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HEALTHY
EATING LEADS TO HEALTHY DIGESTION
The
more I study nutrition, the more I am convinced that we need to
eat more raw, uncooked, unprocessed food. I am confident that
most of us would notice significant improvements in our energy,
vitality and overall health if we increased the amounts of raw
foods in our diet.
Most
raw food, like our bodies, is very perishable. When raw foods
are exposed to temperatures above 118 degrees, they start to
rapidly break down, just as our bodies would if we had a fever
that high. One of the constituents of foods which can break down
is enzymes. Enzymes help us digest our food. Enzymes are
proteins and they have a very specific 3-dimensional structure
in space. Once they are heated much above 118 degrees, this
structure can change.
Once
enzymes are exposed to heat, they are no longer able to provide
the function for which they were designed. Cooked foods may
contribute to digestive malfunctions, because their enzyme
content is damaged and thus requires us to make our own enzymes
to process the food. The digestion of cooked food uses valuable
metabolic enzymes in order to help digest your food. Digestion
of cooked food demands much more energy than the digestion of
raw food. In general, raw food is so much more easily digested
that it passes through the digestive tract in 1/2 to 1/3 of the
time it takes for cooked food.
Eating
enzyme-dead foods places a burden on your pancreas and other
organs and overworks them, which eventually exhausts these
organs. Many people gradually impair their pancreas and
progressively lose the ability to digest their food after a
lifetime of ingesting processed foods.
In
1930, the Swiss researchers at the institute of Chemical
Chemistry found that if a food had been heated beyond a certain
temperature (unique to each food), or if the food was processed
(refined, chemicals added, etc.), this always caused a rise in
the number of white cells in the blood.
The
researchers named this reaction 'pathological leukocytosis',
since the body was reacting to highly altered food. They tested
many different types of foods and found that if the foods were
not refined or overheated, they caused no reaction. The body saw
them as 'friendly foods'. However, these same foods, if heated
at too high a temperature, caused a negative reaction in the
blood, a reaction found only when the body is invaded by a
dangerous pathogen or trauma.
The
worst offenders of all, whether heated or not, were processed
foods which had been refined (such as white flour and white
rice), or pasteurized (a process in which milk is flash-heated
to high temperatures to kill bacteria), or homogenized (also
seen in milk where the fat in milk is subjected to artificial
suspension), or preserved (chemicals are added to food to delay
spoilage or to enhance texture or taste). In other words, foods
which were changed from their original God-given state.
Raw
foods and digestive enzymes
Raw,
uncooked foods are rich in enzymes. Enzymes are needed for the
digestive system to work. They are necessary to break down food
particles so they can be utilized for energy. The human body
makes approximately 22 different digestive enzymes which are
capable of digesting carbohydrates, protein and fats. Raw
vegetables and raw fruit are rich sources of enzymes.
Lack
of digestive enzymes can be a factor in food allergies. Symptoms
of digestive enzymes depletion are bloating, belching, gas,
bowel disorders, abdominal cramping, heartburn and food
allergies.
All
of us lose our ability to produce concentrated digestive enzymes
as we grow older. In cases where age is a factor, or where lack
of digestive enzymes causes food allergies, supplementation may
be helpful.
What
are Digestive Enzymes?
Digestive
enzymes are special catalytic proteins that help your body break
food down so your body can utilize the complete spectrum of
nutrients in the food we eat. Unfortunately, food enzymes, which
are sensitive to heat, are usually inactivated when food is
cooked. This leaves your body with the challenge of trying to
break down foods for absorption into your system with no help
from the natural enzymes that would otherwise be present in many
of the foods we eat. While your body can break down foods with
no help, it may put additional strain on your system. Digestive
enzymes act to supplement and maximize the activity of the
body’s own enzymes and the "friendly" bacteria our
bodies need.
Our
lifestyles and diets are constantly changing. If the last 25
years are any indication, these changes are usually not for the
best. Foods that would otherwise offer us their own added
enzymes to help our bodies absorb more nutrients are
increasingly processed, heated for extended shelf life, and
stripped of vital elements. The problem is that in making
increasing numbers of foods "safe" for ingestion, we
are in some cases making foods less healthy for our systems.
This means our bodies now need to work harder to absorb the same
nutritional content as it may have just a few years ago.
The
more food that you can eat raw, the better. If you do cook your
food, the best way to cook food is to lightly steam or stir-fry
them. Eat as few over-processed and over-cooked foods as
possible. The body has a difficult time digesting fried,
pasteurized, barbecued, dried, and other over-processed and
over-cooked foods which you find in boxed and processed foods.
I
would encourage you to consume at least 50% of your food as
uncooked. Raw fruits and vegetables should be eaten at every
meal to ensure proper digestive health. If you’re having
ongoing digestive problems, you may want to look into taking a
high-quality digestive enzyme supplement to help relieve any
digestive discomfort.
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