Why
I Now Say No to Distilled Water Only
By Chet Day
Reprinted from Chet Day's Health and Beyond Weekly Newsletter
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 some 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.
If
you'd like up-to-date facts about organic and inorganic minerals
instead of over-simplifications and erroneous conclusions, visit:
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. [For info about the body pH click
on the link below]
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.
