HOW TO EAT.
It seems that all of us ought to know how to eat, for we have much
practice; yet the individuals who know the true principles of nourishing
the body are comparatively few. Very few healers are able to give full
and explicit directions on this important subject. Some can give partial
instructions, but we need a full working knowledge.
In one period of our racial history there were times when it was
difficult to obtain food, as it is now among some savage people. Then it
was without doubt customary to gorge, as it is among some savages now
when they get a plenteous supply of food, especially of flesh food. Even
among so-called civilized people, the distribution of food is so uneven
that some are in want somewhere, nearly all the time. In parts of
Russia, we are informed, the peasants go into a state of
semi-hibernation during part of the winter, living on very small
quantities of inferior food.
With rapid transportation and the extensive use of power-propelled
machinery, famine should be unheard of in civilized countries. In our
land there is a sufficient quantity of food and people seldom suffer
because they have not enough, but considerable suffering is due to
excessive intake and to poor quality of food. Weight for weight, white
bread is not as valuable as whole wheat bread, though it contains as
much starch. Measure for measure, boiled milk is inferior as a food to
untreated milk, either fresh or clabbered. Such facts make it necessary
for us to know how to eat.
The correct principles of taking nourishment to the best advantage have
been fairly well known for a long time, and perhaps they have been fully
discussed years ago by some author, but so far as I know Dr. E. H. Dewey
is the first one who grouped them and gave them the prominence they
deserve. He employed many pages in explaining clearly and forcibly these
principles, which can be briefly stated as follows:
First, Be guided by the appetite in eating. Eat only when there is
hunger.
Second, During acute illness fast, that is, live on water.
Third, Be moderate in eating.
Fourth, Masticate your food thoroughly.
Dr. J. H. Tilden teaches his patients the same in these words:
"Never eat when you feel badly.
"Never eat when you have no desire.
"Do not overeat.
"Thoroughly masticate and insalivate all your food."
Because these true dietetic principles are so important, probably being
the most valuable information given in this book, let us give them
enough consideration to fix them in the mind. They should be a part of
every child's education. They should be so thoroughly learned that they
become second nature, for if they are observed disease is practically
impossible. Accidents may happen, but no serious disease can develop and
certainly none of a chronic nature if these rules are observed, provided
the individual gives himself half a chance in other ways. When the
eating is correct, it is difficult to fall into bad habits mentally.
Correct eating is a powerful aid to health. Health tends to produce
proper thinking, which in turn leads the individual to proper acting.
_First, Eat only when there is hunger_: Hunger is of two kinds, normal
and abnormal. The real or normal hunger was given us by nature to make
us active enough to get food. If it were not for hunger, there would be
no special incentive for the young to partake of nourishment and
consequently many would die comfortably of starvation, perhaps enough to
endanger the life of the race. Normal hunger asks for food, but no
special kind of food. It is satisfied with anything that is clean and
nourishing. It is strong enough to make a decided demand for food, but
if there is no food to be had it will be satisfied for the time being
with a glass of water and will cause no great inconvenience.
Abnormal hunger is entirely different. It is a very insistent craving
and if it is not satisfied it produces bodily discomfort, perhaps
headache. The gnawing remains and gives the victim no rest. Very often
it must be pampered. It calls for beefsteak, or toast and tea, or
sweets, or some other special food. If not satisfied the results may be
nervousness, weakness or headache or some other disagreeable symptom.
When missing a meal or two brings discomfort, it is always a sign of a
degenerating or degenerated body. A healthy person can go a day without
food without any inconvenience. He feels a keen desire for food at meal
times, but as soon as he has made up his mind that he is unable to get
it or that he is not going to take any the hunger leaves. Normal hunger
is a servant. Abnormal hunger is a hard master.
A person in good condition does not get weak from missing a few meals.
One in poor physical condition does, although this is more apparent than
real. In the abnormal person a part of the food is used as nourishment,
but on account of the poor working of the digestive organs, a part
decomposes and this acts as an irritant or a stimulant. The greater the
irritation the more food is demanded. The temporary stimulation is
followed by depression and then the sufferer is wretched. This
depression is relieved by more food. Please note that it is relieved,
not cured. The relief is only temporary.
All food stimulates, but only slightly. It is when the food decomposes
that it becomes stimulating enough to cause trouble. It is well to
remember that considerable alcoholic fermentation can take place in an
abused alimentary tract. The stimulation obtained from too much food is
very much like the stimulation derived from alcohol, tobacco or
morphine. At first there is a feeling of well-being, which is followed
by a miserable feeling of depression that demands food, alcohol, tobacco
or morphine for relief, as the case may be, and no matter which habit is
obtaining mastery, to indulge it is courting disaster. When a habit
begins to assert itself strongly, break it, for later on it will be very
difficult, so difficult that most people lack the will power to overcome
it.
If there is abnormal hunger, reduce the food intake. Instead of eating
five or six times a day, reduce the meals to two or three. It is quite
common for such people to take lunches, which may consist of candies,
ice cream, cakes, milk or buttermilk and various other things which most
people do not look upon as real food. Take two or three meals a day, and
let a large part of them be fresh vegetables and fresh fruits. Eat in
moderation and the troublesome abnormal hunger will soon leave. By
indulging it you increase it.
Many people get into trouble because they believe that they have to have
protein, starch and fat at every meal. This is not necessary, for the
blood takes up enough nourishment to last for quite a while. A supply of
the various food elements once a day is sufficient, which means that
protein needs be taken but once a day, starch once a day and fat once a
day. Starch and fat serve the same purpose and one can be replaced by
the other.
Cultivate a normal hunger, then fix two or three periods in which to
take nourishment, and partake of nothing but water outside of these
periods. If there is no desire for food when meal time comes, eat
nothing, but drink all the water desired and wait until next meal time.
_Second, During acute illness fast_: This is so obviously correct that
we should expect every normal individual to be guided by it. Even the
lower animals know this and act accordingly.
According to this rule we should go without food when ill, but to do so
is contrary to the teachings of medical men. They teach that when people
are ill there is much waste, which is true, and that for this reason it
is necessary to partake of a generous amount of nourishing food, so they
give milk, broth, meat, toast and other foods, together with stimulants.
Feeding during illness would be all right if the body could take care of
the food, which it can not. In all severe diseases digestion is almost
or quite at a standstill and the food given under the circumstances
decomposes in the alimentary tract and furnishes additional poison for
the system to excrete. Food under the circumstances is a detriment and a
burden to the body. In fevers, the temperature goes up after feeding.
This shows that more poison has entered the blood. In fevers little or
none of the digestive fluids is secreted, but the alimentary tract is so
warm that the food decomposes quickly. Feeding during acute attacks of
disease is one of the most serious and fatal of errors. There is an
aversion to food, which is nature's request that none be taken.
When an animal becomes seriously ill, it wants to fast, and does so
unless man interferes. Here we could with advantage do as the animals
do. Nature made no mistake when she took hunger away in acute diseases,
and if we disregard her desires, we invariably suffer for it.
We should make it a rule to take no food, either liquid or solid, during
acute disease.
Those who have had no opportunity to watch the rapidity with which
people recover from serious illness may take the ground that sick people
would starve to death if they were to be treated thus, for some of these
acute diseases last a long time. Typhoid fever, for instance,
occasionally lasts two or three months. It never lasts that long when
treated by natural means, and it is very mild, as a rule. The fever will
be gone in from seven to fourteen days in the vast majority of cases,
and then feeding can be resumed.
Chronic disease is often due to neglected acute disease, at other times
to the building of abnormality through errors of life which have not
resulted in acute troubles. While acquiring chronic disease, the
individual may be fairly comfortable, but he is never up to par. Most
chronic diseases can be cured quickly by taking a fast, but usually it
is not necessary to take a complete fast. The desire for food is not
generally absent and there is usually fair power to digest. One of the
most satisfactory methods, if not the most satisfactory one, of treating
chronic disease is to reduce the food intake, and instead of giving so
much of the concentrated staples, feed more of the succulent vegetables
and the fresh fruits, cooked and raw, using but small quantities of
flesh, bread, potatoes and sugar. This gives the body a chance to throw
off impurities. There are always many impurities in a deranged body.
_Third, Be moderate in your eating_: This is often very difficult, for
most people do not know what moderation is. In infancy the too frequent
feeding and the overfeeding begin. The common belief that infants must
be fed every two hours, or oftener, is acted upon. The result is that
the child soon loses its normal hunger, which is replaced by abnormal
hunger. When food is long withheld it begins to fret. The mother again
feeds and there is peace for an hour or so. When mothers learn to feed
their children three times a day and no more there will be a great
decrease in infant ills and a falling off in the infant mortality. The
healthiest children I have seen are fed but three times a day. They
become used to it and expect no more.
Another thing that makes it difficult to be moderate is impoverishing
the food through refinement and poor cooking. These processes take away
a great part of the mineral salts which are present in foods in organic
form. These salts can not be replaced by table salt, for sodium chloride
is but one of many salts that the body needs and an excess of table salt
does not make up for a deficiency in the others.
Children fed on refined, impoverished foods are not satisfied with a
reasonable amount. There is something lacking and this makes itself
known in cravings, which demand more food than is needed to nourish. I
have noticed many times that children are satisfied with less of whole
wheat bread than of white bread, and that the brown unpolished rice
satisfies them more quickly and completely than the polished rice. In
other words, depriving the foods of their salts is one of the factors
that leads to overeating.
Simplicity is a great aid to moderation. It is also necessary to
exercise the conservative measure, self-control. Some writers suggest to
eat all that is desired and then fast at various intervals to overcome
the effects of overeating. In other words, they advise to eat enough to
become diseased and then fast to cure the trouble. This is better than
to continue the eating when the evil results of an excessive food intake
make themselves known, but it does not bring the best results. Such
people have their spells of sickness, which are unnecessary. If they
stop eating as soon as the disease makes itself known, it does not last
long. By exercising self-control sickness will be warded off. By using
will power daily it grows stronger and those who force themselves to be
moderate at first, are in time rewarded by having moderation become
second nature.
People should always stop eating before they are full. Those who eat
until they are uncomfortable are gluttons. They should be classed with
drunkards and drug addicts.
If discomfort follows a meal it is a sign of overeating. It would be
well to read this in connection with the chapter that treats of
overeating.
_Fourth, Thoroughly masticate all food_: Horace Fletcher has written a
very enthusiastic book on this subject. Enthusiasm is apt to lead one
astray, and even if thorough mastication will not do all that Mr.
Fletcher believed, it is very important, and we owe Mr. Fletcher thanks
for calling our attention to the subject forcibly.
Thorough mastication partially checks overeating.
Our foods have to be finely divided and subdivided or they can not be
thoroughly acted upon by the digestive juices. The stomach is well
muscled and churns the food about, helping to comminute it, but it can
not take the place of the teeth. All foods should be thoroughly
masticated. While the mastication is going on the saliva becomes mixed
with the food. In the saliva is the ptyalin, which begins to digest the
starch. Starch that is well masticated is not so liable to ferment as
that which gets scant attention in the mouth. Starches and nuts need the
most thorough mastication. If thorough mastication were the rule, meat
gluttons would be fewer, for when flesh is well chewed large quantities
cause nausea.
Milk digests best when it is rolled around in the mouth long enough to
be mixed with saliva. To treat milk as a drink is a mistake, for it is a
very nourishing food.
All kinds of nuts must be well masticated. If they are not they can not
be well digested, for the digestive organs are unable to break down big
pieces of the hard nut meats.
The succulent vegetables contain considerable starch. If mastication is
slighted they often ferment enough to produce considerable gas.
Fruits are generally eaten too rapidly, and therefore often produce bad
results. Even green fruits can be eaten with impunity if they are very
thoroughly masticated.
Those who are fond enough of liquors to take an excess should sip their
alcoholic beverages very slowly, tasting every drop before swallowing.
This would decrease their consumption of liquor greatly.
Even water should not be gulped down. It should be taken rather slowly,
especially on hot days. During hot weather many drink too much water.
This tendency can usually be overcome by avoiding iced water and by
drinking slowly.
These four rules should be a part of your vital knowledge. If you forget
everything else in this book, please remember them and try to put them
into practice:
_Eat only when hungry.
During acute illness fast.
Be moderate in your eating.
Thoroughly masticate all food._