain
situations.
For example, I took a small group on a healing and meditation retreat into the high
mountains of Wyoming. We camped at 10 or 11 thousand feet and made day hikes up as high as
12 thousand 3 hundred feet.
While there, we drank only spring water coming from a glacier right above the lake we
camped near.
In addition to this, we took along a totally raw selection of fruit (limes) and some
totally raw energy bars that were highly alkalizing and healing; you can find the recipes
on (www.KalsSchool.com) on the
downloads page -- available to registered users.
Being an herbalist, I also planned for us to eat lots of the wild greens along the way.
While this sounds like a pretty good program, it actually had one serious drawback -- the
fact that we would all get stuck in extreme alkaline shock. Because of the spring water,
which was, itself, extraordinarily alkaline, we got stuck in alkaline and could not get
back to acidic. Further, alkaline water does not hydrate well and we had gone to a much
higher altitude where we needed more hydration
help, not less.
The consequence was weakness and extreme dehydration. We had not thought to bring along a
watermelon or distilled water or some vinegar
even, to make for a slightly acidic hydration source. We just cavalierly kept drinking
from the spring and doing half a dozen other things to make ourselves alkaline.
This was unwise and made it hard to make the trek down the mountain! When we got home we
ate large amounts of watermelon and were hydrated in just a few hours.
Sometimes, acidity is quite necessary for survival and over alkalinity can be a hazard.
Even in serious illness, it is important for the body to be able to regain a slightly
acidic state in order for the immune system to function well.
This is the natural way of things. Most of the time the body stays alkaline, but it is
easy to switch back to acidic because there are no unnatural or extreme alkaline agents in
the body. The body will switch to acidic to clean up, to kill invaders, to rapidly
hydrate, to kill cancer, to heal rapidly, to deal with threats and so forth.
So, we stay alkaline to keep disease away, but when disease strikes or finds its way in,
we want the body to be able to switch back and forth freely.
This leads to the conclusion that we should watch out for alkalizing substances and
programs that are so extreme as to attempt to manipulate the body in an almost drug-like
way to be extremely alkaline.
Some programs I have heard about are like this and, if used at all, should be kept to a
short time frame, such as two weeks. These are programs where no acidic foods are taken,
where water is alkalized before drinking it, where supplements that are alkaline mineral
based are used, where extremely alkalizing fruits or supplements are taken every day, etc.
Rather a person should adhere to the basic alkaline rules that are taught at
KalsSchool.com, which are that we keep our body clean, eat only what nature provides and
work on improving the way we think and what we believe about life and ourselves in life.
We also drink distilled water, which is slightly acidic and, as such, is very usable as
water to flush the system and to hydrate as much as water can hydrate. Most importantly,
water is used to flush the system.
Alkaline water does not do this well at all.
Principle 2: Stress and cleansing
Stress and cleansing always result in an acidic state... perhaps I should rephrase that --
stress and cleansing always involve an acidic state. This is because the body does
everything faster and with more aggression when it is acidic and is calmer and quieter
when it is alkaline.
The person who wants to stay, overall, more alkaline should be aware that cleansing should
be done intensively and then followed by a healthy, natural diet and meditation, healthy
thinking and believing and loving life, feeling that it is okay to be loved and wrong at
the same time and feeling that he/she can handle life for him/her.
Additionally, when one eats under stress, the food becomes a poison. The person will
generally digest the food to be acidic (if she/he digests it at all) and then the person
will find that his/her body will oscillate asynchronously -- meaning at the wrong times
and out of balance with nature and harmony and personal peace and health.
Finally, when one is under a lot of stress and the stress management is not working (I
think this happens to all of us some times) one should not drink lots of pure distilled
water by itself. Distilled water works so well for flushing the system that a problem
arises when stress is high. Normally, the body protects its vital nutrients from water and
keeps them protected while allowing wastes and deposits to be flushed away. Under extreme
stress, the body kicks out vital nutrients and loses control over them.
Thus when stress is high, we make herbal teas or drink water with lots of lemon in it or sea salt stirred into it or some such
thing that will make it less aggressive to vital nutrients, without interfering with its
ability to flush out wastes.
Principle 3: Seek wise solutions
i. Avoid unnatural means of alkalization, such as chemicals and alkaline water. If there
is some need to use such things, keep it to two weeks and no more. If you already have an
alkaline water system, add lemon to it before drinking it. This will help. I would also
alternate by drinking distilled water periodically to keep my body well flushed.
ii. Keep your water acidic by drinking distilled water or by adding lemon or vinegar or by
making an herbal tea that is not too alkalizing.
iii. Use sodium sources for natural pH mitigation. This includes celery and carrot juice,
sea salt, celery seed, seaweeds and so
forth. This manages pH without creating alkaline shock.
iv. Exercise helps to keep a natural smooth oscillation wave going that helps the body go
through healthy cycles of alkaline and acid states. Of course, exercise uses up the
nutrients you are eating to build new you, so any exercise program should include plenty
of really healthy, natural, live food.
v. Emphasize digestion always. Whether stressed or not, digestion is the thing that is
most supportive or destructive, depending on whether it is working or not. Eat raw fruit
20 minutes before each meal, take ¼ teaspoon of cayenne pepper in a little water 15
minutes before each meal, chew your food lots and enjoy it fully. Seek peace with everyone
and everything and yourself in your heart before you take a bite and stay that way or stop
eating until you regain it.
vi. Keep your body nourished and clean with live foods and at least seasonal cleansing.
Eat a wide spectrum of healthy food and eat with the seasons as much as possible.
vii. Understand that the advantage to using whole, live herbs, instead of isolated
supplements for your alkalizing and cleaning is that they will generally allow the natural
oscillation to continue to take place.
Until next time, Kal Sellers, MH (4.24.2008, Kal Sellers (see all articles by this author)
Key concepts: water, cancer
and cleansing) http://www.naturalnews.com/023097.html
About the author
Kal Sellers, MH is a lifelong student and practitioner of the natural healing arts.
Kal is a Master Herbalist, a Massage Therapist, Technician of the Rolf Method of
Structural Integration, Iridologist, Mind-Body Medicine Practitioner, Mental
Re-programmer, Life Coach, Natural Nutritionist, Reflexologist and more.
Kal is currently attending Life University in preparation for chiropractic school.
Kal currently operates and maintains www.KalsSchool.com
an on-line school for natural healing and herbal medicine.
Kal also maintains www.BestFoodist.com
as the website for the distribution of his and his wife's books on natural nutrition and companion recipe book
(Traci's Transformational Kitchen Cookbook and Traci's Transformational Health
Principles).
Kal and Traci have five children, the last three of which were delivered at home, the last
by Kal. They live now in Powder Springs, GA where they maintain live classes on food and
medicine for anyone choosing to master medical independence and life-long optimal health!