My Elevated Cholesterol and Needless Bypass Surgery

Five days to go and I'm counting. And I truly have begun to keep track. I'll begin refeeding Thursday to give me four days of recovery before I spend the next week on the road and at the IONS conference. He normally refeeds three days before sending folks home. He's making an exception because of my travel plans. The fourth day returns me to three full meals for the day.

We went over my blood test results this morning. All vital organ functions are in the normal range. My potassium level is adequate indicating the electrolytes are maintaining their balance. Because of the intestinal distress of drinking water, I have to make sure that I continue to get enough water. I'm down to just over a quart a day which is still adequate. I just had a sip of water. Yuck - it tastes awful!

My cholesterol level is up to 187 from 157 - excellent! This means the plaque is going out rather than coming in. It's not unusual for a person with advanced stages of heart disease to have their cholesterol double and stay at that level for some time after the fast. The cleansing process that has been started continues after the fast is broken. It can take as long as six months it to return to its new lower value.

Our group facilitator told a story about a faster in the March group. As soon as he arrived, his wife and mother were on the phone regularly telling him he was killing himself and that he should stop. He lasted two days under that barrage. He returned home to undergo quadruple bypass surgery. Statistically there is no increase in life expectancy for heart patients with bypass surgery compared to those without.

Had he remained, he would have obtained partial recovery on the first fast. Advanced stages of blockage need as many as three fasts to get the pipes cleaned out enough to resume a normal life style except for the diet. For one patient, Fuhrman had before and after PET scans. The patient came in with 95% blockage. After the first fast, the blockage was down to 60-70% which was enough to get him out of immediate danger.

The bypass surgery was absolutely unnecessary for the man who went home. Because of his wife and mother's blind ignorance, he passed up the opportunity to return to an active healthy life style and spent $40,000 for the surgery. This underscores the importance of support from those closest to fasting patients. I want to thank you folks once again for listening to my ramblings. I've found journaling to be a helpful way to consciously capture and integrate the meaning of this adventure into my life experience. The power of the approach is why I use the method with my students.