Why
I Now Say No to Distilled Water Only
By Chet Day
Paul Bragg. Norman
Walker. Herbert Shelton.
I bet you recognize
the names of the above three "big gun writers" of the
modern natural health and raw food movement. Each of these men
advocated a predominantly uncooked vegetarian diet (though Walker
allowed cheese and Bragg allowed occasional meat or fish), and
each also advocated distilled water as the
only kind of water to drink.
It's amazing to me
how blindly most health seekers follow the advice of the above
three gurus as well as the advice of modern health writers who
use Bragg, Walker, and Shelton as their main sources of truth.
Indeed, if you spend
more than about ten minutes reading many modern natural health
writers, you'll quickly learn that all serious health seekers
should shun any kind of water other than distilled water. Why?
Because Paul Bragg, Norman Walker, and Herbert Shelton said so.
Well, I bought into
this commonly-accepted "truth" back in 1993 when I started
my health journey, and I continued to buy into it for more than
five years before I started to question its validity. I started
to question the value of drinking distilled water for the long-term
when I finally opened my eyes enough to realize I was relying
on information that was, in most cases, more than 50 years old.
Let me say here that
I still consider distilled water the water of choice when detoxing
or working to heal a serious health challenge. To quote Dr. Zoltan
Rona, who feels the same way:
"Distillation
is the process in which water is boiled, evaporated and the vapour
condensed. Distilled water is free of dissolved minerals and,
because of this, has the special property of being able to actively
absorb toxic substances from the body and eliminate them. Studies
validate the benefits of drinking distilled water when one is
seeking to cleanse or detoxify the system for short periods of
time (a few weeks at a time). Fasting using distilled water can
be dangerous because of the rapid loss of electrolytes (sodium,
potassium, chloride) and trace minerals like magnesium, deficiencies
of which can cause heart beat irregularities and high blood pressure.
Cooking foods in distilled water pulls the minerals out of them
and lowers their nutrient value.
I opened my eyes because
about two years ago I started hearing from long-term distilled
water drinkers who had been consuming only distilled water and
who had developed troubles with their hair either thinning or
falling out in clumps. I've subsequently learned that hair loss
is a condition often associated with various mineral
deficiencies.
Since I'd been advised
by a serious natural health student whose opinions I value very
much that distilled water might well contribute to such problems,
I started telling people with hair problems that they might try
going back to filtered water or bottled water to see if doing
so wouldn't help resolve the symptoms. Interestingly
enough, many reported that their hair loss problems improved when
they stopped drinking distilled water.
Digging deeper, I started
reading more carefully the advice of natural health experts who
weren't necessarily coming out of the raw food and Natural Hygiene
schools of health, and I couldn't find a single one of them who
recommended distilled water as the water of choice.
Yes, all of these experts
advocated drinking lots of water -- at least eight full glasses
of water every day -- and all of them said a good filtered or
bottled water was just fine. For example, I know Lorraine Day,
MD, (no relation) doesn't advocate distilled water and neither
does the Iranian medical doctor F. Batmanghelidj, who wrote what
I consider the bible on water, "Your Body's Many Cries for
Water."
Dr. Gabriel Cousens,
a living foods advocate who writes on page 509 of his book "Conscious
Eating," "distilled water is dead, unstructured water
so foreign to the body that one actually gets a temporary high
white blood cell count in response to drinking it."
Additionally, my understanding
of medical doctor Zoltan Rona's article is that long-term distilled
water consumption may well contribute to high blood pressure and
other cardiovascular problems. Dr. Rona writes, "The longer
one drinks distilled water, the more likely the development of
mineral deficiencies and an acid state. I have done well over
3000 mineral evaluations using a combination of blood, urine,
and hair tests in my practice. Almost without exception, people
who consume distilled water exclusively, eventually develop multiple
mineral deficiencies."
Given what these health-oriented
MDs have concluded about distilled water, doesn't it make sense
to further research the topic rather than relying on opinions
formed more than 50 years ago?
If you prefer to ignore
what these health-oriented medical doctors have discovered in
their active practices, then let's take a look at the brutally
deceptive "organic and inorganic mineral" argument that
so many natural health writers use to justify distilled water
drinking. (They also mistakenly use the same argument to
erroneously conclude that all supplements and all cooked foods
are bad.)
Unfortunately, their
oversimplification of the organic and inorganic mineral theory
and, indeed, their general lack of understanding about college
level chemistry and physical laws, calls into deep question the
validity of many of their conclusions about health and diet.
The health writers
who like distilled water better than a ripe nectarine usually
write a lot about the Hunzans, the folks in Pakistan's Hunza Valley
who allegedly live healthfully well into their 90's and beyond.
Interestingly enough, these same writers don't mention the point
that the Hunzans drink a glacial water so full of minerals it's
almost milky in appearance.
Another point involves
alkalinity and acidity. Natural health writers generally agree
that the body maintains best health when it maintains a ph leaning
to the alkaline side rather than the acidic side, and yet distilled
water quickly turns highly acidic, about 5.8 in an open air container.
I didn't understand the chemistry of this
important point until I stumbled onto a great explanation by Fred
Senese at http://chetday.com/jump/waterph.htm
Does it still make
sense to you to drink eight glasses a day of distilled water that
can potentially help to over-acidify the body?
I'd been putting off
writing this article for over a year because I didn't feel that
I had all the facts. I still feel the same way, but I also feel
confident enough with what I have learned to present my current
viewpoint to help others make a more informed decision before
investing a lot of money in an expensive distiller that may well
contribute to health problems in the long run.
You will note, of course,
that the most vociferous advocates of distilled water are also
those who sell high-profit margin distillers. They are also the
ones who continue to quote Paul Bragg and Norman Walker as the
sources of their extensive research.
In closing, I do know
tap water isn't good because of all the chemicals and pollutants
and Lord knows what else in it, but I don't have all the answers
as to the best water for human health, so please don't consider
this article definitive.
I trust this article
raises some questions in your mind that you can now research in
more detail on your own so you can then come to an informed conclusion
about what type of water is best for you and your family. I opened
my eyes because about two years ago I started hearing from long-term
distilled water drinkers who had been consuming only distilled
water and who had developed troubles with their hair either thinning
or falling out in clumps. I've subsequently learned that hair
loss is a condition often associated with various mineral deficiencies.
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