Weight Loss

The rhythm of the heart is dictated by a fascinating electrical, chemical and muscular timekeeping mechanism. This too can go wrong, producing disorders of rhythm or arrhythmias. The pathways along which the signal from the pacemaker cells is sent must be kept open and clear, since otherwise the message may become garbled. If the route is diseased this is exactly what happens: the muscle cells receive instructions to beat either too quickly (tachycardia) or too slowly (bradycardia). In addition, irregularities such as extra beats and atrial fibrillation can occur. Some can be controlled by a regime of drugs, while others benefit from an artificial pacemaker – still others can be prevented altogether.

If, for some reason, the sino-atrial node fails, any other part of the heart can take over its function and keep the heart contracting – albeit at a slower rate. This is seen dramatically in a condition called atrio-ventricular block where, although the heartbeat originates normally in the right atrium, it cannot be conducted down the Bundle of His and so the ventricles produce their own ‘node’. The condition stabilizes with the atria beating at their usual 60 to 70 beats per minute and the ventricles beating at a much slower rate, say 40 to 50 beats per minute. Since the ventricular contractions produce the pulse which is felt at the wrist or neck, this condition can be detected by a slowing of the pulse-rate. If the slowing is severe enough to cause symptoms such as blackouts, the ventricles will require help to speed them up a little, and a pacemaker will probably be inserted.

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No doctor could pinpoint the cause of David’s fainting episodes, but his mother was on a mission to find it.

After the mainstream medical caregivers gave up on David, his mom hired a full-time pediatric nurse and turned to alternative medicine. A homeopath suggested keeping a diary of David’s symptoms, and this experience was revelatory.

Every Tuesday David ended up in the hospital. How could that be?

The journal exposed that on Tuesdays, his mom cleaned the house. Thinking that cleaning might contribute to David’s problems, she didn’t clean the house for two weeks and David slept through the night for the first time in his young life. David’s doctor thought the connection to cleaning was a coincidence, so his mom cleaned the house again and David ended up in the emergency room.

Now on the path to some answers, his mom looked up every chemical listed on the bottles of her cleaning products, read every book she could find, and contacted experts on healthy homes. She soon realized her son had all the symptoms of environmental illness due to exposure to toxic chemicals used in all the commercial cleaning products.

His mom began to remove all the poisons from her home to cure her son. In the process, she was stunned to discover that there were very few pure and healthy products to substitute for the toxic chemicals she’d used to “clean” her home. Determined to find substitutes for toxic chemicals, she made her own cleansers. In fact, her investigation and research into

is, lead to the family creating a successful company that now anufactures a line of natural household cleaners for those ho suffer from allergies, asthma, and chemical sensitivities -s well for those who want the safe, biodegradable products.

David is now eight years old and thriving because his fam-y found and removed the chemicals that made him sick.

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Group therapy has become an increasingly popular form of treatment for a range of problems, including alcohol abuse. (Of course, with AA dating back to 1935, alcoholics have been recovering in groups, long before group therapy became popular or alcohol treatment was even known.) Why the popularity of group treatment methods? The first response often is: “It’s cheaper,” or “It’s more efficient; more people can be seen.” These statements may be true, but a more fundamental reason exists. Group therapy works. It works very well with alcoholics. Some of the reasons for this can be found in the characteristics of alcoholism, plus normal human nature.

For better or worse, people find themselves part of a group. And whatever being a human being means, it does involve other people. We think in terms of our family, our neighborhood, our school, our club, our town, our church. On the job, at home, on the playground, wherever, it is in group experiences where we feel left out or, conversely, find a sense of belonging. Through our contacts with others, we feel okay or not okay. As we interact, we find ourselves sharing our successes or hiding our supposed failures. Through groups we get strokes on the head or a kick in the pants. There is no avoiding the reality that other people play a big part in our lives. Just as politicians take opinion polls to see how they’re doing with the populace, so do each of us run our surveys. The kinds of questions we ask ourselves about our relationships are: “Do I belong?,” “Do I matter to others?,” “Can I trust them?,” “Am I liked?,” “Do I like them?” To be at ease and comfortable in the world, the answers have to come up more ayes than nays. The practicing alcoholic doesn’t fare so well when taking this poll. For the myriad reasons discussed before, relationships with other people are poor. Isolated and isolating, rejecting and rejected, helpless and refusing aid—with such a warped view of the world, alcoholics are oblivious to the fact that the drinking has been causing the trouble. When one is wed to the bottle, other bonds cannot be formed. Attempts to make it in the world sober will require reestablishing real human contacts. Thus groups, the setting in which life must be lived, become an ideal setting for treatment.

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