Page 75 - Spring2009

All Thumbs Book Reviews

Breaking the Vicious Cycle: in the intestine to ferment, the stage is set for
Intestinal Health through Diet intestinal disorders.
By Elaine Gottschall, B.A., M.Sc. A host of conditions can compromise the
The Kirkton Press, 2004 function of the enzymes within the microvilli:
a nutrient-poor diet; decreased stomach acid due
Sometimes great misery and hardship bear to aging, antacids; iodine deficiency; antibiotic
unexpected fruit. When Elaine Gottschall and therapy; and a high consumption of sugars and
her husband struggled in 1958 to find answers for starches. In fact, those with Crohn’s disease have
their eight-year-old daughter’s ulcerative colitis, been found to consume between 20 and 220
I cannot imagine that they might have envisioned percent more carbohydrates than those without
the day when Mrs. Gottschall would detail their the disease.
path to success for others with gastrointestinal Simply suffering from a folic acid or B 12
disorders in her book, Breaking the Vicious deficiency will reduce the vitality and quantity
Cycle: Intestinal Health Through Diet, now in of these enzymes, and I am reminded of yet
its twelfth printing. another reason not to adopt a vegetarian regime:
The Gottschalls had endured three years of those who do not consume animal products find Just as the
medical failures and their daughter’s steadily de- it difficult at best to maintain adequate levels of naturally
clining health, when specialists maintained that B . Most vegetarians are advised to supplement alkaline rumen
12
her condition was incurable, and surgery seemed with this nutrient.
imminent. With so little to lose, they turned to Dr. Samuel Gee, a world-renowned special- of cows is
the Specific Carbohydrate Diet as outlined by ist in pediatric digestive disorders, commented in acidified by a
Drs. Sidney V. and Merrill P. Haas. his time that “what the patient takes beyond his grain-based
Their first sign of the diet’s success was the power to digest does harm.” Gottschall details
disappearance of their daughter’s recurrent night the damage that occurs within the intestine when diet, it is
terrors, and within two years she was free of all sugars and starches are allowed to remain and strongly
digestive difficulties. Most compelling for many ferment. suspected that
to learn, however, is that she eventually returned Just as the naturally alkaline rumen of cows
to a more normal and unrestricted diet, and con- is acidified by a grain-based diet, it is strongly when humans
tinues that way without difficulty today. suspected that when humans consume too many consume too
The central thesis of the book is that many carbohydrates which cannot be fully digested, many
digestive disorders arise from the fermentation our intestinal pH is acidified as well. This sets
of incompletely digested carbohydrates. While in motion a chain of undesirable events. carbohydrates
single sugar carbohydrates, or monosaccharides, The acidic environment facilitates muta- which cannot
require no further action on the part of the body tion of harmless bacteria into pathogenic forms. be fully
to be fully absorbed and are therefore well tol- Fermented byproducts nourish pathogenic bac-
erated, the more complex disaccharides (double teria, yeast and parasites, as well as encourage digested,
sugars) and polysaccharides (starches) must be microbes from the colon to migrate up to the our intestinal
broken down by the fragile enzymes within the small intestine. As microbial overgrowth in- pH is
intestinal microvilli in order to pass into the creases, the intestinal lining attempts to protect
bloodstream to be assimilated. When this process itself. Mucus-producing goblet cells grow in acidified
is incomplete and the sugars and starches remain number and secrete a protective mucosal layer. as well.

SPRING 2009 Wise Traditions 73