Chronic Disease and the Time Factor in Recovery

28 Jun Chronic Disease and the Time Factor in Recovery

Paul A Goldberg MPH, DC, DACBN, DCBCN

Chronic Diseases last a very long time. In the practice of medicine, chronic diseases involve a lifetime of disease management while the patient sinks further and further into a degenerative state. The Goldberg Tener Clinic Bio-Hygiene System has a much more optimistic goal of returning patients medically diagnosed with chronic diseases to a state of reliable health and vitality and the methodology to make this possible for many chronically ill people.

This is not to say that the road back to good health from chronic disease is either easy or quick. Returning to health from Chronic Disease takes right action, perseverance, effort and time. The BioHygiene System of the Goldberg Tener Clinic, individually implemented, has returned thousands of patients with serious chronic illnesses to health, but it is not a miracle. It is the outcome of understanding causes and building health as opposed to treatment of symptoms. BioHygiene does not supersede Natural Law nor try to bend or break it. It works with Nature to create the right actions and conditions for health to have the opportunity to return.

Patience is a virtue required to accomplish most important objectives in life. Unfortunately it is in short supply. Many people today are in a frenzied hurry to get what they want… and they want it now. When in discomfort they want a cure, instant relief at the flick of a finger and the writing of prescription.

Chronic disease develops over many years. To lose our health takes an extended period of time, usually many years, as the body continually does its best, even under adverse conditions to retain its balance. Likewise, to regain our health even with the right effort, also takes an extended period of time. Acute diseases, which almost always precede chronic disease, are addressed more rapidly by the body as by definition they have been present for a shorter period of time and are not well ingrained in the individual. In acute illness, the body is rarely as debilitated as it is once we have evolved into chronic illness. Once the body has entered a state of chronic disease, however, it has succumbed to whatever abuses have been heaped upon it and is no longer is able to bear up to the burdens it has been made to endure. It has given up the fight. At this point a careful evaluation and plan of action need to be created in order to create the conditions necessary for it to regain its energies and recover.

Overindulgence in food, excessive exercise, work, poison habits such as drugs, alcohol, poor diet, lack of sleep, mental stressors and lack of positive health giving influences such as sunlight and fresh air rest are common predecessors to chronic disease. These factors and others are involved in the building of chronic disease and must be ferreted out and addressed if we are to have hope of recovery. Simply burdening the patient with toxic drugs, hormones, supplements of all kinds and a variety of treatments unrelated to causal factors is sure to fail as millions of chronically ill people can testify to.

In BioHygiene we delve into the patient’s past often uncovering numerous long-term etiological factors in the evolution of their disease. These have over time caused the body’s defenses to capitulate and must be addressed. Drug usage is common in our population from both legal and illegal, prescription and over the counter indulgences. Alcohol is engaged in freely and widely accepted. Many are foolish enough to believe, based on studies sponsored by the spirits industries, that alcohol, a cytotoxic, mutagenic material, is healthy for us in “moderation”. Many think the same for marijuana. We want to believe what we want to believe. We want to continue to engage in the behaviors that got us ill and yet recover our health anyways. Nature, however, is blind to such foolishness.

Even behaviors beneficial for us in moderation such as exercise, work, sexual relations, and good quality foodstuffs are destructive when engaged in to excess. The term moderation in all things might be better put as moderation in all good things.

Chronic disease is created step by step over an extended time. When the first signs of ill health appear with indigestion, fatigue, skin outbreaks, joint and muscle pains and other acute symptoms most seek out medical or alternative medical treatments and cures that have not the least bearing on why those problems started. Covering up symptoms leads to the progression of the acute problems into a variety of chronic disease over the years.

Commonly engaged in and accepted behaviors such as taking antibiotics, antacids, steroid usage, hormone replacement and a variety of painkillers are employed for everything that ails us but the problems are left untouched. The body therefore must then deal not only with the problems themselves but also with the toxic effects of the potions and pills, including numerous nostrums and remedies from the Alternative, Functional and Complimentary Practitioners, that are eagerly utilized by an ill informed public. For those suffering with episodes of acute disease, recovery will likely occur despite all these medical and alternative medical treatments. In time, however, chronic disease evolves and all the drugs and nostrums of these practitioners prove to be nothing more than ongoing interfering factors in recovery despite the patient’s faith that if they only find the right drugs or supplements their health will return. It is a fool’s paradise. Years of poor diet, sunlight deprivation, lack of fresh air, destructive sleep habits, multi-tasking and long hours staring at television, video games and computer screens starting at a young age along with other factors, combine to form a perfect storm for the genesis of chronic diseases and pills, potions and nostrums, whether medical or alternative medical, cannot address these. Causes must be identified and addressed and hard work initiated with a high degree of perseverance and patience.

Chronic diseases take time to create but today many begin to suffer as children. Allergies, asthma, behavioral disorders are rapidly increasing in terms of both quantity and severity as we create young people with poor resistance to disease and increasing sensitivities to their environments. Our neighborhoods appear deserted and are no longer active with children playing in their yards and in the streets.  Where are the children? In their closed rooms dumb stricken by the screen on their computers playing video games and talking on their cell phones using the latest “Apps”… all this is now swept into the realm of normalcy and no one sees it as strange any longer.

If not already sickly and weak as children, as we enter our twenties a few aches and pains appear. Most tend to ignore the messages given. Bowel issues, constipation, diarrhea, allergies, the new plague of eosonophilic esophagitis, behavioral disorders, autism, skin problems, early distortion of visual acuity, all are signs things are not right and that chronic disease lurks outside the front door. We respond by treating symptoms with drugs and potions, continuing our mis-behaviors till years later a chronic disease develops as if “out of the blue”. When diseases medically called names such as rheumatoid arthritis, digestive diseases, neurological problems, inflammatory bowel diseases, and other chronic diseases appear we imagine that we must have caught something and run to the Medical or Alternative Medical Physician to make it disappear with a pharmaceutical wonder, little realizing that we have been the architects of our diseases and that our health has been on the decline for many years.

As the culmination of adverse habits, behaviors and emotions comes to the surface and chronic disease titles are assigned, a short cut back to health is desperately sought after. Chronic diseases occurring through a combination of genetics and wrong living over half a lifetime, cannot be resolved overnight. Health cannot be restored without addressing causes and doing the hard work of rebuilding the body appropriately.

After doing a thorough investigation as to causal factors through an extensive interview, physical examination and laboratory analysis, all part of the BioHygiene System, we present the findings to the chronically ill patient with our thoughts on what factors contributed to the evolution of disease in the particular patient’s case. An initial plan is presented to start with. The patient is instructed that they should not expect instant relief and that ups and downs are likely. This will include in many cases some initial weight loss and exacerbation of symptoms as the innate healing potential of the body is supported and the tearing down of old tissues and building up of new ones, with all the metabolic processes this entails, commences.

Despite being forewarned, some expect near instant relief from a condition that took half a lifetime to develop. Some also want to continue to engage in the same habits that led to the disease in the first place. The glutton wants to continue in their gluttony, the over-exerciser and work addict wants to continue to overwork and over exercise. The drug taker wants to continue their litany of pharmaceuticals to dull any discomforts.

Some of these patients have often been under the care of the Medical Matrix for five, ten or more years hoping that the taking of poisonous drugs would solve their problems while they simultaneously engaged in their destructive behaviors. Upon starting a BioHygienic Program, some expect that by identifying and addressing causal factors that they should feel well in a matter of a week or two.  Not only is instant relief expected but also the patient wants to continue the same habits that led to his or her problems and/or keep taking the drugs that have proven to be destructive. Insanity is defined as doing the same action over and over again and expecting a different result. When we engage in the same habits that resulted in our being sick and expect to get well anyway, we meet that definition.

There are those willing to enact some aspects of the plan. A patient for example might be willing to change their diet but not give up over-exercising. Another is willing to give up coffee, but it is not convenient for them to get to bed prior to midnight. Some will cherry pick what changes they will make and which they won’t. Nature, however, once chronic disease has begun, is not so selective or so forgiving. The will to get well has to be accompanied by a commitment that includes addressing all the factors that led to the genesis of disease, including all hygienic factors. Nature does not make bargains.

We are sympathetic to the patient who says they must continue with the job they hate for financial reasons. We understand the patient who contends they must continue to work a nightshift or work overtime on a regular basis even though that does not allowing themselves the opportunity to obtain sufficient rest. We are sympathetic with the student loans to pay off, the escalating house mortgage, sending little Jimmy to the expensive private school and a host of other reasons that are argued for not being able to follow the needed health reform methods that are suggested in any particular case.

Our being sympathetic and understanding however does not get the job done. Nature demands what nature demands and we don’t have the power to negotiate with her, as some patients seem to think we can. Sacrifices have to often be made in recovering our health…we sometimes must retreat from the battle in order to win the war and that might mean cutting back on the amount of hours we work, forgoing the expensive family vacation one year, and sending Jimmy to a public school so that his Mom or Dad can reduce their working hours and have a shot at recovering their health. It might mean going to marriage counseling, going to bed early, halting obsessive exercise habits, eliminating poisonous drug and food habits and addressing a myriad of health destroyers.

How long does it take to recover from chronic disease? There are many factors involved in making this estimation. How old is the patient, how much reserves do they have to effect healing with, how many drugs have they taken in the past and for how long, what is their genetic background, what body parts if any have been removed, how well do they adhere to instructions given, how disciplined are they in following through. What is their home environment like i.e. is it conducive to healing? What is their level of familial support? Will they give full attention to all the aspects needed for healing rather than just focusing unduly on a single aspect such as diet, exercise or supplements? Can they take responsibility for the restoration of their health under our guidance and stay the course? Over the years thousand of our patients have and their pictures, testimonials and before and after lab studies showing dramatic changes in their inflammatory indices, blood sugar levels, blood lipids and other markers of health and disease bear solid evidence to the value of identifying and addressing causes and having the determination and perseverance to carry out the needed instructions despite the effort that is required. To have the will to get well. See two examples of this above.

Good health once lost impacts all aspects of our lives. It turns a world of marvel and beauty into one of pain and sorrow. To regain it takes right actions. It takes perseverance. It takes time.

Paul A. Goldberg, MPH,DC,DACBN,DCBCN
Director, The Goldberg Tener Clinic