Degenerative diseases appear to be caused or complicated by a process few medical researchers suspected until quite recently: inflammation. Scientists have long linked edema, arthritis, and inflammatory bowel disease to inflammation, but have only recently implicated the process to diabetes, certain cancers, and other unsolvable degenerative conditions. The latest research links heart disease more to various inflammatory conditions (those ending with ’itis’) than to high cholesterol. Inflammation has always played a role in infections. Catch a cold or fever and the nose runs, coughing sets in, temperature rises, and all the other great symptoms that children pray for, as an excuse to ditch school, appear. All of these symptoms are expressions of the inflammatory process. Another form of inflammation has to do with insults to the body, such as parasites, fungi, bruises, broken bones, and smoking. Healthy immune systems use inflammation to right an unbalanced body; when the job is done, inflammation and other symptoms go away.

Blood tests often show chronic, low-grade inflammation in the body. All of the known related problems have been studied and inflammation can’t be linked to any specific cause. Maybe investigators aren’t looking in the right direction for answers. Where does this inflammation with no known cause come from? Is there a way that we can stop this process before it even gets started? Can we prevent diseases? Are you tired of taking anti inflammatory pills?

Are you inflicted with an acute, chronic, or degenerative disease and still searching for an answer? This book will give you a fresh look at your health and how to heal yourself.

Research has shown me that many of the serious, unsolved diseases of modern civilization are expressions of chronic inflammatory processes. Medical therapy is often directed at controlling symptoms rather than removing their cause. My intent is to show you how your own lifestyle can cause inflammation, resulting in disease. I will then provide you with techniques you can use, techniques to effectively respond to an out-of-control immune system and prevent or naturally abort the inflammation process.

Throughout this book, my objective is four-fold:

1. To present the latest research that supports the link between inflammation and disease.

2. To outline alternative causes for conditions that are presently listed in the mainstream literature as having “unknown cause.”

3. To reiterate the importance of finding the sources of your health problems.

4. To show you how to change your lifestyle to remove the problem of inflammation.

At the beginning of each condition listed in Chapter 5, I have given other names, or other diseases with similar problems, for the first disease on the list. Many times these diseases are not mentioned in the chapter, but the information applies to all the diseases.

Pass with me now through to the other side of the looking glass, taking the first steps on your journey to good health. We begin with an understanding of inflammation itself, which will be covered in the next chapter.