Rheumatoid Arthritis and Osteoarthritis-Sounding Off

Posted on 12/21/2010 by Paul Harris

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Welcome to Rheumatoid Arthritis and Osteoarthritis For The Layman - a trusted source where you can discover the truth about arthritis pain relief therapies, arthritis natural cure methodologies and other techniques that may or may not be appropriate for your needs.

I created Rheumatoid Arthritis and Osteoarthritis For The Layman to help you arrive at intelligent decisions about what you can do to naturally, safely and effectively address and recover from your arthritis. My feeling is that you should have every reasonable protection when dealing with people and companies that sell arthritis-related products, books and services, online and offline, that offer solutions to your chronic arthritic complications but often have no real-world experience or that exercise little common sense in dealing with people stricken with arthritis.

Who am I to show such concern for your wellbeing? I’m Paul Harris, a certified nutritionist, health author, complimentary alternative medicine practitioner and, right at this moment, someone you may want to listen to.  I once had a painful case of rheumatoid arthritis – particularly in both knees - that abruptly ended my career as an aspiring track star in high school and which dragged me away, kicking and screaming, from my favorite team sport during my teens and early 20s…basketball. This was no small matter given the fact my brother played college basketball and my dad played in a professional basketball league as a young man. So, when I tell you arthritis ruined my life and dispelled many of my fondest dreams, I’m dead serious.

After many painful and fruitless years of trying numerous home remedies and bogus cures for my condition, I eventually found someone who taught me nature’s one, trusted way to successfully reverse and recover from juvenile rheumatoid arthritis, rheumatoid arthritis, osteoarthritis or any other manifestation of this dreaded rheumatic disorder. I discovered nature’s secret mechanism – her unfailing system – for restoring health and wellness to anyone who elects to follow the narrow path to her inner sanctum and uncover her formidable curative healing powers.

The program worked so well that I adopted it, made a few changes to reflect current healthy trends in nutritional research and I’ve been using it successfully with patients, clients and readers of my health publications for over 2 decades. The guy who introduced me to nature’s healing process and became my best mentor was the late Bernard Jensen, DC, ND, PhD.

Dr. Bernard Jensen, used to say;

“Only nature can cure disease. The only thing any doctor can cure is a ham. Nature can cure disease but she needs the right opportunity to do it.”

Jensen personally saw over 350 thousand patients during his long and illustrious career as a Nature Curist, many of which were some of the worst cases of arthritis you could imagine.  His was a voice of wisdom you could rely on. His work with arthritics from around the globe was legendary. I know…I was there for 11 years watching many of these “miraculous cures” take place at Jensen’s Hidden Valley Health Ranch in Escondido, California.

During the past two decades I’ve brought much of the great man’s philosophy and methodologies to my own practice. If you’ll allow me, I’d like to use my extensive knowledge and experience to help you find a natural, sensible solution to your rheumatic ailment.

Maybe you have rheumatoid arthritis or osteoarthritis and, after quickly surfing this blog, you’ll soon be on your way to another online location in your quest to discover the one, elusive gemstone of information that can rid you of your rheumatic troubles and bring peace and happiness to your life.

Or maybe you’re tired of worrying about how much cartilage or synovial membrane tissue you’re losing daily and you’re seriously looking for arthritis pain relief treatments and arthritis natural cure methodologies that actually work. Regardless of your motivation, I welcome your presence here and any comments you may wish to leave to share with other site visitors.

FYI, both sides of my family have been struck hard by difficult cases of rheumatoid arthritis and crippling osteoarthritis. I was able to help those in the family who would listen. It was tough – every one of them, save one, fought me at every turn. But the few who heeded my advice pulled through okay. They listened! That’s all I ever asked of them and it’s all I’ll ever ask of you – hear me out!

Periodically I may mention something unconventional that your favorite arthritis columnists or bloggers don’t agree with. That’s fine and understandable. Their experiences have taught them one thing while my 25+ years in the trenches have taught me something else.

The fact that we differ doesn’t mean any of us are wrong in our views. It simply indicates that different folks have and need different strokes. After all is said and done, we must all share this planet and get along, regardless of how radical or unpopular our views and beliefs may be.

When you want straight answers about serious rheumatic disorders such as rheumatoid arthritis, osteoarthritis and a host of other arthritic complications, be sure to bookmark this blog and drop by often. Sure, I’ll throw in a few interesting articles and videos from other online sources to spice up your experience here. We’ve all come to expect that with any organized and contextually meaningful blog.

But I guarantee that with each fresh, new entry that I personally write and post here at Rheumatoid Arthritis and Osteoarthritis For The Layman I’ll have something to say to you that I’ll bet my last dollar can help you in your quest to overcome rheumatoid arthritis, osteoarthritis or whatever rheumatic condition you may have. At the very least I’ll help you find natural, safe and biologically-friendly remedies for those annoying arthritic aches and pains. Talk soon.

Here’s a video I thought you’d find interesting…

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Juvenile Arthritis- Are We Throwing in the Towel and Crying Uncle?

Posted on 02/22/2011 by Paul Harris

What’s the deal with juvenile arthritis? I think most folks know it as juvenile rheumatoid arthritis or pediatric rheumatoid arthritis or even juvenile idiopathic arthritis. Regardless of what you call it, this is one rheumatic disorder we really need to put our heads together and figure out a way to get rid of it ASAP. There are few things that can happen to young, happy parents that can cause as much havoc, stress and sadness in their lives as having a child diagnosed with juvenile arthritis. 

This is a sickness that gives no quarter. It will not only affect the joints but can also lead to cataracts, glaucoma, blindness or stunted growth if not treated properly, or, worse, if treated improperly. Kids who exhibit common symptoms of this disease – lack of physical coordination, upset sour tummy, excess flatulence, headaches, and painful swollen joints – require immediate, special; care. I’ll tell you from personal experience that no amount of drugs, fancy diets or physical therapy will reverse this hideous ailment if you don’t allow natural healing forces within the body to control and govern the entire healing process. 

As my wise mentor, Dr. Bernard Jensen, used to say so often; “only nature can cure disease”. He was correct in that assertion and proved it, conclusively, over 65 years of direct patient care where he rendered care to over 350,000 patients – many thousands of which had every conceivable form of rheumatic disorders including juvenile arthritis. I have also seen how quickly and efficiently nature can reverse illness and restore health if given the opportunity to do as such. Juvenile arthritis is not an invincible foe. It may seem as such if you listen to the hype about it coming from traditional medical circles. We CAN beat this thing and we MUST! 

Our kids need a fighting chance to lick this monster once and for all. I’d really like to see some of our best minds in the traditional and nontraditional fields come together to share ideas and come up with a mutually agreed on protocol that could pull our youngsters away from the embrace of juvenile arthritis. I have a few interesting ideas. Let me know your thoughts.

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Arthritis Cure: The Amazing Healing Power Of A Therapeutic Fast

Posted on 02/10/2011 by Admin

If you are looking for a sure-fire arthritis cure through drug therapy or specialized diet alone, there is none. However, there is a way of bringing about the same results you may be searching for by completely natural means. I’m referring to therapeutic fasting. Through the medium of a supervised therapeutic fast you can jumpstart a virtually unknown and suspected cleansing agent of nature – autolysis.

How does autolysis relate to your desire to find an arthritis cure? Think about it. If you had a car that wasn’t running well due to a lot of oil sludge buildup, what would you do? Clean it out, of course. The same principle applies to your body when you are stricken with arthritis. In order to begin the process of regenerating your body you must first clean out old mucus settlements, metal and mineral deposits, morbid cellular waste, excess carbonic and uric acids, calcium deposits in your joints and harmful bacteria. A therapeutic fast is the mechanism best suited to accomplish this. 

In most common forms of arthritis, such as rheumatoid arthritis, osteoarthritis and juvenile rheumatoid arthritis, the body is heavily laden with carbonic and uric acid and excessive calcium deposition in joints or soft tissue structures. The underlying causes of this condition are usually poor nutrition, lack of relevant exercise, poor breathing, lack of adequate daily rest, low vitality, buildup of excessive bodily waste and stressful life pursuits. Until a strong and persistent effort is made to get rid of these factors your body will further deteriorate in direct proportion to the time it devotes to travelling the same path that led to development of your disease state. 

To begin the process of engineering an intelligently planned and executed natural arthritis cure that can last a lifetime, you will need to stimulate your body into breaking down and subsequently expelling toxic material that has served as a breeding ground for the development and steady growth of your symptom complex.  It is deep within these hardened mucus pockets that inorganic minerals, metals, harmful bacteria, dead bodily tissue and other undesirable substances find refuge away from the body’s normal channels of waste elimination. Simultaneous with this activity you will begin loosening, melting away and absorbing hardened calcium deposits into the blood, lymph or interstitial fluid between cells for use elsewhere in your body or to be eliminated.  

You may ask why your body undergoes this magical cleansing process. Your body engages autolysis in its frantic endeavor to locate sources of nourishment so that your cells can continue to feed. Each cell of your body – particularly your central nervous system, brain and heart muscle – must be supplied with a steady source of nutriment even though you are not physically feeding your body externally in any way.

Autolysis usually kicks in at about the third or fourth day of a therapeutic fast. This is the point where your body realizes it’s not being fed from any external source and it starts scavenging for any nutriment it can find stored in your body. It will look for sustenance in the blood, lymph, interstitial fluid, organs, glands, muscles, fatty tissue, within joints, inside tumors and other growths and wherever else it may find a source of available food.

This accounts for the quickness with which many who are stricken with arthritis are able to once again use their joints without excessive pain or discomfort within a few weeks or months after undergoing a therapeutic fast. Much of the hardened organic and inorganic settlements in arthritic joints and soft tissue are broken down and successfully absorbed into the blood stream, lymph or interstitial fluid during the process of autolysis. This is how your body feeds itself during a therapeutic fast. The benefits you derive from this activity are greater joint mobility, removal of toxic waste material, natural and healthy weight loss and the beginning of what could be a new lease on life for you. 

This may not be what you had in mind as far as an arthritis cure is concerned. However, it is the way nature cures – by natural cleansing, subsequent tissue rebuilding and replacement and whole being healing.

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Arthritis Natural Treatment: The Secret Of Going From Treatment To Recovery

Posted on 01/31/2011 by Admin

By Paul F. Harris

Arthritis natural treatment usually implies a biologically friendly pain mitigation course of therapy for anyone afflicted with one of the more painful forms of arthritis. Rheumatoid arthritis, osteoarthritis, psoriatic arthritis and juvenile rheumatoid arthritis are four of the more agonizing rheumatic diseases that seem to attract the attention of alternative health practitioners who offer care to this special patient population. What many critics of the alternative health care delivery field question is whether or not these desperate patients are receiving the best available care to alleviate their arthritic conditions. For any arthritic patient seeking to naturally alleviate her suffering or to reverse the arthritic affliction, this should be a reasonable concern. 

Arthritis natural treatment protocols administered by alternative health practitioners generally follow a certain predictable pattern of care delivery. The arthritic patient is counseled on the particulars of the diagnosed illness, one or more diagnostic tests are done, a recommended course of treatment is discussed and the patient is sent home with written instructions as to what she must do to carry out her part in the treatment process. At least one follow-up office visit is set during the initial visit to allow the practitioner to monitor the effectiveness and appropriateness of the recommended protocol and the patient’s progress. 

This is business as usual when it comes to arthritis natural treatment protocols. If this is the rule of the day, with successful treatment programs, why is it that so many who are afflicted with some form of arthritis, and who follow these supposed health-restoring regimens, are so eager to pursue each new, hip-sounding arthritis reversal program that comes along? Can it be that the programs aren’t working? And if, in fact, these programs of arthritis reversal and recovery are working so well, why are these tortured souls who have tried these regimens still eagerly searching for nature’s magic elixir to cure their rheumatic ailments? 

Having once suffered the agony, constant discomfort and frustration of rheumatoid arthritis, while in my late twenties, I can state, with conviction, that I tried every hot new supplement, herbal formula, water treatment and special diet I came across. Nothing worked for any length of time. After about a month the old pains and the humiliating sense of defeat and frustration would invariably find their way back into my unhappy life. I’m certain the majority of adults afflicted with degenerative rheumatic diseases have been down much the same trodden path. 

In 1984 I was introduced to Dr. Bernard Jensen’s home-grown arthritis natural treatment protocol that he administered at his Hidden Valley Health Ranch in Escondido, California. While on his program, which I elected to pursue in the comfort of my home, I discovered a well-guarded secret that was the key to the great success world-class biological clinics and natural health spas were enjoying in Australia, Europe and in a few North American nature cure clinics, such as Jensen operated. The commonly applied ‘secret’ therapy was therapeutic fasting. 

It was through Jensen’s therapeutic juice and broth fasting protocol that I subsequently became acquainted with autolysis – nature’s magical cleansing power and cellular rejuvenating catalyst. To my pleasant surprise, during the last ten days of the fourteen-day fast I observed how autolysis orchestrated a thorough cleansing of my body, which included old mucus settlements, mineral deposits, morbid cellular waste, excess carbonic and uric acids and harmful bacteria, all of which were breeding grounds for the proliferation of my rheumatic disease. After completing the fast Jensen put me on a healthy daily diet. Within four months I was completely rid of any traces of rheumatoid arthritis and it has never returned. 

In my twenty-six years of direct involvement with health care services delivery, I have yet to find anything that can trigger the necessary cleansing process of autolysis as thoroughly and effectively as a therapeutic fast. If you are determined to overcome your arthritic affliction you must first clean house. Only then can your body begin to restructure and rejuvenate itself in a healthy way. The next time you have a mind to seek out and try another arthritis natural treatment protocol, ask the program’s creator if during the early stages of the program you will have the opportunity to meet and become intimately acquainted with autolysis – nature’s magical cleansing power and cellular rejuvenating catalyst.

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Osteoarthritis And Rheumatoid Arthritis:Their Deadly Relationship With Intestinal Flora

Posted on 01/29/2011 by Admin

By Paul F. Harris

Osteoarthritis and rheumatoid arthritis have a deadly relationship with intestinal flora – often referred to as friendly bacteria. This is the region of the large bowel located near the splenic flexure. Among other activities, the intestinal flora is primarily charged with the responsibility of maintaining the proper pH level for the colon, for the production of certain nutrients and for helping to keep excess acids to a minimum in the body. As essential as the healthy functioning of the intestinal flora may be to good health, rarely do we hear or read about the importance of a healthy intestinal flora in keeping the development and proliferation of rheumatic disease states, such as osteoarthritis and rheumatoid arthritis, to a minimum.

During the early part of the twentieth century a brilliant English surgeon, by the name of Sir Arbuthnot Lane, proved, conclusively, the relationship between a healthy colon and adequate supplies of sodium and potassium being available to the friendly bacteria. He further determined that acidophilus is absolutely critical for the healthy functioning of the intestinal flora. Having operated on more than 2,000 cadavers and hundreds of living patients, Dr. Lane was able to see these relationships clearly. He noted that where mineral salts such as sodium, potassium, magnesium and silicon were deficient, and where acidophilus was not being adequately supplied by diet, the intestinal flora was underactive and often contributed to low-grade infections. This condition invariably led to a highly acidic state where sodium reserves in the body were depleted from the stomach, lymph and joints. This often set the stage for the development of the symptom complex arthritis, in one form or another. 

Although the established medical culture of his day frowned upon his findings, Lane’s work was studied and championed by John Kellogg, Are Waerland and, in later years, Dr. John Tilden and Dr. Bernard Jensen. Kellogg, Tilden and Jensen were able to prove the relevance of Lane’s claims during many years of sanitarium work with patients stricken with osteoarthritis and rheumatoid arthritis. What I later learned while studying with Jensen in Escondido, California, was that Lane, Kellogg, Tilden and Jensen were right in their assertions. When organic sodium and potassium salts and acidophilus are lacking in the diet, and when body is overloaded with toxic waste material, a severe chemical imbalance will take place in the intestinal flora. Acid wastes cannot be properly neutralized in the colon and, subsequently, throughout the body. Nor can essential fluids, such as are created by the synovial membrane in the joints, properly lubricate and moisten critical surface structures of the skeletal system. 

The cells of the body require a copious supply of sodium phosphate to help remove cellular metabolic waste – particularly carbon dioxide. Without this simple sodium compound cellular waste can accumulate to the point where the cells are starved of nutrients, toxic, dysfunctional and inclined to pathological conditions. As this continues unabated, the body will deteriorate and degrade to where it can develop such degenerative health issues as osteoarthritis and rheumatoid arthritis. 

Understanding the great importance of the proper balance of sodium to potassium throughout the body and the necessity of acidophilus in the diet can aid the body in overcoming and often reversing afflictions such as osteoarthritis or rheumatoid arthritis.

If you are given to drinking coffee – even decaffeinated – eating chocolate, drinking soda pops, excessive protein consumption, drinking pasteurized milk, eating refined sugar products or denatured wheat products, you will be depleting vitamin and mineral reserves and have a difficult time replenishing and maintaining a healthy intestinal flora. 

When you combine proper food intake with a healthy flora environment you can successfully treat and often reverse osteoarthritis, rheumatoid arthritis, bursitis, gout, acid reflux and rheumatism. These are all primarily symptom complexes of the same basic disease – systemic toxemia, which is usually brought on by a tired, undernourished and enervated body unable to keep up with the demands of one’s lifestyle and faulty dietary habits.

Posted in Rheumatoid Arthritis and Osteoarthritis | Tagged , , , | 7 Comments

Rheumatoid Arthritis – The Healing Crisis Your Doctor Never Mentioned

Posted on 01/21/2011 by Paul Harris

Rheumatoid arthritis is a life-altering disorder that remains a mystery to our most brilliant medical minds. So much so that most traditionally trained Rheumatologists delivering care to patients afflicted with the dreaded disorder tend to limit their scope of care to mitigation of pain and discomfort. This has been the status quo of how patients suffering from rheumatoid arthritis have been cared for during the past few decades. Medical science has seemingly not been in too great a hurry to find a disease reversing and health restoring protocol that could be dispensed to the general public.

In recent years we’ve seen the emergence of concerned groups, in defiance of the traditional medical field, demanding answers and pushing the envelope with regard to new and promising health restoring treatments and therapies for the many forms of arthritis. Many of these voices have in hand, factual, scientifically derived protocols that, in many instances, have been proven to be effective in alleviating the pain and discomfort of rheumatoid arthritis. There are some who go so far as to claim they have discovered ‘cures’ for all rheumatic ailments.

Unknown to the average guy on the street, there is something rarely discussed, even in medical circles, that is at the forefront of any sensible, practical and successful attempt to restore the health of anyone afflicted with rheumatic complaints. This is nature’s cleansing process that Homeopathic physicians and other nature cure practitioners call the Healing Crisis.

A Healing Crisis usually takes place within the first three to eight weeks of a conscious and sustained, total body cleansing effort. Its average duration is from three to five days. It is often initiated by a therapeutic fast or cleansing diet. This allows an immutable principle of nature to kick in which is often referred to as ‘the law of cure.’ This principle teaches that:

1. The natural cure of any disease state starts deep within the body and works out toward the skin.

2. The natural cure of any disease state starts with the head and moves downward toward the feet.

3. The natural cure of any disease state takes place in reverse order as the symptoms originally appeared in the body.

A disease state such as arthritis follows a certain path or stages of deterioration and degradation and a predictable path to recovery. When an arthritis sufferer engages in some type of systemic waste removal and adopts a biologically friendly fasting regimen or a healthy diet, that person will often begin to go through a re-visitation of the same symptoms experienced at different stages while the ailment was developing.

It is at this exact point that nature, by way of a Healing Crisis, can walk a person back through the degenerative, chronic, sub-acute and acute stages of their rheumatic ailment until the original condition of acute irritation is reached.  Reversal of the disease state at its foundation can often be achieved if the person continues to allow the great immutable principle of nature to operate unhindered throughout the body.

From there it is simply a matter of following a sensible dietary program and adopting certain lifestyle modifications to achieve the desired goal of partial or complete reversal of the rheumatic disorder. What many biologically-oriented practitioners have known for years and what some of our contemporary health professionals are discovering is that without a Healing Crisis and the reversal process there can be no complete recovery from disease.

A Healing Crisis signals the beginning stages of the reversal process that often takes a person back through all of the bodily sensations, pains, aches, nervous tension, thought patterns and emotions associated with each level of disease manifestation in the previous stages of disease development.  Over the years I have spoken with many people who told me they literally panicked when confronted with these old disease symptoms again. This usually occurred when people were not educated about Healing Crises and engaged in aggressive and extended fasting or bodily cleansing, without proper supervision. Their initial reactions, when experiencing the old symptoms, were shock and disappointment.  

The day before a Healing Crisis began these people were feeling good, until the old disease symptoms started reappearing. They were completely at a loss as to what steps to take to deal with the symptoms. If you have rheumatoid arthritis or any rheumatic disorder that you would like to overcome, naturally, sensibly and responsibly, contact me. I’ll show you, step-by-step, how to intelligently prepare for nature’s great cleansing process – the Healing Crisis. Once that occurs you can confidently begin to cleanse, rest, rejuvenate, feed and strengthen your body in preparation to reverse your rheumatic illness.

Posted in Articles by Paul Harris, Healing Crisis | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , | 1 Comment

Rheumatoid Arthritis – The Shocking Truth About How It Starts

Posted on 01/20/2011 by Paul Harris

Rheumatoid arthritis is one of the most baffling and feared of all human ailments. Perhaps this is due, in large part, to the many conflicting hypotheses and theorems that abound throughout the medical field about this dreaded disorder. Each day we hear of new and often conflicting discoveries that supposedly shed light on why certain people are more susceptible to contracting this ailment than others. All of this uncertainty tends to create an atmosphere of fear and distrust toward anyone claiming to have yet another ‘cure.’ 

In recent years there have been two widely disseminated theories about rheumatoid arthritis. On the one hand, medical researchers have claimed there is a definite connection between heredity and the likelihood of someone developing it. On the other hand, a number of medical doctors have expressed their belief that this and other forms of arthritis can be traced to a rogue virus or other micro-organism. As well meaning as these theories may be, there is another position that deserves critical evaluation. 

Rheumatoid arthritis is primarily caused by a lack of biochemical sodium reserves in the body. I’m not referring to the table salt variety that the human body cannot metabolize efficiently. When the body’s organic sodium reserves are low a number of physiological changes begin to occur. Acid stomach, chronic constipation, joint swelling, calcification and bone spurs, excessive flatulence and stiff joints – any trained observer will recognize these symptoms as manifestations of arthritis. Although hereditary factors or rogue viral strains may not be present, low sodium reserves are detected in over 90% of such cases when these symptoms are evident. 

Among other important functions, the body uses different combinations of organic sodium to neutralize excess systemic acids, to help remove metabolic waste products from cells and to keep calcium in solution so that it doesn’t precipitate in the joints and soft tissues. This is basic biochemistry that anyone suffering from any arthritic affliction should know. It stands to reason that if organic sodium is the primary element the body utilizes to keep calcium in solution, one would certainly want to ensure that his or her sodium reserves were kept well stocked at all times. 

As sensible as this may be, the lack of knowledge on this subject is what causes so much needless suffering in our society. During the 11 years I spent studying with world renowned natural health advocate, lecturer and practitioner, Jorgen Bernard Jensen, DC, ND, PhD, at his Hidden Valley Health Ranch, in Escondido, California, I personally witnessed the power of organic sodium to reverse various forms of arthritis – even in advanced stages. I came to know, without a doubt, that rheumatoid arthritis can be managed and, in many cases, reversed at virtually any age. This can happen provided there is an understanding of the vital role organic sodium plays in any serious effort to recover from rheumatoid arthritis.

Posted in Articles by Paul Harris, Rheumatoid Arthritis | Tagged , , , , | 16 Comments