Very surprising, cautionary news to me:
Dr. Lisa Raskin from Austin Tx has been kind
enough to put together her presentation on
nightshades. This is very important for everyone
to read so I am sending it out to all of you. It
is quite detailed so please take time to read it
carefully. Please also feel free to spread it far
and wide with proper credit where credit is due.
Dr. Raskin can be contacted
at <mailto:lraski...@yahoo.com>lraski...@yahoo.com
if you have any further question or would like to
make an appointment with her. For those of you
who are doctors who want to attack the veracity
of Dr. Raskin's research, please do so to me not
to her and if you do please include all
references to articles and scientific research.
If you do not it will be assumed that it is your
personal opinion only and i won't be able to pass
it along. Removing nightshades from your diet
will probably be one of the best things you could
possibly do for your long term health.
_______________________________________________________________________
Dr. Lisa Raskin
2525 Wallingwood Drive, Suite 901
Austin, Texas 78746
512-698-3902
TX Chiropractic Lic# 8376
lraski...@gmail.com
Notes from nightshades presentation given on
September 28th, 2009, Victory Day, during Vaidya
R.K. Mishra's Global Conference call on "SVAHAR
or Life in Bliss through SVA Health"
We know according to Vaidya's tradition, that the
nightshades tomatoes, potatoes, green peppers and
eggplant affect the vibrational and physical
channels in very negative ways.
It turns out that they are part of a very huge
family of plants containing about 2000 species.
The main culprit seems to be a type of chemical
compound called alkaloids. There is one type of
alkaloid that causes the most trouble and that is
called Solanine. Solanine is a neurotoxin.
Nightshades contain at least 6 OTHER neurotoxins,
including atropine and nicotine. One of them is
scopolamine which depresses the central nervous
system and is used as a sedative, and in the
famous 'date-rape' drugs.
Each of the neurotoxins in the nightshades
affects humans differently. We know through
Vaidya how awful nicotine is, because it shrinks
the vibrational channels and its connection to
cancer is well-known. Science has found that
nicotine causes a short-term increase in blood
pressure, heart rate and the flow of blood from
the heart. And it also causes the arteries to
narrow. Nicotine is extremely addictive.
Another neurotoxin in nightshades is atropine, a
blocker preventing nerve transmission. The other
three are powerful acetyl cholinesterase
inhibitors that prevent the breakdown of
neurotransmitters needed for proper nerve
function. Which means the neurotransmitters get
stuck in the synapse, preventing nerve
transmission and function.
These alkaloids that are found in nightshades
help protect them from insects, so they are
basically pesticides! Some potatoes are actually
bred just to make pesticides....they are made
into dust and spread over plants.
A little bit about the strange history of how
nightshades became foods. Most are actually more
famous as drug-type substances than as foods.
The best-known are mandrake (which were thought
to contain evil spirits), tobacco, and
belladonna, which is also known as 'deadly
nightshade'. Tomatoes, green peppers, eggplant
and potatoes were only ornamentals and not
thought of as edibles until the 1800's.
Tomatoes had their beginnings in South America
and were actually eaten by the ancient Aztecs,
but weren't introduced to Europe until the
1800's. So that means that Italy didn't have
pasta sauce until the 1800's!
Now, before potatoes were introduced as a food,
the peasant classes actually identified them as
being poisonous. It was easy for them to tell
because the flowers of the Deadly Nightshade
(belladonna) plant and the flowers of the potato
plant are so similar. Legend has it that Sir
Walter Raleigh gave the potato plant to Queen
Elizabeth I (1533-1603) as a gift. And then some
aristocrats were invited to a huge banquet that
featured potatoes in every course. The cooks,
who had never seen potatoes before, discarded the
potatoes and boiled the highly poisonous stems
and leaves, which quickly made everyone very ill.
The potatoes were banned from court, and given to
the Irish!
Eggplant was actually called "The Mad Apple". In
the Mediterranean area eggplant was thought to
cause insanity if eaten daily for a month. A few
spoonfuls of eggplant contain the same amount of
nicotine as sitting in a closed room with a light
smoker for three hours!
Now I'm going to tell you a little bit of what
happens in the body when we eat nightshade
veggies. There seems to be two types of
nightshade poisoning, acute and chronic. Acute
poisoning can happen from green or sprouted
potatoes and tomatoes because they have so much
more solanine. The symptoms can be cramps,
diarrhea, dizziness and sleepiness. For many
people these short term effects are even more
intense, such as chronic migraine headaches,
dizziness, intestinal disturbance, and 'food
poisoning' like symptoms, which many people don't
connect with nightshade plants such as potatoes.
But it's the chronic, slow onset symptoms that
are even worse, because the effects of chronic
solanine poisoning can be anything from IBS,
joint pain, appendicitis, birth defects
(including spina bifida), depression, endocrine
suppression, especially thyroid, arthritis in all
its forms, increased intestinal permeability,
migraines, osteoporosis, arteriosclerosis, and
interference in the absorption of calcium (up to
80%), iron, and vitamin D.
How does this happen? Solanine has been found
to do some very powerful things that disrupt the
biochemistry of the body.
The first thing that it does, as I mentioned
before, is that, like pesticides and nerve gas,
it blocks the activity of an enzyme in nerve
cells called acetyl cholinesterase. Without
this enzyme, the neurotransmitter acetylcholine
builds up in synapses, the junction between
nerves, and creates a blockage of flow. This
blockage of the flow of acetylcholine can have
some very negative effects. In an overdose, it
can affect our control of muscle movements,
leading to muscle twitching, trembling, paralyzed
breathing or even convulsions. Even though the
solanine in one single potato isn't strong enough
to cause such a huge effect, it turns out that it
builds up in our tissues over time AND the body
is very slow to break it down. It's not water
soluble, and is not destroyed by cooking. It
takes the body 1 to 2 1/2 months to get rid of
the solanine from just one potato. It usually
builds up in the smooth muscles and organs such
as the intestines, heart, lungs, and endocrine
system, mostly in the thyroid. Harmful effects
may take years and years to appear. It might be
the 10,000th baked potato with salsa on top that
takes a person over the edge and makes them
symptomatic. The good news here is that with
total avoidance it only takes 4-5 months to
excrete all your solanine, and symptom relief can
be much faster.
OK so Solanine is a neurotoxin. But there is more.
The other thing that solanine does is that it
seems to cause joint damage and inflammation.
Many people experience stiff joints, painful
wrists, ankles and knees. Researchers think that
these nightshades cause excessive LOSS of Calcium
from the bone and excessive DEPOSITS of calcium
into soft tissue. Dr. Michael Liebowitz, a
chiropractor who has given us many testing
techniques and knowledge in the fields of
dysbiosis, food and chemical sensitivities,
started researching nightshades, especially
solanine, when he stopped eating them and his
chronic joint pain and dysbiosis improved.
He says that solanine basically takes calcium out
of bone and deposits it wherever it feels like,
leading to side effects including heart disease,
arthritides, and osteoporosis. What he
discovered is that if you have a patient who is
doing everything positive about bone mass (the
right vitamins, minerals, exercise, lifestyle,
etc), and they are eating nightshades, the
solanine in the nightshades sabotages EVERYTHING
that they are doing and that patient will NOT
gain bone mass. He found in his patients with
osteoporosis and osteopenia, that as long as they
ate nightshades, all supplements were worthless.
The nightshades just cancelled out all the
positive effects of anything they did.
Solanine is a cell disruptor (which means it
causes the cell to rupture), and so it attacks
the lining of the stomach and intestines as well.
Many people who have been diagnosed with
intestinal disorders such as celiac disease and
Crohn's, and the common treatments have never
worked, have become symptom free just by avoiding
nightshades. It has even been shown as a cause
for appendicitis.
Solanine is a true poison. Extracts of
nightshades are now being used as a rat poison.
When Dr. Liebowitz tried to get a sample of
Solanine from a chemical supply, the company was
very hesitant to sell it because it is such a
strong poison. He finally paid $95.00 to receive
only 5 mg which had been extracted from a potato.
There was a huge skull and crossbones on the jar!
What's interesting to me is that the symptoms of
solanine intake have been well known since the
1800's and we have done nothing about taking them
off the market as food. Potato breeders have
tried to keep the solanine content of potatoes
low. But no studies have been done that
determine safe levels of nightshade plants.
None. People eat them and are not made
IMMEDIATELY sick, so it was assumed, and still
is, that nightshades are safe. They do not look
at the chronic effects. And to make things
worse, the solanine content in potatoes increases
under light. Under grocery store lights, the
amount of solanine can exceed the safe limits by
9 times within 24 hours. Potatoes used to be
sold in burlap bags to keep them from being
exposed to light, but now they are out in the
open in supermarkets, or in transparent plastic
bags.
There has been a popular belief, approved by the
FDA, that the antioxidants in tomatoes can
prevent prostate cancer. But the most recent
study not only failed to prove this, they found
that the men who had high blood levels of beta
carotenes (those who might have eaten lots of
tomato products) had the MOST AGGRESSIVE form of
prostate cancer!
When I started doing research on the nightshades
I was surprised to find out that there seemed to
be only one 'hard' scientist studying the role of
nightshade in poor health. His name is Dr.
Norman Childers of Rutgers University. I
subsequently ordered his books and he is amazing.
He deserves credit because HE is the one who has
really brought the subject of nightshade
poisoning to the attention of the public. It is
only because of his work in the 70's that the
connection between nightshades and poor health
are well known. Now he currently has data on
over 50,000 subjects in his almost 40-year study
who have been on the no-nightshades diet and they
have recovered completely or shown great
improvement, some leaving canes, walkers, and
wheelchairs. (His website has a great deal of
information and some of his research.
(<http://noarthritis.com/>http://noarthritis.com/)
Dr. Childers is convinced that the poisonous
effects of nightshades are far more extensive
than joint and gut problems. He feels their
negative effects are systemic and all-inclusive
and could be causing such afflictions as
Alzheimer's and Cancer. The tomato used to be
called 'the cancer apple'. He says "The
nightshade plants, when found in pastures, are
ruinous to livestock. If a cow were to graze in
a field of nightshades, in a short time they
wouldn't be able to walk anymore. Farmers have
known this for over 100 years and today those
plants areĀ. destroyed before they can cause any
harm to the animals. The nightshades are subtly
and eventually ruinous to us...and we die ten to
30 or more years early."
Dr. Childers says that some day scientists will
take note but says, like tobacco, people are
addicted to these foods and would rather look the
other way!
What is so amazing to me that Vaidya's tradition,
thousands of years ago, knew these vegetables
were poisonous. We are truly so fortunate to be
students of this tradition.
References:
Childers, N.F. Cancer-my experience. The
Arthritis Nightshades Research Foundation.
<http://Noarthritis.com/cancer_and_nightshades>Noarthritis.com/cancer_and_nightshades
Childers, N.F. Childers's diet to stop arthritis,
The nightshades and ill health. (1981).
Somerville, NJ: Somerset Press.
Childers, N.F. & Russo, G. The Nightshades and
health. (1977). Somerville, NJ: Somerset Press.
Childers, N.F. Nightshades - The number one
health problem. The Arthritis Nightshades
Research Foundation.
<http://www.noarthritis.com/the_number_one_health_problem>Noarthritis.com/the_number_one_health_problem
Childers, N. Ph.D and.Margoles, M.S. M.D. (1993).
An apparent relation of nightshades (Solanaceae)
to Arthritis.
Journal of Neurological and Orthopedic Medical Surgery, 12:227-231.
Fowler, M. Nightshade free pain free. (2007). LaVergne, TN: Grass Fire Media,
Liebowitz, M. & Wilson, J. Treating the complex
patient 2009 [Videotapes]: Scottsdale.
Mateijian, G. What are nightshades and in which
foods are they found? Newsletter for The
World's Healthiest Foods
Foundation.
<http://whfoods.com/genpage.php?pfriendly=1&tname=george&dbid=6>http://whfoods.com/genpage.php?pfriendly=1&tname=george&dbid=6
Peters, U. & Leitzmann, M. & Chatterjee, N. &
Wang, Yinghui & Albanes, D. & Gelmann, P. et al.
(2007). Serum
lycopene, other carotenoids, and prostate
cancer risk: a nested case-control study in
the prostate, lung, colorectal,
and ovarian cancer screening trial. Cancer
Epidemiology, Biomarkers & Prevention, 16:962-968.
Researchers refute lycopene benefits, find
association between beta-carotene and aggressive
prostate cancer. (2007)
Fred Hutchison Cancer Research Center News.
<http://www.fhcrc.org/about/pubs/center_news/2007/june/art3.html>fhcrc.org/about/pubs/center_news/2007/june/art3.html