Abstract

The therapeutic dry fasting method is described by the author based of his 25 years of experience in monitoring fasting patients. The effect of the method on the human body is examined in detail, recommendations are provided on the preparation and exit from dry fasting, as well as on the actions to be taken in case of possible complications. Indications and contraindications are enumerated. The book is intended for a wide circle of readers who are interested in fasting and use it as a cleansing and medical procedure.

WARNING

All therapeutic suggestions reported in this manual are not a substitute for the advice of the reader’s own physician. It is highly advisable to consult medical professionals before undertaking a water or dry fasting practice. The authors, publisher, distributors and retailers of this book cannot be held responsible for any damage or injury that may be connected, arise from or in any way associated with the application of the method illustrated in this book. Those who decide to follow its principles and algorithms will do it under their own responsibility.

Sergey Filonov

20 questions and answers about dry fasting

Copyright © Vera Giovanna Bani 2019. All rights reserved.

First edition: November 2019

Translated from Russian by Yana Solominskaya (chapters 8-20)

Translated from Italian by Francesca Morgante (chapters 1-7)

Cover by Julia Novachenko

Russian title: Сухое лечебное голодание – мифы и реальность

Italian title: Venti domande sul digiuno secco

www.siberika.it

ISBN 9791220063487

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be stored in a retrieval system, reproduced for any purpose, transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise or translated into any language in any form without written permission of the Copyright owner.

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Contents

Foreword by the curator of English and Italian edition Vera Giovanna Bani

The good fate of therapeutic fasting in Russia and the contribution of Prof. Yuri Nikolayev (introductory article by Vera Giovanna Bani)

Preface by Sergey Filonov

1. What is dry fasting?

2. Is dry fasting a natural method?

3. What conditions can fasting help? Indications and contraindications for fasting and dry fasting.

4. What is the scientific background of therapeutic fasting and dry fasting in particular?

5. What type of fasting (RDT) are being researched and commonly used in clinical practice (in Russia)

6. What methods of fasting have been developed and disseminated in the USSR-Russia?

Ivanov’s method: 42 hours a week of dry fasting

Shchennikov’s method: the complete dry fast (CDF) of 7-9-11 days

Lavrova’s method: a 5-stage cascade dry fasting

Filonov’s method: fractional dry fasting (FDF)

7. What are the advantages of dry fasting compared to water fasting?

8. What mechanisms does a dry fast trigger within the body?

8.1. The mechanism of toxins burning "in their own furnace" and production of "endogenous" water

8.2. Anti-inflammatory and immune-stimulatory mechanism: the action of free forms of glucocorticoids

8.3. The mechanism of acidification of the internal environment of the organism: the first and second acidotic crises

8.4. Autolysis

8.5. The mechanism of rejuvenation and tissue renewal: apoptosis

8.6. Youth and quality of life extension

8.7. Preventive mechanism: protection against radiation, adverse environmental factors, prevention of oncological diseases

8.8. Renewal of the organism’s energy

9. How to properly prepare your body for dry fasting?

9.1. Bowel cleansing. Introduction

9.2. Methods of use of enterosorbents

9.3. Intestinal sorbent cleansing procedure

9.4. Liver cleansing

9.5. Intestinal and liver cleansing (week-long program)

9.6. Accelerated cleansing of the body

9.7. Dietary recommendations to follow after cleansing procedures

9.8. Buckwheat porridge fast

10. What is fasting accompanied by?

10.1. Hunger sensations

10.2. Weakness

10.3. Chilliness or fever (more typical of dry fasting)

10.4. Bad breath

10.5. Dimmed vision, vertigo

10.6. Headache

10.7. Sleep disturbances

10.8. Pain in various parts of the body

10.9. Toothache

10.10. Egress of pus

10.11. Nausea, regurgitation and vomiting (sorbents required)

10.12. Palpitations

10.13. Heartache

10.14. Muscle pain from overstrain

10.15. Colds

10.16. What to do if menstruation occurs during a dry fasting practice?

11. How should you conduct a short dry fast?

11.1. Before fasting

11.2. Essential benefits of fatty acids contained in fish

11.3. The importance of fish oil fatty acids in sustaining health and vessel health

11.4. Home dry fasts up to 5 days

11.5. How to conduct a dry fractional fast properly

11.6. Recommendations on conducting dry fasting

11.7. Let’s move on to the day-to-day description of the 5-day dry fast

12. What time and which days are best for fasting?

13. How to exit from short dry fasts (1-2-3-4-5 days) properly?

13.1. Withdrawal from dry fasting. Recommendations

13.2. Withdrawal from a 1-day fast

13.3. Withdrawal from a 48-hour fast

13.4. Withdrawal from a 3-day fast

13.5. Withdrawal from a 4-5 day fast

13.6. Nutrition program for good digestion (during withdrawal from a fast)

13.7. How to prepare Bolotov’s whey (serum)

13.8. What are the potential complications during withdrawal from fasting?

14. What’s the ideal scheme for conducting a dry fractional fast at home?

15. How many kinds of dry fasting exist?

15.1. Interesting facts: Secrets of Japanese monks

15.2. Interesting facts: Dry fasting and dousing with cold water

16. How should you conduct a long dry fast?

17. Dry fractional fasting. Who do we recommend it to?

18. How to come out of a 9-day dry fasting course?

A nutritional program for coming out of a fast

19. What diseases can be cured through dry fasting?

19.1. Dry fasting for acute diseases.

19.1.1. Fasting for acute infections (acute respiratory diseases, influenza)

19.1.2. Dry fasting for the relapse of gastric ulcer or duodenal ulcer, chronic pancreatitis, cholecystitis, colitis, etc.

19.1.3. Dry fasting for diabetes

19.2. Dry Fasting for chronic diseases

19.2.1. Dry Fasting for endointoxication and atherosclerosis.

19.2.2. Dry Fasting for hypertension

19.2.3. Why dry fasting helps fight chronic diseases

19.2.4. Dry fasting for cystic tumors in the body

19.2.5. Dry Fasting for Infertility

19.2.6. Toxemia in Pregnant Women

19.2.7. Endometriosis

19.2.8. Dry Fasting for Benign Tumors

19.2.9. Mastopathy

19.2.10. Prostatitis and benign prostatic hyperplasia

19.2.11. Dry Fasting for Bronchopulmonary Diseases

19.2.12. Cardiovascular Diseases: Hypertension and Atherosclerosis

19.2.13. Neurological diseases: degenerative disc disease, protrusions, disk herniation, migraine.

19.2.14. Rheumatoid arthritis, ankylosing spondylitis, deforming osteoarthrosis, infectious polyarthritis

19.2.15. Can dry fasting treat AIDS and hepatitis C?

19.2.16. Dry Fasting against Cancer

19.2.17. Dry Fasting against Skin Diseases

19.2.18. Functional Nervous System Disorders

19.2.19. Dry Fasting against Obesity

20. How does doctor Filonov debunk myths about dry therapeutic fasting?

Myth #1. People can survive 2-3 days without water.

Myth #2. Many people wonder where our exotoxins and endotoxins go, because we don’t conduct special cleansing procedures: enemas, hydro-colon therapy, or sauna treatment.

Myth #3. Kidney problems may occur during dry fasting because of a huge burden on the kidneys. Dry fasting is one of the most dangerous cleansing methods.

Myth #4. Fasting is a huge stress for the body.

Myth #5. Many nutritionists claim that people suffer from vitamin deficiency while fasting, the body doesn’t receive protein on time, and it burns structural proteins of its own tissues, primarily muscles, in addition to fat.

Myth #6. The body can constantly renew itself, so there’s no need for any type of fasting.

Myth #7. Fasting is ineffective for weight loss. People lose fat during a fasting course, but they quickly regain weight after switching back to their usual diet.

Myth #8. Many people believe that dry fasting can treat all incurable diseases, even the terminal stage of cancer.

Myth #9. Many people write that dry fasting requires salt-water enemas and rinsing the mouth with water, as these procedures help undergo dry fasting.

Literature

Foreword by the curator of English and Italian edition Vera Giovanna Bani

Between 29 June and 13 July 2019 I had the honor and the privilege of organizing the first dry fasting practice in Europe (Strunjan - Slovenia), with Dr. Filonov and his team of masseurs: his daughters Olga Kulikova, Anastasiya Antonova and nephew Andrey Cherkasskyj. We worked with a fantastic group of almost thirty people, all Italians except for one German girl, one French and one Swiss. The experience was wonderful, effective and constructive for everyone (see the photo dossier at the end of the book).  But how did this project of disseminating dry fasting begin?...

…In October 2016, I began to get interested in dry fasting without suspecting that this path would eventually propel me into an unexpected world. I discovered that in the post-war Soviet Union, where pharmaceutical lobbies were entirely inexistent, and a strong spirit of innovation and scientific research prevailed, a medical-scientific approach entailing therapeutic fasting was formally consolidated. Drawing on a tradition previously established in Russia, the mechanisms of therapeutic fasting had been successfully investigated and clinically tested on thousands of patients over the course of 60 years. This provided the scientific foundation that eventually made it possible for the Ministry of Health to approve its methodological indications. Many Russian doctors had the opportunity to cultivate this approach and even develop a radical branch, as the dry fast could be defined.

In November 2016, I worked to meet Dr. Filonov, who is considered the top dry fasting expert in Russia. I offered him to become the forerunner of dry fasting in Italy and he gave me “carte blanche”. Thus, in March 2017, thanks to the invitation of the Italian University of Health headed by Dr. Valdo Vaccaro, I had the opportunity to introduce Dr. Filonov to the Italian audience.

In the summer of 2017, I tested this fantastic method on myself at Dr. Filonov’s headquarters in Altai Republic (Ust-Sema, West Siberia) and finally in mid-December 2017 the monograph, Digiuno secco. Gli ultimi sviluppi della digiunoterapia in Russia (Dry Fasting: the latest developments in fasting in Russia), came to life.  It’s the first non-Russian book about dry fasting! This 687-page volume comprises the almost complete version of the first book by Dr Filonov, Suchoe lechebnoe golodanie. Mify i realnost (Dry medical fasting. Myths and reality) and selected chapters of his second book, Lechenie organizma sobstvennymi silami (Curing the body with its own strengths)[1].

The book was received with great interest in Italy: its emergence attracted the attention of the community of complementary medicine supporters, and many bought it without hesitation, despite its weight and hefty price.

Nonetheless, we’d like to emphasize, however, is that the subject of our work has had repercussions outside of a circle of enthusiasts of the alternative medicine scene: today, our website Siberika.it receives continuous requests for clarification from ordinary people who are intrigued by the approach proposed by dry fasting.

In 2018, this growing interest has encouraged us to produce a lighter and cheaper text, which was nevertheless full of informative content: 20 Domande sul digiuno secco (Twenty questions about dry fasting - 271 pages), a compendium of Dr. Sergej Filonov’s monographs, which is also a practical manual aimed at clarifying all the fundamental points related to the dry fasting method in a question-and-answer form. The positive response to this compendium further convinced us that the subject is attracting more and more readers by the day. We therefore understood that the time has come to present it in English for the benefit of the huge English-speaking community.

We hope to have correctly grasped the needs of the general audience and hope to succeed in our intent to offer the first, essential and exhaustive encounter of the dry therapeutic fasting method here.

Vera Giovanna Bani (vera.bani@gmail.com;  siberika.it)

The good fate of therapeutic fasting in Russia and the contribution of Prof. Yuri Nikolayev (introductory article by Vera Giovanna Bani)

In Russia, therapeutic fasting has a history that can be traced back to 1769, when Petr Vilyaminov, professor of medicine at the University of Moscow, wrote the treaty Slovo or postakh kak sredstve predochraneniya ot bolezney (On fasting as a means of disease prevention) after having held a series of lessons on the benefit of fasting.

Vilyaminov's observations found a follower fifty years later: in 1822 L. A. Struve, a professor at the University of Jurev, wrote about fasting as an excellent method of treatment for many diseases.

In 1834, Professor I. G. Spassky from the University of Moscow used fasting in his medical practice. In the article he wrote in the same year, titled "Uspeshnoe deystvie goloda na prostudnye zabolevaniya" (Successful application of fasting in the treatment of cooling diseases) he observed:

"By limiting and changing nutrition, fasting ends up balancing many disturbances in the body's vegetative process and in this sense it appears to be an excellent remedy in the treatment of different chronic diseases".

Subsequently, between the late 1800s and the early 1900s, Dr. Nikolay Lvovich Zeland (1833-1902) was interested in experimental fasting. Born in Saarema, now Estonia, he completed his studies in Petersburg and was appointed to work in the outlying regions of the Russian Empire, in Vladivostok, Alma-Ata, and Tashkent. Zeland did a lot of research on dosed fasting, experimenting on himself and on animals. He came to the conclusion that, thanks to the impact of the fast:

"It is possible to notice not only radical changes in the composition of the nervous system and in the state of being, but at the global level the processes of digestion and hematopoiesis improve... A temporary arrest of the vital processes becomes a source of renewal and of great energy for these same processes. Abstinence from habitual food becomes a stimulus thanks to which the elements of the tissues become stronger and are enriched with proteins. (...) After my experiments I came to the conclusion that fasting is not only an effective therapeutic remedy, but also a practice that deserves attention as an educational method".

Dr. Zeland explained his observations in the article "O posledovatelnom vliyanii lishenija pishchi na pitanie" (On the progressive impact of food abstinence on nutrition), published in the "Russkaya medicina" journal (Russian medicine), 1888, № 5-10, 12.

In 1902 it was prof. Vladimir Pashutin who studied the physiological and patho-physiological characteristics of water, dry and partial fasting in animal studies and in a clinical context. Practicing at the Medical-Military Academy of Tsarist Russia, he experimented on different animals for a long time and came to formulate the essence of the physiological mechanisms involved. Thanks to this, V. Pashutin is considered the pioneer and founder of the theory of fasting or endogenous feeding. To this day, his experiments have not lost their significance.

The figure of Aleksey Suvorin deserves a special mention. Descending from a powerful family of St. Petersburg publishers, he was interested in alternative methods of treatment and oriental self-healing practices since early age; he studied treaties of Indian medicine, Tibetan, Chinese and books of Western hygienists. In 1914, under the pseudonym Aleksey Poroshin, he described his first experiments with fasting in a diary entitled Novyj chelovek (The New Man), published by the homonymous publishing house that he founded.

After the revolution and the civil war that ensued in Russia, Suvorin migrated to Yugoslavia, where, despite living on the edge of poverty, he found the enthusiasm to found a publishing house with a Yugoslav partner. The latter, however, ended up deceiving and denouncing him, and Suvorin was imprisoned without trial. In prison, as a protest against the unjust sentence, he began a hunger strike that invigorated him instead of annihilating him. It is said that on the 35th day of his voluntary fasting he was given the opportunity to defend himself in court. He won the trial and continued to fast for up to 42 days, with surprising results, which, as the story goes, ended up gaining the interest of the director and staff of the penalty facility, as well as many inmates.

After this experience, Suvorin became a very active champion of the cause of therapeutic fasting. In 1931, his works were released in Belgrade: Ozdorovliyenye golodom i pishchej (Healing with fasting and food), Metoda Suvorina (The Suvorin method), Lechenie golodaniyem (Healing through fasting). In a short time, his method became very popular in Yugoslavia and while Suvorin gained the esteem of tens of thousands of patients (assisted at a distance, by postal correspondence), he also made many enemies. Invited to Paris in 1937 to discuss a fasting clinic project, he died suddenly under circumstances that remained mysterious.

Russia remembered this illustrious emigrant and promoter of fasting in relatively recent times: his writings were only published in Moscow in 1998, collected in the monograph Metod Suvorina. Lechenie golodaniyem (Suvorin's method. Healing through fasting). Today, everyone in Russia recognizes the contribution of Aleksey Suvorin to the Russian history of therapeutic fasting, and he remains one of the most appreciated authors among experts and enthusiasts of the method.

Belarusian M.P. Zyazulya stands out among Suvorin's followers. He was able to heal severe forms of tuberculosis using the method described in Suvorin's books. In the more recent times, one of his compatriots, Belarusian doctor G. A. Vojtovich, created his method of fractional fasting along the same lines.

However, the great architect of the widespread propagation of therapeutic fasting was the psychiatrist Yuri Nikolayev (1905-1998): to him we owe the approval and the introduction of the method (for which he coined the name Razgruzochno-dieticheskaja terapiya, abbreviated as RDT – Diet-fasting therapy) to the USSR’s state health system. The documentary Le jeûne une nouvelle thérapie, made in 2011 by the French director Thierry de Lestrade and the journalist Sylvie Gilman, translated into Russian under the title Nauka golodaniya (The science of fasting[2]), pays tribute to the work of this courageous doctor.

Yuri Nikolayev was born into a family of established vegetarians, lovers of yoga and oriental philosophy. According to Nikolayev himself, his parents were in close contact with Lev Tolstoy, the most famous vegetarian in Russia, and his father corresponded with the American writer Upton Sinclair, a fervent supporter of the hygienic cause and author of the book The fasting cure. Besides, he was also busy translating Herbert Shelton's books into Russian.

Young Yuri’s ideas and position took shape in this fertile soil. He started his career as a doctor, served as a military doctor after graduation, and was a student under the famous academic M.O. Gurevich in the psychiatric clinic of the First Institute of Medicine in Moscow in 1939 - 1941.

His interest in fasting was likely to have been initially stimulated by the family environment, was later consolidated thanks to the contribution of Prof. Bakulev, President of the Academy of Medical Sciences of the USSR. In 1956, Prof. Bakulev published an article titled Po povodu odnogo metoda lecheniya (Regarding the treatment method) in the journal "Meditsinskij rabotnik" (The medical worker). The article described a successful experiment in the treatment of chronic diseases with fasting, specifically some cases of complete remission of gastric and duodenal ulcers after a 12-day water fast.

It must be said that discussion of "fasting" in the USSR of the 50s and 60s was certainly difficult. The specter of hunger was still very much alive in the country. The nine hundred days of the Nazi siege of Leningrad, with thousands of deaths from starvation and numerous incidents of cannibalism, as well as the challenging post-war years characterized by scarcity of food had left a profoundly mark on the collective unconscious of the Soviet population and the memory of deprivation had not subsided in a little over a decade. However, Prof. Bakulev was able to direct the attention of the scientific and medical community to the possibility of applying therapeutic fasting, and Nikolayev was certainly deeply impressed. So much so that he too, in his psychiatric practice, found constants worthy of interest. He wrote:

"I noticed that some schizophrenia patients often give up eating and resist when they are force-fed. I wondered if this renunciation of food was not perhaps an instinctive reaction to the sick organism's defense. So, I tried to treat these patients with a paradoxical method: the dosed fast”

In the late 1940s-1960s, Nikolayev intensified his observations of schizophrenia patients who became the object of his doctoral thesis, presented in 1960 under the title Razgruzochno-dieticheskaja terapiya shizofrenii i ee fiziologicheskoe obosnovaniye (RDT diet-fasting therapy in the treatment of schizophrenia and its physiological basis). In those difficult years, Nikolayev's selflessness in his work of furthering therapeutic fasting would not have been successful, had it not been for a decisive stroke of luck: Nikolaeyv’s wife, also a psychiatrist employed in the rehabilitation of alcoholics, happened to handle the case of Lev Bulganin, son of an important man of the party, the Chairman of the Soviet Council of Ministers, N.A. Bulganin.

The Nikolayevs both treated the illustrious patient together and managed to cure him by applying the method of therapeutic fasting. The powerful N.A. Bulganin, wishing to express gratitude for his son’s healing, assured Dr. Nikolayev his high protection. Thanks to this, Nikolayev was able to freely conduct his research and experiments at the psychiatric clinic and record his observations.

Using fasting to treat thousands of cases of schizophrenia and other psychic disorders, he noted that, by eradicating the disease at the root, fasting could heal several diseases simultaneously. Thus, with copious clinical results in hand and the protection of the high-ranking official Bulganin, Nikolayev soon succeeded in introducing therapeutic fasting into clinical practice, thus contributing to its approval by the Soviet Ministry of Health.

In 1961, Nikolayev was appointed director of the psychiatry program at the Rostov-on-Don Medical Institute. During the two years in this position he had managed to set up a school of experts in therapeutic fasting and inspire numerous colleagues.

In the decades that followed, Nikolayev worked in Moscow at the Soviet Scientific Research Institute of Psychiatry and coordinated the work of the numerous fasting wards that had been opened everywhere throughout the Soviet Union.

The development of the method benefited immensely from the collection Problemy lechebnogo golodaniya (Problems of therapeutic fasting), published in Moscow in 1969. It comprised the contribution of scientists such as P.K. Anokhin, A.A. Pokrovskiy, P.A. Fedorov, in addition to Nikolayev. It comprised approximately sixty articles dedicated to therapeutic fasting in psychiatric practice, to the neurophysiology of the sensation of hunger and satiety, and to the pathophysiology of fasting. Nikolayev himself spoke of the growing interest and fervor in the studies in the introduction to 1988 edition of his book Golodaniye radi zdoroviya (Fasting for Health), published for the first time in 1973 with 200,000 copies.

At the end of the 1990s, the Republic of Buryatia hosted a pilot experience to introduce fasting dietary therapy (RDT) in the practice of medical and hospital facilities at the state level. Under the scientific direction of Prof. A.N. Kokosov, a training program for RDT specialists was established in the republic, with lectures, seminars and conferences on the method aimed at both doctors and health personnel, and the interested public.

Since then, in Russia, the number of scientific articles that have been released and authors who have made contributions to the field of therapeutic fasting (including dry fasting) are uncountable. This is evidenced by the materials reported in Appendix 1 and the relative bibliography included in this book, which contains references, as complete as possible, on the enormous amount of medical and scientific research carried out in the USSR-Russia in the last sixty years.

Finally, I would like to add that 25 years since the creation of the Russian fasting dietary therapy (RDT) were celebrated on 10 August 2019, in Goryachinsk, Republic of Buryatia, and I had the pleasure of being present and of getting to know the people who are still carrying out this fantastic project (see the photographic dossier at the end of this book).

Preface by Sergey Filonov

I was born in the Altai region in a family of physicians; both my mother and my older sister are pediatricians. Since early childhood at home I regularly overheard conversations about medicine. With such a "family anamnesis" it was a foreseeable predicament that my path would lead me straight to the study of medicine, and so it was indeed, even though, from what I recall, during childhood and adolescence I was fond of totally different things: like all the boys on our street, I, too, wanted to become a pilot.

One day my father and I went skiing. After our outing we visited some friends for a cup of tea, and it was there that for first time in my life I saw a cancer patient. He was very thin and suffered from severe pain. This made a very strong impression on me. Once I reached home I asked my mother if it recovering from this disease really was impossible, and she replied: "Unfortunately, my son, at this stage of the illness our medicine is yet ineffective."

In eighth grade, by chance, I stumbled upon a book. I do not remember the title, but I remember well that it spoke of a talented healer who had cured a man suffering from cancer by treating it with herbs and fasting. Hence, the body has the reserves and forces capable to treat such a serious and insidious disease like cancer, I thought.

For every poison, there must necessarily be an antidote in nature. For each disease in the body there must be forces able to heal it. After all, animals in nature do not have hospitals, clinics and doctors. They are guided by their natural instincts. They know better than any herbalists, which grass to take in the moment they need it, or they heal themselves just by fasting. From that moment, I became more interested in natural ways of healing. I began to read books about fasting, hypnosis, herbs, acupuncture. I began to understand: a man is a natural pharmacy, the organism has all it needs for the treatment of any disease, it is only necessary to discover these natural medicines and stimulate them to benefit the organism, with work, patience and willpower. My decision to enroll in medical school was absolutely conscious, but I knew that I would not be interested in sitting at the clinic and to prescribe tablets. I had to find a specialization and to gain knowledge in such a way that my future patients would be assisted and able to utilize their huge hidden potential to heal diseases.

On the fourth year of my medical degree, I was appointed to supervise a patient with bronchial asthma. When I went to her room, I could not believe what I saw: a blooming woman with a pink blush on the face and sparkling eyes. She didn’t look at all like an asthmatic patient. I wanted to apologize and say, that I had entered in the wrong room, but still I asked her name. It turned out I was in the right place!

"Don’t be so surprised - she said - that I don’t look like an asthmatic person. I have been on a twenty-day course of fasting, and now I'm at the end of it. After the tenth day of fasting I stopped having asthma attacks and I stopped using an inhaler. "

Her appearance and her breathing impressed me. It's one thing to read books about fasting, and another thing to see in practice the results of it. After this meeting, I definitely decided that I needed to know everything about this wonderful technique and make sure to specialize in it.

Professor Yu.S. Nikolayev authored the best texts on therapeutic fasting at the time. His book[3] is written with such enthusiasm and faith in this natural method, that after reading it I also wanted to practice it. So I did, and got my whole university group involved. We started a juice fast, then tried the water fast. Of course, most of my group abandoned the experiment, but I continued. I particularly liked to fast before exams: after fasting my head became light, clear, and memory was very much improved, and most importantly I would go take the exams without any fear.

After graduating from the medical institute I was appointed in the locality of "Goryachinsk", in the Republic of Buryatia on the shore of the sacred Lake Baikal. The nature and beauty of these places enchanted me, especially the energy and the magnificence of the Lake.

Working in this sanatorium I was fortunate to meet a very interesting person, Vladimir Romanovich Verbul. He was suffering from bronchial asthma and was the first, in Buryatia, to try the 24-day fast in the domestic environment.

His work colleagues were shocked by the results of his therapeutic fast. Together they decided to invite the famous Professor Yuri Sergeyevich Nikolayev to Buryatia. When the professor arrived, they took him to our "Goryachinsk" sanatorium, so I had the chance to meet this extraordinary man for the first time. Yuri Sergeyevich liked the sanatorium and the surrounding nature very much. He said: "Here at Lake Baikal, the place and conditions are perfect for therapeutic fasting."

Professor Nikolayev invited me to follow him to Moscow to practice in his therapeutic fasting ward.

After my period of study in Moscow, we opened department for therapeutic fasting in our sanatorium. It was difficult for me to start it. Our collective was skeptical about fasting as a therapeutic method and they openly called me "the hunger doctor". I remember well that when my first patient went to the canteen, the day of his exit from the fast, the nurse brought him a plate of cold porridge of salted millet and told him: "come on, eat!". Fortunately, he remembered my advice and decided to wait for me. But what would have happened if he had eaten it?!

Over time, however, seeing the good results of therapeutic fasting, our collective began to have a completely different opinion and some of them even decided to personally experience a course of fasting.

After working independently for two years, I was fortunate enough to go on to specialize in St. Petersburg, at the fasting department led by Professor Alexsey Nikolayevich Kokosov. There, for the first time I heard about absolute (dry) fasting and its application in the treatment of diseases.

It happened that some of my patients who had practiced a water fasting course had seen all their symptoms disappear during the fast, but at the end of it part of the symptoms had returned. Those were unpleasant moments for me. I had pondered for a long time how to improve the effectiveness of the method, understanding that, obviously, the longer the period of fasting, the better the result would be. But unfortunately times were changing, people had to start paying for the health services and not everyone could afford to undergo a long assisted fast. How to strengthen the curative effect of fasting under the conditions offered by our sanatorium?

It was my dog who suggested a solution. He had been hit by a motorcycle and after the accident had given up not only eating but also drinking. For seven days, he remained motionless in a dark corner of the shed and only on the eighth day he began drinking, and then eating. Then I thought he had an internal trauma and probably an edema. He instinctively felt it and for this reason he gave up drinking, which ended up saving him.

After a while, as if on purpose, I, too, had an adventure with the motorbike: after a day of fishing I slipped and sank in the icy water. To get home, I had to travel twenty miles on a motorbike and the result was that I froze to the bone. This accident provoked an acute sinusitis and I had awful pains every time I lowered my head.

I began to reflect on the situation. I thought: the pains are mainly caused by an edema. But if there is no water, there will be no edema. I decided to fast without water until symptoms resolved.

On the fifth day of dry fast all the symptoms of the disease had disappeared and even today they do not bother me anymore. That was my first dry fast experiment. I was at Lake Baikal and it was not difficult to practice the fast, thanks also to the fact that I had a good experience of water fasting. In any case, I was most impressed by the therapeutic effect and the results obtained in such a short period of time. I had assisted patients with sinusitis, but the results only showed up after the tenth day of water fasting.

One day a young man suffering from chronic prostatitis came to see me. I had already assisted him on a fourteen-day water fast. After the practice he was better, but he still had periodic aggravations. I reflected that prostatitis is an infectious process. Every infection loves to reproduce in water, edema is present in any infectious process. The boy was serious about his intent to heal and my arguments about dry fasting convinced him. He did a 5-days dry fast and then a 5-days water fast. Exactly one year later he came back to me and said that he did not want to fast with water anymore, that he liked the effect of dry fasting and that there were no exacerbations that year. Under my direct supervision he did a 7-day dry fast. Later he called me often to tell me that he felt very satisfied with the achieved results.

I was afraid to carry out a dry fast longer than seven days, but in life I have always been fortunate to meet interesting and unique people. For family reasons, I was forced to go to the Altai region, where I was offered to work in a medical center specializing in therapeutic fasting.

At the time, from the city of Ulan-Ude, I received an invitation to a conference dedicated to fasting. The conference attracted the most famous doctors specializing in therapeutic fasting, from all over Russia. I went. On this occasion I had the good fortune to meet one of the founders of the dry fasting method, Professor L. A. Shchennikov, who assisted patients on 11-day fasting. After the conference the professor invited me to visit him in Kislovodsk. There, I was acquainted with his patients and studied his method in practice. This is a very effective, but very difficult approach for an untrained person

When I returned home after being in Kislovodsk I did a 9-day dry fast, spending my time at home and a bit in the Altai mountains near Lake Teletskoe. Then I realized that a serious dry fast can only happen by staying in nature, possibly in the mountains and near mountain rivers. After this experience I did a 10-days dry fast, but only staying in the Altai mountains: we spent the whole period on horseback, on excursions. Considering all the advantages and disadvantages of the various methods of dry fasting and my personal experience, now I believe that the most effective approach is the "fractional dry fasting" that I propose to all my patients.

I have been working with therapeutic fasting for 30 years. I have personally assisted hundreds of patients. There have been excellent results but there have also been cases in which therapeutic fasting did not help. People often call me, write to me or simply ask me how to start and how to get the maximum benefit from this technique. Nowadays, thanks to the Internet, information regarding dry fasting is spreading rapidly. To tell the truth, it is often contradictory information: some people write that with a 2-day dry fast you can recover from cancer, while others say that in order to heal, you need a 15-day dry fasting. Both are wrong. Dry fasting, according to my personal experience, is one of the most effective methods among types of fasts but if you are not properly prepared and it is practices correctly it can be very risky, like all other methods of healing.

Unfortunately, people turn to this method when it is too late, as a last resort, after having tried everything and wasted a lot of time. I always tell my patients that everything needs to be done on time. This method, like others, has its indications and contraindications, however its effectiveness is incomparable in treating the initial phase of almost all kinds of diseases.

There are real horror stories about the damage that a dry fast could cause. It is not my intention to underestimate other techniques of fasting and treatment, but I firmly believe that it is very important to provide people with the most truthful and complete information and the possibility of choice.

If someone decides to autonomously tend to their own healing using the dry fasting method, then they must do it correctly, in order to obtain the maximum benefit and make use of all its potential. My book is dedicated to this category of people. I tried to illustrate the method as clearly and completely as I can, providing highly reliable information, based on the results of decades of practice and confirmed by my patients’ feedback. Remember: a man can bear anything if he knows why and for what purpose he is doing it.

Sergey Ivanovich Filonov, MD[4]

1.   What is dry fasting?

An absolute fast or dry fasting (DF) is normally defined as abstinence from any food or liquid over a particular time frame. Russian doctors recommend a practice from 1 day up to a maximum of 5 in domestic conditions (3 days for people affected by illness) and from 6 to 11 days strictly under medical assistance (see question 10).

This type of fasting requires abstaining from water not only for internal use, but also for external use. For maximum therapeutic effect, in fact, it is advisable to totally refrain from any contact with water; this results in the greatest experience of rejuvenation and restructuring of the cells through the detoxification process stimulated by DF.

It is necessary to also avoid brushing teeth; while fasting the saliva composition changes and acquires the ability to "dissolve" the enamel. Throughout the fasting practice a special organic layer usually coats the teeth and protects them from decaying. If the wish to brush one’s teeth is too strong it is possible to do it, but only once a week.

Regarding contact with water for domestic use, it will be sufficient to use a pair of rubber gloves.

It must be said that in the case of certain pathologies doctors allow patients to wash themselves with cold water (less than 11 degrees) or swim in natural water basins. The contrast in temperature experienced by the body enhances the thermal reaction triggered by DF within the organism, which is considered one of the main mechanisms of self-healing.

2.   Is dry fasting a natural method?

Nowadays dry therapeutic fasting is considered one of the most advanced healing methods, but in fact this approach is “as old as the world”. It was born at the dawn of humanity. It can be affirmed with certainty that since the beginning of the evolution of animal life forms existing today, dry fasting was frequently used by all their representatives.

As humanity progressed this archaic method has been mostly forgotten and only in recent decades, thanks to the growing popularity of hygienism and water fasting, there has been a return of interest in this ancient practice. Dry fasting is an absolutely natural process, incorporated into the genetic code of man and animals: it is well known that when animals fall sick, especially in serious conditions, they immediately refuse food and water.

When the body gets ill, it begins to mobilize all its forces to protect itself and it starts using its reserves, if they exist. Therefore, with the intent to save energy from processing external water and food, the body triggers a rescue program, which involves an automatic "refusal" to introduce them.

Similar situations also occur in response to adverse environmental conditions: to protect themselves from extreme cold (winter hibernation) or from extreme hot (aestivation) animals do not eat and do not drink for long periods and enter a state of inactivity and metabolic depression characterized by low body temperature, slow breathing, slow heart rate and low metabolic rate. The function of hibernation-aestivation is to conserve energy when sufficient food is unavailable.

This phenomenon can affect animal and plant species, both in the adult form and in the intermediate forms of development (eggs, larvae, chrysalises, seeds, spores, pollen, buds, tubers, bulbs, etc.) and may depend on seasonal environmental phenomena, as in the case of winter hibernation or from accidental external causes (drought, temperature changes, lack of nourishment). In all these situations we speak of anabiosis, or apparent death or latent life[5]. Anabiosis is a temporary state during which the organism, in the absence of nourishment, slows down its vital functions, which resume perfectly as soon as the external conditions normalize.

Therefore, fasting is a natural adaptive mechanism, an organism’s automatic self-defense reaction genially developed by Mother Nature and incorporated into the vital strategies of animal and plant organisms to survive environmental conditions.

3. What conditions can fasting help? Indications and contraindications for fasting and dry fasting.

Main indications:

- hypertension, stages 1 and 2;

- neurocirculatory dystonia, hypertensive or mixed (there are limitations regarding hypotonic neurocirculatory dystonia since there is a chance of orthostatic collapse);

- ischemic heart disease, angina pectoris of classes I, II and III;

- chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD);

- bronchial asthma;

- pulmonary sarcoidosis, phases I and II;

- chronic gastritis with secretory insufficiency and hyperacidity, gastroduodenitis;

- pancreatitis and chronic cholecystitis without gallstones;

- biliary dyskinesia

- irritable bowel syndrome (IBS);

- diseases of the musculoskeletal system of inflammatory and dystrophic origin;

- neuroendocrine disorders in chronic salpingoovaritis;

- prostate adenoma;

- alimentary-constitutional obesity, diencephalic obesity;

- resistance to drug therapy;

- skin allergies (chronic allergic dermatosis, neurodermatitis, psoriasis, eczema); food allergies and (or) from drugs.

- neurosis, depressive conditions, schizotypal personality disorder.

Contraindications

1. Absolute contraindications:

- marked body mass deficit (more than 15% from the expected values);

- malignant tumors;

- active tuberculosis of the lungs and other organs;

- bronchiectasis;

- systemic diseases of the blood;

- type I diabetes mellitus;

- thyrotoxicosis;

- disorders of the heart rhythm and/or of the pulse propagation of any origin;

- post-focal myocardial infarction;

- heart failure of II B - III degree;

- chronic hepatitis and cirrhosis of the liver;

- chronic renal failure and renal failure of any genesis;

- thrombophlebitis.

2. Relative contraindications:

- coronary heart disease with rhythmic disorders and cardiac failure greater than stage II A;

- severe hypotension;

- cholelithiasis;

- urolithiasis;

- stomach ulcer and duodenal ulcer;

- chronic venous insufficiency;

- type II diabetes mellitus;

- gout;

- febrile conditions;

- pregnancy and breastfeeding;

- in childhood (up to 14 years) and the elderly (over 70);

4. What is the scientific background of therapeutic fasting and dry fasting in particular?

In Russia therapeutic fasting has a research tradition that can be traced back to 1769, when Petr Vilyaminov, professor of the Moscow University medical school, wrote the treatise Slovo o postakh kak sredstve predochraneniya ot bolezney (“On fasting as a means of disease prevention”).

Later, between the early 1800s and the mid-20th century, many Russian researchers and physicians became interested in fasting, among which we cite prof. I. G. Spassky, Dr. N. Zeland, prof. V. Pashutin, A. Suvorin and prof. Bakulyev, who studied the physiological and pathophysiological characteristics of fasting and applied it in animal studies and in a clinical setting.

But the great promoter of fasting as a therapeutic practice was the psychiatrist Yuri Nikolayev: he was responsible for the approval and the introduction of fasting in the USSR state healthcare system. Thanks to the contribution of prof. Nikolayev fasting was scientifically investigated in studies that began in the 1960s and continue to the present day, with a peak of activity in the decades of the 70s, 80s and 90s.

It was Professor Nikolayev who coined the term razgruzochno-dieticheskaya terapiya (RDT) (“fasting-dietary therapy – FDT”)[6]. The term distinguishes spontaneous fasting or fasting induced by circumstances beyond personal control from therapeutic fasting researched and applied in the medical field on the basis of precise protocols approved by the Ministry of Healthcare first in the Soviet Union and later in Russia. This is also understood as a therapeutic practice based on the transition of the organism to an endogenous diet.

With regards to dry fasting specifically, it was only in recent decades that (in Russia) total abstinence from food and water started being applied in clinical practice (V.A. Zakirov[7]  and I.E Khoroshilov[8]), although the physiologist Vladimir Pashutin[9] in 1902 and the gastroenterologist and dietician M. Pevzner[10] in the 1950s had already written about the possibility to limit water during an absolute fast.

The method of dry fasting has scientific evidence. The Scientific Research Institute of Pulmonology in St. Petersburg, led by prof. A. Kokosov[11], has produced guidelines on the treatment of various lung diseases using the dry fasting method. A clinical experiment conducted in the mid-1990s at the Medical Academy of Ivanovo, showed that absolute fasting (without food and water) opens interesting prospects for the treatment of cancer and serious immunodeficiency disorders. It is scientifically demonstrated that dry fasting allows the organism to develop the highest concentrations of biologically active substances, hormones, immunocompetent cells and immunoglobulins in body fluids (according to the research developed in the USSR-Russia, see the bibliography section).

5. What type of fasting (RDT) are being researched and commonly used in clinical practice (in Russia)

The medical recommendations elaborated by the Russian Ministry of Health[12], define the different types of fasting: absolute or dry fasting (absence of food and water), complete fasting (absence of food with water intake), incomplete or water fasting (with limited water intake) and different types of qualitative fasting (protein, lipid, vitamin, carbohydrate).

The incomplete or water fasting (with normal water intake): is the most commonly used in the clinical practice of the RDT.

The absolute or dry fasting: from a physiological perspective, during this type of fasting the body does not undergo a deficit of liquids because every kilogram of splitting lipid mass (glycogen) releases up to 1 liter of endogenous water (metabolic). In a normal environmental temperature, the organism does not lose large quantities of liquids through pulmonary and cutaneous perspiration: between 1.5 to 2 liters a day, so the water deficit does not exceed 0.5-1 liter per day, i.e. physiologically admissible values under conditions of reduced basic metabolism.

If the absolute absence of food and water does not exceed 3-4 days, the dehydration of the body does not exceed an acceptable low level. Normal clinical practice recommends short dry fasting exercises (1-3 days) during which neither enemas nor laxatives are prescribed. During a dry fast the times for typical fasting phased are reduced: the stage of alimentary excitement lasts a few hours; the stage of increasing ketoacidosis lasts from 1 to 3 days. Upon observation, the splitting of fat deposits starts earlier and is more complete. Furthermore, a high concentration of biologically active substances such as hormones, immunocompetent cells and immunoglobulins is detected in body fluids. Contrary to popular belief the "dry" fasting is objectively better tolerated than " water " fasting. Moreover, in cases of illnesses such as bronchial asthma, hypertension, forms of allergy, etc., a 3-days dry fast proved to be much more effective than a 3-days water fast. On the basis of the studies and results obtained, it can be said that 3 days of absolute fasting correspond to 7-9 days of water fasting.

The combined fasting: absolute (dry) + complete (water) fasting: a method of consecutive application of absolute (dry) fasting for 2-3 days and complete (water) fasting from 10 to 14 days. In accordance with this practice, patients are advised to abstain from food and water for 1-3 days (depending on individual tolerance) and no cleansing procedures (enemas) are prescribed. Starting from the 2nd-4th day, patients begin to take water in a dose of 10-12mg per kg of body-weight per day for the duration of the fasting period and continue the complete (water) fast according to the RDT method. Some researchers observe that the use of combined fasting allows to reach the acidotic peak in a shorter time and to greatly reduce more body fat mass. In the case of treatment for hypertensive patients, the normalization of blood pressure begins earlier, thereby reducing the necessary time for fasting, and, consequently, the duration of the patients’ hospitalization is also reduced. This method is the favored alternative in cases of obesity or edema as a complication of the main disease.

Furthermore, the combination of dry and water fasting is well tolerated by patients, it has a therapeutic effect even in cases where the general duration of RDT is reduced and it optimizes the progress of the therapy thanks to the early onset of the acidotic crisis.

Disadvantages: during a combined fast there is no excretion from the body of "heavy dead water", the anti-inflammatory effect is less pronounced compared to the same effect during a dry fasting and the depurative effect is also weaker. To obtain a positive therapeutic effect it is necessary to practice a long period of water fasting, at least 30 days.

WARNING! With the combined fasting it is expected to start strictly with dry fasting days and then continue with water fasting. It is dangerous to invert the practice and do the opposite because it is always absolutely necessary to start from the process that imposes a more extreme modality and then transition to one that is more acceptable to the body. So, it is possible to go from dry fast to water, but you can never go from water to dry!

Fractional therapeutic fasting: this approach, well investigated by Dr. Voytovich[13], involves a few repeated or consecutive cycles (usually 3) of RDT (water fasting). The average duration of the fasting period is 14 days whereas the duration of the therapy is six months. It is possible to apply both complete and combined fasting. Dr. Filonov elaborated his method of fractional dry fasting based on Dr. Voytovich’s indications concerning fractional water fasting.

Gradual therapeutic fasting: in this type of therapy, the duration of the fast is reduced to the first clinical signs of reaching an acidotic peak, i.e. until the shift to endogenous nutrition. Following this transition there is a recovery period equal to the duration of half of the first fast (1st step). Afterwards, the fast resumes again until "the peak" (2nd step). In total, this approach requires 3-4 steps. The use of this technique is advisable for hypertensive patients unable to tolerate long periods of fasting, especially for patients over 55 years of age. The technique may also be a method of choice for patients whose condition would pose great health risks to practice the classical FDT (RDT).

6. What methods of fasting have been developed and disseminated in the USSR-Russia?

Ivanov’s method: 42 hours a week of dry fasting

In the Soviet Union, one of the founders of a unique healing system, which also includes dry fasting, was Porfiry Ivanov (1898-1982). He was born in Ukraine in a family of miners. After graduating from the mandatory four classes of parochial school, the 15-year-old boy began working at the coal mine. In 1934, he had a dream that became recurrent and made him realize that man should not fight against the negative elements of nature, but learn to take advantage of them for his best interest.

He began to experiment on himself with various procedures to temper the body: he would go out without headgear and jacket in the winter frost, he walked barefoot all year, and poured buckets of frozen water over himself.

Soon he developed phenomenal abilities. In addition to a robust health, he gained considerable bioenergetic power and extra-sensory abilities, which helped him to heal patients with complex diseases. He lived in a period and in a country that did not allow the manifestation of such extraordinary abilities. He was arrested many times, he spent overall 12 years in prison and in psychiatric hospitals, but nothing could break him down. He had hundreds of followers who learnt his doctrine (Detka - Babe). Specialists of such doctrine hold attitudes close to neopaganism, Buddhism and yoga.

Detka is summarized in 12 simple and practical guidelines and one of the fundamental recommendations concerns dry fasting. According to this system, in order to keep in shape, have strong health, a clear mind and a heart open to others it is mandatory to practice dry fasting for a minimum of 42 hours a week: eating should stop around 18:00 on Friday, absolute fasting begins on Saturday during the day and Sunday until about 12noon, then it is recommended to go out for a walk in the open air, possibly on the grass and barefoot, return home and only then eat.

Why is the fasting recommended for at least 42 hours? Because over this period an important substitution of sodium with potassium occurs at the cellular level. Sodium contributes to the preservation of organic substances in the cell and this can end up obstructing it, while, on the contrary, potassium contributes to its purification and therefore improves metabolism. The Ivanov system, in addition to dry fasting, includes long daily walks, possibly barefoot on the grass and in winter on the snow, buckets of ice water on the feet and then on the whole body, steam baths, baths in natural water basins (sea, rivers, lakes, streams) twice a day; all this allows to strengthen the energy body, freeing it from external negative energies and restore the body’s natural defense system.

Comment by dr. Filonov

A major drawback to the Ivanov rehabilitation system is certainly the orientation towards a rural way of life. For inhabitants of modern cities, however willful and diligent, walking barefoot on the ground and pouring buckets of cold water is difficult to practice every day. The cold ablutions could be reserved to the weekends and holidays, but the procedure requires daily practice and should be executed with the feet touching the soil. An alternative would be a cold shower, but it is a completely different process. Nonetheless, those who can follow the Ivanov’s technique with fasting, walking and ablutions, will quickly obtain amazing results.

Shchennikov’s method: the complete dry fast (CDF) of 7-9-11 days

A great contribution to the development of dry fasting method was advanced by Leonid Aleksandrovich Shchennikov (1932-2019), author of the book Tselebnoe vozderzhanie ot zhidkosti i pishchi (Therapeutic abstinence from liquids and food - Moscow, 2003) and owner of the patent n. 2028160 for the approach called "Method of body rehabilitation " (1993).

Shchennikov was an expert in non-traditional medicine, a naturopathic doctor and a healer. For over 40 years, has demonstrated the benefits of therapeutic abstinence from food and water at the cellular level.

In his book L. A. Shchennikov tells how he elaborates the technique of dry fasting. The complete dry fasting (CDF) by L.A. Shchennikov requires a practice of minimum 7, 9 days, but ideally 11 days. Here are the benefits and advantages of the CDF:

- effectively stimulates the internal resources of the body responsible for increasing the body's resistance to external, internal and external-internal negative factors;

- helps to resolve different pathological conditions and chronic diseases;

- total renunciation of fluid intake inhibits or interrupts the decomposing fermentation processes of the gastrointestinal system;

- it is an effective way to reduce overweight in obese people (on average 1 kg per day);

- reduces the high level of metabolism found in patients with long-term chronic diseases;

- improves blood circulation to the skin, opens the skin-pores and improves the process of cutaneous respiration, increases the threshold of cold perception, facilitates the assimilation of condensed moisture through the skin and respiratory organs during outdoor walks, especially in evening and night hours;

- improves the body's utilization processes of abnormal cells and pathologically modified cells, cholesterol deposits in artery walls, softens tartar deposits in the oral cavity and calculi in tissues and internal organs (gallbladder, kidneys, joints);

- normalizes blood pressure as well as the activity of the central nervous system and the autonomic nervous system, improving respiration and tissue metabolism;

- improves reparative processes in the human body utilizing the body's reserves and internal resources;

- improves conductivity and permeability of nerve impulses (including trophic impulses) towards various tissues and organs;

- activates the processes of toxin removal (empowers the body to remove toxic metabolites, exotoxins and endotoxins);

- stimulates the immune system;

- the CDF can be practiced in nursing homes and specialized sanatoria or even in domestic conditions, but under the supervision of CDF specialists;

- it can be used in case of infectious diseases (acute and chronic viral hepatitis, chronic hepatitis), oncological diseases (prostate adenoma and uterine fibroids), severe somatic diseases (bronchial asthma, inherited degenerative diseases of the nervous system, ischemic heart disease), inflammatory diseases (prostatitis, myocarditis, and many others);

- strengthens the person's willpower and faith in themselves and in their abilities;

- the CDF helps to joyfully perceive the surrounding world and work creatively for the sake of themselves and humanity;

- The CDF, unlike other fasting systems, can be interrupted at any stage of its implementation, without compromising the health of patients.

Comment by dr. Filonov

The main advantage of this method lies in the fact that, if you succeed to do an 11-day CDF, you reach the second most curative acidotic crisis. As a consequence, the therapeutic result is excellent. This type of fast must however be practiced in places immersed in nature, in ecologically clean locations, with fresh air, near running water courses and under the strict supervision of a CDF specialist.

However, the organism of today's human beings is so full of toxins and waste products that there is a risk to die not so much of hunger, but due to the strong intoxication of the body. When a fasting practice begins, all the waste stored in the most hidden corners of the body starts moving and invade the blood like an avalanche, changing its physiological markers. This can already cause malaise, lethargy, and general soreness. The excretory organs may not have time to eliminate all toxins and poisons from the bloodstream. All the excretory organs would be activated: the kidneys, the rhinopharynx, the gastrointestinal tract, the skin. As a result, the urine would become cloudy, and kidney and bladder pains may appear. The feces may become liquid and a stomachache would be common. The secretions from the nose would become abundant, as in the case of a common cold. The skin would be filled with pimples and acne, there may be a frequent rash. All these effects are unpleasant and sometimes even dangerous; they indicate the challenges of the intoxicated organism to adapt to fasting. Usually this occurs between the fourth and the eighth day. The one who fasts ceases to lose weight, tiredness increases, nausea, headache, heart failure and arrhythmia may appear. These are the main characteristics of the “block” (a severe intoxication). If the malaise is very strong it is necessary to stop fasting promptly, gradually begin re-feeding with fruit juices and a vegetarian diet, and then repeat the attempt.

For this reason, suddenly starting this type of prolonged dry fasting, without previous experience and a deep cleansing of the body, is very, very difficult.

Lavrova’s method: a 5-stage cascade dry fasting

Valentina Lavrova is the author of the book Kljuchi k taynam zhizni (The keys to the mysteries of life), where she illustrates in detail the approach she prefers: the cascade-dry fast. This kind of dry fast is excellent for beginners and experts. Before starting to fast it is recommended to follow a vegetarian diet for a few days, excluding animal protein, including fish.

According to the Lavrova method, the first stage involves one day of DF alternated with one day of regular eating. By carrying it out for one month, the result is 15 days of complete fasting.

In the second stage of the cascade fast it is possible to eat and drink two days and abstain from food and water the next two days. But at this stage it is a must to observe the golden rule. How to end the fast: after two days of abstinence, it is necessary to drink water and only after a couple of hours it possible to eat kefir. The first food must be animal based proteins, but not vegetable-based. Two hours after taking kefir it is possible to eat anything.

Why does Lavrova not recommend eating vegetables and fruit immediately after the fast? The reason is associated with the pancreas, an inert organ, which cannot start working suddenly and immediately perform its functions; its function depends on the supply of insulin in the blood. In other words, in order to avoid compromising the pancreas, it is better to let it be activated progressively. If there is no kefir at home, boiled milk or fish or chicken broth will do, but without vegetables or bread.

The third phase of the cascade fast involves three days of dry fasting, three days of drinking-eating, then three days of abstinence and three days of drinking-eating. The fast ends as already described.

On exiting, the golden rule for the end of fast must be strictly observed, i.e. drink water and then kefir. Before fasting, during fasting and after a dry fast no enemas are needed, since there is no absorption of toxins occurring in the gastrointestinal tract due to lack of water. If performed correctly, the stomach will clean itself up. With dry fasting, enemas are not necessary, but if it’s not possible to resist and a person drinks water then it may be a good idea.

The fourth phase of the cascade fast involves four days of abstinence from food and water and four days of normal feeding. The same rules as the previous stages apply.

The fifth phase of cascade fasting is the last one and proposes five days of abstinence from food and water and five days of intake; the same rules as the previous stages apply.

These days are difficult, it is not possible to sleep during the day, and fresh air is needed. The body releases an unpleasant odor. Crystals are removed from the body. The pores open and through them all toxins that the kidneys would never have been able to remove are eliminated. It can be difficult to speak because of oral dryness. There is no feeling of hunger, only thirst. In exiting it is fundamental to remember the golden rule: first, only water and only 2 hours later a little kefir or boiled milk, or light and liquid animal based protein food and 2 hours later it is gradually possible to eat more; but with caution.

Lavrova recommends starting the practice rigorously from the first and second phases, never from the following ones. The author also notes an important detail: during the days of fasting contact with water should be avoided as much as possible. We must not give the cells the opportunity to be fed, otherwise they will not be able to renew and restructure. It can be hard to keep from washing the hands and doing housework in contact with water, but there is no alternative. It may be difficult to go to the fourth and fifth stages, but do not be discouraged, writes V. Lavrova. If you persist, you will certainly succeed. After fasting, drink only pure fresh water. If you observe a correct exit algorithm, this method is harmless to the body.

Comment by dr. Filonov

The advantage of Lavrova’s fast is that it presents itself as an ideal propaedeutic exercise for dry fasting of greater duration. It is an approach that can be carried out independently in domestic conditions, without practical complications. It gives a good rejuvenation effect, it is an excellent remedy in cases of acute diseases and in the early stages of the disease.

The disadvantage lies in the fact that the time lengthens considerably. In order to obtain a good therapeutic effect from any type of fasting, especially in the case of severe chronic diseases, it is absolutely necessary to go through some phases, especially the first and second acidotic crises. In figurative terms, it is possible to say that if the first acidotic crisis eliminates "the stem of the disease", the second destroys "the root of the disease." During the cascade fast to reach the second acidotic crisis it is necessary to undergo a five-day cascade DF for five days of normal feeding, for a period of two months to a year. Few people can find so much time, willpower and patience.

Filonov’s method: fractional dry fasting (FDF)

To weigh the advantages and disadvantages of the various DF methods and the characteristics of their stages, Dr. Sergey Filonov has developed his own personal approach, the fractional dry fasting (FDF), based on the fractional water fasting method studied and proposed by Dr. G. Voytovich (see question 5 above and Note 14).

Dr. Filonov argues that it is very difficult for the contemporary man to practice dry fasting lasting 10-11 days, that requires willpower, patience, a good training and an appropriate preparation. Usually only strongly motivated patients can perform an 11-12 and even 13-day dry fast but it should be noted that on the eleventh day of DF the energy reserves are already at a minimum. It is precisely for that reason that Dr. Filonov decided to experiment by splitting dry fasting and proposing it for subsequent cycles, usually two and exceptionally three: the first cycle lasts 5-7 days, the second 7-9 days and an eventual third one of 9 days. These cycles are interspersed with periods of food reintegration according to a special method.

The first phase of dry fasting (detoxifying) lasts as long as the patient is able to endure. In this phase it is preferable not to have any contact with water or even brushing teeth, but some people may be allowed to bathe under a waterfall and in mountain rivers to optimize the elimination of waste materials, which is essential for maintaining homeostasis in the body.  During the first phase, the first acidotic crisis occurs, and this is a sign of a good body cleansing. Then the patient goes out of the fast with a special program that also includes the intake of energizing and adaptive herbal infusions from Altai mountains (rhodiola or golden root, red root or Hedysarum neglectum, Rhaponticum carthamoides and others).

The second (strictly therapeutic) cycle of dry fasting lasts until the second acidotic crisis occurs, aimed at eradicating the disease. The second cycle of DF is normally better tolerated than the first, both physically and psychologically. In some cases, in the presence of very serious diseases, it is advisable to practice also a third cycle of DF, the final one. The most important thing to note is that with every new fast an ever more rapid transition to endogenous nutrition occurs and a very high quality biosynthesis. In other words, this kind of "pendulum" fasting cycle allows to increasingly strengthen the body's defenses.

The further advantage of this method lies in the fact that, after the first cleansing phase, the functionality, memory capacity and energy potential of the cells are restored, and subsequently, with the second fasting period, the cell is allowed to conclude the process, to clean up deeply and perfect the steps that may have been neglected. It is something like the principle of supercompensation: everything that at the beginning has been superficially treated, now is definitively cleansed and purified. As a result, the body approaches new positive stresses in a state of "greater combat readiness". In this system, a fast is superimposed on the other, optimizing the therapeutic effect.

The FDF is also convenient for people who are overweight or obese, because it does not allow weight gain. The weight decreases progressively and usually obese people not only regulate their weight, but they reduce it by 2-3kg because the superfluous fat cells are destroyed by the acidotic crisis, their number is normalized and they become as many as the amount patients had in their youth.

The DF according to the method Filonov, in addition to its therapeutic value, has a strong rejuvenating and regenerating effect, it is tolerated rather well and does not bring any complications in practice. Therein lies the difference with Shchennikov’s fasting, who recommends right away prolonged DF practices, of 9-10-11 days. In the cascade fasting according to V. P. Lavrova the DF is practiced with equal times for the fast and the exit: 1 day of fasting and 1 day of eating, then 2 days of DF and 2 days of eating, up to 5 days. It is a very effective fast, but it is necessary to practice it for a long time before reaching the second acidotic crisis. According to the Filonov method, on the other hand, the process takes place in crescendo, the terms increase with each cycle and thanks to this way of proceeding the second acidotic crisis occurs in a shorter time.

After a proper preparation for DF (proper feeding, bowel and liver cleansing, water fasting, DF training days – (see question 9 and following), it is possible to switch to the Filonov method: a practice of 5- 7 days of DF, then a recovery period of 2-3 weeks and a second practice of 7-9 days. If there are still problems you can complete with a final practice of another 9 days (the terms are individual, and depend on the pathological situation and the individual aims). One of the disadvantages of the FDF is that it takes much more time than the CDF and a mandatory, long and quality preparation to adapt the body to this type of practice.

7. What are the advantages of dry fasting compared to water fasting?

In a dry fast the organism is subjected to harsher conditions than in a water fast. It is forced to restructure itself in order to produce not only nutrients but also water. In the body’s tissues the splitting occurs more quickly and takes place in a short time. The phases of therapeutic fasting, in the case of dry fasting, are the same ones identified for water fasting, but the times are reduced considerably: the excitation phase lasts less than a day, the phase of increasing ketoacidosis lasts from 1 to 3 days and on the third day of dry fast the ketoacidotic crisis appears. The second acidotic crisis, the most curative one, occurs at the 9-11th day. The sooner it appears, the sooner it passes, and the more time remains for renewal and healing of the organism.

During a water fast, exogenous water (water coming from outside) enters the body, and water is the main factor of purification. According to the law of biological expediency, a cell, in this case, spends the minimum of its energy: all toxins, poisons, waste are dissolved and, to put it in a figurative sense, there is a phenomenon of washing the toxins from the cell and intercellular space. During a DF, however, incineration of toxins occurs in their own furnace, in a way. This means that every cell, in the absence of water, triggers an internal fusion reaction, and turns into a mini-reactor. Water is of utmost necessity and cells are deprived of it, and this is a problem especially for diseased and altered cells. In these extreme circumstances what happens is that the strongest, healthiest cells survive, and in order to survive in this situation they must intensify the production of their own high quality endogenous water. This endogenous water is probably of a quality many times higher than that of exogenous water, always according to the law of biological efficiency. A cell consumes a lot of energy and consequently the resulting product must, in terms of quality, correspond to the effort invested. Here we are not dealing with the human mind, which can be mistaken, but with a natural process that overseas each stage of development and aims to ensure the continuation of life. During a dry fast the replacement of the old "dead water" takes place with "living water" of superior quality, endogenous water, synthesized by the organism itself.

Many patients report that dry fasting is better tolerated than water fasting because of the lack of hunger. This is not surprising. The fact is that the exogenous water and the body’s own water are very different. When the organism receives water coming from the outside, it has to rework the molecules, erase the useless information, structure it and transform it into "its" molecules, having the properties of the organism itself. To do this, as well as for the digestion of food, the body is forced to spend a certain amount of energy and time.

With DF all these processes do not take place, and in this sense it is a more complete practice as it provides a complete rest for the organism. If no food enters the body and no heavy ("dead") water, the blood does not receive harmful substances and has the chance to be constantly cleansed by the organism. The same blood composition is repeatedly cleansed through the filter systems and thus becomes perfectly pure. During a DF practice the blood purifies all the superfluous substances and the blood plasma becomes transparent like glass, everything is re-harmonized, including the coagulation factors. The DF in this sense purifies the blood more completely than a treatment of blood cleansing, hemodialysis or haemabsorption.

The anti-inflammatory effect of dry fasting is much more powerful than the effect achieved with a water fasting practice. This is because inflammation cannot exist without water. Inflamed areas swell. Micro-organisms, such as microbes and viruses, multiply can only in a sufficiently watery environment. It follows that a water deficit is extremely counterproductive for the inflammatory process. With a DF external water is missing, therefore pathogenic microorganisms immediately find an unfavorable environment. Thanks to the dehydration established by DF, the cells of the body and the pathogenic microorganisms undertake a very strong competition for the appropriation of water. The cells of the body, in their home field, easily manage to seize the water from the microorganisms and not only that. In DF mode the body not only synthesizes endogenous water, but can also acquire it from the air through skin absorption. This is because during a DF the skin stops secreting and shifts to an absorption mode. Healthy and strong cells receive an extra dose of energy and water while the sick ones, viruses and bacteria cannot do it. Microbes, viruses and worms die instantly without water.

During a water fasting practice, to reinforce the detoxification process, special treatments are used, such as enemas, hydrocolonotherapy, Turkish bath, sauna, etc. During a dry fast, these treatments are not needed because the body triggers its own unique mechanisms, which neutralize poisons and toxins. This does not happen in any other form of fasting. During DF the toxins burn in their own furnace: every cell, in the absence of water, triggers an internal thermal reaction. The result is a sort of extreme and immediate destruction within the very cells of all the waste, superfluous and pathological elements. Each cell temporarily transforms into a mini-reactor and the internal temperature of the body increases. This change in temperature may not even be detected by a thermometer, but during a DF the patients feel it as an internal heat, "a fire" or chills. The temperature is an important part of a series of defensive reactions. From experience we know that with fever all toxins are eliminated; poisons and even tumor cells fully suspend their activity. This process accelerates the healing. By reacting with a fever the organism causes microorganisms to slow their growth.

Slimming effect: during DF in the patient's organism receives neither food nor water, so there is no external energy supply. The organism is forced to produce energy and water endogenously, i.e. within itself. For this reason, unusual chemical reactions begin to occur within the organism and metabolic processes are modified. For example, less muscle tissue is lost compared to adipose tissue. During a water fast, muscle and fat tissue are reduced roughly in equal proportions. During DF, however, the patient acts somewhat like a camel. The reason is that the organism maintains its vital capacity at the expense of reserve fat. The adipose tissue is destroyed very efficiently and does not regain its initial volume. In fact, it is destroyed 3-4 times faster than muscle tissue because fat tissue is made up of more than 90% water, while muscle tissue remains relatively intact. The organism does not suffer because of lack of water, because it obtains the water it needs from adipose tissue. In DF the adipose tissue burns 3 times faster than during a water fast. The burnt fat reserves are not restored, unlike in water fasting. It is possible to observe an early and better digestion of fat deposits, compared to water fasting. After a water fast the adipose tissue is restored more quickly, especially when resuming the same diet as before the fast, but with DF this occurs to a lesser extent. The nutrition based on organism’s own reserves is perfectly balanced. The body takes only what it needs from its reserves, rather than what is artificially imposed from the outside.

Anti-aging effect. Why is the rejuvenation effect on the body during DF greater than with a water fast? The diseased, degenerate and weak cells cannot withstand extreme conditions, so they die and decompose. Which ones remain? The cells with a good organization and a wide and efficient genetic engineering; the ones that are not afraid survive and maintain their functions. This way fasting helps to discard the useless, weak, sick and harmful parasitic cells. They do not exercise their functions and it is better to clear them in time, without allowing them to die of natural death otherwise they would be able to generate offspring of more weak and inoperative cells. After DF the strong cells remain, which, by dividing, produce high quality offspring cells with the same properties of the mother cells.

8. What mechanisms does a dry fast trigger within the body?

8.1. The mechanism of toxins burning "in their own furnace" and production of "endogenous" water

Many observe that dry fasting is better tolerated than water-based fasting, especially because of the absence of hunger. This is not surprising. The structure of the water from outside the body and what the body actually assimilates are two completely different things. The body processes the molecules of the incoming water, it cleanses superfluous information, restructures and transform them into its own molecules, with the properties of the organism itself. To this end, as for the absorption of food, an expense of time and energy is necessary. Dry fasting is more complete precisely because it provides a full rest to the body. At the same time the body cannot exist without water, for this purpose the body reserves are engaged, firstly from superfluous fat (the body synthesizes water using oxygen from the air and the hydrogen from the adipose tissue).

During water fasting exogenous water (i.e. from the outside) enters, and water is the main factor of purification. Toxins are washed away from the cells, from the intracellular space.

During DF, without water, there is no "washing" but rather a process of burning the toxins "in their furnace" meaning that every cell, in the absence of water, begins an internal thermal reaction. Each cell turns temporarily into a mini-furnace, a mini-reactor. Water is absolutely necessary, but the cells remain without, especially the diseased and altered cells. In such circumstances the strongest, healthiest cells survive, and whether they like it or not, in order survive such extreme conditions they are forced to activate the production of own endogenous water, of excellent quality. Based on the law of biological efficiency, the endogenous water should be of greater quality than the exogenous water. In fact, the cell consumes a lot of energy and consequently the quality of the final product must correspond to the invested efforts.

Exogenous and endogenous water can be compared respectively to a polluted river where a chemical factory discharges its waste, and to a mountain stream, which originates from the depths of the earth and feeds on defrosted water rich in healing potential. During the dry fast the old "dead water" is replaced by "living water" of excellent quality and synthesized by the organism itself. In the meantime all the negative information brought into our body from the outside is eliminated. By making a relatively short fast without water the organism is stimulated to elaborate the water that it already contains within, thereby renewing our information. This is why at the end of the fast we are informationally uncontaminated; we are composed of a matrix of information devoid of anything negative coming from the external environment. Similar mechanisms do not exist in any of the other existing types of therapeutic fasting. This phenomenon is one of the main advantages offered by this form of fasting. It is one of the main therapeutic mechanisms of DF, which plays a decisive role in renewing the energetic balance of the human organism.

8.2. Anti-inflammatory and immune-stimulatory mechanism: the action of free forms of glucocorticoids

The second therapeutic mechanism by importance is an anti-inflammatory and immunostimulatory one. Life does not exist without water and even inflammation cannot progress in its absence. Every part of the body that is inflamed can be distinguished because of its swelling. Microorganisms, viruses and microbes, can only multiply in a sufficiently watery environment. A lack of water compromises the inflammation process. The dehydration occuring in the body with DF triggers a ruthless competition for water between the strongest body cells and pathogenic microorganisms. The cells of the body, full of their role as "home owners", will subtract water from microorganisms. At the same time, the organism is able to not only synthesize endogenous water in sufficient quantity, but also to absorb the water from the outside, from the air, through the skin. This is because during DF the organism functions in absorption mode rather than in emission. Then, the healthy and strong cells receive extra energy and water from the air, by seizing it, while the sick cells, the viruses and the bacteria cannot do it. This is why it is fundamental to practice DF in the middle of nature, preferably in the mountains and near streams and waterfalls.

Without water, microbes, viruses and parasites die instantly. 70% glucocorticoid and sexual hormones are linked to blood transport albumins and only 30% circulate in the blood in a free state. During DF, the transport albumins decay and their amino acids are employed in supplying the body's needs, mainly the needs of the brain and the cardiovascular system. During this process there is a release of huge quantities of hormones circulating in a free state in the blood: the amount of glucocorticoids flooding the blood is three times greater than usual. This exerts a strong anti-inflammatory effect, suppressing all inflammation outbreaks present in the body. Glucocorticoid hormones are in fact the most powerful anti-inflammatory agent in the body. The powerful therapeutic mechanism of dry fasting aimed at fighting inflammatory diseases lies in the action of free forms of glucocorticoids.

As mentioned above, during a dry fast the toxins burn "in their own furnace", which means that every cell, in the absence of water, triggers a thermal reaction, a particular radical method within the cells that destroys all the superfluous, excessive, and morbid elements. Each cell transforms into a temporary mini-reactor that manifests as an increase in internal temperature. This temperature may not even be noted with a thermometer, but during DF, patients clearly perceived as a sensation of heat, internal fire or chills. It should be emphasized that in this state the temperature itself is an important element of defensive reaction. We know from experience that with temperature all the waste, poisons and even cancer cells are destroyed and their activity is suspended. This process accelerates healing. By increasing in body temperature, the organism causes microorganisms to slow their growth.

If the body does not receive food and dead and heavy water, our blood does not receive many harmful substances, while it is instead cleansed by the body, i.e. the same blood composition will be repeatedly purified through the filter systems until it becomes as ideally pure as possible.

The human body has a powerful weapon against diseases: the immune system, designed to safeguard our health with the help of organs and tissues programmed for the detection and elimination of foreign substances and harmful microorganisms such as viruses, bacteria and diseased cells. The main organs of the immune system are the tonsils, the adenoids, the appendix, the spleen and the thymus gland. Bone marrow, white blood cells and lymphatic tissues are also important elements of the immune system. All these elements work together and, when necessary, trigger the body's immune response.

In a healthy organism with a strong immune system it is quite difficult for viruses to survive. Bacteria are destroyed before they can cause infection. Altered or diseased cells are destroyed before they can cause cancer or other illnesses. But if the immune system is not healthy, it will not work properly. In this case we can easily get ill from colds, flu, infectious diseases and even cancer. Maintaining a healthy immune system is the most important thing we can do to preserve our health, because this system is our main biological ally in the war against diseases.

But how does the immune system work? When a foreign body invades the organism, whether it is a virus or a splinter, the immune system begins to effectively produce a series of complex chemical reactions. From this moment the immune system embarks on its mission: to find the outsider and to destroy it.

In our organism there is an entire system of cells that resemble amoebae; they are the mononuclear phagocytes. In every organ there is a group of cells specific for only that organ, which appear like amoebae and migrate throughout the body, engulfing and digesting any alien bodies. These particular cells are found in the skin, in the liver and in the heart and even in the brain. They migrate continuously, looking for prey. The problem is that any food, even vegetable, contains a small amount of fat and the mononuclear phagocytes, instead of carrying out their direct functions, focus on capturing and digesting these droplets of fat, as if they had nothing else to do. During dry fasting, however, the phagocytes are left without food, i.e. without fat, so they begin to perform their direct tasks: capture and digest bacteria, viruses, cell residues, dead or dying cells, thus fostering renewal and the rejuvenation of the organism. Cancer cells, always present in the body, are also digested. The destruction of diseased cells, and not of healthy cells during DF is also associated with the release of lymphoepithelial cells from the entire digestive system.

Abstinence from water and food for many days creates the conditions for the withdrawal of the powerful army of b-lymphocytes from the frontline gastrointestinal positions. They accumulate from the lymph nodes and lymphatic collectors of the long digestive path. In particular many of them come from the small intestine. Once they have transitioned to the reserve position, the army of b-lymphocytes can be utilized for its direct purpose: to suppress and eliminate all pathogens and foreign bodies. Infections in a dormant state practically do not surrender to modern antibacterial therapies (treatments with antibiotics, sulphanilamides and other pharmaceutical drugs). Indeed, in this stage of their development, microorganisms live in their protective envelopes and become more resistant to these drugs and other medicines. However, during the course of dry fasting their envelopes are destroyed by the acidosis activated by phagocytes and enzymes.

During the dry fast, body fluids reach the highest concentrations of biologically active substances, hormones, immunocompetent cells and immunoglobulins.

8.3. The mechanism of acidification of the internal environment of the organism: the first and second acidotic crises

To obtain a good therapeutic effect from the fasting practice it is necessary to observe certain phases. The first phase, called "food excitation", lasts for 2-3 days in case of water fasting while it lasts 1-2 days with dry fasting. The "food excitement" phase is a stress for the body. This stress mainly causes the activation of the hypothalamus that begins to secrete a variety of substances that have a particular impact on the body's endocrine glands with the aim to adapt the organism to a mode of subsistence without food or water. After 24 hours of fasting in human beings, the secretion of the growth hormone, somatropin, by the pituitary gland increases abruptly. According to recent data, this is the reason why dry fasting seems to have a rejuvenating effect on the body. The growth hormone also activates the pancreatic hormone glucagon, which intensifies the breakdown of glycogen in the liver thus replenishing the organism with nourishment. Dry fasting also removes the body's toxicity through beneficial effects on the thyroid gland.

The second phase is that of intensifying acidosis. Usually this phase in dry fasting lasts from 2 to 4 days. As soon as food and water are completely renounced, the body begins to consume the accumulated reserves and secondary tissues. The breakdown of nutrients and tissues during fasting leads to the accumulation of byproducts inside the body. Consequently, there is a rapid shift of the body's pH towards acidity (acidosis) even if the acidification values do not exceed the physiological norm.

The acidosis that occurs during the fast is the first and most important physiological mechanism that triggers a chain of other therapeutic mechanisms, usually neutralized by the usual diet. The acidification of the organism’s internal environment determines the autolysis, the process of disintegration of the tissues. In fact, in an acidic environment certain phagocytes and enzymes are activated to destroy the organism’s weakened tissues and all the foreign elements. The processes associated with autolysis, in turn, trigger the body's detoxification mechanisms to remove toxins, and weak and pathologically altered tissue. Tissue decomposition ensures that all the waste contained in it is released and removed from the body, while the altered tissue is destroyed. The acidification of the body and the increase in phagocytic activity lead to the normalization of the organism's microflora.

During acidosis, the body's cells assimilate carbon dioxide and nitrogen from the air. This process helps to fix the carbon dioxide dissolved in the blood according to the principle of photosynthesis, the best synthesis of nature. The atmospheric air we breathe turns into a nutritious environment. In other words, the intensified assimilation of carbon dioxide by the cells, together with the intense consumption of nitrogen from the air, creates the optimal conditions for the production of high quality nucleic acids, proteins and other biologically active substances necessary for normal human activity. In other words, by practicing dry fasting we use the carbon dioxide and nitrogen present in the air and thanks to them we create the proteins necessary for the functioning of our organism. But the question arises: at the expense of what? Well, let's remember what plants do. They take energy from the sun and thus can convert the same carbon dioxide and nitrogen from the air into mineral salts and organic compounds. But humans also have similar abilities and can nourish themselves with natural and cosmic energies, although this normally does not happen or occurs only in a small number of people. Currently only a few people are known to live without eating or drinking[14]. When this mechanism starts it means that the organism has already switched to a mode of full internal (endogenous) feeding that guarantees the complete synthesis of amino acids and other biological compounds. During DF many organs and systems of the organism benefit from a physiological rest that allows them to restore their damaged structures and functions.

DF sets in motion an intense decomposition of the tissues due to the autolysis and the restoration of the digestive organs’ structure and function. These processes stimulate metabolism in general and later, when feeding is resumed, prove to support the overall digestive capacity of the organism. During DF, the body's defense functions are reinvigorated both at the cellular level and at the level of the whole organism, which becomes much more resistant to internal and external harmful agents. All the physiological mechanisms illustrated above lead to a powerful regenerating and rejuvenating effect, which becomes especially evident in the period following the practice (after 21 days from the end of the DF practice).

Therefore, during DF, the process of acidification of the internal environment of the organism grows rapidly. Usually the maximum acidification is observed on the 2nd or 3rd day. Here's what happens: at the beginning of the dry fast, the body still has animal sugar reserves (glycogen) and uses them. But once glycogen reserves are depleted (this usually happens on the first day of fasting), the acid byproducts from incomplete digestion of fats (butyric acid, acetone) begin to accumulate in the blood. The blood’s alkaline reserves are lowered and this is reflected on the state of well-being: the patient can have a headache, feel nausea, a feeling of weakness, or general malaise. On the tongue the white patina settles at a growing rhythm, the tongue and lips become dry, mucus is felt on the teeth, the breath smells like acetone, the skin becomes pale and dry, the sense of hunger and thirst are both considerably. A general sense of malaise is the result of the accumulation of toxins in the blood. At this moment the patient may feel an internal heat in the body, which comes  from the organism triggering its mechanisms of neutralization of harmful substances. But as soon as the ketone bodies begin to be utilized, their concentration ceases to increase. The ketone bodies are high-energy components, therefore they act somewhat as fuel to begin the synthesis of the new amino acids that lead to tissue regeneration. The regeneration process can occur with severe pain and it is necessary to be ready for this.

In the initial stages of DF the state of acidotic intoxication (or acidotic crisis) may occur on the 3rd-5th day, after the 3rd or even the 2nd day from the beginning of the DF. The sooner the acidotic crisis appears, the sooner it passes, the longer time is left for organic renewal. The highest acidification peak arises at the same time of the crisis and this causes an acute exacerbation of all chronic pathologies. Based on the degree of acute aggravation, it is possible to understand how successful the fast has been to unhook one or the other disease and to "eradicate" it from the body. If the acute aggravation is pronounced, complete healing can be expected. If instead it is weak it means that the mechanisms induced by fasting are aimed at solving more important problems. In that case, after some time it will be advisable to repeat the fast to ensure that it takes care of the residual pathologies. After the acidotic crisis has "eradicated" the disease from the body, the defense forces previously occupied in resolving the disease are released and therefore become more available overall. Hence the conclusion: as long as the fasting organism does not overcome the first acidotic crisis it will not be able to establish the healing of chronic diseases and the increase of its immune defenses.

The third phase of the dry fast is called the "compensation or adaptation phase". The duration of this phase is individual. On average it starts from the 5th day of DF and ends on the 8th. At this stage there can be an improvement in mood, with a reduction in fatigue and discomfort. This improvement can follow a wave pattern. The feeling of hunger disappears completely, while thirst may increase. The duration depends on the fat deposits present in the body. This phase ends with the second acidotic crisis, which takes place from the 8th until the 11th day.

Between the end of the first acidotic crisis until the beginning of the second, the organism makes reserves of vital forces. During the metabolic acidosis in some people the main disease worsens, the state of mind and health deteriorate, strength is lost, sleep disappears and body temperature often increases. These symptoms indicate that fasting has begun to "eradicate" the disease.

If in the first two phases of fasting tissue autolysis was the only source of nutrition, during the second acidotic crisis autolysis basically acts as a natural surgeon. Therefore, to achieve a complete therapeutic effect it is necessary to go through this second crisis. To express it in figurative terms, it can be said that if the first acidotic crisis eliminates "the stem of the disease", the second destroys "the root". To understand how tumors and pathological structures are dissolved in a fasting organism, it is necessary to fully understand the process of autolysis, which, although very common in nature, it is normally ignored by physiologists.

8.4. Autolysis

The term "autolysis" is of Greek origin and literally means "self-dissolution". Autolysis is the ability of biological entities to decompose their structures through a hydrolytic method thanks to the action of enzymes and phagocytes.

To better understand this mechanism we will examine it on the basis of examples that exist in nature. The plant kingdom abounds with examples of autolysis, but a few will be enough for illustrative purposes. All bulbs, such as an ordinary onion, contain within themselves a new plant, surrounded by enough nourishment to survive a period of rest during which it has no possibility to take nutrients from soil and air. The onion can safely germinate in a bucket or in the bag where it is stored. It produces shoots and in a short time it turns completely into green sprouts. The bulb gradually becomes soft and at the end turns into a wrapping for the plant. As the plant grows, it uses up the remaining contents of the bulb and assimilates the shoots. Beets, turnips and many other tubers grow in a similar manner. They get the nutrients for growth through the autolytic absorption of the contents of the tuber and even when they extract nutrients from the earth they continue to produce stems and leaves and to grow.

Humans have general reserves located in the bone marrow, in the liver, in the blood and in the fatty tissues, and also private reserves, available to every single cell. All living beings can use one or the other reserves for their nourishment if they cannot obtain nutrients from external sources or if they are unable to assimilate them (in case of illness, for example).

It is possible to cite many examples of autolysis, but the ones offered are sufficient to clarify that it is a common phenomenon. It remains to be said that the body itself manages this process, like all other life processes, and that autolysis is not an uncontrolled and blind action like an elephant striding through glassware.

Fasting practices provide many examples of the organism's control over the process of autolysis. For example, it is possible to note that body tissues disappear according to the degree of their usefulness: fats and pathological thickenings disappear first and other tissues follow only afterwards. Within all living things, from worms to humans, during the fasting period different organs and tissues vary in their ability to reduce their weight. Usually the liver loses more weight than other parts of the body, especially in the initial period, and this is due to the loss of glycogen and fat. The lungs lose almost no weight and the brain and the nervous system even less. Vital organs feed off of accumulated reserves and less important tissues, which means that abstinence from food can eventually be harmful only after the depletion of reserves.

The organism has the ability to shift its chemical component; fasting provides many wonderful examples of this. The assimilation and reorganization of the parts of the organism of living beings during a period of food absence, the digestion and the redistribution of the reserves, of the superfluous elements and of the secondary tissues observed in all the animals in periods of fasting represent one of the most wonderful phenomena in biology.

The organism is not only able to build tissues, it is also able to destroy them. It does not only distribute its nutritive reserves, but can also redistribute them. Autolysis itself makes redistribution possible. The process of autolysis can be utilized to obtain great practical advantages and can serve, for example, to remove tumors and other growths present in the body. Those substances that are less important in the general economy are always captured and removed, first. For this reason, when the autolysis process is activated, all pathological formations (lipomas, tumors, abscesses, etc.) are reduced and in some cases completely removed. All as a result of a period of rigorous and prolonged abstinence from food. After a more or less prolonged practice of fasting many people have freed themselves from tumors, which disappeared through autolysis (Herbert Shelton talks about it in detail).

8.5. The mechanism of rejuvenation and tissue renewal: apoptosis

Why is the rejuvenation process of the organism during a dry fast more powerful than that triggered by a water fast?

The fact is that the diseased, degenerate and weak cells are unable to cope with the extreme conditions imposed by dry fasting. When cells live in a comfortable environment they get used to a constant level of nutrients and water. They lose the possibility of renewing themselves and reinvigorating themselves effectively. It is as if they get lazy to trigger the mechanisms of self-renewal of the tissues. But as soon as food and water cease entering the gastrointestinal tract, new conditions of existence are established in the organism. Under these conditions, the old biomolecules are “dismantled”, the unstable cells die and decay (and the deficit of energetic and plastic substances is offset at their expense). But at the same time new cells are synthesized, which are more resistant, and able to survive the conditions imposed by the new circumstances.

There is another important source that guarantees rejuvenation and "fasting survival": apoptosis, a mechanism of programmed cell death. Most of the cells in the human body live actively for a few years, after that they age and become functionally passive; which is the state of fat cells. Even colonies of microorganisms have a mechanism of "food recycling" of old cells. All multicellular organisms use their old cells as a source of raw materials and energy, as a source of reserves in cases of emergency.

When the "food recycling" mechanism undergoes prolonged inactivity, these old cells can and do become a factory of pathological proteins that attack their own immune system. These are the factors that cause the alteration of central and tissue regulation, i.e. they become progenitor cells of malignant tumors. So, they must be removed from the body. For millions of years, periods of forced fasting have been a norm in animal life. For this reason, for multicellular organisms the process of elimination of useless cells, which are structurally or functionally atypical, has never been a problem.

Apoptosis, i.e. programmed cell death, incorporated into the genetic apparatus of all multicellular organisms - animals, plants and fungi - is a process that is energetically dependent and genetically controlled. It is activated by specific signals and aims to free the body from weak, useless or altered cells. Every day about 5% of the cells of the body undergo apoptosis, and new cells take their place. During the process of apoptosis, the cell disappears without a trace within 15 to 120 minutes.

Apoptosis is one of the basic mechanisms of oncological self-prevention. Excessive apoptotic activity can cause disorders of cell loss, aplasia and degenerative processes as well as malformations and tissue defects; while deficient apoptosis may imply uncontrolled cell growth, the mechanism underlying cancer, autoimmune processes and premature aging. For example, there are good reasons to believe that excessive apoptosis is associated with dangerous diseases such as aplastic anemia, amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, Alzheimer's disease, AIDS, etc.

During fasting, global changes occur. On the one hand, the physiological process of apoptosis is reinvigorated: the organism is renewed and rejuvenated at the expense of the death of old, sick or altered cells. On the other hand, the pathological mechanisms of apoptosis are eliminated: premature aging, neoplasms, etc.

Let's analyze these mechanisms in detail.

Understood as a community of cells, the organism during the fast "eats" not only the fat cells, but also all the elements that are superfluous, morbid or malfunctioning. The continuation of the organism’s life is impossible without the self-cleaning function of its cell populations. Cells infected with viruses, toxins or damaged by radiation, as well as those that have reached their biological limit, have one thing in common: they have to either leave the organism or be eaten. This happens in nature.

In the absence of external feeding, a particular type of signaling molecule appears within a multicellular organism. These molecules cause the activation of intracellular proteins in the cytoplasm of atypical cells. The cells that are not involved in the collective activity of the organism are sensitive and respond to these molecules by triggering a self-destructive mechanism: the cell "closes" all its programs, its nucleus "contracts" and begins to subdivide. Without destroying its outer envelope the cell subdivides into 5-10 "apoptotic bodies" and is absorbed by other cells. This is what happens in a colony of microorganisms. Otherwise it is digested in the intestine, sharing the fate of fat cells.

The phenomenon of apoptosis was discovered relatively recently, in 1972, and is considered the most interesting matter of the last 50 years in the field of biology and medicine. According to modern conceptions, apoptosis is a general biological mechanism responsible for maintaining a constant number of cell populations, as well as for the selection and elimination of defective cells. Habitual feeding and ecological pollution hinder this physiological mechanism.

According to the observations of Russian scientists, the activation of the process of food apoptosis occurs after 20 hours of dry fasting (strictly observing the rules for a correct fasting practice). When one eats continuously, according to the usual food pattern, "caloric garbage" becomes the number one problem. It becomes a cause of disease and premature aging. "Rescue technologies" save life if you fast, but kill it if we are constantly satiated.

Australian and American researchers have indirectly confirmed the benefit of Muslim fasting. They were able to discover the cellular mechanism that explains the link between fasting and longevity in humans and other mammals.

Australian scientist David Sinclair and his research team discovered that sirtuins SIRT3 and SIRT4, which prolong the life of cells, are activated during fasting. Scientists had previously hypothesized that the work of mitochondria was associated with the organism’s life span. When the mitochondria are exhausted, the cell becomes vulnerable, apoptosis begins, i.e. the program of self-destruction is activated. The signal of the beginning of apoptosis is the reduction of the amount of the oxidation reduction coenzyme NAD+ (nicotinamide adenine dinucleotide) in the mitochondria, in the nucleus of the cell and in its cytoplasm. An experiment (during which laboratory animals were forced to fast for 48 hours) made it possible to establish that in the guinea-pig's organism during this period the Nampt protein was activated. This protein triggered the synthesis of NAD+ in the cytoplasm, which in turn determined the synthesis of the enzymes coded by the  SIRT3 and SIRT4 genes. These enzymes favorably influence mitochondrial function and energy metabolism in the cell, i.e. they delay aging and prevent apoptosis.

"If we could maintain a high concentration of NAD+ in the mitochondria, able to stimulate the SIRT3 and SIRT4 genes, the cell would not need anything else for a while" - said the study authors, who called this phenomenon "mitochondrial oasis hypothesis." It can be assumed that there is a molecule capable of influencing the concentration of NAD+ in the mitochondria, as well as in the SIRT3 and SIRT4 genes.

Tissue renewal

Doctor of Biological Sciences Professor L. V. Polezhayev[15], the most prominent specialist in animal limb regeneration, who developed a method of recovering lost limbs, tails, i.e., in amphibians, writes:

“Fasting is a process of intensified physiological regeneration, renewal of all cells, their molecular and chemical makeup. Interestingly, the biochemical changes during fasting and reparative regeneration are very similar. In both cases, there are two phases: destruction and recovery. In both cases, the destruction phase is characterized by the prevalence of decomposition of protein and nucleic acids over their synthesis, shift of pH to acidity, acidosis and more. The recovery phase in both cases as well is characterized by the prevalence of synthesis of nucleic acids over their decomposition, and a return of pH to its neutral state. From the teaching on regeneration, we know that the amplification of the destruction phase leads to the amplification of the recovery phase. Therefore, with sufficient foundation, we can consider fasting a natural stimulatory factor of physiological regeneration. At the basis of fasting there is a biological process, which leads to the renewal and rejuvenation of the tissues of the whole body.”

However, new cells grow especially intensively during the recovery period. Similar renewal happens in other organs and tissues, which is why fasting is an ‘universal doctor’. No surgeon can remove specific affected tumor or ulcer cells, while preserving healthy adjacent cells and not compromising tissue integrity. This is how precisely hunger, the great physician, heals.

8.6. Youth and quality of life extension

Everyone familiar with dry fasting or even with just water fasting sees numerous examples of physical rejuvenation achieved during fasting. Physical improvements are usually accompanied by mental ones. Sometimes hearing is restored in people who have been deaf for many years. Eyesight becomes so acute that those who have been wearing glasses for years, don’t need them anymore (sight restoration in blind people is extremely rare), the sense of smell and taste perception become keener, in case of sensory nerve paralysis, sensory perception gets restored, a burst of energy may be observed, mental capacity increases, weight decreases, the body’s functional activity becomes more intense, eyes become clear and sparkling, complexion improves and freshness and rosy glow, which are characteristic of youth, are restored, facial wrinkles disappear, blood pressure decreases, heart performance improves, the enlarged prostate decreases in size, sexual rejuvenation takes place — these processes, which are the evidence of rejuvenation, may be observed by everybody who has practiced fasting or is familiar with this problem. It is as if fasting creates conditions for a rebirth, a revitalization of the organism. At that time, all the cells in the body are cleansed, foreign substances (metaplasmatic materials) are removed from the cell protoplasm, so that the cells are rejuvenated and start to function more effectively.

Some of these foreign materials are highly toxic and accumulated long ago in the fatty cells and the connective tissue cells, figuratively called the organism’s landfill, that’s why it’s necessary to remove them from the circulation and metabolic processes in the body. When the tissues get rid of these materials, it increases the effectiveness of the physiological mechanism. Along with the renewal of the body due to fasting, a certain potential is also created, which ensures improved body function after the fast is complete.

Wear and damage, repair and replenishment are continuous and almost synchronous processes in all living organisms. Something is created, and something is destroyed. Both of these processes are called metabolism, the production is called anabolism and the destruction – catabolism.  Catabolism prevails during periods of activity, anabolism – during periods of rest and sleep.

Anabolism is the process of repairing the body, when it gets a new burst of energy and prepares for new activities. This process is dominant during the period of active growth and it slows down somewhat during aging.

It is established that fasting accelerates metabolism, and after the end of a fast the anabolic or constructive phase develops intensively. Thus, one can say that a general cleansing of the body renews the constructive processes of life. It is true that under experimental conditions this improvement in life processes is brief. However, in most cases this happens because the researchers can’t manage to bring their patients back (on the patients’ demand) to anything but their usual lifestyle after fasting.

A person’s age is the duration of their life. The term ‘age’ denotes several different aspects of life: level of a person’s development (physiological age), level of mental development (psychological age), etc. Any other term or expression signifying nothing else but chronological age brings vagueness and confusion of age with the condition of the body or the extent of its growth and development.

When we say that one person is old at 40, and another is young at 70, we actually mean their physical and mental state, and not their age. A suggestion to use the expression “functional age” when discussing an individual’s state, rather than their date of birth, is based on this confusion as well.

It is true that the date of birth tells us nothing about the state of a given organism or about the extent of its mental development. These factors are only indirectly connected to age and are not its important components. A 70-year-old can be young according to their physical and mental state, and a 40-year-old can be old, languid and depressed. And yet the first person is already 70, while the second is only 40. Knowing this, we can ignore the widespread assertion, that ‘we’re trying to turn back time’. The age-related changes happening in the organism that are called ageing, aren’t so much linked to the passing of time, as to the factors, absolutely unrelated to time per se.

If there were a causal link to ageing, then a person at 70 should have all the indications of old age, inherent in this period of life, and a person at 40 – all the indications of youth, found at this age. The fact that the case is often the opposite makes us doubt the assumption that the state of the body is irreversibly linked with the number of years lived. We shouldn’t find it difficult to understand that although age is expressed in time, time isn’t the cause of the ageing process. For example, let’s take a stone being washed by water. It changes over time, but it’s not time that polishes it, it’s water. The ageing process requires time, but time isn’t the cause of polishing.

Two stones, polished by water in the to the same extent, abrade at different speeds, depending on their hardness and density. Due to the same reason, two people under the influence of identical destructive factors age at a different speed, depending on their individual resistance to the destructive factors.

A stone abrades faster or slower depending on the amount of water flowing around it: if it’s small, the stone abrades slowly, if there’s a lot of water, the abrasion happens faster. A person also ages fast or slowly depending on the number of destructive influences this person is affected by.

Let’s expand our example somewhat: let’s imagine a self-restoring rock. At first it was being polished by water, then the water stopped washing it. The rock begins ‘repairing’ itself and restoring the larger part of the lost matter. In the human body, a natural process will take place (because the organism is self-repairing), when the causes of ageing are eliminated.

The body is capable of destroying some of the damaged structures, replacing them with fresh ones, and renewing the cells by dumping the ‘loads’ accumulated in them and ‘repairing’ their damaged parts. Figuratively speaking, the human body can actively handle its business on its own in a constructive manner.

Humans can live longer and better than they do now. They should live much longer than now, and enjoy absolute health and energy. They shouldn’t waste away at 60 or earlier. But in fact, excluding deaths from accidents and homicides, people die from diseases. If we lived in a way that prevented the development of diseases, not only could we live longer than what’s considered normal now, but we could also preserve our physical and mental powers.

Aging is defined as an ‘accumulation of changes in the organism, increasing the probability of death of a given individual over the course of time.’ This simply means that aging is a slow accumulation of pathological (unhealthy) changes in the organs and tissues, injuries in the structures of the body and a slow deterioration of its vital functions. Old age is just another chronic disease. And this is the reason why we can age sooner or later, and some people at seventy look younger than some 40-year-olds.

Aging happens over time, but time is not its cause. Consequently, it doesn’t matter, what method we should use to precisely determine human physiological age, what matters is that we found and figured out the causes that lead to aging. Eliminate the cause of aging, and let the physiological age take care of itself. Nobody knows for sure what the changes of the organism leading to aging are, or what sort of changes they are exactly. Let’s examine the experiments of a well-known French scientist Dr. Alexis Carrel[16], author of the book Man, The Unknown. Keeping separate fragments of a chicken heart alive over the course of many years, he found out that they aged, unless they got rid of the waste accumulated in their cells. In other words, they aged because of the accumulation of waste produced by their own metabolism in the culture medium where they were placed. If this waste was regularly removed, preventing the cells from getting poisoned by it, the chicken heart didn’t age. This is very important proof that aging is the result of chronic saturation with toxic substances. Unfortunately, the important discovery attracted too little attention, perhaps, because a way to use it was not discovered.

Carrel’s experiments and many other similar ones helped scientists conclude that cells are potentially immortal. In their normal state, they keep dividing over and over again, but they don't’ die. Death turns out to be an abnormal phenomenon. Nevertheless, under the regular life conditions we observe that cells actually age and die in great numbers. In order to extend life indefinitely, all the conditions have to be favorable.

If cells are potentially immortal, as scientists currently think, and the body as a system gets older, then it’s obvious that one of two things is true. Either the functional specialization of cell groups / body organs is mismatched, or there’s no coordination of cell groups in the organism. Perhaps, both of these factors are true. If one or both of these assumptions are true, this poses a question:  is the discrepancy of specialization or the discrepancy of coordination a primary (initial) condition of life or is it (the mismatch) a result of established and resolvable causes? If it’s a primary condition, then we cannot hope to prevent the aging process for more than a short period of time, as it usually begins quite early. But if it’s induced by causes that can be avoided or eliminated, which seems likely enough, then we’re capable of doing a lot to prevent aging.

At least countless experiments on many lower forms of life have demonstrated that it’s not only possible to delay the aging process for an infinitely long time, but also to reverse it, restoring youth.

For more than 15 years, professor C. M. Child[17] from the University of Chicago researched animal ageing. His results revealed that periodical fasting usually promotes bodily rejuvenation.

In his research of some insect species, he found out that, when given abundant food, the insects’ life lasted for 3-4 weeks, but if the amount of food was decreased or the insects were forced to fast, they would stay active and young for at least 3 years. Here’s his conclusion: “Partial fasting prevents aging. The fasting person is transferred from mature age to initial postembryonic stage, he is almost born again.”

Child pointed out that in the organic world rejuvenation is nothing but a normal cell renewal process. This process is continuous throughout the life of any organism.

Similar research was conducted by the employees of the Institute of Physiology of the National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine. Through the introduction of a special dietary regimen, they ‘rejuvenated’ two-year-old rats to a state typical for three-months-olds. English biologist Clive McCay[18] achieved a 1.5-fold life extension in mice, by means of two days a week without food, and decreasing food intake by a third allowed the mice to live twice as long.

Interesting experiments on animal rejuvenation were conducted by a remarkable physician Suren Arakelyan[19]. According to his data, aged hens, who were put through a fast, began to lay eggs again, began recovering their feather coating, their voices became higher and younger and their bodies – more graceful and slender. Here’s a photograph that Suren Arakelyan has kept since his experiment. There are two aged layer hens in his arms. The hens were sisters. One fasted, the other didn’t. After the photo was taken, the gluttonous sister lived for only a month, while the rejuvenated hen lived for six more years. It was definitely surprising: out of 1000 birds written-off because of their age, 910 laid an egg every day. And not just an egg! The egg weighed 68 grams, while the one laid by a pullet weighed only 48 grams. The biochemical analysis confirmed that the quality of the egg was better, too. There was a fear that hunger will lead the birds to their death, but they, on the contrary, began living much longer: for 18 years, on average, instead of the 6 allotted by nature. The species’ lifespan was extended threefold. A chicken named Krasavitsa reached a fantastic age of 21. Proportionately, for a human this age would equal 240 – 250 years.

After chickens, Arakelyan started working with bulls belonging to a high-priced breed. Their youth is short, lasting only four years. And then they become meat. The bulls went on a fast, but they took a complex stress-relieving drug. It was stress-relieving because normal hunger induces a distressed, restless state in animals. Taking these substances, the bulls as though didn't notice the hunger. This went on for twenty days. The bulls grew thin, having lost 15-20 % of their fat mass, but those were temporary losses, the weight soon came back, and with it came specific reproductive capabilities. This allows to conclude that when fasting is employed during the month-long rest once a year, bulls’ life expectancy grows threefold!

Inability to preserve youth is caused by factors that interfere with the perfect process of renewal. Any elimination of these interfering factors at any age leads to a shift – to renewal and youth.

However, it should be acknowledged that there are clear limits to human rejuvenating capabilities. Irreversible changes may occur in the tissues of the human body, and any efforts to eliminate them are akin to efforts to grow a new leg after it was lost. Many lower forms of life, and some of them are very complex organisms, possess the ability to grow new members or internal organs (even new heads, brains and eyes); their rejuvenating capabilities are substantially wider than those of highly developed organisms. But a human can be rejuvenated to a greater degree than we had previously thought. Up until now, we can agree that the larger is the number and the degree of pathological changes that have occurred in the human body, the smaller is its capability of restoring youth. However, I don’t think that the greatest possibilities of rejuvenation by means of fasting are of interest only to people of both sexes in their advanced age. Fasting is also extremely important to younger people as a means of reversing the aging process, although their aging is slowed down. If we can use fasting to prevent destructive processes in the vital organs by periodically freeing the organism of its toxic load and providing these organs with the much-needed rest. then we will be able to achieve a much more prolonged effect in aging prevention than in searching for the ways to rejuvenate the organism.

When I began working at the Goryachinsk health resort, the nurse brought me the case records of the patients that were to have an appointment with me. When I was looking through them, one drew my attention. The patient was 80 years old, his diagnosis was deforming coxarthrosis of the hip and knee joints. Well, I was wondering to myself how he was going to get there, and what treatment I could possibly prescribe to him at this age. Subsequently, a slim, youthful man of about 50 came to me for an appointment and said that he’d just been swimming in Baikal (it was November) and it was great. When I asked for his name, it turned out he was that 80-year-old ‘grandpa’. My surprise knew no bounds. I asked him at once, “What about your sore joints?” “Oh, I forgot all about them a long time ago, doctor, and the diagnosis in my rehabilitation and health resort card form is there so that I can go to the health resort.” I was very interested to know how he had achieved these amazing results in the treatment of his disease and rejuvenation of his body. Here’s his story:

“My problems began after I turned 50, I started having pains in my hip joints when moving, it became difficult to get up. My knee joints subsequently began bothering me, too. I underwent all kinds of treatment and went to all kinds of health resorts. Granted, I felt somewhat better after going to health resorts, but at some point, the pain came back. I realized that if I didn’t cardinally change something in my life, I would become fully disabled and immobilized. I began collecting information, talking to people with the same diagnosis, who had improved their health by natural means. At that time, there was practically no information on body cleansing or fasting. I learned about liver cleansing from a talented healer from a neighboring village. I’d known about fasting since childhood, because my grandmother had rigidly observed the fast — only water and nothing else. I cleansed my liver and gradually began conducting fasts. I felt better after a ten-day fast, my joints were hurting less, my capacity for movement increased. After that I started walking more. Once after a walk I had bad swelling in my left knee and horrible pain. I thought that if I tried fasting without water, then my swelling would come down faster. To my surprise, the pain and the swelling went away on the third day, which had never happened during water fasting. The first time I dry fasted for five days. Of course, it was harder than a water fast, but the results and the effect of dry fasting impressed me. I realized that you can achieve better results in a shorter period of time. After that, I only fasted dry. Every week I dry fasted for a day, and two times a year – for seven.

With great effort and with the help of the knowledge I had received from other people’s experience, I achieved a full cure from coxarthrosis of the hip joints.

Last year I celebrated my 80th birthday as a practically healthy man.

Reaching this age, which seemed improbable and inaccessible 30 years ago, not only became a reality, but a reality full of joy and happiness.

The tests that I conducted and my test results show that I’m not only healthy, but also that for me the age of 80 isn’t the time of decrepit old age and suffering from ailments, on the contrary, it’s the time of a normal life of a person looking forward to the future. (...).

To support the due level of health, I first and foremost take care of my moral health, and monitor my nutrition regime, which rich in cereals, vegetables, fruit, without salt or solid fats, and maintain a high level of physical activity, but the most important thing is systemic dry fasting.”

Subsequently, this unique example influenced me greatly, affecting my decision to introduce dry fasting into my practice.

One of the striking examples of the miracle of fasting is the author of the homonymous book Paul Bragg[20]. He tragically died surfing the ocean waves at the age of 95 and remained healthy until his very death.

Perhaps, one day doctors will accept fasting as a powerful natural method of body rejuvenation, which is in many ways superior to manipulations with stem cells or expensive plastic surgery. It’s important to understand that any effective rejuvenation of the body is the result of internal strength and processes working under favorable conditions, and not of forcible states induced by exotic actions. Health restoration, in other words, termination of the pathological state and rejuvenation are the same process.

If we could see fasting as a method that gives the body an opportunity to not only free itself of the load of accumulated toxins, but also from the burden of accumulated anomalous changes in its tissues, then we will be able to use this method for the purposes of rejuvenation with enormous success.

8.7. Preventive mechanism: protection against radiation, adverse environmental factors, prevention of oncological diseases

Why does fasting protect from radiation and why are fasts held on designated days? In order to answer this question comprehensively, we are going to begin with what seems an entirely different topic — how does radiation damage our organism? Radiation is a powerful flow of energy which, when penetrating the organs, cannot be assimilated by the cells because of its power and causes a phenomenon of ionization in them. Ionization is the tearing off of atoms and molecules caused by the impact of the particles. As a result, a mass of radicals is formed in the cells. A radical is an extremely biologically active fragment of a molecule which combines with DNA molecules and blocks their biological properties, which start to damage its genetic apparatus. Then a breakdown of the DNA and RNA double helix takes place. As soon as that happens, and it usually happens in the quickly dividing cells of the gastrointestinal tract, the cells stop dividing and start being destroyed as foreign by the organism’s own immune system. A destructive process develops in the tissues. Such micro-holes created by the aforementioned process are easily penetrated by infections (which are numerous in the gastrointestinal tract) and then sepsis begins, leading to the organism’s death. Scientists conducted a series of interesting experiments on rats. One group of rats was exposed to radiation or fed food containing radionucleotides, and then starved. For comparison purposes, a group of absolutely healthy animals was starved, too. A physiological period of starvation for rats is 12 days. All animals in the healthy control group died after this period, but the irradiated rats lived for 24 days, started to look even better than before, and had no intention of dying. The researchers had to kill the rats and thoroughly analyzed their tissues, as a result of which they found out that the rats looked excellent, as young, healthy animals, and had no radioactive damage! Why does this happen? It turns out, when fasting during advanced biosynthesis, the body needs energy, and the radiation that was inassimilable before, now is fully expended on this. The bad turns into good! A number of other mechanisms that protect the organism from radiation during hunger were discovered at the same time. Here they are:

1. The body restores the cells’ membranes by increasing alcohol production. Restoration of the cells’ membranes is nothing but a reinforcement of cellular barriers. As a result, subsequent exposure to radiation will have a less pronounced damaging effect on the cells.

2. Increased carbon dioxide content in the cells decreases the ionization caused by exposure to radiation.

3. The quickly dividing cells of the gastrointestinal tract, which suffer the most from radiation, abruptly slow down their division. After all, they’re forced to divide quickly because they’re affected by their own digestive enzymes, get damaged and desquamate. The organism, owing to high speed of division of these cells, restores the stomach and intestinal walls. This doesn’t happen during fasting. The gastrointestinal tract cells rest, and the energy previously spent on accelerated division is now used for restoring internal structures, repairing torn DNA and RNA helices. This is also facilitated by enhanced biosynthesis inside the cell because of the fixation of carbon dioxide in it, which doesn’t happen during regular food intake. Owing to that, they don’t die, don’t get rejected by their own organism, and when the body switches to regular food intake, they divide as if nothing had happened and perform their former functions to the full extent. But during regular food intake, these two processes of division and restoration of the inner structures of the cell can’t be carried out fully, and radiation further exacerbates it.

4. According to practical research, radiation and radionucleotides are removed from the human body in just 12-14 days of water fasting or 5-7 days of dry fasting. This makes a person lose much less weight than during a normal fast. As a result of the aforementioned processes, that occur during fasting, the problems of radioactive exposure are completely solved. And indeed, after Chernobyl, academician A. I. Vorobyov[21] decided to employ fasting in treating people stricken by acute radiation sickness (when ulcers appear in the gastrointestinal tract). Bone marrow transplantation and use of powerful antibiotic therapy are nearly hopeless in such cases, but thanks to fasting, the affected people restored their health. For the first time in the world practice, the fasting method helped in the case where other, most innovative (American, Japanese) treatment options proved to be powerless! And it’s no wonder, since these treatment options are the fruit of artificial conclusions, while fasting is a natural process that has nothing in common with them.

After this introduction, let’s pass on to the main question — why are fasts conducted at specific times of the year? If we combine the dates when fasts are conducted and astrological signs, then we’ll see that three out of the four fasts fall on ‘Fire Signs’. The Nativity Fast (40 days) falls on Sagittarius. Great Lent (48 days) falls on Aries. The Uspensky Fast (14 days) fall on Leo. The length of the Apostles’ Fast is not constant and varies between 8 and 42 days. This variation is caused by adjustment to natural rhythms. In years of the active sun, when there’s a lot of energy, its duration increases. In cold years, on the contrary, the length of this fast shortens. There’s no ad-libbing — everything happens according to nature’s laws. In the above-mentioned periods, an increased amount of energy reaches the Earth from space. This energy, which works like radioactive energy, can disrupt the organism’s function. Remember A. L. Chizhevsky’s[22] work The Earthly Echo of the Solar Storms, and a lot will be clarified immediately.

If you fast during this time, then cosmic energy and an increased amount of solar energy will go towards creation, intensifying biosynthesis. If you still continue eating, then the energy won’t assimilate and will cause damage to your cells, and free radicals will inhibit the cell’s function, undermining the living potential of the whole organism. But at the same time, bacteria and viruses convert to active state and successfully attack the weakened organism due to the abundance of energy. It is exactly at this time that flu (spring and the beginning of winter) and cholera (summer) epidemics may be observed all over the world. In years of active sun, these processes are of such a pronounced nature, that in the Middle Ages the majority of the European population died out because of it! You can fast during another time of the year, but the combination of increased natural energy and fasting produces the best effect, activating the ‘fire principle’, which is suppressed during fasting. Ancient sages took absolutely everything into account and gave the best recommendations, we only have to follow them.

Protection against adverse environmental factors

Along with our own toxins, which are produced inside the organism, the toxic substances from the chemicals that have infested our daily lives, from our poisoned atmosphere, from our water and our food, are removed from the body during fasting. However, this was to be expected. In our environmental conditions, it’s impossible to not consider these facts. But fasting also produces an excellent preventive effect. For a long time after the end of a dry fast, the highest protective potential is maintained, during periodic fasting a person becomes almost invulnerable to nitrates, phenols, sulphur dioxide and nuclear power stations.

Prevention of oncological diseases

When I was studying calorie restriction therapy with Professor Y. S. Nikolayev, he told me about a curious experiment. Students of Stavropol Medical Institute divided 120 white rats into 4 groups.

The first group was the control group, and the remaining three were subjected to a 3-day-long fast. The first of these three were inoculated with sarcoma before the fast, the second — during the fast, and the third — after it. All the control group members who hadn’t fasted, died. Half of the 30 animals that had been inoculated with sarcoma before the experiment a half died, out of the 30 ones that had been injected during the fasting a third did. All those who have been injected after the fasting survived. As I’ve already written, during dry fasting the strongest, most viable cells survive, that’s why even short-term dry fasts are a serious preventive treatment against malignant tumors. Another marvelous impact of fasting was recorded by American scientists. They studied the impact of fasting on the development of severe forms of cancer. The animals were divided into two groups — the experimental group and the control group. The rats in the control group were subjected to radiation. The dose was chosen so that it wouldn’t cause a quick death, but 2-3 weeks after the irradiation every member of the group had blood cancer. The experimental group was luckier. Prior to irradiation, the animals underwent a full fast. You may think that the organism weakened by fasting should react even more acutely to this negative influence, and the sickness should be more severe. But the results were exactly the opposite! Compared to the control group, the experimental group had 70 % fewer sick rats.

8.8. Renewal of the organism’s energy

As I’ve already written, water is one of the best carrier of energy information. This is achieved through water’s unique molecular composition and variability of its cluster structure. It was also proven by scientists that, long before any symptoms of illness appear, local areas of ‘heavy’ water, water with irregular structure, or pathological zones, are formed in the human organism.

Any kind of evil eye, hex or just people’s envy, in short, all the negative energy is located in these pathological zones. During dry fasting the old ‘dead’ water is replaced with high-quality, energetically renewed, ‘live’ water, synthesized by the body itself.

Dry fasting is, first and foremost, intense spiritual work, intended to clean the soul and body of the essences feeding off them, which also strengthens will power and the power of positive thinking in the initial stage of evolution. Dry fasting evenly burns everything unfit for its evolution in terms of both mechanics and spirit using all the organs of the body. The reason is that after at least 7-10 days, negative energy essences, sensing their death in the absence of food, start to come out of you, since they can’t stand dry fasting and positive vibrations radiating from you. Especially if you support all this with positive actions. Dry fasting gives you a reserve of energy.  It seems unbelievable: how can a person not eat anything, spend their energy, but still have increased energy levels? But there’s no paradox. When the body is devoid of organic food, it begins to intensely consume subtle energy from space and the environment. With transition to normal nutrition, the hyper-restoration effect comes into action — the body starts to collect energy more intensely than it did prior to fasting, luckily it has all the relevant capabilities at that point. After all, thanks to fasting the chakras are cleansed along with the energy channels, which lots of abilities depend on. After the end of a fast, the time of sleep decreases to 4-5 hours, a person literally gains strength, they’re boiling over with energy. This remarkable state lasts for a long time if a person eats healthy, exercises and spends time outdoors.

Special effects

Here are the gifts which everybody receives from dry fasting along with the cure from the illnesses that had tormented them for a long time, and which (not a single one of them!) are, of course, possible without deep refreshing and calming of the whole body.

- First of all, the general perception abilities are greatly increased —  tactile, skin sensitivity and the sense of smell are heightened, which produces interesting effects. You’ll be able to feel through the shop window, to sense the taste of the foods there, to know that a certain egg in fridge is already not fresh, to remotely perceive that there’s something wrong with the food, which can actually just turn out to be an excess of preservatives. In pronounced cases of perception increase you’ll have no problems guessing the contents of a tin with no label on it.

- During fasting, sweat secretion almost stops — the skin turns from a secretor to an absorber, at the same time when in contact with a substance, not only does it start to be absorbed, but you can also feel the taste of the substance in your mouth. Thus, if you have to cook food for others during your fast, you can determine ‘by touch’, if there’s enough salt in the soup. But I wouldn’t advise you to knead dough, the oil will be absorbed by your hands, rather than by the food.

- A person’s intuition increases intensely during dry fasting. Just like a cat, one may begin feeling pathological or, on the contrary, healing energetic zones. Interestingly, they’re different for every person

- Sometimes people develop telepathic abilities, they begin to understand each other without words.

- Those who fast regularly notice that fasting enhances willpower. Iron-strong determination is undoubtedly necessary for achieving success in any difficult undertaking. A 24-hour abstinence from food makes a person mentally stronger and prepares them for making a prudent choice and then acting with firm determination.

- Fasting awakens the (often lost) sense of how much food and water a person really needs to sustain their life. During abstinence from food, a person experiences certain suffering. On the one hand, it naturally develops compassion for others suffering from hunger, with barely enough to sustain oneself. Only after having the same experience yourself, you can genuinely understand the suffering of the poor and wretched.

- If you were sensitive to cold, often came down with the flu, your feet were cold and, consequently, you couldn’t fall asleep for a long time — after dry fasting you will become resistant to cold.

- If you had grey hair and it was falling out, after fasting it will become thicker and regain its color.

- If you had poor vision, it often improves after a dry fast.

- If the whites of your eyes were yellow, they will become clear white.

- If you snored during sleep, your breathing will become even and silent, you will stop grinding teeth in your sleep.

- If you suffered from bad mouth odor, your breath will become clean and odorless.

- If you were bothered by morning bitterness in the mouth, the taste in the mouth will always be sweet and fresh.

- Yellow plaque on teeth disappears. They become pearl-white.

- If your teeth were loose (paradontosis), they will sit in the gums more firmly.

- If you had a persistently runny nose, fasting completely cures this problem.

- If you had hypertension (or hypotension), your blood pressure comes back to normal.

- Insomnia vanishes and deep wholesome sleep is restored.

- Sexual activity increases and grows stronger.

- A person becomes 10-15 years younger working-efficiency-wise.

Of course, many health benefits listed here can be achieved by any kind of fasting, but during dry fasting they can be achieved more effectively and within shorter timeframes.

9. How to properly prepare your body for dry fasting?

NOTE: ! Never conduct dry fasting without trying water fasting first !

9.1. Bowel cleansing. Introduction

You might believe that preliminary cleansing was invented by all those boring theorists who don’t understand that people who want to fast have jobs, and are therefore busy. Thus, you start fasting completely unprepared. Inside the colon, which ends with the anus, in the pockets of the colon hides a greenish, clay-like substance with a very unpleasant smell, which is called fecal stones. It is very hard to rinse out just with water and over the years it can grow so bulky that it blocks the passage in the colon, requiring painful surgery in order to clean out these stones. In some especially neglected cases, up to 25 kilograms of these stones are taken out of the patient’s colon. To be sure, such fasting, without bowel cleansing, has few benefits. First of all, you feel strong hunger during fasting all the time. That’s because fecal masses, fecal stones, and the juice produced by them, which is being absorbed by the body from the bowels during fasting, poison you once and for all. Furthermore, when you, after finally having scrupulously and stoically endured the entire process until the end, begin coming out of a fast, you once again perfect your fasting technique and immediately eat as much as you can hold.

Naturally, when a person stops eating, eventually they start having a cleansing crisis, which is accompanied by unpleasant sensations, and the fasting person believes they’re already dying from not eating and succumb to panic, starting to eat again.

When toxins leave the body, which always happens during fasting, you may experience unpleasant sensations, weakness and pain in some parts of the body. That’s why a person who’s ignorant about fasting may feel that their body is being irreparably destroyed during fasting.

Coloproctologists say jokingly: the organism is essentially an upgraded intestinal canal. And, to be fair, they aren’t really exaggerating the importance of this organ. After all, it is in the intestinal canal that all the vital digestive processes take place.

The majority of the substances necessary for the body is absorbed through the intestinal walls. It turns out that a person’s health directly depends on the state of their bowels. But an irregular, unbalanced diet leads to waste accumulating on the intestinal walls. These dense deposits impede the absorption of nutrients, produce toxins, disturb intestinal peristalsis. As a result, a person often experiences weakness, irritability, constipation, skin breakouts, weight problems. Organ function is hindered, which threatens with serious ailments.

Out of all bowel segments, the large intestine is especially susceptible to toxin accumulation.

Since the gastrointestinal tract is rich in its own endocrine ‘taps’, which change their activity under the influence of changes, related to metabolism in the bowels, this system in our body primarily provides normal regulation of metabolic processes, their correspondence with metabolic and adaptive changes. And, of course, all these systems are dominated by the nervous system, which controls the overall coordination of all the systems’ activities.

That’s why it’s quite appropriate that diseases of organs and systems that, at first sight, are unrelated to the bowels, during their course are accompanied by intestinal disorder and, in particular, a decrease in its barrier function. In this case, the ejection of intestinal toxins into the blood and lymph of the sick organism increases, which substantially increases the accumulation of endotoxins in the organism and leads to the development of endotoxicosis — accumulation of toxic substances in tissue and intracellular fluid. These substances can affect the flow of metabolic processes in the cell, disturb the regulation of bioprocesses. Digestive tract diseases can create more than 100 different complications: food allergy, eczema, arthritis, spondylitis, schizophrenia… The list goes on.

According to scientists, in cases of chronic intestinal diseases one of the causes of internal organs and systems pathology may be linked to the disorders of the absorption of important food components. This can be caused by loss of nutrients due to diarrhea, excessive bacterial growth or change in intestinal wall permeability.

People affected by similar bowel dysfunction develop all kinds of different diseases quickly and easily. Under these circumstances, the probability of fatal outcome increases, and the chances for the organism to conquer the disease and for the person to get well decrease. In other words, if functional and pathological changes arise in the digestive tract, the body stops receiving enough nutrients. The state of the microscopic flora fluctuations, resulting in the immune system weakening and the organism becoming defenseless against even the smallest threats. A danger of oncological, allergic, dystrophic diseases arises.

Enterosorption  -  an effective means of  intestinal rejuvenation and  cleansing

Currently enterosorption is one of the best means of life prolongation (organism rejuvenation). Enterosorption is effective, simple and safe. We definitely have to take advantage of it!

Medicine widely employs a method of blood purification called hemosorption. This method entails a person’s blood being run through a sorbent, which extracts a number of harmful substances from it. Usually, synthetic charcoal is used as a sorbent. However, these procedures can turn out to be unsafe for the body. A well-known gerontologist, academician V. Frolkis[23] effectively used enterosorption to increase lifespan. The important point is that a person secretes up to 10-12 liters of digestive juices per day. The liquid part of these juices is filtered out from the blood. It’s absorbed back into the blood in the lower parts of the intestinal canal. Therefore, when we conduct the sorption of digestive juices, we can harmlessly purify blood, lymph, and consequently, intracellular and cellular liquid, or, in other words, the whole organism in its entirety. It’s crucial that the enterosorbent also absorbs cholesterol, which is ejected into the bowels by the gallbladder. This is, perhaps, the best way to prevent atherosclerosis, which is the cause of one in two deaths.

28-month-old rats were used in the experiment. The rats were subjected to enterosorption cycles: for 10 days, a sorbent (synthetic charcoal) was added to their food, then there was a 30-day break. This experiment has led to a 35 % increase in the rats’ lifespan. The effect of enterosorption on the cells is so substantial that it affects the rate of protein synthesis in the organs.

The effect of the enterosorbent on lipid metabolism in the body is of huge importance. The content of total lipids (triglycerides, cholesterol), which have a large significance in the development of atherosclerosis, in the liver decreases by about 30%. Similar shifts may be observed in the brain and heart tissues. The influence of enterosorption on lipid metabolism has turned out to be so substantial that its use restores the structure of cellular walls! That is, something that has already been destroyed is restored, which means that the body is rejuvenated! As a result of long enterosorption, cell damage, connective tissue growth in the organs and nerve centers begin significantly later, atrophy is less pronounced, there is less vascular sclerosis and more.

Which enterosorbents are best?

Even ordinary dietary fibers (cellulose, which is the plant cell membrane, etc.) have a minimal effect.  That’s why you can often hear a recommendation to eat more plant foods. The so-called microcrystalline cellulose is also produced from plant fiber. But, of course, specially developed preparations produce the greatest effect. It can be either ordinary activated charcoal sold at the drug store, or ‘advanced’ enterosorbents based on apple and citrus pectin with addition of different plant extracts and healthy bacteria, which have a cholagogic and general health-improving effect on both the digestive tract and the whole organism. Such sorbents include Toxfighter, Polyphepanum and others. The main indicator of an enterosorbent’s efficiency is its ability to create an absorbing surface. The simplest enterosorbents, such as activated charcoal (Carbolen), create an absorbing surface of 200-300 square meters per 1 gram of sorbent. There are more powerful granulated charcoal-based enterosorbents and coal-fiber materials (Vaulen, Aktilen, ‘Dnepr’). They have the power of a 1000 (!) and more square meters per gram.

If you’re going to use ordinary activated charcoal, then the daily dosage should be about 5-7 grams. However, to achieve the greatest effect, plant-based enterosorbents can be taken in dosages 2-3 times higher than indicated. The treatment can be carried out over the course of a month.  It is crucial to know that enterosorbents are taken on an empty stomach (you may take them 30-60 minutes before meals). We recommend you to dissolve a portion of the product in water (or wash it down with water) in an amount of 100-200 grams. It’s good to increase the total amount of liquid taken during the day during the enterosorption course.

Enterosorbents used nowadays can be combined into several groups:

- Carbon adsorbents based on activated charcoal (Carbolen, Carboktin, Gastrosorb), granulated charcoal and coal-fiber materials (Vaulen, Aktilen, ‘Dnepr’);

- Ion-exchange materials or resins (Cayexilit, Cholisteramin);

- Lignin-based enterosorbents (Polyphepanum, Lignosorb);

- Polyvinylpyrrolidone derivatives (Enterodesum, Enterosorbum);

- Others (Argil, aluminium hydroxide, Almagel, Gastal, Sucralfatum, silica gels, zeolites);

- Natural dietary fibers (cereal bran, cellulose, aliginates (detoxal), pectins (Polysorbovit 50, Polysorbovit 95, Hitozan).

We use POLYSORB MP in our practice. It is inorganic, non-selective, multifunctional intestinal sorbent (enterosorbent) composed of finely dispersed SiO2.

9.2. Methods of use of enterosorbents

Enterosorption may be carried out in different ways.  There are three main methods of use of enterosorbents:

1. single intake of a full dose of an enterosorbent;

2. a treatment course of an enterosorbent (7-10 days);

3. intestinal sorbent cleansing (2-3 days);

Depending on your well-being, mood and wishes, you can use different methods of enterosorption and different enterosorbents. Every person chooses the method of detoxification that they think is the most effective and acceptable. For example, one-time intakes outside the house; sorbent cleansing of the large intestine as a part of a health resort treatment; or different season-specific methods, etc.

Moreover, it’s possible to combine various methods of enterosorption. For example, you can carry out a sorbent intake course and end it with intestinal sorbent cleansing, and combine sorbent cleansing of the large intestine with oral sorbent intake.

In our opinion, the best way to make your organism healthier is simultaneous or consecutive combination of different methods of influencing the organs and systems of the body. It’s expedient to use various methods of herbal treatment, psychotherapy, exercise therapy, fasting, etc. during and before enterosorption. Not only aren’t such combinations contraindicated, in fact, they strengthen the health benefits of enterosorption.

Single intake of a full dose of an enterosorbent

This method is used when there’s an increased load on the detoxifying organs of the human body. It helps the organism deal with the types of poisoning that most frequently occur in everyday life. Such everyday situations can be the bodily condition after drinking alcohol, food poisonings and their prophylaxis, light diarrhea, working with toxic substances (paints and lacquers, glass cleaners, inhaling fumes of combustibles and lubricants, etc.). A single intake is carried out in the following manner.

Stir 8 tbsp. of sorbent in 1 glass of water or use 2 tbsp. 4 times a day every 3 hours. Drink this solution. It’s best to take the sorbent on an empty stomach.

Of course, this method doesn’t provide a steady and deep detoxifying effect on the organism, as no significant reorganization of the work of the digestive tract structures and the detoxifying systems is possible in such a short period of time. The main aim of a single intake of a sorbent is the resolution of relatively simple everyday tasks. In this way, we help the organism to get rid of toxic substances faster and more effectively. Depending on whether or not the desired result was achieved, you can repeat the intake 2-3 times.

You can use this method on an as-needed basis.

Course intake of an enterosorbent

In this case, the intake course of an enterosorbent is as follows. Take 1 tbsp. of an enterosorbent for 7-10 days 3 times a day.

9.3. Intestinal sorbent cleansing procedure

Preparation for the cleansing (with salt solution)

You have to begin taking a sorbent in a daily dosage (3 tablespoons during the day between meals) 24 hours before the procedure day. On the next day, take 3 more tablespoons in an arbitrary manner on an empty stomach, but mandatorily prior to any fluid intake. A crucial condition for a successful intestinal sorbent cleansing is prior fasting for a period of 8-10 hours (you can fast for longer — up to 20 hours, but no less than 8 hours). Failure to observe this condition abruptly changes the course of physiological processes in the gastrointestinal tract.

When you eat, the mechanisms of intestinal absorption are immediately activated by the body. They will be active until the organism fully assimilates the digested food. And if the absorption mechanisms are active, and some substances get into the stomach and intestines, the organism will start to assimilate them immediately. Consequently, you won’t be able to hold the salt solution in. Moreover, the presence of incompletely digested nutrients in the intestinal contents will hinder the gastrointestinal tract activity: the cleansing solution won’t gradually move along the intestines, but will linger in certain segments. If the fluid and the sorbent aren’t moving along the intestines, while the mechanisms of intestinal absorption are activated, in all likelihood, the organism will begin absorbing the solution.

It’s necessary to understand that even a small amount of sweetened tea is a contraindication for starting intestinal sorbent cleansing, because when sugar breaks up, it produces glucose, and glucose abruptly increases the intensity of sodium absorption. As for drinking pure water, there are no restrictions, because it is absorbed quickly, but it’s still better not to drink any water in the 30 minutes prior to the procedure.

In our opinion, the optimal and most convenient period for cleansing is the time after a night’s sleep, since the delay in food intake in this case is natural and doesn’t require psychological and physiological efforts. You can carry out the procedure at any other convenient time of day, but you have to observe the above-mentioned conditions.

Besides that, provide for: free access to the bathroom and toilet and 3-4 hours of free time.

Preparing the solution

The fluid for the irrigation of the digestive tract (working solution) is prepared as follows. Use a container that can hold at least 3 liters of liquid. Pour 2 liters of boiled water into it, and without covering it, put it in a clean dry place at room temperature. This water has to stay in it for the whole night.

Prepare the salt solution immediately before the procedure. For this purpose, measure exactly 1 liter of pure water with a measuring jug and add 1 level tablespoon of regular salt. The solution should be boiled thoroughly in a separate vessel (boiling time should be around 30 seconds). After that, without letting the solution cool down, add this liter to the two liters prepared yesterday. After you mix the solution, it is ready to use.

Make sure that all the salt has dissolved. The solution should be warm, but not hot. If you follow the sequence of actions, it’s going to have just the right temperature.

If you took the sorbent beforehand, you can begin the cleansing procedure. Don’t let the solution get cold, start taking it right away.

Fluid intake

As we’ve already mentioned, the solution has to be consumed in its entirety over the course of 40-60 minutes. This condition is also crucial and has to be observed rigorously.

First, in order to effectively stimulate the peristalsis of the digestive tract, a sufficient pressure on its walls has to be created. A more extended intake will allow the fluid to distribute over the different segments of the intestines, lessening the pressure on their walls.

Second, the processes of moving the liquid along the digestive tract have to get ahead of the processes of dilution and absorption of the liquid. A 40-minute period allotted for consuming the working solution conforms to all these conditions.

This elucidates the need to consume a certain amount of cleansing fluid — 2.5-3 liters. If you stop and interrupt the working solution intake for a long time, then the volume of the consumed fluid won’t be sufficient to effectively stimulate the movements of the intestines. Of course, the taste of salt water isn’t very pleasant or habitual to us. Here, first of all, you need a certain positive attitude and an awareness of the need to carry out the procedure. Besides, you have to firmly believe that the cleansing procedure will help your body get rid of harmful toxins and will prevent the emergence and development of many diseases.

We can give a few practical recommendations to those who carry out the intestinal sorbent cleansing procedure for the first time:

- take small sips;

- don’t keep the solution in the mouth;

- try not to swallow air;

- don’t force the intake of the fluid;

- in case of possible unpleasant feelings of fullness in the abdomen or light nausea, you should stop and take a 2-3-minute break.

Our experience tells us that as you repeat the intestinal sorbent cleansing procedure, all the troubles completely disappear the second or third time around. Moreover, an experienced person acquires a desire and an ability to drink the entire volume much faster than in 40 minutes. However, we have to warn you: striving to drink the cleansing solution as fast as possible may lead to a painful stretching of the stomach walls. Is it worth causing yourself suffering and enduring unnecessary pain to save 10-15 minutes?

Intestinal cleansing

So, you drank the entire solution in the required period of time. Now arm yourself with patience and wait — all the mechanisms are started. Immediately after you complete the fluid intake and during the subsequent waiting you can notice your abdomen swelling and feel the fluid moving inside of it. These phenomena are normal in the given situation.

Usually, during the first attempt of carrying out this procedure, 60-80 minutes pass from the moment you finish taking the working solution until the moment you feel the first urges to defecate. If the urges are absent at that time, don’t worry. If this is the case, do the following: walk for a while; carefully do some squats; while standing alternately lift bent legs up to your stomach, but do it calmly, without any fuss or strain; stroke your stomach clockwise and wait a couple of minutes.

When you acquire a certain experience in conducting intestinal sorbent cleansing, you’ll notice that the first urges to defecate will appear as early as 10-15 minutes after you complete the intake of the working solution. You need to make yourself comfortable on the toilet and make sure that the splashes of the cleansing fluid coming out of you don’t scatter every which way.

After the first act of defecation, be on guard and don’t go far from the toilet — repeated urges may appear at any time. Sometimes during the urges to defecate, an act of urination can happen, after which the desire to defecate disappears. Don’t rush to leave the toilet, wait for 1-1.5 minutes.

It should be noted that the frequency of urination can increase under the influence of the described method of intestinal sorbent cleansing — this is a normal phenomenon, which is linked to partial penetration of sodium and water into the bloodstream.

According to observations, abundant stool discharge is repeated 4-6 times, though it may happen a greater number of times. During the first act of defecation, a doughy mass comes out, and during the subsequent acts a dirty liquid with sorbent particles comes out, becoming lighter and clearer with every time.

As your intestines are being emptied, the feeling of heaviness and stretching in the abdomen decreases, along with the bloating. After you feel complete relief, repeat the above-mentioned physical exercises and go to the toilet again (even if you don’t have the urges). Generally, some residual amount of the liquid lingering in the colon will come out.

I wrote about this method because Epsom salt isn’t sold everywhere. In our practice, we use intestinal cleansing with the aid of Epsom salt.

Finishing the procedure

At that, the intestinal sorbent cleansing procedure per se is seemingly finished. However, we’ve noticed the following. If you drink some plain, fresh water (1-1.5 liters, optionally, in several steps), then the discharge of liquid from the bowels resumes. At the same time, the liquid coming out of the bowels takes the form of almost clear water, which is the evidence of a comprehensive cleansing. But it’s worth emphasizing that you should drink an additional amount of water only after the bulk of the cleansing solution comes out — after you defecate no fewer than 4-5 times.

Additional fluid intake can be combined with intake of bran (3-4 spoons). Bran contains a lot of so-called indigestible fibers in its structure. These fibers, which have a low absorption capacity, will gently complete the processes of cleansing the walls of the digestive tract, stimulate stool evacuation (usually after intestinal sorbent cleansing there’s a delay of stool for 1-2 days). Besides, as a result of the bacterial flora breaking up micro-cellulose contained in bran, fatty acids are formed, which are required for nourishing and restoring the surface layer of the colon.

After you finish the procedure, it is recommended to have a refreshing shower or bath.

After the end of the digestive tract cleansing (for our purposes, it will be the time of the last cleansing waters discharge), you need to refrain from eating for 2-3 hours. It’s advisable to start your food regimen with rice porridge (optionally with a small amount of butter) or other gruels (buckwheat, millet). You should abstain from meat, spicy, sour foods, as well as fatty foods for the next 24 hours.

If you follow all the listed instructions and directions precisely, you shouldn’t have any side effects or complications. But if you carry out the intestinal sorbent cleansing procedure erroneously, you’ll create a certain risk of a massive influx of sodium chloride and water into the blood. This, in turn, will lead to an increase in the amount of circulating blood, a minor increase in arterial pressure, an additional burden on the myocardium and an increase of the kidneys’ excretory function.

It has to be mentioned that such side effects pose no threat to the functioning of the mentioned organs and systems and disappear without exterior assistance within a very short amount of time. In the worst-case scenario, you can take some diuretics (i.e., furosemide). Also, there’s no need to attach great importance to periodic spastic pains in the course of the advancement of the fluid along the gastrointestinal tract, they appear unexpectedly and disappear quickly. In those cases, we recommend you to gently stroke your stomach clockwise, or apply something warm to your stomach.

Contraindications

When discussing the contraindications, we have to note that the spectrum of diseases that allow to cleanse the intestines is virtually unlimited. However, certain difficulties may arise, for instance, when the digestive tract patency is disrupted, and also in the early postoperative period, when there is a risk of developing functional intestinal insufficiency. In our opinion, the use of this method in case of acute diseases or an acute exacerbation of a chronic disease is inexpedient. In such cases, it’s recommended to confine yourself to a course of sorbent intake.

There’s a possibility (although a small one) of a massive uncontrolled influx of water and salt from the intestines into the blood, which makes us include in the list of contraindications (or, rather, a need to consult a specialist) for using this method diseases and conditions such as stage 3-4 hypertensive disease, renal hypertension, stage 3-4 heart failure, cerebrovascular disease, stage 3 chronic renal failure, cholecystitis.

After conducting intestinal sorbent cleansing, a person, despite their sense of well-being and good mood, might feel tired for a period of time (1-2 days), as if after prolonged physical activity. This proves that after the cleansing, important and energy-intensive reconstructive and restorative processes begin in the organism, in the digestive tract, as well as in the other organs and systems.

What can cause such energy demands?

First of all, the processes of restoring parietal intestinal structures, which are ‘washed away’ during the sorbent cleansing; second, activation of the mechanisms of endotoxin discharge into the blood and subsequent temporary increase in the activity of the natural detoxification systems of the organism; third, adaptive reconstruction of the systems and organs under the stress of intestinal sorbent cleansing.

9.4. Liver cleansing

Everybody says that you need to cleanse your liver… ‘Why do I need to cleanse my liver, if it doesn’t hurt? You’re telling me that I’m going to feel better after the “Liver cleansing” program, but I’m feeling great now, without any cleansing,’ you’ll answer.

Let’s take a different approach to this problem. Nobody questions the fact that the oil filter in your car (beloved Lada, Ford, Mazda, or Porsche) has to be changed. In general, it might be good to clean the engine and the injector system. Why? What for? Well, because, if you don’t do it, the engine or the injector, or both, will fail at some point. And to get it all repaired, you’ll have to pay LOTS of money. If we were to draw an analogy, then the liver is our filter. And as you can’t replace it, you have to clean it. And, of course, it’s perfectly clear, that if you don’t do this, your individual system will give up and it’ll be extremely hard to fix it. It’s well-known that the function carried out by the liver are among the most important in the organism. Toxins are stored everywhere in the body, especially in the fat tissues. They are particularly numerous in the liver, which is our organism’s filtration plant.

According to medical statistics, 4-5 kg of chemicals enter the human body only from food and drinks (including alcohol) every year. All this goes into the liver and stays there.

People who disregard liver cleansing, end up on a hospital bed sooner or later. The liver, which is full of toxins, is unable to discharge them, which is akin to having a bomb filled with several kilograms of poison inside your body.

Who needs liver cleansings? This question can’t be answered unambiguously. I believe that everybody needs cleansings, but the specific cleansing system and their time should be selected individually.

What’s required for a cleansing, in order for you to get the maximum result with minimum effort?

First of all, your emotional state. Neutral or positive mood, relaxed state, calmness — all of these are required for success. If a person approaches cleansing as if it’s slave labor, then they feel a certain degree of tension: physiologically, the body is in a state of defense, which means contraction: smooth muscles (vascular, duct, intestinal walls) spasm, which results in hindered discharge of toxins.

Secondly, it’s your attitude to get a positive result (a lack of a result is also a result). Humans are curious creatures, and curiosity can become a guarantee of a pleasant cleansing. When engaging in a cleansing, a person becomes an explorer. When a person is curious to know the result, they have no fear, but have an interest: what’s going to happen to me? And in this case even a negative result produces a question rather than fear: what did I do wrong.

Thirdly, you have to prepare for cleansing in a proper manner. A vegetarian diet is mandatory before a big cleansing, you also need to exclude alcohol entirely. As for the cleansing itself, the more precisely you follow all the recommendations, the bigger effect you’ll get.

And finally, the completion, or coming out of the cleansing. This is pretty much the most important moment: the cleansing is over, the body got rid of the toxins, and cannot yet always (at first, anyway) absorb the food you used to eat. That’s why after the cleansing, it’s important to adhere to the same diet, you kept to before it.

9.5. Intestinal and liver cleansing (week-long program)

This is a week-long program. You need to buy the following at the chemist’s: POLYSORB MP sorbent in packs (1 pack), if POLYSORB MP is not available, it can be substituted with any other sorbent, Epsom salt in 20-gram sachets (7 sachets); GEPAR phytocomplex in capsules or sachets (15 sachets or 1 pack) or any cholagogic tea; olive oil (250 ml); lemon-orange juice (50:50) 250 ml (preferably freshly squeezed).

Daily regimen when preparing for cleansing

- Take 1 tablespoon of the POLYSORB MP 4 times a day one hour before meals (mix in one glass of water) for 3 days.

- Day 4 — take 2 tablespoons of POLYSORB MP mixed in 1 glass of water 4 times a day, 1 hour before meals.

- GEPAR phytocomplex for 6 days (pour 1 glass of boiling water over the powder or the sachet, let it draw for 15 minutes, or 1 capsule — drink this 3 times a day, 30 minutes before meals).

- Morning: on an empty stomach drink raisin water (method of preparation: infuse 1 tablespoon of raisins with a glass of boiling water and leave it overnight.) In the morning, drink half of the infusion.  Use the berries for porridges or salads. Do your morning exercises, self-massage, have a shower. Then, drink 1 tablespoon of vegetable oil, eat a salad: carrots, apples, cabbage, finely grated and seasoned with lemon juice or vegetable oil.

- Lunch: vegetarian soup, freshly cooked porridge (buckwheat, millet or maize, you can have it with some vegetables or fruit).

- Dinner: fermented milk products (quark, sour cream, yoghurt, kefir, cheese) or beet salad.

- Don’t forget to drink the GEPAR phytocomplex before lunch and dinner. Before going to bed, drink the raisin water, and go to sleep with a hot-water bottle over the liver area.

- Keep to this diet for three days.

- On the 4th day only drink dried apricot or prune compote.

So:

1st day — vegetable diet, GEPAR, POLYSORB MP.

2nd day — vegetable diet, GEPAR, POLYSORB MP.

3rd day — vegetable diet, GEPAR, POLYSORB MP.

4th day — dried apricot or prune compote over the course of the day, 3 tablespoons of GEPAR, POLYSORB MP 4 times a day.

5th day — 3 more spoons of sorbent arbitrarily on an empty stomach and prior to fluid intake in the morning.

A crucial condition for a successful intestinal cleansing is prior fasting for a period of 8-10 hours (you can fast for longer — up to 20 hours, but not less than 8 hours). Failure to observe this condition abruptly changes the course of physiological processes in the digestive tract. When you eat, intestinal absorption mechanisms are abruptly activated in the body. They will be active until the organism fully absorbs the digested food. And if, while the mechanisms of absorption are active, any substances get into the stomach and the intestines, the body will begin absorbing them immediately. Thus, you won’t be able to hold the salt solution in the intestines. Moreover, the presence of incompletely digested nutrients in the intestinal contents will slow down the activity of the digestive tract: the cleansing solution won’t be gradually moving along the intestinal canal, lingering in its separate segments. If the fluid and the sorbent aren’t moving along the intestinal canal, while the mechanisms of intestinal absorption are active, then, in all likelihood, the organism will begin absorbing the solution.

Please be aware that an intake of even a small amount of sweetened tea is a contraindication for starting intestinal sorbent cleansing, since, when it breaks up, sugar creates glucose, and glucose abruptly increases the intensity of sodium absorption. As for drinking pure water, there are no restrictions, because it’s quickly absorbed, but it’s still better not to drink 30 minutes prior to the procedure. Come home from work early. Take some mineral water (you have to open the bottle, so that the gas comes out), dissolve 60 grams of Epsom salt in 1 glass of mineral water (if you weigh under 80 kg), or 80 grams of Epsom salt in 1 glass of mineral water (if you weigh more than 80 kg). You can add some lemon juice to the Epsom salt, so it’ll be easier to drink. Drink the Epsom salt in one shot, and within 1 hour wash it down with 6-7 glasses of mineral water. Then proceed to self-massage your abdomen.

After the last visit to the toilet, eat some rice porridge without salt, optionally with a small amount of butter. After the meal, it’s good to take a hot bath and have a good night’s rest, no strenuous activity on that day.

6th day

8:00 am — wash down 2 teaspoons of honey with 1 glass of water,

10:00 am, 12:00 pm — drink GEPAR, you can drink apple juice until 2:00 pm.

2:00 pm — drink Epsom salt (1 sachet mixed in a glass of warm water).

6:00 pm — drink Epsom salt (1 sachet mixed in a glass of warm water), put a hot-water bottle over the area of your right hypochondrium.

7:00 pm — drink 200-250 grams of warmed-up (35°C) olive oil (if you can’t tolerate olive oil, you can replace it with quail eggs, you need to drink half a glass), you have to drink the oil while standing, on the exhale, preferably in one shot, and wash it down with a bit of lemon-orange juice. Drink 200 grams of lemon-orange juice (50:50) in 7 steps every 15 minutes: 7:00 pm, 7:15 pm, 7:30 pm, 7:45 pm, 8:00 pm, 8:15 pm, 8:30 pm, 8:45 pm. (Keep the hot-water bottle in the area of your right hypochondrium). After drinking it, lie on your right side, with a hot-water bottle, wrapped in a towel, under your right hypochondrium, keep it there until 9:00 pm.

11:00 pm — cleansing enema (35 °C water), empty your bowels into a pot, examine the contents: there could be a discharge of bile, fecal stones, green oval calcium bilirubinate stones, yellow cholesterol flakes, sand at the bottom of the pot.

7th day

3:00 am — cleansing enema (35 °C water), drink Epsom salt (1 sachet mixed in a glass of water) after the enema.

7:00 am — eat a carrot, beet and cabbage salad

8:00 am — drink 2 tablespoons of POLYPHEPANUM[24] dissolved in water.

Note: while conducting a cleansing you might feel somewhat unwell, this is related to an intensive discharge of bile and fast absorption in the intestines, you may feel weak, dizzy, nauseated, especially during a cleansing enema. You should smell some ammonium hydroxide, ensure access to fresh air, take 24 drops of СORVALOL (menthol sedative), suck on a clove of garlic cut in half. In case of persistent nausea, don’t hold it in, or you can take 2 tablets of CERUKAL (antiemetic, reduces nausea, hiccups). It’s advisable to take LINEX[25] for a period of time after cleansings. For adults: take 2 capsules of LINEX 3 times a day, washing it down with a small amount of liquid. None of these bacteria can survive in gastric juice with a pH of 2. After food intake, the pH of the gastric juice fluctuates between 4 and 5, which makes it possible to save the viability of lactic acid bacteria in the digestive tract. That’s why LINEX is ingested after meals.

P.S. If you have problems with intestines, i.e. constipation, you need to prepare a good laxative mix for the whole cleansing course. Ingredients: dried apricots, figs, prunes, raisins — take 100 grams of everything. Wash everything thoroughly, blend, add 100 grams of honey, 2 tablespoons of vegetable oil and 50 grams of the cassia herb. Take 2 tablespoons before sleep for 4 days. Before cleansing, you have to do an ultrasound of the liver and gallbladder. If any stones are found in the gallbladder, cleansing is contraindicated. Sometimes life circumstances don’t allow you to conduct liver and intestinal cleansing, as mentioned in the first version.

Sometimes life circumstances don’t allow you to conduct liver and intestinal cleansing, as mentioned in the first version. In this case:

9.6. Accelerated cleansing of the body

The advantage of this version is a fast cleansing of all segments of the gastrointestinal tract from fecal stones and gas blocks. It’s recommended in cases of all chronic diseases, except for the ones listed below.

Contraindications: all edemas, asthma, diabetes, peptic ulcer disease in the acute phase, acute diseases of digestive organs (colitis, gastritis, cholecystitis, pancreatitis, appendicitis, hemorrhoids, tuberculosis and colorectal cancer). This version is not recommended for weakened people, in case of fever, high arterial pressure (20-30 mm Hg above the individual norm), heart attacks, arrhythmia, for patients who are bedridden for any reason, those with stage III obesity, for people with chronic constipation and for people over 60 years old, if they haven’t done any cleansing before.

Cleansing regimen

1st day

- Vegetarian diet. Take 3 tablespoons of POLYPHEPANUM (The main active component of sorbent POLYPHEPANUM is hydrolytic lignin). One tablet contains 375 mg of active substance.)  per one glass of water 3 times a day, one hour before meals.

- 10:00 pm. Do an enema.

2nd day

- 9:00 am.  Take some mineral water (you have to open the bottle, so that the gas comes out), dissolve 60 grams of Epsom salt in 1 glass of mineral water (if you weigh under 80 kg), or 80 grams of Epsom salt in 1 glass of mineral water (if you weigh more than 80 kg). You can add some lemon juice to the Epsom salt, so it’ll be easier to drink. Drink the Epsom salt in one shot, and within 1 hour wash it down with 6-7 glasses of mineral water. Proceed to self-massage your abdomen. After achieving the desired outcome of intestinal cleansing, drink 2-3 glasses of fresh, room-temperature water and induce vomiting. This will empty the stomach and contract the pyloric sphincter.

- Lay down and rest for half an hour. Don’t drink any water. In 30 minutes eat some rice cooked in water (2 tablespoons of rice) without sugar, salt or butter. You can have some vegetable soup and porridge — after the rice.

3rd day

- 8:00 am. Drink some juice (apple, carrot-beet).

- 2:00 pm. Drink 3 teaspoons of Epsom salt mixed in a glass of water. Wash down with 0.5-1 glass of cold water. During the day, you can drink water without restraint.

- 6:00 pm. Drink 3 teaspoons of Epsom salt mixed in a glass of water. Start to warm up your liver from both sides (from the front and the back) with two hot-water bottles. Ten minutes before the cleansing put olive oil on a water bath and heat it up to 40-42 °C.

- 7:00 pm. Prepare 200-250 ml of olive oil and 150-200 ml of citrus juice. Drink all the olive oil at once with a small amount of citrus juice, change the water in the hot-water bottles, go to the toilet, lie down on your right side.  One hot-water bottle should be placed in the liver area on the abdominal side, the other – on the back. The bottles should be wrapped in towels. For cleansing, use room-temperature citrus juice. Drink the juice without standing up, every time in the amount of 1 gulp on the 15th, 30th, 45th, 60th, 75th and 90th minutes, on the 105th minute drink all the remaining juice at once and lie for 30 more minutes.

- Perform an enema at 10:00 pm, 3:00 am, 6:00 am.

- In the morning eat a salad made of sauerkraut, raw carrots, marinated beets in 3:1:1 proportion, you can season it with lemon juice).

9.7. Dietary recommendations to follow after cleansing procedures

- During the first 2 days: tea with rusks, gruel cooked in water (buckwheat, oatmeal), vegetable soup cooked in water, stewed vegetables with oil, salads, juice, fruit, weakish tea. During the first week, exclude milk and dairy (fermented dairy products are OK).

- During the first two weeks exclude fatty, spicy food, alcohol, canned food, smoked food.

- After intestinal and liver cleansing, you need to conduct a soft buckwheat porridge fast. Although these fasts don’t solve serious problems, they have a very good cleansing and weight loss effect.

9.8. Buckwheat porridge fast

One of the soft body cleansing methods is a buckwheat porridge fast. I learnt about it in a place on Lake Baikal (a Tibetan cleansing method). The gist of this method: for 7 days eat only buckwheat porridge, cooked in water, without any butter and with a minimal amount of salt. Drink only pure water, preferably meltwater, but sometimes you can drink herbal cholagogic teas (hill-growing saltwort, briar, elfdock, perforate St John's wort, corn silk, knotgrass root), you can add some honey to the tea, and some bran to the porridge (for effective intestinal cleansing). It’s also necessary to take LINEX. After 7 days, it’s advisable to switch to a dairy-plant diet and you can begin water fasting.

10. What is fasting accompanied by?

Every person who fasts does it differently. Even fasts of the same length proceed differently for the same person. This fact is related both to our individual characteristics and to the thoroughness of the preparation for fasting – conducting preliminary cleansing procedures, the general condition at the outset of fasting, time of the year, the diet prior to fasting, the psychological state, and many other factors. Remember that the better you prepare for fasting, the better your attitude is, the easier will the process go and the fewer different complications are bound to occur. However, you will not be able to entirely avoid unpleasant sensations. Most often they are not dangerous, yet you do need to know what to do in each case.

The first issue is fear. This isn't a joke. No one should start a long fast without sufficient knowledge about it, and unaware of how fasting should be conducted. If possible, it's best to have a person who had already fasted. There shouldn't be anyone anxious around you – aunties, cousins, and others saying that you're pale as death, that your pulse is under 40, that your heart may stop tonight… .

On the third day of fasting, after coming back from a walk, despite the fact that I haven't rested once, I felt well and recalled a case described in a newspaper, which portrayed the enraged survivors of an earthquake tearing at each other with hunger like wild animals. These people have spent 72 hours without food. I also spent 72 hours without food or drink. The difference was in the fact that they were dying from hunger, while I consciously abstained from food and drink for the sake of health.

There's more. If a similar crisis occurs during conscious abstinence, if you feel nervous tension, weakness and doubts, just remember that there are people around you who are stronger than you in spirit, and who are capable of uplifting your mood and dispelling your doubts.

10.1. Hunger sensations

This is what people are usually most afraid of. In fact, there is nothing pleasant about overeating on the last few days prior to fasting, and then paying attention to minute sensations with horror. However, when a person is calm about it, does not overeat and cleanses the intestinal tract properly, there is barely any hunger present.

On day 4 or 5, the food reflex fades out entirely, the sight and smell of food no longer even cause salivation. It does, however, happen, that the person fasting constantly thinks about food and anticipates the pleasure of treating themselves after breaking the fast, arousing the food center with these thoughts (and even more with the images). The appetite may be partially preserved, particularly with a contaminated intestinal tract.

Fighting the feeling of hunger is not difficult. First of all, one has to attempt to avoid thinking about food. It’s best done through distracting oneself and engaging in various activities. Secondly, one has to have a decisive mindset. Say firmly to yourself, “I won’t eat today,” and the body will know that it’s not deception, then hunger won’t cause too much trouble.

There may be hunger spasms in the first days, which may be relieved by two or three sips of water or by ignoring these sensations. If they get too intense, you should drink 1-2 liters of water and induce vomiting.

In fact, those who fast usually carry a bottle of water with them and sip a little whenever needed.

However, it's necessary to keep in mind that the feeding center in the brain is reflexively excited at any contact with food in those who are new to fasting, even if a person wants to be indifferent to it. This interferes strongly with the proper activation of the internal feeding mechanism. Those fasting should best abstain from preparing food and avoid being present at meals. Non-compliance with this rule often leads to sleep disturbances, headaches, heartburn and irritation.

Here is a good exercise to deal with the sensation of hunger. This exercise is performed on an empty stomach. Whenever a hunger sensation is felt, should relax the stomach, place the palms below the navel level, one over the other. Inhale, pull in the stomach, helping yourself with your hands. At the height of breathing in, hold your breath for 3-4 seconds, Relax and breathe out. Repeat the exercise 10 times. The entire procedure should take 1 minute. This exercise is efficient for slightly overweight persons. Over the course of our practice we have yet to meet a patient whose hunger sensation or 'gastronomic fantasies' were impossible to eliminate.

10.2. Weakness

Weakness, sleepiness, lack of desire to move during fasting attest to the lack of energy. Its resources can and should be replenished. There are numerous methods, which include the already mentioned water treatments, massage, walks.  Bathing and sunbathing are very beneficial in the summers. A rather powerful method is walking barefoot on the ground, preferably with a minimum of clothing on.

The effect of any method is multiplied manifold if a person feels a connection with nature. You may simply bathe, pour cold water over yourself, walk barefoot, or you may mentally greet the Earth and the Sun, the Air and the Water, feel the intrinsic link with them, harmony and mutual understanding, and the elements will respond to the greeting — all you have to do is feel it.

However, generally, a certain weakness is normal, and one simply needs to be prepared for it. Usually, a person begins to get tired on the second day, and there may be subsequent periods of time when one may have a difficult time even getting up. But none of that is a reason to worry.

At any time when strong fatigue is felt, it's best to sit or lie down, and rest. It's not, however, good to lie around for too long, it's best to take a walk in the fresh air after resting, and you will feel much better. After a crisis usually comes relief, when a person no longer wants to stay in one place, he feels like walking and communicating. Many remain in excellent spirits up until the completion of fasting.

10.3. Chilliness or fever (more typical of dry fasting)

During the cold season, many fasters feel very chilly. This is not a reason to worry either, you should simply dress warmer. It's typical of many to put on 2-3 pairs of warm undergarments, several sweaters, etc.

However, not everyone feels chilly. There are people who merely suffer from the cold. They endure hunger easily well both in the summer and in the winter. But most often, fasters do feel chilly. They should take more walks, take hot baths (pine baths are best) and … pour cold water over themselves. Short dowsing is recommended, just for the impact on the thermoreceptors.

If, despite all the efforts, a person is still chilly, he or she should try to decrease the water intake volume or drink hot water. Figuratively speaking, water extinguishes the fire element, while without water, the fire flares up full-force.

Very often the chilliness spontaneously transforms into fever. If the flushes get strong, one can undress and drink water. In fact, chilliness and fever are very typical during fasting. But while fever is not dangerous, chilliness is actually undesirable during fasting, and you should warm up in one way or another.

10.4. Bad breath

On the second or third day, the breath acquires a foul smell (if the body is not sufficiently cleansed). This is the smell of the insufficiently oxidized compounds being released. Usually the acetone smell prevails. However, putrid, malodorous, and other similarly 'pleasant' smells are sometimes mixed in. In those who fast up to a crisis for the first time, the breath may become so foul that it may be difficult to remain in the same room with the person. Imagine how many toxins he or she may have carried in their body! In the course of the body cleansing, the smell grows weaker and after day 12-18 it becomes barely noticeable. It's important to help the lungs release as many toxins as possible. The methods are those already familiar to us — walks, physical activity, water and other procedures that stimulate metabolism.

10.5. Dimmed vision, vertigo

Often happens after a quick rise from a sitting or a supine position (the so-called gravitational or orthostatic collapse). A few seconds later, the dimmed vision sensation usually passes, but the person may fall during this time, while consciousness is not typically entirely lost.

This state is caused by a sharp re-distribution of blood, the volume of which decreases during fasting. There is no danger in this, yet getting up is best done slowly, holding on to the back of a chair or a wall (particularly in the bathroom after a warm bath.

Dimmed vision is most often encountered and most clearly pronounced in tall thin people. Those who spend a lot of time outdoors, don't stay in bed for excessive periods of time, and are engaged in interesting activities are far less prone to these unpleasant symptoms.

10.6. Headache

A headache is a sign of severely contaminated blood. Most often headaches are present prior to the crisis. After the crisis, headaches occur when a person spends a lot of time in stuffy spaces or inside a vehicle, when toxins cannot be removed through breathing.

Headaches pass if we assist oxygen in burning, and waste removal systems in removing waste. Thus, it's best to take more walks, perform enemas and water treatments, resorting to sorbents is also possible. Dissolve 3 tablespoons of sorbent in 1 glass of water and drink the solution. Place the sorbent in your mouth, like pills, and wash down with boiled water.

Of course, this method does not have a deep and persistent detoxifying effect on the body, since no meaningful reconstruction takes place in such a short time in the work of the gastrointestinal tract and detoxification systems. The main goal of single-time sorbent intake is the resolution of relatively simple daily tasks. Thus, we are assisting the body in getting rid of toxic substances. Depending on whether the desired result has been achieved, the intake may be repeated 2-3 times.

In the presence of strong pain, an additional enema may be done. No medicine should be taken when fasting.

10.7. Sleep disturbances

Overpowering sleepiness often comes over people during fasting. There's no reason to combat it, it's best to sleep as much as you want. Just don't forget about cleansing and walks.

Sometimes, on the contrary, the desire to sleep disappears when fasting. If it does not impose serious discomforts, you can stay awake for as long as you wish. When you are troubled by the lack of ability to sleep, then, after 3-4 days of insomnia, after depleting the regular range of methods (4 to 5-hour daily walks, baths, shower), the fast should be broken, and should be repeated in 2 or 3 months. In serious cases, a specialist's consultation is necessary.

10.8. Pain in various parts of the body

Pain during a fast may often be frightening. It's high time to remember the law of introducing order, namely, the fact that when new order is introduced, it always begins with a temporary disorder. If you start to combat it, the new order will not be introduced. All the symptoms during fasting are usually short-lived and pass quickly. The symptom demonstrates that the body has begun to cleanse yet another batch of damaged tissues. This is the only meaning of the symptom, and there is no point in searching for other explanations. If something begins to hurt during fasting, it means that the body is grasping onto it and the restoration has begun. If you've fasted up to a problem rooted your early childhood, the cleansing is close to completion. During fasting all the diseases emerge for a short time in reverse temporal order. It is extremely rare for the pain to persist for a long time. Of course, that's frightening, yet one simply has to live through it.  I don't know of any cases of someone suffering from ignoring the 'hunger symptoms.' There are more afflictions from breaking fast before time. The pain usually subsides without a trace several days later, but sometimes returns. It depends on the order that the renovation processes take. It's difficult to predict anything in this regard, since the set of diseases is always different. The instinctive mind always knows better what and in which order should be 'repaired.' There is often entirely unexpected pain, unrelated to an exacerbation of an existing disease. This is the elimination of the diseases that have not manifested yet. For instance, an unclear tenderness in a joint testifies to prevention of looming arthritis. An upset pancreas points to pancreatitis that is not destined to happen.

A certain woman was suffering from headaches so severe that she was forced to have 5 enemas in a row and take sorbents. The scientific approach prevailed and the pain was gone.

Strong pain may occur when kidney stones are passing, and in this case, one may take drotaverine compounds and take a hot bath. However, it does happen that stones disappear entirely unobtrusively, possibly after dissolution.

10.9. Toothache

All teeth that require treatment should be treated prior to undertaking a long-term fast, so that there are no troubles on their part. Strong pain is a rare occurrence during fasting, but teeth are best treated in advance. There are many other things to take care of during a fast.

If the teeth are still bothering you, if pus, tenderness or other unpleasant sensations appear, dry white wine may be used to rinse the mouth.

During a fast, the desire to clean one's teeth frequently appears. Many note that a literally compulsive need to cleanse them emerges. This should not, however, be done, since during fasting the composition of the saliva changes, and it becomes capable of dissolving the teeth enamel. Normally, the teeth are covered with an accretion that prevents damage. However, teeth may be cleansed once a week, if the desire to do so is strong. Cleaning the teeth too often may lead to their loss.

10.10. Egress of pus

Certain gum diseases and maxillary sinusitis may be accompanied by the egress of pus to the mouth cavity during the fast. That is normal and requires no special measures. The pus should be spat out, and the mouth – rinsed with water diluted with either white wine or a weak lemon juice solution.

10.11. Nausea, regurgitation and vomiting (sorbents required)

When you feel weak and nauseous, and want to stop the fast, fight fire with fire – move around and walk a lot. Physical activity makes all the organs and muscles work, pumps the blood around and quickens the cleansing. Apathy is not as strong and passes faster after a three-hour walk. On the contrary, indulging apathy makes it stronger and stretches out the body cleansing process. You need to know that the body requires three times as much fresh air when fasting. Do take walks!!!

People with troubled digestion often have sour regurgitation during their first fasts. When such regurgitation occurs, the stomach should be cleansed (by drinking water and inducing vomiting), so as to avoid self-poisoning and disruption of normal internal feeding. In the most severe cases, when regurgitation is worsened by persistent heartburn, and 2-3 daily cleansings don't provide the required result, you can drink small amounts of diluted still mineral water with sorbents added.

Green or even black vomit is possible in case of an ailing liver. The vomiting is a sign of the beginning of liver cleansing, the general state may worsen, and irritation may increase. It's most prudent to just wait for several days. You can also lavage the stomach with warm or even hot water and apply a hot-water bottle to the liver.

When the unpleasant sensations pass, stomach cleansing is terminated. There is no reason to undergo this procedure without a reason.

10.12. Palpitations

Palpitations aren't dangerous in and of themselves. The pulse may drop to as few as 40, or leap to as many as 100 beats per minute. If it is not accompanied by severe weakness or pain, no special measures are required. Otherwise, it's best to take warm soothing baths. If the palpitations cause strong concerns, half a cup of hot water with ¼ teaspoon of honey may help alleviate them. However, if it exceeds 120 beats per minute and you feel ill, you absolutely have to stop fasting.

10.13. Heartache

In the presence of persistent heartache or increasing arrhythmia, it’s necessary to restore the heart chakra, sometimes remove the magic spell from the heart, etc. If that's impossible, it's best to resort to an electrocardiogram, and in some cases the fast has to be broken. Tolerable pain usually passes on its own, it may be soothed in the same way as palpitations, as well as with acupressure. Sometimes self-hypnosis, general relaxation and contemplation work well. There is also a special mudra that relieves a heart attack. It's called the “Life-saving mudra” in the Orient.

To form this mudra, bend the index finger and touch the palm of the hand as low as possible. The thumb is placed on top, pressing on the index finger. The thumb, index and middle finger should be placed together, while the little finger remains straight. The same is done with the other hand. The mudra should be held for 2-3 minutes and more, and the heartache should begin to be relieved within the first minute. Of course, the mudra is not only used during fasting, but at any time and for any attacks. If a person is unconscious, the fingers are positioned in the mudra by the person administering aid, and the mudra does warrant its name - “one that saves life.” I have seen people coming out of major attacks using it, and the face that was already growing bluish or greenish would assume a normal color in mere minutes, the pain would be gone and the bodily functions would be more or less restored.

10.14. Muscle pain from overstrain

Such pains are present when a person overstrains oneself with sports, forcedly stretches the muscles or is engaged in heavy labor. They are especially unpleasant during fasting, against the background of general weakness. One does not need to take any measures, but during fasting these pains are very slow to pass. If they are seriously disturbing, small amounts of ointments with snake or bee venom or shilajit are recommended for application on the troubling areas. They are usually applied once daily, or twice if the pain is severe. One does need to be aware that during fasting the body practically eats up all fats and creams that are applied to the skin, including lipstick.

10.15. Colds

It's an extremely rare occurrence, but sometimes people do get colds during fasting. It's recommended to avoid exposure to cold, drink less water (a day or two of dry fasting may even be recommended), and wait patiently for the cold to pass. The energy field's potential during fasting increases so much, and the work of defense mechanisms improves so strongly that even the most severe infections subside rather fast. The microbes are simply consumed by the body.

Colds occur when a person criticizes others, gets angry, manifests pride or boasts about fasting.

10.16. What to do if menstruation occurs during a dry fasting practice?

Continue with the fasting practice, without problems; in fact, the occurence of the period is a sign of good functioning of the organism. It is possible to get washed, taking care, however, to prevent any water from entering the mouth.

11. How should you conduct a short dry fast?

11.1. Before fasting

After you've cleansed your intestines and liver and performed a water fast, you may proceed with dry fasting. One of the crucial things that allow dry fasting to go well is the consumption of polyunsaturated fatty acids prior to fasting. During the preparation for winter and summer hibernation, an important characteristic of the animals' diet is an enhanced consumption of fatty acids, which increase the organism's robustness to prolonged dry fasting. The term 'fats' denoted substances that contain glycerin and fatty acids, connected by etheric bonds. In more accessible terms, they are substances that contain carbon, hydrogen and oxygen. They are divided into two major groups according to the degree of fatty acid saturation – solid fats (lard, animal fat, butter), which contain saturated fats, and liquid fats (sunflower, olive, nut, seed oils, etc.), which mostly contain polyunsaturated fatty acids. Scientists have been long aware that during hibernation, particularly in the winter, the water in all of the examined animals' blood was replaced with glycerin. It's a polyatomic alcohol produced by the body by oxidizing fatty acids as a required element. It does not dry out, does not freeze when chilled, does not expand or contract during temperature variations; basically, it preserves all of the body's liquid elements, wherever they are – in the blood, in the joints, in the brain. Water in the cells, or in the blood, freezing when chilled and expanding, or increasing in volume, would mechanically rip these cells and blood vessels to pieces. Of course, a person does not hibernate when dry fasting, but there are many similar physiological mechanisms that resemble those of hibernating animals.

11.2. Essential benefits of fatty acids contained in fish

The chief characteristic of fish oil fatty acids is the fact that they participate in the synthesis of energy by the body. Omega-2 is a structural substance of the brain and the retina of the eye, and is required for normal brain activity, since it provides a fast input of energy that assists in impulse transmission, which carry a signal from one cell to another. It helps us think better, retain information in memory and retrieve it when required. These fatty acids, as they bond to oxygen molecules in the body, transport the electrons and provide the body with energy for an entire range of chemical reactions. There is a number of practical observations that prove that consumption of food rich in fish oil promotes the relief of general fatigue, clears up thoughts and brain activity, increases physical activity. Omega-3 fatty acids increase human energy endurance and activity, and also improve concentration and memory to the same degree. The statement that fish is the food of the genius is, in fact, rather scientific, since the main bonds between fats in the brain are the Omega-3 fatty acids, which contain docosahexaenoic acid.

11.3. The importance of fish oil fatty acids in sustaining health and vessel health

Omega-3 fatty acids, which fish oil is rich in, thin the blood, lower the risk of blood thickening and of formation of cholesterol plaques and blood clots. The speed at which blood moves through a healthy person's vessels is  60 km/hr, blood's normal viscosity, its thickness, amount and speed of flow through the vessels are the most important health indicators.

The greatest danger for our organism is the increased blood coagulation and lowered viscosity of blood in the vessels (although blood coagulation is crucial during bleeding). Fish oil acids don't allow the thrombocytes (blood cells that coal thickening and coagulation of blood during bleeding) in the blood to adhere to each other, thus thinning the blood and increasing its flow speed.

An increase of thrombocyte count in the blood and the lowering of blood viscosity is dangerous for the functioning of all vital organs. In this case, the heart, the brain, vision and the kidneys suffer from insufficient oxygen intake, and these organs' functioning is impeded by insufficient blood delivery, which may, with time, lead to a full loss of all vital functions by these organs.

For instance, due to increased blood coagulation, an artery may slowly fill with stagnant blood, and severe illness may develop in the point of junction of the vessel and an organ, such as an infarction, a vascular accident, etc.

Omega-3 fatty acids play an important role in the body's production of hemoglobin molecules, which are responsible for transporting oxygen in erythrocytes, participate in controlling the nutritional elements that pass through the cell membrane, and lower the negative effect of the dangerous fats on the organism.

Recent medical research clearly testifies to the efficiency of Omega-3 fatty acids in not only fighting heart disease and preventing infarctions, but in resolution of problems linked to bad mood, frayed nerves, postpartum depression, menopause symptoms, psychological crisis, and other reasons that lead to depression.

2-3 capsules of fish oil should be taken twice daily before meals. It is also advisable:

•         Rapeseed, sunflower, corn, soybean, walnut oil - 1 tablespoon of any oil from this list once daily;

•         Sunflower, sesame, poppy, pumpkin seeds, walnuts;

•         Wheat sprouts;

•         Many other plant and animal products that contain these acids in various degrees of concentration: flax oil, soybean oil - 1 tablespoon once daily.

•         Flax seeds and walnuts

•         Fish and seafood

•         Soybeans

•         Dark green leafy vegetables

Besides, in order to increase the consumption of Omega-3 fats, use the following advice:

•         Use rapeseed, sesame, nut or at least olive oil as salad dressing.

•         Regularly consume 100-150g. of fatty and semi-fatty fish (salmon, mackerel, herring, sardines, trout, tuna, etc.) 3-4 times a week. It's best to choose fresh rather than frozen fish, as well as fish caught in the wild, rather than one that was grown at a fish farm, since the amount of Omega-3 fatty acids in fish depends on the type of the food it consumes, and fish is fed mostly flour and compound feed, rather than plankton.

Curing and salting leads to a loss of a certain part of Omega-3 fatty acids, up to 50% are lost if the fish is frozen for a year. Canned fish is a different story, particularly because plant oil preserves Omega-3 fatty acids from break-up during the storage period. By eating a can of sardines in olive oil over 2-3 days, you will almost entirely cover your requirements for these fatty acids. Fish canned in natural juices or in water contains slightly less Omega-3 fatty acids.

In addition, the following foods should predominate in our diet between fasting periods:

•         whole-grain cereals made with water and served with plant oils;

•         raw and stewed vegetables;

•         beans and mushrooms;

•         local nuts and fruit;

•         honey;

•         sea fish;

•         seasoning made from herbs and roots.

•         If you can't forego meat, you should minimize its consumption, favoring lean boiled meats:

•         chicken, turkey, rabbit, veal.

•         Don't forget fermented milk products and fresh juices.

Fasting, at least one- or two-day fasting, is best conducted during workdays, since during the weekends there may be guests visiting, etc.

11.4. Home dry fasts up to 5 days

I will attempt to inform you about dry fasts up to 5 days in length, since conducting longer fasts at home is not recommended. The following schedules are preferable:

Schedule 1: Short dry fractional fast, recommended for those well-prepared and self-assured.

Fast for 24 hours (1 day) – eat for 48 hours (2 days)

Fast for 48 hours (2 days) – eat for 72 hours (3 days)

Fast for 72 hours (3 days) – eat for 96 hours (4 days)

Fast for 96 hours (4 days) – eat for 120 hours (5 days)

Fast for 120 hours (5 days) – withdrawal from dry fasting

Schedule 2: Dry Fractional Fast Light

Schedule 2 is recommended for those unsure of themselves or those with a serious pathology.

First period: Fast for 24 hours – eat for 1 week

Second period: Fast for 48 hours – eat for 1 week

Third period: Fast for 72 hours – eat for 1 week

Fourth period: Fast for 96 hours – eat for 1 week

Fifth period: Fast for 120 hours – withdrawal from dry fasting

This pendulum-like fasting cycle provides an opportunity to improve the reserve bodily defense forces. How is this effect achieved with this type of fractional fasting? The additional advantage provided by this method is that after the first phase of cleansing we've given the cells a chance to clean up, restore functionality and memory volume, the cell's energy potential, and then we allow it to complete the process with the second stage of the fast - finish the cleaning, work on the points missed. It turns out that cleansing through fasting triggers the super-compensation principle. Everything that was previously missed, is being cleaned out. Thus, the body approaches new positive stresses with heightened 'combat readiness,' and in this method one fast somehow overlaps on the other, and the health benefits are increased. I really appreciate this method, it is beneficial to health, and the rejuvenating effects are very pronounced, it is endured much more easily, and the main thing is that there are practically no complications.

11.5. How to conduct a dry fractional fast properly

- Prior to conducting a 1, 2, 3, 4, 5-day dry fast, enemas and any other laxatives should not be performed, since the absorption of toxins from the digestive tracts is absent due to the absence of water.

- It's best to eat exclusively fermented milk products (buttermilk, bacteria-enriched fermented milk, baked yogurt, or, best of all, Bolotov whey) for one day prior to conducting a dry fast.

- The recommendation to fully avoid contact with water refers only to those who want to obtain the maximal medicinal effect from the fast being conducted, and it's not at all a stringent requirement. If you have, in fact, wet your hands, or came under the rain, nothing terrible will happen to you. I hope that everyone has a pair of medicinal or household rubber gloves, which you can use to do all the household work.

- Fasting should be started gradually, according to the schedule. If you have endured 1, 2, 3 or 4 days of fasting, you can go for 5 days. A fast that's longer than 5 days is not recommended at home! If you are conducting a fast that's longer than 2 days, it's preferable that it coincides with the weekend. I have personally conducted seven-day fasts, but, of course, I started gradually.

- The main thing for conducting dry fasts is to believe in your own huge hidden reserves, in the great wisdom of your body and to not be afraid of anything.

- During the fast, all of your diseases may be exacerbated, you shouldn't be afraid of that – any natural treatment works through aggravation, especially since a fast can always be broken without any detriment to health.

- Under no circumstances should the previously planned dry fasting term be prolonged in the process of fasting, since it corresponds to the pre-programmed psychological state. For instance, if you're set on a 2-day fast, then it's unacceptable to prolong it to three days, even when you’re feeling perfectly well. On the other hand, if you don't handle fasting well, you can always withdraw from the fast, according to the stringent rules of breaking fast.

- The first dry fast should last no longer than one day, gradually moving forward to 2-, 3-, 4- and 5-day fasts according to cascade dry fasting schedules.

- No medicine should be taken during dry fasts, you should not alleviate the pain, and just endure it. If the pain is unendurable, you can break the fast, adhering to stringent withdrawal rules.

11.6. Recommendations on conducting dry fasting

- For starters, spend several days or weeks psychologically preparing for the fast. Read, convince yourself, discuss with yourself – enough, it's time! Think it over and set a convenient day of the week. Don't listen to anyone or anything after that. Listen to literally no one: people who can't control themselves don't want to have someone strong nearby, and they will be against it. Listen to literally nothing: the media with their astrological forecasts and moon phases (tested by me personally) only break up your rhythm. Don't offer anyone (especially someone close to you) to fast together. It's a strictly personal affair. You'll be the first one to feel sorry for the 'tortured' relative, and you'll snap. Your co-workers won't notice, and warn everyone at home that they shouldn't argue with you and offer you food. Try to put all food and drinks away, and don' think about them; it's best to conduct the dry fast out of the city, close to nature and in seclusion.

- During fasting, just as when quitting smoking, don't discuss the 'troubling' topic with anyone, neither 'pro,' nor 'con.' If you've still broken down and started to eat – don't be hard on yourself, don't deepen your guilt complex. You're still doing great, you've started to work on yourself! After an unsuccessful attempt or a breakdown wait a week before starting to fast again. On the day that you set, don't rush the events – you're doing a serious thing! The body will muster up its strength, while you can work on your willpower again.

- What should we expect during the fast? First of all, it's the struggle with ourselves. You will not experience bodily suffering – one day is nothing. You'll be seeking out a reason to eat or drink out of self-pity – I'll go through with it next time, there's so much work. Or I'll make it up to myself, there's a whole life ahead of me. Or I need to finish up the borscht. Or I'll start when I get sick. These and hundreds of other arguments will torture your mind. Tell yourself, “No, today is the day for me to be a hero.”  When the wave of weakness passes, praise yourself for overcoming it. Live your regular life, with no leaps towards either laziness or sports.

- Only breathe through your nose. Camels, who are the dry fasting champions, only breathe through their noses. Fasting without water is dangerous for those who breathe through their mouth because it speeds up bodily dehydration due to the mouth cavity continuously drying up!

- There are also numerous reasons why dry fasting should not be conducted while breathing through the mouth. Learn to breathe with your nose, it will make your waterless fasting very effective.

- Try not to talk, a vow of silence is best, in other words, you should scrupulously save energy, remember that any speaker loses up to three liters of water in two hours of speaking. The mouth must be kept closed. It’s best to refrain from washing out your mouth and cleaning teeth.

- Nature walks are mandatory, it's been noted that if you spend the entire day of fasting at home, the subjective feeling of well-being deteriorates, weakness and chilliness increase. On the other hand, walks or working in the fresh air may lead to physical tiredness, the mood and subjective feelings of well-being improve, the person is buoyant and vivacious. However, as I always tell my patients, one should walk like cats do. Your moves should be soft, smooth and calm.  There shouldn't be any sharp ascents, and any excessive physical strain and efforts should be excluded.

- During short-term dry fasts, you may take a cool shower (with your mouth closed), but if you are feeling well, there is no need for it, and the therapeutic effect will be stronger.

- It's best not to shave during fasting, even with an electric razor. A redistribution of life-sustaining resources takes place during dry fasting. Everything that the body can do without is supplied minimally. The beard, as well as the nails, starts growing slower.

- You definitely have to find something to do for distraction, such as watching comedies. I like to watch films about nature, women usually like to knit, you can read interesting books, etc. The key thing is not to think about water, you have to constantly distract yourself. There is a simple and effective exercise that distracts me very well and also helps heal the spine. You have to lie down on the floor, with knees bent and soles on the floor, lift your back, put a 1.5-liter plastic bottle filled with warm water under it, and slowly, enduring the pain, roll it along the spine. The bottle moves from the shoulder blades to the tailbone, working through each zone 10 times (and later on - 30). A cool sense of lightness and increased flexibility emerges in the spine after this exercise.

- During dry fasting you should wear light, simple, "breathing" clothes, linen is best, and synthetics are strictly prohibited.

- It is great to walk barefoot in the morning, it tones the body and has a diuretic effect. At night, if you have a chance, it is better to sleep in the open air, and is better not to sleep at all during the day.

- Ventilate your room regularly, leaving the window, window or balcony door open at night.

- Hypoxic training exercises are very valuable during dry fasting. This is how they are performed: calmly inhale, exhale, hold your breath for as long as you can. Gradually increase the delay. They are very beneficial for the body during a dry fast.

- When cells exist under comfortable conditions, they become accustomed to a constant level and volume of incoming oxygen and lose the ability to effectively bind and use the oxygen to produce the required energy. Why save any, when there’s always enough? The cells, so to speak, are “lazy” to synthesize structures that aren’t required at a particular moment. Therefore, when coronary circulation suddenly deteriorates, such cells are not capable of quickly rearranging themselves, and of switching to a different type of intracellular metabolism. The amount of energy produced by the cell drops sharply, and it dies. If you periodically provide a measured hypoxic load, the cells of the body, including the heart muscle, will experience oxygen starvation. The situation does not deteriorate abruptly, because the loads are strictly metered, all cells remain fully functionally intact. But the new artificially created conditions require an adaptive bodily response. Cardiac muscle cells begin to take this factor into account, metabolic processes change, anti-hypoxic protection structures emerge. Now, a sudden uncontrolled hypoxic load will not cause damage to myocardial structures, because its cells have already been taught, they have an apparatus capable of effectively binding and using blood oxygen, fully providing themselves with energy even under conditions of repeated deterioration of blood flow.

- The most difficult thing about dry fasting are dry mouth and thirst. Simultaneously with the search for water during a dry famine, a mode of water economy is introduced:

- sweating decreases;

- mucous membranes of the nose dry up;

- the amount of moisture in the mouth decreases. There’s enough for several minutes of conversation;

- the mucus that glues the lips, appears. There is a special yoga exercise that helps reduce these manifestations

Yoga exercise to quench hunger and thirst

This exercise is featured in the prana yoga guidelines called Breathing with the Tongue.

Stick out the tongue, roll it into a tube and begin to inhale air through the formed tube. Hold your breath for as long as you can, but do not over-exert yourself. Exhale slowly through both nostrils. Repeat the exercise 12 times. Yogis claim that this exercise helps quench the sensations of hunger and thirst, and also cools the body in the heat. It saturates the blood with oxygen and so on, and so forth ... In any case, focusing on breathing and counting helps to distract oneself from obsessive thoughts about food and water for a while. The exercise is entirely uncomplicated.

If you are having a difficult time with it, you can take an ordinary pebble or raisin in your mouth to start the flow of saliva - a natural structured liquid - and the thirst will subside. But the most important thing is to breathe through your nose and be silent.

About 80% experience sleeplessness. Let me share my experience in dealing with insomnia. A person has difficulties falling asleep due to internal anxiety, which causes subconscious tension of the muscles, so they require relaxation. If you want to include relaxation among your activities, but do not have the appropriate training, then spend some time on the next exercise, which details the process of relaxation based on the “concentration - muscle tension - stress delay - stress relief - relaxation” cycle for each of the muscle groups.

Relaxation exercise

This exercise requires twenty minutes and a quiet room where you will not be distracted. It is more convenient to perform it in loose clothing. Record the instructions or ask someone to read them to you slowly out loud until you memorize the sequence of steps. Lie calmly on your back on a hard surface for a couple of minutes, concentrating on your breathing.

Then switch the attention to the hand and the forearm of the right hand. Make a fist and tighten your forearm muscles. Keep them tense for a few seconds, and then relax them as quickly as possible. Continue to relieve tension until the muscles become completely relaxed. Rest for a minute and then move the focus to your right arm above the elbow. Bend your right arm at the elbow and tighten your biceps. Hold this state, then relieve tension; relax your muscles and wait for one minute. Then focus on the hand and forearm of your left hand. Squeeze the left fist and tighten the muscles of the forearm. Hold the tension – then let it go and relax your muscles.

Wait one minute, then move on to the left arm above the elbow. Bend your left arm at the elbow and tighten your biceps. Tension delay – let it go - relax – wait for one minute. Now focus on your forehead. Raise your eyebrows as high as possible - delay - withdrawal - relaxation - waiting. Focus on your eyes, nose and cheekbones. Close your eyes tightly and wrinkle your nose - delay – letting go - relaxation - waiting. Next, do the neck and throat. Lower the chin so that it almost touches the chest, while exerting pressure on the chest - delay – let go - relaxation - wait. Next comes the chest and shoulders. Bring the shoulder blades together and take a deep breath — delay — let go — relax — wait. Now the belly. Tighten the abdominal muscles, as if to protect from a blow - delay – let go - relax - wait. Right thigh. Tighten the muscles of the upper right leg - delay – let go - relax - wait. Right calf. Extend your right leg and pull the toe toward you - delay - let go - relax - wait. Right foot. Bend the toes of the right foot and turn the foot with the toe inside - delay - stress relief - relax - wait. Left hip. Tighten the muscles of the upper left leg - delay - stress relief - relax - wait. Left calf. Pull your left leg and pull the toe toward you - delay - stress relief - relax - wait. Left foot. Bend the toes of the left leg and turn the foot with the toe inside - delay - stress relief - relax - wait.

This sequence of actions should be repeated until they are executed with complete automatism. When you reach this stage, you can also learn short relaxation techniques that will help you relax on the go and constantly maintain your feeling of well-being. Their purpose is to achieve deep relaxation, with minimal time and effort.

Another option is simultaneous muscle relaxation, when all the muscles tense up at once, the tension is maintained for some time, then the tension is alleviated, and the muscles relax. After that, you should switch to positive images from nature: forest, mountains, etc. Although you may not fall asleep, you will still get a good rest, and time will pass quickly, which is crucial during dry fasting.

11.7. Let’s move on to the day-to-day description of the 5-day dry fast

Day 1.

It is advisable to consume only fermented milk products on the day preceding the fast. You have to become convince yourself that everything will be fine, you will be able to complete the dry fast, and, as a last resort, you can always withdraw from the fast without any damage. If you are well-prepared for dry fasting, and you have something to keep you busy, the first day usually flies by.

Day 2.

On day 2, a desire to eat usually appears, but it must be overcome. Do an exercise to relieve hunger. Sometimes there may be dizziness, headache, gnawing in the stomach. You should not be afraid of these symptoms – they are launching the process of the body’s endogenous restructuring and cleansing. You need to walk more and spend time outside before bedtime in the evening and do relaxation exercises.

Day 3.

On day 3, most people who are dry fasting usually develop acidosis. A very important point in a dry fast is the acidotic crisis, which occurs after the transition to endogenous nutrition. Do not be afraid of feeling unwell during this period, for beginners it usually occurs on the third day. (However, for some people, the period of transition to endogenous nutrition during a 5-day dry fast can take place without a pronounced acidotic crisis).

An acidotic crisis occurs when the concentration of ketone bodies (products of incomplete breakdown of triglycerides or fats) in the body increases, and there is no way to dispose of them. During this period, you feel unwell and experience typical signs of intoxication. However, as soon as the utilization of ketone bodies begins, their concentration ceases to increase, and since ketone bodies are high-energy components, they are used as fuel for the synthesis of new amino acids, which can lead to tissue regeneration.

The regeneration process can be extremely painful, and you should be aware of this in advance. In the initial stages of the dry fast, an acidotic crisis can occur on the 4th, 3rd, or even 2nd day of the dry fast, occurring increasingly earlier with each subsequent fast. The faster it passes, the more time remains for bodily renovation. For example, if an acidotic crisis occurs on the 2nd day, there will be 3 days to regenerate. At this time, an acetone smell may be coming from the mouth, you may experience nausea, dizziness, shortage of air, weakness. The hunger sensation is waning, the thirst becomes tolerable. Blood pressure varies depending on the bodily characteristics. There’s no need to be afraid of any phenomena, since due to the adaptation of the body to the new vital activity conditions, the symptoms are somewhat exacerbated. Calm, slow nature walks are the best choice during this period.

Day 4.

The pressure may drop or rise, body temperature may rise. This is physiologically normal during dry fasting. Chills or fever are possible depending on the patient’s characteristics and the symptoms of the disease, as well as on the gender and age.

By increasing bodily temperature, the body causes a slowdown in the growth of microorganisms. It becomes easier for the immune system to track down and destroy everything that’s alien or altered. Also, there is a decrease in the chilliness threshold, normalization of thermoregulation processes, expressed in hot flashes and requiring the use of cold water, which stabilizes the patient's condition. All colds are completely excluded, during this time, you can walk barefoot in the snow or dew, pour cold, icy water on yourself, walk naked in nature.

Day 5.

All chronic diseases begin to be exacerbated, including the ones that we were not aware of. The most affected organs manifest themselves through pain, and we must be prepared for this. We must thank our bodies for such wonderful healing work. If nausea appears, abdominal massage and cold compresses on the liver area should help. If walking is difficult, it is best to lie down in a calm, cool place and listen to good classical music. As a result of the body's struggle with ailments, body temperature rises, and a person feels feverish.

Blood pressure may increase or decrease depending on the individual bodily characteristics. You can take a cold shower, spend time outside more often in light clothes or even without any in any weather. If there is snow, you can walk on it barefoot. You may experience insomnia, increased thirst, blood pressure may fluctuate. The usual weight loss during dry fasting ranges from 1 to 2 kg, depending on how much weight one started with, and how much physical activity there was.

Of course, each person is unique and individual in their own way. Dry fasting can be completely different, but I tried to describe the manifestations that I observed in most patients.

12. What time and which days are best for fasting?

I am often asked questions about what time and which days are best for fasting. Every season has its pros and cons. In May, it is very effective to fast in order to heal the liver; in my practice, many patients cured hepatitis in May. August and September are perfect for withdrawal and rapid, superior body renovation. Dry fasting is easiest in October and November. January and March are the most difficult months for dry fasting. But, in fact, time or season do not play a dominant role. The main thing - if you have serious problems, then the sooner you fast, the better, regardless of the time.

Yogis recommend fasting on a certain day of the week according to the date of birth. This day almost always coincides with a good day for different horoscopes.

Another important thing in fasting is taking the phase of the moon into account. 1 to 3-day fasting is usually easiest during the new moon or the full moon. Moreover, it is easier for some people to fast during the new moon, for others - during the full moon.

The 11th day of the moon cycle is also particularly emphasized, as it’s recommended for fasting since the ancient times. It is usually harder to fast during the waning moon (when the moon is in decrement). Of course, you do not need to take all these biorhythms into account, and fast, let’s say, on Saturdays, as Porfiriy Ivanov advises. However, Saturday was also a deliberately chosen day.

13. How to exit from short dry fasts (1-2-3-4-5 days) properly?

13.1. Withdrawal from dry fasting. Recommendations

- A fasting day is 24 hours, from 8am to 8am on the next day. Many recommendations suggest that withdrawal from fasting should be conducted in the evening, but with dry fasting, the main healing effect occurs at night (I described this mechanism in the “Treatment of Diseases” chapter).

- By date, the withdrawal should be twice the length of the dry fast. If the dry fast is five days long, then the withdrawal is ten days.

- Coming out of the dry fast should be strict, because the withdrawal is much more important than the dry fasting process itself.

- After dry fasting, the body becomes clean, so you should only load it with clean, fresh, high-quality products without pathogenic microflora.

13.2. Withdrawal from a 1-day fast

8.00 – drink good quality water, in the first glass it is necessary to add bifidum or lactobacterin (1 sachet per glass of water), or now a new drug “LINEX” has appeared.

11.00 – dried apricot, prune, raisin compote.

14.00 – kefir, bifidok or Bolotov whey.

18.00 – vegetable soup (cabbage, carrots, beets, onions, potatoes, dill, parsley).

22.00 – compote, herbal tea, honey.

Withdrawal from a 36-hour fast: the same, but starts in the evening.

13.3. Withdrawal from a 48-hour fast

1st day is the same as withdrawal from 1-day fast.

Second day:

8am - herbal tea with honey, compote or kefir, buckwheat porridge made with water, you can add a little vegetable oil (you can choose other cereals), you must drink one quail egg 3 times a day from the second day of fasting (do not be afraid – quail do not get salmonellosis) on an empty stomach. This is required because quail eggs contain the whole periodic table, and most importantly, natural stem cells, which the body needs so desperately after a dry fast. Women can do facial masks: mix quail eggs with cedar oil, apply overnight for 20 minutes.

14.00 – fish soup (preferably made from rock trout, salmon, pink salmon), you can add some salt. Salad, any cereal. Tea, compote, kefir, honey.

18.00 – boiled beets, cereals, tea, compote, kefir.

22.00 – herbal tea, honey.

13.4. Withdrawal from a 3-day fast

The first two days have already been described above.

Third day of withdrawal:

8.00 – fresh juice, salads, cereals

14.00 in – borsch or other soup, cereals, salads, tea

18.00 – vinaigrette, fish baked in foil, fresh juice

Fourth day:

9.00 – dried fruit decoction (raisins, dried apricots, prunes) - 200.0 g

12.00 – mushy buckwheat porridge - 200.0 g

15.00 - fresh cabbage salad with 100.0g, fish soup, fermented dairy drink - 100.0

18.00 - vegetable decoction - 200.0

21.00 - fermented milk drink 200.0

Fifth day:

9.00 - oatmeal porridge with dried apricots - 150.0, green tea - 100.0

13.00 - steamed vegetables (carrots, beets, cabbage) - 150.0, juice - 100.0

17.00 - soup (carrots, beets, cabbage, gray bread crackers or bran sticks), apple - 1 pc.

21.00 - fermented dairy drink - 200.0

Then you can switch to regular meals, but ideally meals with a predominance of fresh vegetables and fruits are preferable for 2 weeks.

Following a withdrawal from a fast, the nutrition should be perfect.

13.5. Withdrawal from a 4-5 day fast

- Withdrawal order: drink water first. Ideally, the water should be thawed, dew or spring. The drinking manner is important: you need to add three capsules of LINEX to the first glass of water, drink this glass of water over the course of fifteen minutes. and that’s vital: do not hurry, drink sip by sip. The last sip should be taken during the fourteenth minute. Drinking an entire glass in under ten minutes is very risky. The water consumption systems cannot cope, and fainting is the least of potential consequences.

Thus, over the course of two hours, you should drink eight glasses of water. Then you can brush your teeth. In very rare cases, the first sips of water can cause nausea. Each sip of water must be held in the mouth, mixed it with saliva, and then swallowed after 20-30 seconds. Drinking water can be combined with taking a shower. After a shower, it is good to pour cold water over yourself, and then take a warm bath (not a hot) with infusions of herbs (no longer than 8 minutes). Along with the washing, you must continue to drink water until 12 o'clock.

- At 12 pm you need to drink warm protein broth (as much as you want), fish broth, without vegetables, well-cooked, without salt or bread. Broth can be cooked with spices (but don’t eat the spices).

- After dry fasting, you should start eating in small portions. The extended time of withdrawing from the dry fast is associated with the need for a gradual increase on the burden on the pancreas, which was inactive during fasting and must now be carefully put into operation.

- At 2 pm, eat animal protein in the form of a fermented milk product: kefir, Bolotov whey (see below for details) - as much as you want, in small portions. When breaking fast, observe the following important rules: drink water, eat food slowly, in small portions. Drink a sip, swallow a bite, sit down, listen to yourself. If you chew a portion of food, and do not feel any taste, or it tastes bland, it means that your stomach is not ready to digest this food and it is ballast for you. Wait a few days and try it again. If you feel discomfort during or after eating it, such as pain in the stomach, dry mouth, an internal unwillingness to eat any more of it, stop the intake of this food. It means that it is harmful, and do not regret the money spent on food – your health is more valuable.

- In the absence of discomfort, the volume of food consumed should equal the volume of a tea glass. Consumption time is also fifteen minutes. If you feel discomfort with one type of food, immediately switch to another type.

Somehow, my patient, with extensive experience of withdrawing from fasts using water, prepared raw vegetables to withdraw from his first five-day dry fast.

After the water came the turn of vegetables. He swallowed the first bite, waited a minute, and wanted to continue, but then felt a sting in his stomach, as if he was stabbed. Then he realized that the pain disappeared when he ate boiled vegetables. After that, he started to come out of dry fasts using protein foods: kefir and fish broth, and there were no problems. This is necessary because after the end of a dry fast, the body is in dire need of building material, which is animal protein, for the synthesis of proteins and new cells. Violation of this rule can lead to negative consequences!

- Do not forget about the therapeutic chewing method (by H. Fletcher[26]).

- Starting on the second day, you can gradually begin consuming bee products: honey and pollen. Food should be varied and well-saturated with vitamins and micro- and macro elements. During the first five days after the start of withdrawing from the dry fast, use only fresh, pure and high-quality products. You cannot eat sugar and sugar-containing or canned products.

- You can start salting your food from the third day on, it is best to use rock or sea salt. Do it very, very gradually, the amount at the tip of the knife.

- During the withdrawal, especially in the early days, you need to guard against drafts and cold. in the first days of the coming out, the immune system is reconditioned to neutralize food and water, so the body is weakened, then the body will be restored and the immunity will be even stronger than before fasting.

13.6. Nutrition program for good digestion (during withdrawal from a fast)

Most people are constantly sick or almost sick because they are trying to process a huge amount of excess food that they consume. After a fast, you can easily and quickly establish proper digestion. Make it a rule not to eat after 4pm. If you observe this condition, you will sleep soundly. You will feel rested in the morning, and your body will self-purify and normalize the fat layer. Eat breakfast between 9 and 10 in the morning or earlier. Eat a fresh vegetable salads made with carrots, cabbage and greens (steamed vegetables in the winter). The second course will comprise bread from sprouted grains with honey or sea kale, or whole-grain porridge with a little oil. Together with cabbage, carrots and greens, they will stimulate the work of the digestive tract, cultivating the right microflora, and will restore the body’s endocrine system through feedback.

Eat a salad first. This will result in the activation of a number of processes that underlie the normal functioning of the body. For example, the secretion of digestive juices is stimulated, since raw vegetables are rich in natural stimulants. After several years of such a nutritive regime, you will feel that your body does not recognize a different beginning of a meal. As a result, you can increase the consumption of fresh vegetables and fruits to make them comprise 60% of your diet. Fresh vegetables, fruits and juices made with them are all rich in vigor. Their tissues are rich in energy, they support the structure of body tissues and skin elasticity.

50% of an ideal diet comprises raw fruits and vegetables. Cellulose and pectin contained in most plant products are called ballast substances, since they are not absorbed by the body. These substances are necessary, they play an important role in the process of digestion: they set the intestinal hormonal system in motion, and the whole body through it, regulating the intestinal motor function; create a favorable microflora in the gastrointestinal tract, which is partially used by the body as a full-fledged live protein, with protein taking up a 10% share. Protein can be in the form of meat, fish, eggs, natural cheese, or in vegetable form, i.e., nuts and seeds. Brewer's yeast, bread and sprouted wheat soup are also an important part of a protein diet. They are especially indispensable as suppliers of vitamins B, E and D.

The remaining products are divided into three parts. One-third (30%) is natural starch, obtained from cereals and legumes. Another third (at least 5%) are natural sugars, which are contained in dried fruits, honey, and fresh juices. The last third (no more than 5%) consists of natural fats, such as sunflower, corn and olive oil, natural lard, butter and ghee. People who are prone to obesity should avoid eating sugar, bread and cereals. Alternatively, they should be consumed in minimal quantities, and the porridge must be freshly boiled. Chewing thoroughly is an absolute must. When eating quickly, a person consumes 3-5 times more porridge than necessary. This leads to obesity. If you use a small amount, chewing it to the consistency of milk, then constipation disappears, bowel motility improves (at the time of chewing, motility accelerates fourfold), congestion in the gastrointestinal tract is eliminated.

The recovery period should be two times longer than the fast. Try eating properly at least during this period. The daily routine during the recovery period remains approximately the same (walks, physiotherapy procedures, occupational therapy, active rest), but for thin people special procedures may be added, such as full-body oil massage (especially the lower back) and hot baths. Overweight people should employ sauna and body massage with boiled down urine. By observing such a sensible fasting program, you will be filled with life force, and fasting will become an indispensable part of your life. Day after day, watching the miracle of renewal happening in your mind and body, you will enjoy living the new healthy life, which makes you more perfect and healthy every day.

For a excellent cleansing and purification of the body, you have to take mixed turpentine baths as per Zalmanov’s[27] recommendations at the time of withdrawal. The total number of baths equals 10.

13.7. How to prepare Bolotov’s whey (serum)

Pour cold boiled well or spring water into a clean 3-liter jar.

Dissolve 1 cup of sugar and 1 teaspoon of homemade sour cream in water. Half a cup of celandine grass (dry or fresh, but clean, without mold) should be placed in a gauze bag and drowned at the bottom of the can with a sinker.

Neck cans tie a gauze in 3 layers.

Infuse kvass for two weeks at room temperature in a dark place. You have to keep an eye on it - remove mold from the surface and filter the liquid if sediment appears.

2 weeks later, 1 liter of ready-made kvass is poured from a 3-liter jar into a 1-liter glass bottle with a cap. This is a portion for about 3 days of intake.

Add 1 liter of water to the 3-liter jar and add 1/3 cup of sugar.

3 days later, the brew will be ready again. You can continue in this manner without changing the celandine for up to 2 months, adding water and sugar.

Take between 1 tbsp. and 0.5 cup 20-30 minutes prior to meals 3 times a day for 2 weeks. Then, take it once a day for a month to consolidate the effect.

13.8. What are the potential complications during withdrawal from fasting?

When you come out of a short-term dry fast, there are usually no serious complications, but you still need to know about them. Complications most often occur with reckless people who are not aware of their actions. Anything you undertake should be taken seriously, and the issues related to personal health are twice as important. Therefore, if you decide to practice fasting yourself, heed attention to it. Master the method gradually, study the resources, others’ experience and, most importantly, watch yourself. If, after short-term fasting, you start overeating and cannot control your behavior, do not undertake long fasts in any case.

So, here are the main complications:

- Overeating in the first days after fasting. If, however, this happens after fasting and you have overfilled your stomach, you must induce vomiting and flush the stomach. Then resume the withdrawal in the usual manner. If you overeat later on, conduct a one-day fast, then continue to withdraw using proper foods.

- Edema, urinary retention. A rather frequent complication. It occurs due to the fact that during fasting the body expends potassium and the intake of salty foods in the early stages of recovery contributes to the accumulation of sodium, and as a result, of water, in the cells. Although it can be also observed even with proper withdrawal from fasting after long periods of time and in beginners. Usually, it manifests through rapid weight gain. The amount of urine is reduced, and swelling of the face and the legs may appear. If such symptoms occur, salty foods and salt-containing foods should be excluded from the diet. Attempt to eat nothing on this day, take 3 tablespoons of sorbents diluted in one glass of water, 4 times a day every three hours, then take 40 g of Epsom salt diluted in one glass of water, and then fast with water for two days. It is advisable to take a bath, a sauna or a hot bath on the days of fasting - then excess sodium and water are released. Potassium preparations, such as Panangin or Asparkam, in the dosage of 1 tablet 2-3 times a day over the course of 2-5 days, are very useful. These drugs contain magnesium and potassium, which are absolutely safe.

- Constipation. Quite common, especially in beginners. In the absence of natural defecation for more than 2–3 days, an enema should be performed. In any case, an enema is recommended to beginners on the second and third day of withdrawal from fasting, for the purpose of getting rid of undigested food debris and improving well-being. You can take a laxative mix, made of the following ingredients: dried apricots, figs, prunes, raisins – 100 grams of each. Wash everything, grind, add 100 grams of honey, 2 tablespoons of vegetable oil. Take 2 tablespoons before bed for 4 days. Bran is also helpful.

- Flatulence, gaseous distention. The main reason is beginning to consume heavy foods too early, inadequate chewing, eating large amounts of food, inadequate bowel cleansing during and before fasting. The recommendations are: a moderate withdrawal from fasting, enemas, early consumption of garlic, sufficient physical activity during the withdrawal from the fast. In addition, these symptoms are very often observed during fasting in winter and springtime. A recovery period with only plant food in the diet is not proper in winter and spring and "cools" the body. To avoid it, you should increase the proportion of cereals, use spices, vegetable oil and butter (not earlier than the 3rd day). Remember - in winter, the body needs thicker, “warm food”, and in summer and autumn it is quite possible to sustain the body on vegetables for a long time.

- Weakness, dizziness, fainting. Occur in the first 3-5 days of the withdrawal from fasting. They are associated with the premature expansion of the mode of movement. Due to a seeming surge of strength, you cannot evaluate your physical abilities, which leads to bouts of weakness, dizziness, and up to fainting. For prevention during fasting withdrawal, you have to observe a stricter regimen than during the fast itself. Get sufficient rest, do not take long walks, do not perform heavy physical work, do not overstrain yourself, and only experienced fasters who are well aware of the characteristics of their bodies can lead a rather active lifestyle. After all, physical activity during the withdrawal contributes to the fastest switch of the body to a normal nutrition regime.

- Exacerbation of underlying diseases. If during the fast your disease is exacerbated, it is desirable to continue the fast until the symptoms disappear. If this is impossible, symptoms may persist during the withdrawal, thus, you have to conduct withdrawal according to the usual scheme and not to hurry with premature intake of heavy food. Homeopathic medicines may be used for treatment. After a week of withdrawal, if the symptoms persist, careful use of medications is allowed. These are the main troubles that you can experience during a withdrawal from the fast. The more first-hand experience you have with fasting, the fewer unpleasant symptoms will be present. Everyone needs to know themselves well, and then everything will work out as you want. The main thing is not to rush, but to constantly build up your own experience.

14. What’s the ideal scheme for conducting a dry fractional fast at home?

Here is the ideal scheme for conducting a dry fractional fast at home.

     REMEMBER:

- Never start cleansing the intestines and liver without changing the mode and quality of nutrition.

- Do not start any fast prior to cleansing the intestines and liver.

- Do not conduct dry fasts prior to trying water fasting.

- In order to get the maximum benefits from fasting, it has to be regular, increase fasting length gradually.

- Never conduct dry fasts for more than five days at home.

- Withdrawal from a fast brings 70% of the therapeutic result, so it should be carried out properly.

The scheme is designed for three months.

1st month:

14 days – proper natural nutrition;

7 days – intestinal and liver cleansing;

7 days – buckwheat porridge fast, or if impossible, a 24-hour water fast;

2nd month:

1st week – a 1-day water fast, or 2 days for those who didn't fast on buckwheat;

2nd week – 2 or 3 days of water fasting

3rd week – 3 or 4 days of water fasting;

4th week – 5-7 days of water fasting for everyone.

3rd month:

1st week – 1 day of dry fasting

2nd week – 2 days of dry fasting

3rd week – 3 days of dry fasting

4th week – 4-5 days of dry fasting.

The following is a far more efficient regime for those with experience with all kinds of fasting:

24-hour fast – 48 hours of eating

48-hour fast – 72 hours of eating

72-hour fast – 96 hours of eating

96-hour fast – 120 hours of eating

120-hour fast – withdrawal from dry fast

To consolidate the effect of therapeutic fasting, the following maintenance regimens are recommended:

- Perform a cleansing of the liver and intestines once a quarter before the seasons change: at the end of February, at the beginning of May (the most effective), at the end of August, at the end of November.

- Conduct a 24-36-hour dry fast once a week. In this case, preliminary cleansing of the intestines is optional. But the days before and after fasting should be "half-starved", with reduced total calorie intake.

- Conduct a 3-day fast once a month, preparations aren’t required.

- Conduct a dry five-day fast once a quarter, preferably after cleansing the intestines and liver.

15. How many kinds of dry fasting exist?

There are two kinds of dry fasting. One, as strict and dry as possible, entails completely giving up water, and not only prohibits drinking water, but also forbids any contact with water. It means not washing our faces, no bathing, no baths, trying not to wash our hands and not to come in contact with water.

Another, milder, way, entails giving up drinking water, while external contact with water in any possible and available way is allowed.

Now we’ll look into the processes that occur during these types of fasting, their differences and advantages.

We’ll begin with saying that dry fasting puts the body under tougher conditions than water fasting. The survival-related processes in the body are much deeper during dry fasting. Not only does the body have to readjust to a different level of energy and reserves expenditure, but also to combat dehydration. Also, during dry fasting we work through both our fears of living without food, and of living without water. As a result, we penetrate much deeper into our inner worlds, making contact with our deep-seated fears. Consequently, the transformation of our inner world is much deeper.

When a person gives up food and water, in as little as 18-20 hours changes in the blood composition and the state of the mucous membranes become apparent. Healthy body cells begin taking both nutrition and water from the weak, sick and alien cells. It’s as if the sick, low-quality cells dry out and are rejected. Besides, when there's no aquatic environment, various viruses, bacteria and even helminthes cease to reproduce, and if fasting lasts for several days, they leave the body by themselves or die. This is only a small part of the processes happening inside us. During dry fasting the mucus accumulated in our body is destroyed, accordingly, it stops being a nutrient medium for different pathological microorganisms.

The viability of every cell in the body increases noticeably and very fast. During dry fasting, the processes aimed at considerable renewal start inside our bodies. The renewal begins as soon as we complete a dry fast. The whole body is renewed and rejuvenated. During dry fasting, the vessels are efficiently cleansed. The mucous membranes of the stomach and the intestinal canal, as well as the mouth cavity are well cleansed and renewed.

A special mood is important for dry fasting. For the majority of people, it’s psychologically harder to endure it. Although for many people who dared and gained such an experience, it is dry fasting that they switch to in their practice.

Enemas are contraindicated when dry fasting. Even if the bowels don’t work, they quickly and immediately recover when you end the fast. It’s acceptable to do a small series of enemas before fasting, especially if you feel that your body is full of toxins, if you tend to have headaches.

Let’s return to the two kinds of dry fasting.

The first method entails complete giving up of any contact with water from the inside and from the outside. The organism is put under the hardest critical conditions and activates its hidden internal reserves for survival. The body begins to dry out very slowly. The first things that dry out are our diseases, mucus, viruses, tumors, and edemas. They dry out because the organism's cells take nutrition and fluids away from them. As a result, the cells become strong and very alive. The consumption of water and fluids decreases. The breath is altered. The lungs are renewed. If you fast in this manner for three days or more, your sensitivity increases incredibly. You will start to sense smells acutely, feel fine energies, people’s states, it will be hard to be in energetically contaminated spaces and, conversely, very pleasant to be in clean ones. You begin dreaming about bodies of water, streams. Sometimes you drink water in your dreams and quench your thirst. Your mouth, lips, throat, skin, all get dry. A major advantage of this kind of fasting in particular is the renewal and rejuvenation of the skin and the mucous membranes.

The second kind of dry fasting entails giving up drinking water, but not giving up contact with water from the outside. Porfiry Ivanov was a follower of this method. He advocated dry fasting every week for 40-42 hours, and showering with water, bathing in open bodies of water at the same time. He himself fasted in this manner for long periods of time. Some people, while dry fasting for several days, sit in the bathtub for hours, wash their faces often, and wet their heads. The external contact with water makes it easier to endure the fast, making it easier to fast for longer periods of time. Every contact with water cleanses the pores, refreshes, invigorates. Granted, quite often you’re thirstier afterwards. The effects of the internal cleansing during the second kind of fasting are practically the same, perhaps, a bit weaker. If we gargle with water, then the mucous membranes are also more poorly cleaned. When we come in contact with water, our skin absorbs the water. Skin feeding activates. This is the merit of this method. Also, contact with clean water is desirable.

Based on this state, there is also a combined type of fasting: dry plus water. Dry fasting for a day or several, then ending the dry fast, then fasting on water. Fasting on water after dry fasting is easy and pleasant. I want to stress that water fasting comes after dry fasting and not vice versa!! This kind of fasting allows the cells to become imbued with moisture, extending the cleansing effects. It’s an exotic method, and I recommend it only to those people who have fully mastered water fasting and dry fasting, have extensive experience with these practices.

Dry fasting is limited in duration to a maximum of 11 days. However, there’s a record in The Guinness Book of Records: 18 days of dry fasting.

15.1. Interesting facts: Secrets of Japanese monks

During the process of aging, the reserve capabilities of all our organs and systems dwindle with every year. Therefore, in order not to age, you need to train your reserves, more precisely, your adaptation reserves. To train means to use regularly, and they are used, first of all, when there is something lacking. The organism may lack food, water, oxygen, and information. Their conscious, artificial limitation stimulates the use of the reserve capabilities. If we limit the intake of food, we’ll get an excellent method of bodily renewal known since the earliest times — fasting. It is temporary voluntary full refusal of food. The aim of such fasting is switching to internal feeding, i.e. using the reserves. If you stop the intake of water, too, you will get dry fasting — an even more effective method of cleansing, renewal and rejuvenation.

In case of lack of oxygen, for example, in the conditions of highlands, hypoxia (i.e. oxygen deprivation) arises. In such a case, a powerful anti-hypoxic system is mobilized, and its stimulation affects the organism in the most beneficial way. As for information, nature provided for periodic information hunger in the form of night sleep. It’s hard to overestimate the role of a good night’s sleep for health and longevity.

If we combine the methods based on restriction, then it turns out that the perfect method of restoration of the organism is long sleep during absolute fasting high in the mountains.

But ‘There is nothing new under the sun!’ In ancient times in Japan there lived the Yamabushi monks. It’s the most mysterious of all the sects that have ever existed in Japan. Their services were used by Ninjas — the famous medieval Japanese ‘Special Forces’.

After they had mastered incredible abilities of walking on the ceiling, fighting with and without weapons, seeing in the dark, being insensitive to pain, etc., since the age of 15 they were sent to advanced training with the Yamabushi. Ascetics and hermits, living high in the mountains, taught the Ninjas hypnosis and psychic powers, recipes for poisons and balms, acupuncture, abilities to go without food and water for a long time, methods of preservation of health and prolongation of life and more. Their secrets were passed down orally, it was forbidden to write them down.

But let’s try to lift the veil from their secrets, and specifically the secrets of preservation of health and prolongation of life. What do you think the word ‘Yamabushi’ means? Nothing but ‘those who sleep in the mountains!’

A lot of people live, and, accordingly, sleep high in the mountains. Statistics tell us that their average life expectancy is longer than that on the plain, but it’s not just that. After all, the name ‘Yamabushi’ emphasizes that they aren’t just people in the mountains, they are those who sleep there, i.e. their sleep is somehow different from normal sleep. Most likely it was lengthy. But you can’t just sleep for a long time, you need a state of hypnosis, self-hypnosis, influence of soporific herbs, and they had a complete command of this.

Lengthy sleep high in the mountains is the combination of mountain hypoxia, sleep and absolute fasting (naturally, we don’t eat or drink during sleep). Every one of these influences has a powerful stimulating effect on the adaptation reserves of the organism, and just imagine how powerful their combination must be.

The effects of long mountain hypoxia:

- New capillaries begin forming in all the organs, first of all, in the vital ones. Every cell of our organism starts receiving more nutrients and oxygen.

- The lungs begin to work more efficiently as a result of hypertrophy of the lung tissue and an increase in the diffusive surface of the pulmonary alveoli. Moreover, the respiratory muscles increase their mass.

- The blood becomes capable of transporting a larger amount of oxygen owing to an increase in the number of red blood cells and an increase of hemoglobin. There’s also an increase in the level of the hormones of the adrenal cortex — the adaptation hormones – in the blood. In this regard, the blood of donors who are mountain climbers or people living high in the mountains, and preparations made from it, are especially valuable for weakened patients.

- An intense training of the cardiovascular system takes place, since the reaction to hypoxia is the increase in the frequency of heart contractions and the volume of cardiac output.

- There’s an increase in myoglobin content. Myoglobin is a protein that provides a reserve of oxygen in muscles.

- The general energy level, which drops during aging or as a result of illnesses, increases significantly. This happens, first of all, due to an increase in the activity of mitochondria. Under normal circumstances, a part of these miniature power plants is dormant. Secondly, it occurs owing to an increase in the number of the mitochondria, as they begin multiplying.

- During dry fasting the organism imposes a water-saving regime, this manifests in a decrease in perspiration, drying of the nasal mucosa, a decrease in the amount of moisture in the mouth, it lasts only for a couple of minutes of conversation and then dryness appears.

15.2. Interesting facts: Dry fasting and dousing with cold water

There are different opinions on whether you should douse with cold water during dry fasting. Based on my experience, 80% of my patients can’t continue dry fasting for 9-10-11 days, if they start dousing with cold water or bathing. They experience highly increased dryness in the mouth, increased thirst, they lose their spirit and motivation, and they end the dry fast. We certainly understand that every organism is unique, which is why, during short-term dry fasts you can try dousing with ice-cold water (while keeping your mouth closed). The reason you have to douse specifically with ice-cold water is as follows: if the temperature of the water is lower than 11 degrees Celsius, then for a period of time your body’s own temperature rises to 40 degrees. This has a powerful health benefit due to the activation of the immune system and the increase of the internal temperature. If the temperature of the water is higher than 11 degrees C this won’t happen. That’s why during short-term dry fasts you have to try dousing, and if this helps you, you can douse during long dry fasts as well.

16. How should you conduct a long dry fast?

(The method of conducting of a 9-day dry fast and the description of the principal medical mechanisms during this type of fast).

     ATTENTION! – LONG-TERM DRY FASTING (from 5 days on) HAS TO BE CONDUCTED IN THE PRESENCE OF A MEDICAL SPECIALIST and preferably in a group.

     Remember that for beginners long dry fasting is a very intense stress on their mind and organism. You have to be morally prepared for serious challenges. And not only morally. You need to conduct a cleansing of the body, conduct a water fast, learn everything a beginner has to know. And only then should you begin 24-hour dry fasts.

     And now I would like to list the basic criteria, which, if they apply to you, mean you should not conduct a fast under any circumstances: If you do not follow the recommendations and do not conduct proper preparations, a heavy intoxication of the organism could occur (usually this happens on the 5th-10th day). The excretory organs can’t neutralize the toxins and get rid of them fast enough. A blockade occurs, the organism doesn’t adapt to fasting. The fasting person stops losing weight, they experience increased weakness, nausea, headaches, heart weakness and arrhythmia, especially the heart rate exceeds 120 beats per minute. These are the principal indications of a blockade (heavy intoxication). In such cases you have to cease fasting immediately.

Day 1. You need to get in the right mindset. Think that everything is going to be great, at the very least, you’ll be able to stop fasting without any harm. If you are well prepared for dry fasting and you have things to do, then the first day usually just flies by. You may, of course, experience thirst, slight weakness. It is ideal to lie down to rest and try not to speak. You can conduct Old Slavic[28] abdomen massage. The weight loss is usually 1-2 kg.

Even if you are systematically going to conduct 24-hour long dry fasts, it will beneficially affect your organism. Why are weekly one-day fasts effective? Under certain circumstances, the effect of even a one-day fast, conducted once a week, may increase abruptly. To achieve this you have to repeat one-day fasts. If you’re going to fast at the end of every week and then withdraw from the fast carefully, then you’ll get an effect just like one from a long fast. In six months or a year you’ll become unrecognizably healthy.

- If you continue fasting for one day once a week during one year, this will improve your health and rid you of illnesses.

- The fatigue of the internal organs is greatly alleviated with one-day fasts. There are many cases where a mild case of diabetes is cured only due to the pancreas getting a couple of days of rest during the fast.

- One day of fasting makes the organism three months younger. By the way, short-term fasting, besides cleansing and substantial improvement of appearance, has another unexpected effect. It consists in an increase of the imaginative power and the ability to create.

- The effect of weight loss. If you properly and competently prepare for 24-hour fasts and conduct them systematically every week, you can achieve good results in weight loss. American specialists claim that even 1 day of fasting per month can be very good for your health.

Day 2. On day 2, you can usually experience an urge to eat, but you have to overcome it. Sometimes you may experience dizziness, headaches, and discomfort in the stomach area. You shouldn’t be afraid of these symptoms; they signify that the process of endogenous reconstruction and cleansing of the organism has started. You need to go for walks more often and spend more time outdoors, in the evening, and do some relaxing exercises before sleep. You have to conduct abdominal and spinal massage. From day 2, anti-inflammatory and immuno-stimulation mechanisms of dry fasting are activated, thus, such illnesses as acute respiratory disease and flu can be fully cured. The weight loss usually is 1-1.5 kg.

Without water there is no life. The thing is, inflammation also can’t exist without water. Any inflamed spot swells with water. Microorganisms, such as microbes and viruses, can only reproduce in a sufficiently aquatic environment. Water deficit is destructive for an inflammation or any kinds of edema. In such rough conditions, the organism will not allow the presence of a pathological fluid (edema) inside of it, all this pathological fluid is going to be used for its physiological needs. That’s why dry fasting is effective during the treatment of these illnesses (ovarian cysts, endometriosis, spinal disc herniation and any other illnesses which have this mechanism in their pathogenesis).

Due to the dehydration of the organism, a fierce competitive battle for water begins between the cells of the body and the pathogenic microorganisms. The cells of the body, as hosts, take water away from the microorganisms, but the organism itself is able to not only synthesize endogenous water in necessary amounts, but also take water from the air during this period, absorbing it through the skin. This is due to the fact that during dry fasting the organism acts to excrete and not to absorb. The healthy, strong cells receive additional energy and water, while the sick and altered viruses and bacteria can’t do that. According to modern scientific research, the cause of peptic ulcer is infective, this accounts for a very powerful medicinal effect in case of this pathology. That’s why it’s necessary to conduct dry fasting outdoors, preferably in a mountainous area, near mountain rivers and waterfalls.

70% of glucocorticoids and sex hormones are bound by the transport albumins of the blood and only 30% circulate in the blood in a free state. During dry fasting, the transport albumins come apart and their amino acids are used for the needs of the organism, first of all for the needs of the brain and the cardiovascular system. In such a case, there is a release of an enormous amount of hormones, which circulate in the blood in a free state, this accounts for a good medicinal effect in the treatment of asthma. This extraordinary amount of glucocorticoids, which is three times more usual, flooding the blood, has a strong anti-inflammatory effect, suppressing all the inflammation sites in the organism.

After all, we know that glucocorticoids are the strongest anti-inflammatory agent in the organism. In the activity of the free glucocorticoid forms, there is another very powerful medicinal mechanism that fasting activates to affect inflammatory and autoimmune diseases, such as rheumatoid arthritis and others.

Here’s one of the interesting facts about the study of the champion in the duration of dry fasting among animals  - the camel. Camels have immunity to the majority of the most dangerous viral diseases.

Scientists from the United Arab Emirates proposed to more actively study the defense mechanisms of one of the hardiest animals — the camel, in order to combat human diseases. Camels have unique physiological characteristics, which allow them to exist in the harshest desert conditions. They cope with dehydration, because their circulatory system can store supplies of water, the lack of food is supplied with the deposits of fatty tissue in the humps, and camel milk is preserved fresh for much longer than cow milk. But that’s not all. Camels’ immune system is so perfect that they aren’t susceptible to the majority of viral diseases that other mammals die from. They, for example, are completely immune to foot-and-mouth disease and rinderpest. Up until now, people didn’t pay attention to camels as a source of production of various substances that could help combat human viral diseases.  Arabic scientists think that in the medicine of tomorrow, the immune mechanisms of the camel will not only be a matter of thorough study, but also a means to combat many human diseases.

During dry fasting the immune system begins to very effectively conduct a series of complex chemical reactions, when a foreign body invades the organism, whether it be a virus or another infection agent. At that moment the immune system starts carrying out its mission — find and destroy. There’s a whole system of amoeba-like cells in our body, which have a somewhat difficult name for those unfamiliar with the subject — a system of phagocytizing mononuclear cells. In every organ there is its own, specific only to it, group of cells that resemble amoebas and migrate over the whole organ, eating and digesting everything foreign. Such specific cells exist in the skin, liver and heart, and even in the brain. They’re always migrating and looking for prey. The trouble is that any food, even plant food, contains a small amount of fat. And phagocytes (phagocytizing mononuclear cells) instead of carrying out their direct duties, are occupied with absorbing and digesting these droplets of fat, as if they aren’t concerned at all about anything else. So, during fasting, phagocytes are left without food, that is, without fat. And they start carrying out their direct duties: absorb and digest bacteria, viruses, cells remnants, old, dying cells, contributing to renewal and even rejuvenation of the organism. All the pathologically changed tissues are digested, i.e., cysts, myomas, adenomas and even cancer cells, which are always present in the organism, even in the normal conditions.  The destruction of sick cells, and not the healthy ones during fasting is also related to the release of the lymphoepithelial cells of the entire digestive tract.   Giving up food and water for many days creates conditions for a withdrawal of a very powerful army of B-lymphocytes from the gastrointestinal front lines. They gather from all the lymphatic basins and nodes of the extensive digestive tract. But particularly large numbers of them come from the small intestine. The army of B-lymphocytes, no longer needed in the frontlines, is used for its intended purposes. It suppresses and neutralizes all present disease-producing and alien elements, infection, parasites, that are in an encapsulated (dormant) state and basically don’t respond to modern antibacterial therapy (treatment with antibiotics, sulfanilamides and other medicines). On the contrary, during this period of life microorganisms situated in protective membranes become more resistant to these medicines and other drugs. During dry fasting, these membranes are destroyed by phagocytes and ferments that are activated by acidosis, which accounts for a good medicinal effect in treatment of prostatitis.

During dry fasting, higher concentrations of biologically active substances, hormones, immunocompetent cells and immunoglobulins are reached in the fluids of the organism. Another immune-stimulating effect of fasting is that a 5-day dry fast produces positive dynamics in all blood test indices: erythrocytes, hemoglobin, leucocytes, thrombocytes, and erythrocyte sedimentation rate. These changes are evidence of substantial changes in the blood and its energy properties. The indices are improved by 10-20%. But the content of lymphocytes and monocytes in the blood increases most of all. The increase in these main indicators of the immune status of the organism amounted to 80%. Thus, fasting above all boosted the effectiveness of the immune system. However, we know that this is carried out through the energy of the blood. More than half of the ‘electronic’ energy that we get through breathing is freed up during fasting, since it isn’t spent on food digestion. This energy is spent on increasing the energy level in tissues and, first and foremost, the immune system cells. Having received additional energy, the cells can work for their own good, ensuring restoration, rehabilitation and cleansing of tissues, while receiving considerable help from the immune system. But, having received a powerful energy boost from erythrocytes, immune system cells begin carrying out their own functions more actively. In such a manner, real conditions for health improvement and treatment of diseases are created.

    In the USA volunteers participated in laboratory research during the month-long Ramadan fast. This fast is a brief dry fast. Prior to the fast, during the whole month and after its end, the researchers examined the blood of the test subjects. The analyses included chemical composition of the blood, including determination of lipoprotein content, and special analyses of the body’s immune system capacity, including lymphocyte count in the blood, the ratio of their different types, each one’s capacity, and measurement of antibody levels in the blood. The conducted experiments showed the apparently positive effect of the fast on the body’s immune system: functional indices of lymphocytes increased tenfold; in spite of their total number remaining the same, the number of the type responsible for resistance to diseases increased substantially, in relation to other types. Moreover, the content of the IgE protein (the protein responsible for the formation of antibodies in the blood) increased noticeably in the lipoprotein group, there was an increase in the content of the low-density type (LDL), without any increase in the content of the high density type (HDL), which suggests an increase in the activity of immune reactions.

    Thus, during an experiment that involved hibernating animals, it was proven that it’s possible to radically get rid of such serious diseases as syphilis and trypanosomal disease exclusively through hibernation. There is every reason to believe that it will be possible to combat sepsis and even AIDS in this fashion, since there is also evidence of successful combat of viral diseases with the help of hibernation.

    Full disintegration of the organism that can be observed during hibernation, may assist in saving lives of seriously ill patients, as well as injured people with tissue crushing and compression, if hypobiosis is used before the spreading of toxemia – in doing so, the main pathological factor of the trauma will be eliminated and the development and spreading of secondary necrosis and wound infection will be prevented.

    We know of hibernating animals’ non-susceptibility to fatal doses of bacterial and chemical toxins, as well as ionizing radiation; the same non-susceptibility was discovered in an experiment involving animals closest to humans – monkeys, which were irradiated with a 1.5-times lethal dose of ionizing radiation in a state of clinical death, i.e. the very same hypobiosis. All the control animals died, all the experimental animals (clinical death was induced by bloodletting) survived, furthermore, none of them developed radiation sickness. Consequently, the fasting method has a power that increases body immunity in an incredible manner. Thus, the so-called common sense, encompassed in the sentence ‘without food the resistance of the organism towards pathogenic germs decreases,’ in actuality proves to be a simple prejudice.

Day 3. On this day, the majority of people conducting a dry fast begin experiencing acidosis.

The acidotic crisis is a very important point in dry fasting, which occurs after the switch to endogenous nutrition. Don’t be afraid of feeling unwell during this period, for beginners it usually comes on day 3. (But for some people the period of transition to endogenous nutrition during a 5-day 24-hour-long dry fast can pass without a pronounced acidotic crisis). An acidotic crisis begins when the concentration of ketone bodies (products of partial decay of triglycerides or fats) in the organism increases, but a way to dispose of them hasn’t been found. During this time people feel unwell, they experience typical signs of intoxication. However, as soon as the disposal of the ketone bodies begins, their concentration stops increasing, and since the ketone bodies are high-energy components, they serve as fuel for the synthesis of new amino acids, which can lead to tissue regeneration. The process of regeneration can be accompanied by severe pain and you should be prepared for it. Initially, the acidotic crisis can happen on day 4, 3 or even 2 after you start your dry fast. With each new fast it happens sooner. The faster it passes, the more time is left for the renewal of the body. At that time you can experience acetone-odor breath, nausea, dizziness, shortness of breath, weakness. The feeling of hunger subsides; thirst is bearable. Blood pressure fluctuates depending on the characteristics of the organism. There’s no need to be afraid of any phenomena, since, due to the organism’s adaptation to a new living environment, symptoms become somewhat more acute.

The best thing during this period is to take relaxed, slow walks in nature. Abdominal and spinal self-massage, cupping massage is mandatory. You may experience weight loss of up to 2 kg. Fasting is a process of increasing physiological regeneration, renewal of all cells, their molecular and chemical composition.

Interestingly, biochemical changes during fasting and reparative regeneration are very similar. Both cases entail two phases: destruction and recovery. In both cases, the destruction phase is characterized by the prevalence of decomposition of protein and nucleic acids over their synthesis, shift of pH to acidity, acidosis and more. The recovery phase in both cases is also characterized by the prevalence of synthesis of nucleic acids over their decomposition, and a return of pH to its neutral state.

From the teaching on regeneration we know that the amplification of the destruction phase leads to the amplification of the recovery phase. Therefore, with sufficient foundation, we can consider fasting a natural stimulatory factor of physiological regeneration.

At the basis of fasting, there is a biological process that leads to the renewal and rejuvenation of the tissues of the whole body. In environmentally unfriendly conditions, modern human’s physiological regeneration mechanisms work inadequately. During fasting, the organism is cleansed and the regeneration mechanisms begin to work in a natural way. All that can be regenerated has natural tendencies towards self-cleansing and recovery. It rejects anything alien by itself, as soon as the process of deliberate voluntary intoxication ends. All that is capable of regeneration really likes cleanliness, periodicity and dosage. During dry fasting, diseased, pathological tissues are primarily destroyed, which launches a truly universal mechanism of healing bodily injuries using the internal cell reserve — bone marrow stromal cells, one of the main mechanisms of eliminating cranio-cerebral injuries’ consequences.

After ending a fast, one can observe an amplification of regenerative processes in bone marrow blood circulation (an increase in mitotically dividing cells, etc.). Indices of hemogenesis regeneration in peripheral blood (skein cells, for example), generally surpass initial numbers threefold.

But the most important thing is that more brain stromal cells than usual are produced. These cells can turn into any other cells when they reach the corresponding part of the body. Stromal cells begin arriving in the damaged area, when they receive an appropriate signal from the central nervous system. When they reach the damaged area, certain signal molecules instruct them to transform into the missing cells of the damaged tissue.

Day 4. Blood pressure may drop or rise; body temperature may increase. This is a physiologically normal phenomenon during dry fasting.

Shivering or fever is possible, depending on the nature of the patient and the symptoms of the disease, as well as on the patient’s sex and age. As we already know, during dry fasting toxins burn, one can say, in their own furnace — in the absence of water every cell starts an internal thermonuclear reaction. So we obtain a sort of an extreme express method for destroying everything unnecessary, heavy, and pathological inside the cell. Each cell becomes a mini-furnace, a mini-reactor. It’s as if the body’s internal temperature increased. This temperature may not be registered with a thermometer but it is experienced as internal fever or shivering by people who are in the process of dry fasting. The most important point in this condition is the fact that temperature itself is an important part of the body’s defense mechanisms. From our own experience we know that in the presence of high fever all toxins and poisons are destroyed, even cancer cells fully halt their vital functions. Such a process speeds up recovery. Reacting with an increase in temperature, the organism causes deceleration in the growth of microorganisms. It becomes easier for the immune system to track down and kill anything alien and altered.

One can also observe a decrease in the cold threshold, normalization of thermoregulation processes, manifested in hot flashes and requiring use of cold water, which stabilizes the patient’s condition. All catarrhal diseases are out of the question. As I’ve already written, if you can tolerate dousing with cold-water well, you can walk barefoot on snow or dew, douse yourself with ice-cold water, walk nude in nature.

Abdominal and spinal self-massage, cupping massage is mandatory.

The weight loss amounts to up to 1 kg. In the presence of fever all metabolic processes in the organism accelerate, that’s why exotoxins and endotoxins that cause disease are destroyed faster. Ovarian cysts resolve themselves, mastopathy and myomas disappear, even cancer cells fully stop their vital functions. It’s also known  that when temperature increases, interferon, which enables the body to fight viruses, is secreted more actively. When temperature rises, antibodies that protect the organism from diseases are produced more actively. Phagocytic and bactericidal activity of cytotoxic neutrophils is enhanced; efficiency of lymphocytes grows stronger. One of the most important cells, the T-cell, works best in the presence of fever. Cancer researchers decreased tumor sizes by warming them thoroughly. High temperature decreases vital functions in pathogenic microorganisms.

In the early 20th century doctors used fever to treat syphilis and some forms of chronic arthritis: the patients were placed in a heated box. In our daily lives we can always observe that pets, as well as young children, refuse to eat when they have a fever. The absence of appetite is very often encountered during different infections, but it still isn’t known for sure where this symptom comes from and what it means.

Scientists from San Mateo Medical Center (San Mateo, USA) assumed that lack of appetite is a defense mechanism, which has been preserved in evolution since prehistoric times. Fasting increases the effect of the T-helper 2 immune cells (Th2), that are especially important in fighting bacteria and viruses. All these processes accelerate recovery. Reacting with an increase in bodily temperature, the organism causes deceleration in the growth of microorganisms. It becomes easier for the immune system to track down and kill anything alien and modified. If neither food, nor dead, heavy water enters the organism, then our blood actually doesn’t receive numerous harmful substances, and the blood is constantly cleansed by our organism, that is, blood with practically the same composition is going to be cleansed through the filtering elements over and over again, which means the blood is going to be just about perfectly clean. During dry fasting the blood is cleansed from all the unnecessary matter, and blood plasma becomes crystal clear, everything is harmonized, including coagulation factors.

In this respect, dry fasting cleanses the blood more thoroughly than hemodialysis or hemosorption — mechanical blood purification. Therefore, all the blood-related processes in our organism are carried out almost perfectly. It’s all very simple — that’s why our immune system will get a magnificent rest.

Day 5. All our chronic illnesses, even those we were unaware of, start to flare up.

The organs that are the most affected with diseases manifest through pain, and you have to be prepared for that. You need to thank your organism for such a good healing job. If nausea appears, it helps to massage the abdomen and place something cold on the liver area. If it’s difficult for you to go for a walk, it’s better to lie down in a calm cool place and listen to good classical music. Due to the organism’s fight against ailments, body temperature increases, and you may feel feverish. Blood pressure may increase or decrease, depending on the individual bodily characteristics. You can take a cold shower, and spend more time outside wearing lightweight clothes or even no clothes at all, regardless of the weather. If there’s snow, you can walk on it barefoot.

You can experience insomnia, increased thirst, your blood pressure may fluctuate. Generally, the weight loss during dry fasting varies from 1 to 2 kg, depending on the person’s initial weight before the fast and on their physical activity. Of course, every person is unique in their own way. Dry fasting may pass in very different ways, but I tried to describe the manifestations that I had observed in the majority of patients.

Abdominal and spinal self-massage, cupping massage is mandatory. From day 5 on, auto-digestion processes start intensifying. Auto-digestion is a property of biological subjects that allows them to hydrolytically break down their own structures with enzymes and phagocytes.

Fasting cases provide many examples of control that the organism exercises over the auto-digestion processes. For example, tissues disappear proportionately to their usefulness — first, fats and pathological growths, with other tissues to follow. Every living being — from worm to man — demonstrates that different organs and tissues are very different in their weight loss capacity. Usually the liver loses twice as much weight as the other body parts, especially during the initial period, due to the loss of glycogen and fat. The lungs lose almost nothing, the brain and the nervous system — even less. Vital organs feed at the expense of accumulated reserves and less important tissues, so that abstinence from food could only do harm after all the reserves of the organism are depleted.

The body has an ability to move its chemical elements, with many wonderful examples provided by fasting. Absorption and reorganization of the bodily elements, which is observed in living beings when they’re deprived of food; digestion and redistribution of reserves, excesses and secondary tissues, observed in all animals in case of forced fasting, are, in the author’s opinion, some of the most marvelous phenomena in biology. The organism is capable not only of creating tissue, but also of destroying it. Not only can it distribute its nutrient reserves, it can also redistribute them, and it’s auto-digestion that makes redistribution possible. The auto-digestion process can be turned to great practical advantage and made to serve us in our pursuit of getting rid of tumors and other growths in the body. In order to minimize the expenditures, the least valuable substances are always the first to be seized and removed, that’s why all pathological growths  — ovarian cysts, fatty tumors, benign tumors, prostate adenoma, abscesses — rapidly decrease in size and often disappear completely as a result of strict and long abstinence from food and fasting. Many of those who practiced fasting got rid of their tumors with the help of auto-digestion (see Herbert Shelton’s books).

Day 6. Thirst increases substantially, you may want to rinse your mouth, moisten it, and make the process somewhat easier for yourself. Sleep time can decrease to 2 hours. Reactions slow down.

The desire to stop fasting arises. Now it’s really important to understand how much your willpower means in the ambition to achieve the set goal. The crucial thing here is your determination to continue fasting. It’s important to understand that you will obtain priceless experience, and feel your self-respect growing with every day. You have to feel happy about yourself. Even if you don’t make it all the way to the end, this experience will enrich you. Your spirit grows stronger, your lust for life increases. On day 6, your sense of smell becomes more acute. The smells you haven’t paid attention to before become vivid and accessible. You may experience pains in the sacrum and the small of the back. Also, your eyesight may deteriorate.  Different salts are excreted abundantly with the urine, and it becomes darker in color. Don’t be afraid of that, it indicates a real ongoing healing process, and, as I always tell my patients, any natural treatment goes through an exacerbation.

The most difficult thing on this day of fasting isn’t the inability to drink or eat, but the lack of sleep. For a successful result, you need to develop and conduct relaxation procedures, which lead to sleep. You need to conduct cupping massage, abdominal and spinal self-massage in the evening. Weight loss amounts to 1-2 kg.

Dry fasting intensifies apoptosis processes. Apoptosis is programmed cell death, an energy-dependent, genetically controlled process, which is launched by specific signals and rids the organism of weakened, useless or damaged cells. About 5% of cells in the organism undergo apoptosis, and are replaced by new cells daily. During the apoptosis process, a cell vanishes without a trace in 15-120 minutes. In particular, apoptosis is one the main mechanisms of preventing benign tumors, cystic growths and oncological diseases.

In case of its pathological increase, aplasia, degenerative processes, and certain tissue defects and deformities occur, while a decrease launches autoimmune processes, tumors and premature ageing of the organism. There are, for example, fairly convincing reasons to believe that such serious diseases as aplastic anemia, rheumatoid arthritis, amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, Alzheimer disease, AIDS, etc., are linked to pathologically increased apoptosis. A universal process takes place during fasting - on the one hand, physiological apoptosis intensifies: the organism is renewed and rejuvenated at the expense of the death of old, sick, changed cells. On the other hand, the pathological mechanisms of apoptosis, such as premature ageing, oncological diseases, etc., are eliminated.

The apoptosis phenomenon was discovered relatively recently, in 1972. This became the most interesting discovery of the last 50 years in the spheres of biology and medicine. In modern terms, apoptosis is a general biological mechanism responsible for the consistency in the numbers of cell populations, and the morphogenesis and culling of defective cells. Regular food intake and negative ecological situation stand in the way of this physiological mechanism. According to our observations, food apoptosis is activated after 20 hours of dry fasting (if the proper fasting technique is observed).

Day 7. This day may be one of the most healing among all the preceding ones.

Powerful cleansing and renewal of a person’s energy occurs in this period.  You may have unusual or strange dreams on this day: snakes or worms coming out of your body, etc. That’s how we get rid of hex, evil eye and pathological energy. Dry fasting, first and foremost, is intense spiritual work, intended to cleanse the soul and body from entities parasitizing on them; this work also serves to strengthen willpower and reinforce positive thinking.

Dry fasting uses all the organs of the body to evenly burn anything unfit for its evolution, not only its mechanical aspect, but spiritual as well. Thanks to fasting, chakras and energy channels that form the basis of many abilities are cleansed. As far as the physical aspect is concerned, this is the period of alleviation, emotional uplift, stabilization of bodily functions. Blood pressure stabilizes. Urine acquires a dark brown color; the cleansing process is underway. In the morning, conduct cupping massage, abdominal and spinal self-massage. The average weight loss is 1 kg.

Why do cleansing and energy renewal occur? During this period, a unique mechanism is activated - replacement of the old, ‘dead water’ with the super-quality ‘live water.’ Not only can water benefit a person, it can also harm them. As is well known, water is one of the best carriers of energy information. This is achieved due to the unique molecular composition of water and variability of its cluster structure.

Thus, in 1932 a sensation spread all over the world. It turned out that besides ordinary water, there’s also heavy water in nature. In the molecules of such water, hydrogen is replaced with its isotope — deuterium. Only extremely small amounts of it exist in nature. But here’s what was found just recently: heavy water can be present in the human body as well. Water with an increased concentration of deuterium is also known as dead water. It is poorly excreted from the organism and poisons it slowly. According to some scientists, this is due to the information poisoning of the water. It is established that if a thought is heavy, negative, low-frequency, articulated with great energy, it can eventually redirect hydrogen atoms, making them double up, as it were, making them heavier. This is how ordinary water becomes dead.

It was also proven by scientists that long before any symptoms of disease appear, local areas of heavy water — water with incorrect structure, pathological areas – form in the human organism. These resemble swamps in the body, where parasites start actively multiplying. All this leads to a decrease in local immunity and internal organ damage. We need to be careful when dealing with water, since our bodies don’t contain ordinary water. The water inside us is structured.

In our everyday lives, we mainly drink chlorinated, over-boiled water; all modern drinks contain nothing useful for the body. This water, when it enters the organism, isn’t just directly excreted through the pores, it goes through a series of serious transformations, requiring great energy expenditures from the organism. That’s why excessive consumption of such liquids creates a large burden on the organism and leads to a multitude of illnesses. The large amount of dead, heavy water in the organism of a modern human is a fault. This water doesn’t participate in the exchange, accumulates and isn’t excreted by the body. It is heavy ballast, nonviable and inactive, steadily accumulating in our body. D₃O is radioactive water. It pushes us towards aging and death. Many people note that dry fasting is easier to endure compared to water fasting, because of the lack of the feeling of hunger during it. This, in fact, isn’t surprising. The thing is, water outside the organism and assimilated water are two entirely different things. The organism processes incoming water molecules, cleans them of unnecessary information, structures them and turns them into its own molecules, possessing the qualities of the given organism. To do this, just like to assimilate food, the body has to spend a certain amount of energy and time. That’s why dry fasting is most certainly of more value, because it allows the whole organism to rest, particularly the digestive tract, which is the reason why, taking into account all the dry fasting mechanisms, peptic ulcers can be completely cured. Another effect is conditioned by the fact that the organism can’t exist without water, which is why it immediately starts using its reserves – first of all, the excess fat (the organism synthesizes water using oxygen from the air and hydrogen from the fat tissue), which is very effective in treatment of obesity. During water fasting, exogenous water, that is, water from the outside, enters the organism. And it’s that water that is the main cleansing factor. In accordance with the law of biological expediency, in this case the cell spends a minimum amount of its own energy, since everything is going smoothly: all the toxins and poisons dissolve and, figuratively speaking, the toxins are washed out of the cell and out of the intercellular space.

But during dry fasting the toxins are burned up, one might say, in their own furnaces — every cell starts “a thermonuclear reaction” in the absence of water. Every cell becomes a mini-furnace, a mini-reactor for a period of time. But water is essential, and the cells lose these allowances, especially the sick and altered ones (that’s why myomas, mastopathies and ovarian cysts can be treated so effectively). Under these circumstances, the strongest and healthiest cells survive, and in order to survive, they have to activate the production of their own super-quality endogenous water. And this endogenous water has to be several times better than exogenous water, once again, in accordance with the law of biological expediency. After all, the cell spends a lot of energy – thus, the product that we get in the end has to be of a quality that corresponds to the efforts spent. After all, this isn’t the human mind, which can make mistakes. This is nature itself, which has anticipated any scenario and does everything for life to continue.

Exogenous and endogenous water can be compared to a dirty river where a local chemical plant empties its waste during high water, and a mountain river, originating from the depths of the earth and fed with melt water infused with healing energy.

During dry fasting, the old, ‘dead’ water is replaced with the super-quality ‘live’ water, synthesized by the organism itself, while all the negative information, brought into our organism from the outside, is erased.

After a relatively short fast without water, we make the organism process the water it contains inside. By doing so, we are renewed in terms of information, and that’s why upon the completion of the fast we become pristine information-wise and are, in fact, an information matrix with nothing negative recorded in it by the environment. This phenomenon is one the most important advantages of this type of fasting and it could be considered one of the main healing mechanisms of dry fasting. There are no such mechanisms in any type of fasting that exists in nature. This mechanism is one of the principal ones, and plays a large role in the renewal of the energy balance in the human body.

Day 8. You may experience a bad taste in your mouth and bad breath during this period, so it’s preferable to breathe through your nose. Your heart rate may increase or decrease. You may also experience a rise in body temperature, nausea, which indicates liver detoxification, weakness, dizziness, and loose stool. Don’t be afraid of these symptoms, since they indicate an ongoing detoxification process. Other symptoms include pain in the breasts and around the uterus for females, and in the prostate gland in male patients. They indicate the healing of benign tumors. If you feel weak during this period, it’s better to lie down in a cool place. If affusion helps you, it is acceptable. If you feel strong enough, take a walk outside, preferably in nature. If possible, do self-massage and cupping massage of the abdomen. Weight loss may constitute up to 2 kg.

The anti-tumor mechanism is maximally potent during this period. This mechanism is the most important decisive factor in treating benign tumors and cystic tumors. A healthy body constantly fights mutating cells - the body doesn’t allow newly formed atypical cells to fuse and form a dense tumor. This fight is conducted by antitumor immune control, specifically, three types of cells: macrophages, natural killers (NK-cells) and cytotoxic T-lymphocytes (CTLs). Macrophages eat and digest malignant cells; after detecting them, CTLs produce polymer-proteins, perforins, which perforate the outer membrane of a malignant cell, thus equalizing the osmotic pressure inside and outside the cell and killing it, if it’s still alive, additional proteins are produced, and these are granzymes that destroy its nucleus. A natural killer is special; it’s one of the most powerful antitumor cells. It recognizes any atypical cells that aren’t recognized by macrophages and CTLs.

In patients with benign tumors (fibroids, mastopathy, and prostate adenoma), all three types of cells are in their suppressed state: most of them are young and immature elements incapable of vigorous actions. Moreover, their maturation rate is extremely low. The lifespan of these cells is short. Most importantly, their antitumor activity is low. Perhaps, a combination of these factors leads to the destruction of the body’s antitumor shield. What is the mechanism of the antitumor fasting action? Fasting brings on powerful body detoxification, and it contributes to the accelerated maturation of natural killers. As a result, there are a large number of their mature and combat-ready forms. The lifespan of macrophages, CTLs, and NK cells is also multiplied several-fold.

The most important is the activation of macrophages, CTLs and NK cells, after which they not only become capable of destroying atypical malignant cells, but also manifest great cytotoxic activity towards any altered cells. There is an increase in the necrosis of tumors and interleukins. Since phagocytes are left without nutrition, they start carrying out their direct duties: they capture and digest bacteria, viruses, cell debris, and old and dying cells (thus contributing to bodily renewal and even rejuvenation). All the altered and even cancerous cells that are normally present in the body are digested.

We all know that pathologically changed body cells, including cancer cells, start dying at high temperatures. During dry fasting, the body temperature rises. That’s why all metabolic processes in the body are accelerated. Therefore, even cancer cells are destroyed faster, as they completely suspend their vital functions.

    Recently, I’ve learned another anti-tumor mechanisms. A professional gynecologist came to us for treatment along with her friend. Her friend was diagnosed with very large uterine fibroids. After dry fractional fasting, her friend got an ultrasound scan when they returned home. The tumor has significantly decreased. As the doctor told me, the most important thing during the examination was that the blood supply to the tumor was interrupted, which also lead to its reduction. A tumor can’t exceed the size of a pinhead unless it obtains an independent blood supply source. Angiogenesis provides it with the oxygen and nutrients necessary for its growth and spreading.

During dry fasting, the blood thickens, especially in pathologically changed tissues, the growth of blood vessels in the tumor is suppressed, and the blood supply and its nutrition deteriorate. Consequently, tumor growth is inhibited. When the blood supply is disturbed, especially in large nodes, they degenerate; the affected area has a soft gelatinous texture. Their further degeneration can lead to the complete disappearance of pathologically changed nodes.

According to a number of researchers, the malignant cells fed by surrounding tissues often die under conditions of limiting nutrients in the body on purpose (fasting). It’s well known that malignant cells require significant amounts of nutrients due to their rapid growth, and they exceed the needs of normal cells several times. Obesity and unhealthy diets seem to increase the risk of cancer.

It has been established that it’s impossible to induce the development of malignant tumors with the help of carcinogens in hibernating animals during the hibernation period, though this goal is easily accomplished in their waking state. Besides, tumor degradation is noted in hibernating animals during their hibernation period if the tumor was present in their waking state.

In 1938, American pathologists Fay and Smith[29] offered a method of treating malignant tumors in humans with the help of artificial hibernation caused by cold for the first time in world practice.

Clinical trials were conducted on 38 patients suffering from common malignant tumors with metastases, including brain metastases, and many patients were able to relieve the pain only with large doses of morphine.

After being given sleeping pills, the naked patients were covered from all sides with rubber pads filled with ice, and their body temperature has been maintained in the range of 32.2-29.4°C for 5 days. The temperature dropped to 27.7°C in one case, but without any consequences. During the hibernation period, patients didn’t urinate or defecate, their respiratory and cardiac activities practically stopped, and they were unconscious. Subsequently, the patients were awakened, warmed up, and given strong hot coffee. 2-4 days later, hibernation was induced again. In total, each patient had hibernated for about 40 days. Patients didn’t remember anything about their hibernation. After awakening, they didn’t experience any unpleasant sensations. On the contrary, the pain caused by their tumors diminished or completely disappeared, and their overall condition improved. Patients experienced weight gain and increased appetite. In the cases where the brain was affected by metastases, there was an improvement in mental activity. A significant decrease in the size of the tumors (sometimes up to 50%) and a delay in relapse were also observed. The rate of tumor growth during relapses was significantly reduced.

Whenever possible, the authors of this method took biopsies of tumors prior to patients’ exposure to hibernation, during their hibernation, and following it. The comparison of the results of two biopsies demonstrated clear changes in the treatment process. For instance, blood vessels in the tumors narrowed down and disappeared. After being affected by the cold for 48 hours, tumor cells stained poorly, they swelled, and the protoplasm was granulated. Destructive changes were also observed in the chromaffin apparatus. However, as the authors of this method determined, all of these changes in tumors were not permanent, with the exception of two cases where tumors and metastases disappeared completely in two women with breast cancer.

Fay and Smith attributed the observed changes in malignant tumors to their direct exposure to cold, but the current data on hypobiosis may change this point of view. Cold is only one way of introducing a person into the state of hypobiosis, but it may be different, and changes in tumor tissues were caused by hypobiosis or the deep body disintegration to the cell level, which occurs during hypobiosis.

Day 9. Based on my practice, I consider this day to be one of the most important for treatment.

If you reach this stage, try to put all of your efforts, patience, and will into going through it. During this period, your body temperature may rise and you may experience headaches. Patients often want to douse themselves with cold water. As I mentioned, if you enjoy it, it’s allowed. The most interesting thing is that the whole body burns, but legs and arms are cold, even in the summer. Your heart rate can increase significantly, which is a reaction to a fever. This day can be considered a real crisis aimed at treating and rejuvenating the body. If you feel very weak, it’s best to lie down in a cool place, preferably near the river. Silence is very important on this day. Time will pass very slowly, so it’s advisable to engage in some sort of activity. The most important thing is to understand that there are only a few hours left, but they mean a lot to the treatment of your body. You can engage in massage if you want, but if you don’t feel the desire to do it, it’s best not to. Weight loss approximates 1-1.5 kg.

This stage of fasting has a very powerful anti-aging effect. Why is the body rejuvenated?

Dry fasting leads to more powerful body rejuvenation than other types of fasting because sick, altered, and weak cells can’t withstand extreme and harsh conditions. They die and disintegrate. Which ones are preserved? They are cells with a proper structure, and efficient and wise genetics. They are the ones that didn’t panic, survived and remained active.

Thus, fasting helps to get rid of useless, weak, sick, and harmful cells, and they’re eliminated from the body. These cells are parasites. They don’t perform their functions, work, and duties. It’s best for you to get rid of them in time, rather than let them die naturally, since they can only recreate the same lifeless and inefficient progeny. Cells divide by multiplying. Their progeny can’t surpass them in quality. Only strong cells survive fasting. They divide and quality is improved. Their substitutes will have the properties of parent cells. When cells exist in comfortable conditions, they get used to a constant level and volume of incoming nutrition and liquid. They lose the ability to effectively upgrade and recover. Cells seem to be too lazy to launch the tissue self-renewal mechanisms. As soon as the supply of nutrition and liquid to the gastrointestinal tract stops, fundamentally new conditions of existence are created in the body.

During dry fasting, old biomolecules are “destroyed,” unstable cells die and disintegrate (compensating the deficit of energy and nutrients). At the same time, new cells, capable of surviving in altered conditions, are synthesized. This mechanism explains the fact that the stomach can even digest nails after dry fasting.

Nowadays, it’s no secret to anyone that therapeutic fasting results not only in a general invigorating effect, but also in positive sexual changes in both men and women. In male patients, sexual attraction to the opposite sex increases; erection and the quality of seminal fluid improve. It’s no wonder men in many cultures underwent a fasting treatment course before conception to get strong and healthy offspring. In female patients, libido increases along with the sensitivity of erogenous zones. It’s possible to eradicate menstrual irregularities and menopausal symptoms and improve the ability to conceive and bear children.

These changes are primarily associated with the therapeutic effects of fasting on all organs and systems. After all, our sexual health is directly dependent on the overall condition of the body, and any problems in this sphere are associated primarily with its malfunctioning. During fasting, all organs and systems are detoxified, cell nutrition improves throughout the body, and the quality of biosynthesis is enhanced. Endocrine glands begin to function better, and hormonal balance improves. Fasting leads to rejuvenation.

Besides, the experiments of S.A. Arekalyan showed an improvement in the reproductive functions of animals during apportioned fasting. The same changes occur in humans. Fasting brings your body state closer to that of a young person, and the distinctive feature of youth is the increased attraction to the opposite sex. Long-term fasting has the greatest impact on the sexual system, which leads to deeper detoxification and renewal of the body, though short-term fasting also has this positive effect (fasting until a crisis, mid-length fasting).

Inadequate intake of nutrients by the body and their subsequently limited delivery to cells prolong their life by activating intracellular autophagy - splitting and processing damaged mitochondria and other cellular structures, which can later be used as new cellular material for vital functions. In turn, young cells have the ability to quickly process damaged structures remaining from the old cells and use them to build new organelles or replenish energy.

Unfortunately, as cells age, they lose this ability, which leads to the accumulation of damaged organelles and aging of the entire body. The experiments on animals carried out by scientists prove that fasting increases the ability of heart muscle cells to self-detox in old animals up to 120%, and it barely affects the state of cells in young animals.

The resistance of microorganisms and plants to the effects of harsh external factors (high and low temperatures, droughts, etc.), which make them fall into a state of rest or anabiosis, should be considered a protective mechanism developed during a long evolutionary process. Ironically, the most effective methods from the variety of tested and identified means of prolonging life turned out to be the simplest ones: a body temperature drop in cold-blooded organisms, fasting and low-calorie diets in warm-blooded animals.

These simple methods can lead to a two-or three-fold increase in life expectancy. All the data suggest that with aging or diseases, the most important body systems, including regulatory ones, have to be kept clean to allow them to function normally. The increase in human life expectancy brought on by periodic dry fasting or low-calorie diets is similar to a prolongation of life in animals achieved by hibernation when the body nourishes itself with its own reserves at low body temperature. It’s established that the higher the total duration of hibernation in animals (during their whole life), the longer their life expectancy – both the whole life and the part that they spend in their waking state.

After mastering the method of placing people in anabiosis (hibernation) artificially, it’s possible to obtain powerful means to fight the most severe pathological conditions and diseases, many of which are difficult or simply impossible to cure now.

I believe that any type of fasting is one of the most affordable methods of preventing diseases and maintaining your health. It’s important to understand that you can’t stay completely healthy only by fasting, but it can significantly reduce the likelihood of diseases. Therefore, the best option is preventative fasting along with proper nutrition and regular exercises.

17. Dry fractional fasting. Who do we recommend it to?

In my practice, there were patients who underwent 11-day, 12-day, and even 13-day dry fasting treatments. Of course, this is a “between life and death” option, since it’s recommended to patients with serious pathologies after undergoing powerful medical therapy. Besides, their vital energy was lowered. Therefore, taking into account our experience and mistakes, we developed a milder and more physiologically suitable method, namely, dry fractional fasting, which has the same effectiveness as long-term dry fasting.

The essence of this method is that it stipulates for several (usually two or three) consecutive dry fasting courses (fractions). The first one lasts 5-7 days, the second one lasts 7-9 days, and the third one lasts 9 days. Restorative nutrition is carried out according to a special method between these courses.

The first part of fasting is detoxing, and it lasts as long as the patient can withstand; one may swim in waterfalls and mountain rivers during this period for better body detox. The first acidotic crisis occurs during the first fasting course. It’s characterized by effective body detox, and patients realize what it is. Following the crisis, they come out of fasting through a special course of Altai herbal medicine that provide the body with a lot of energy.

The second dry fasting course is curative. It should last as long as possible to go through the most curative acidotic crisis (the second one). The second fasting course is much easier than the first one, both physically and psychologically.

Sometimes, a third (final) dry fasting course is required for patients with very serious diseases.

The most important thing is that every fasting course entails an increasingly faster transition to endogenous nutrition and high-quality biosynthesis. The fractional method is good because it doesn’t allow obese people to gain weight. Weight is lost progressively. As a result, obese people not only lose their weight, but it also drops 2-3 kg below the norm. It activates their bodies in a very powerful manner, and they don’t gain weight subsequently, rather, it stays at the same level. Besides, excessive fat cells die, which means that their number is reduced. Therefore, fat cells gain their content during restorative nutrition, but their number is lower, and patients don’t feel weak. Fat cells only begin to be destroyed following an acidotic crisis. After a full fractional fasting course, the number of fat cells in the body is normalized. There are as many of them, as at a young age, and patients look slim and youthful. The destruction of fat cells is possible only during fasting. All kinds of diets only deplete fat cells. As soon as people start eating normally, they quickly recover, and patients gain weight again.

Fractional fasting is very effective in treating obesity. This pendulum-like fasting cycle makes it possible to improve the reserve defenses of the body and its detoxification increasingly more with each fasting course. How does the effect increase during fractional fasting? An additional benefit of this method is that we gave the cell a chance to detox, restored the functionality, memory capacity, and cell energy potential after the first detox stage, and then the second fasting course provides it with the opportunity to complete the started process - to find and fix whatever was missed. It’s just like switching on the super-compensation mechanism in detoxification through fasting. Everything that was overlooked to an extent is fully detoxed. It turns out that the body approaches new positive stresses with increased readiness each time. In this method, one fasting course is followed by another, and the therapeutic effect is increased.

This is the main difference from dry fasting according to L.A. Shchennikov: he conducts dry fasting for a maximum duration of 9, 10, 11 days at once.

Cascade fasting by V.P. Lavrova. Patients undergo dry fasting courses, with equal periods of fasting and non-fasting, in cascades (one/one, two/two, five/five). This fasting method is very effective, but it must be conducted for a very long time to reach the second therapeutic acidotic crisis. In our method, the duration of dry fasting increases with every cycle, so the second acidotic crisis occurs in a shorter period of time. I really like this method as it has powerful healing potential, and the effects of rejuvenation and weight loss are quite evident. Most importantly, patients undergo it with much greater ease, and there are almost no complications. Ideally, you can try this method after preparing for fasting (healthy nutrition, bowel and liver detox, water fasting, 5-day dry fasting course). Undergo a 7-day dry fasting course followed by 2-3 weeks of coming out of fasting, and then a 9-day dry fasting course. If problems remain, you will need 1 month to withdraw from it before another 9-day dry fasting course.

18. How to come out of a 9-day dry fasting course?

You need to prepare Bolotov's whey (see above) and meltwater to properly come out of a 9-day dry fasting course.

How to prepare meltwater

- Water preserves its acquired structure for several hours, although it loses it when heated. However, water that has just melted has the greatest biological power (when there are still pieces of ice in it).

- The easiest method makes it possible to completely remove deuterium. When water starts freezing, remove the newly formed crust of ice. It’s deuterium that freezes first. When the main part of water freezes, rinse the frozen piece with cold tap water. It should become transparent, as the water will remove harmful impurities from the ice. Next, melt the ice and drink the meltwater you prepared.

- The second method. Heat a small amount of liquid to 94-96C. Water shouldn’t boil, but only start bubbling. At this point, remove the pan and cool it down rapidly, then freeze and melt the water. The meltwater prepared this way goes through all the phases of its circulation in nature: evaporating, cooling, freezing, and melting. This kind of water is especially useful as it has tremendous internal energy potential.

- The third method. Water is cooled in the refrigerator until the first ice appears (if it’s tap water, let is stand for a few hours to get rid of dissolved gases). Throw this ice away, as it contains the impurities that prefer the solid state. The remaining water is further frozen until most of it turns into ice (but not all of it). This ice is taken out and used for its intended purpose. The remaining liquid is poured out as it contains the impurities that prefer the liquid state. You will lose about 5% at the beginning and 10% in the end.

- Dew water. If you put sprouted wheat in meltwater for a day (3 tablespoons per liter), you will get dew water. Its composition is very close to that of natural dew. This water is considered the most beneficial for the body. It perfectly detoxifies and charges body cells. It’s better to use it when coming out of dry fasting.

Follow these important rules when coming out of fasting:

- Come out of a fast for as many days as you fast. One day of dry fasting is equivalent to three days of water fasting. Thus, if your dry fasting course lasts for 9 days, you need to come out of it for 30 days or a whole month!

- First and foremost, drink water. It’s best to use dew, spring, or meltwater. The way you drink matters: you must add three capsules of "LINEX" or, better yet, Bolotov's whey (serum) to the first glass of water. Drink it over the course of fifteen minutes. Most importantly, do it slowly, sip by sip, so that you make your last sip in the fourteenth minute. Don’t drink a glass of water in ten minutes or less, as it’s very risky. The water consumption systems may not cope with it, so you may faint or face other harsh consequences. Drink eight glasses of water this way within six-eight hours, and then you can brush your teeth. In very rare cases, the first sip of water can cause nausea. In this case, hold every sip of water in the mouth, mixing it with saliva, and then swallow it 20-30 seconds later.

- You can combine drinking water with taking a shower. After a shower, douse yourself with cold water, and then take a warm (not hot) bath with herbal infusions (no longer than 8 minutes). At the same time, you should keep drinking water for 12 hours.

- Ideally, it’s best to start coming out of a dry fast with Bolotov's whey (serum). Put 1 tablespoon of it in a glass of water, and it will perfectly restore your intestinal microflora.

- If you don’t feel the taste of food while chewing or if it tastes like cotton, it means that your stomach isn’t ready to digest it. You don’t need this food, so wait for a few days before trying it again.

- If you feel discomfort during or after eating – stomach pain, dry mouth, or reluctance to keep eating it – stop eating this food. It means that it’s harmful, and don’t feel sorry for the money spent on this food because your health is more important.

- You can gradually consume bees’ waste products, honey and pollen from the 2nd day on. Food should be varied and full of vitamins, micro and macro elements. During the first five days of coming out of a dry fast, you should eat only fresh, clean, and high-quality food products. Don’t eat sugar and sugar-containing canned products. It’s better to drink juices and eat fruit throughout this period, so that the body keeps detoxing.

- You can start adding salt to your food on the 4th day of coming out of fasting, and it’s best to use rock or sea salt. Do it very gradually, use the tip of a knife.

- When coming out of a fast, it’s important to drink Java tea for a month to help your kidneys function, due to the heavy burden on them. In the summer or autumn, you can eat watermelons, which is the perfect way to break a fast.

- Be prepared for mild numbness in your toes and fingers while coming out of a fast. This symptom will pass with time. Your vision may also be altered, but these changes will also pass. If you have dry skin, it can become drier and may peel off while fasting. The skin on your face and nose may crack. Apply different fruit masks for significant skin improvement.

- When coming out of a fast, please use cupping and honey massage for faster body detox and improved lymphatic drainage.

- When coming out of a fast, you need to stay away from drafts and cold weather, especially during the first days. This is when the immune system is reset to neutralize food and water, so the body is weakened. When the body is reset, the immunity will be even stronger than it was prior to the fast.

Coming out of fast. Methodology

The 1st day:

• 8 am - Drink high-quality hot meltwater, add 1 tablespoon of Bolotov's whey or lactic acid bacteria preparations to the first glass of water. Drink it over the course of fifteen minutes. Do it slowly, sip by sip, so that you make your last sip in the fourteenth minute. Don’t drink a glass of water in ten minutes or less, as it’s very risky. Drink eight glasses of water this way within six-eight hours, and then you can brush your teeth.

• 2 pm – Drink dried apricot, prune, and raisin compote - 1000

• 7 pm – Drink vegetable broth (cabbage, carrots, beets, onions, potatoes, dill, parsley) - 200

• 10 pm – Drink herbal Java tea or compote - 200

The 2nd day:

• 8 am – Drink herbal Java tea with honey or compote - 200

• 11 am – Eat buckwheat soup – 250; starting on the second day, eat one raw quail egg 3 times a day on an empty stomach during the whole period of coming out of a fast (don’t be afraid because quails don’t carry salmonellosis). This is required because quail eggs contain the entire periodic table elements, including natural stem cells, which are so essential and important for the body after dry fasting. Women can apply facial masks: mix quail eggs with cedar oil, apply this mixture for 20 minutes overnight. Eat pollen and royal jelly during the entire period of coming out of a fast (put 1 teaspoon under the tongue on an empty stomach in the morning).

• 2 pm – Eat vegetable soup (cabbage, carrots, beets, onions, potatoes, dill, parsley) – 200

• 7 pm – Eat rice soup - 200

• 10 pm – Drink compote and herbal Java tea with honey - 200

The 3rd day:

• 8 am – Eat a fresh cabbage salad - 200, drink fermented milk 200

• 2 pm – Eat fish soup (from greenling, salmon, humpback salmon), drink tea, compote, kefir, eat honey

• 6 pm – Eat boiled beets, cereals, drink tea, compote, or kefir

• 10 pm – Drink herbal tea with honey

The 4th day:

• 8 am – Drink fresh juice, eat salads or cereals

• 12 am – Eat buckwheat porridge 200, a vegetable salad

• 3 pm – Eat a fresh cabbage salad - 100, fish soup, drink fermented milk 100

• 6 pm – Eat vegetable soup - 200, drink fresh juice

• 9 pm – Drink fermented milk 200, eat any cereal

The 5th day:

• 8 am – Eat oatmeal with dried apricots - 150, drink green tea - 100

• 1 pm – Eat steamed vegetables (carrots, beets, cabbage) - 150, drink fresh juice - 200

• 5 pm – Eat soup (carrots, beets, cabbage, dark bread crackers or bran sticks), 1 apple, drink herbal tea with honey

• 9 pm – Drink fermented milk 200, eat fresh fruits

The 6th day:

• 8 am – Eat raw grated vegetables or fruits 250

• 1 pm – Eat a vegetable salad and a vegetable soup with a piece of bread or porridge with a teaspoon of oil. Drink fresh juice - 250

• 5 pm – Eat soup (carrots, beets, cabbage, dark bread crackers or bran sticks), 1 apple, drink herbal tea with honey

• 9 pm – Drink fermented milk-  200, eat fresh fruits

The 7th day:

• 8 am – Eat raw grated vegetables or fruits - 250

• 1 pm – Eat 200g of lean fish cooked in any way, except for frying. Combine it with a green salad. Drink fresh Juice - 200

• 5 pm – Eat borscht - 250, 1 apple, drink herbal tea with honey 200

• 9 pm - Drink fermented milk - 200, eat fresh fruit

The 8th day:

• 8 am – Eat fruit, drink herbal tea with honey - 200

• 1 pm – Eat fish baked in foil, a vegetable salad - 200, drink dry red wine half diluted with boiling water - 200

• 5 pm – Eat borscht - 250, 1 apple, drink herbal tea with honey - 200

• 9 pm – Drink fermented milk - 200, eat fresh fruits

The 9th day:

• 8 am – Eat raw grated vegetables or fruits - 250

• 1 pm – Eat fish soup, a vegetable salad - 200, drink dry red wine half diluted with boiling water - 200

• 5 pm – Eat borscht 250, 1 apple, drink herbal tea with honey - 200

• 9 pm – Drink fermented milk - 200, eat fresh fruit

A nutritional program for coming out of a fast

After fasting, you can normalize digestion easily and quickly.

- Make it a rule not to eat after 7 pm. If you follow it, you will sleep well at night and feel fresh in the morning. Your body will self-detox and your fat content will be balanced.

- Eat breakfast anytime between 8-10 am (earlier if possible). Eat fresh vegetable salads; include carrots, cabbage, and greens (braised vegetables in the winter). Bread from sprouted grains with honey or seaweed or porridge with a drop of oil will be your main course. Together with cabbage, carrots, and greens, they will stimulate your digestive tract functioning and healthy microflora; restore endocrine system functioning through feedback. Eat a salad first. It will activate a number of processes that underlie the normal functioning of the body. For example, it stimulates the secretion of digestive juices, because raw vegetables are rich in natural stimulants. After a few years of this type of nutrition, you will feel that your body prefers this food. As a result, fresh vegetables and fruits can constitute 60% of your daily diet. Fresh vegetables, fruits, and juices are rich in energy and vitality.

- People who are prone to obesity should avoid eating sugar, bread, and cereals or eat them in minimal quantities, though porridge must be fresh. It’s absolutely necessary to chew them carefully. When eating fast, a person eats 3-5 times more porridge than necessary. It leads to obesity. If you eat a small amount of it, chewing it to the state of milk (according to H. Fletcher), you’ll get rid of constipation, improve bowel movement (it accelerates four times while chewing), and eliminate congestion in the gastrointestinal tract.

- For very effective body detox, take Zalmanov’s mixed turpentine baths when coming out of a fast. A full course consists of ten baths.

19. What diseases can be cured through dry fasting?

19.1. Dry fasting for acute diseases.

First of all, let’s clarify what a disease is. Let’s call a disease a certain temporary state of the body, during which it goes from its stable state (health) of functioning into another (unhealthy) state, which is not characteristic of it. The body unbalanced by a disease puts efforts (therefore, vitality and energy) to return to its original (healthy) state. An acute disease is a time period when the body tries to restore its former (healthy) state by activating vital forces and wasting energy. The signs of an acute disease (such as a fever, loss of appetite, and fatigue) indicate the following:

- A fever indicates that the vital force is activated and the body is getting rid of the cause of the disease through sweating;

- Loss of appetite indicates that the vital force is being preserved because it is no longer spent on digestion;

- Fatigue indicates that the vital force is being preserved because it is no longer spent on physical and secondary functional body activities.

Patients fully recover from an acute condition if they have an adequate supply of vital force and when they preserve it by refusing to eat food and stay inactive. The intake of any medications and antifebrile drugs isn’t recommended. On the contrary, they stop, suppress, and harm this process. True doctors of antiquity and modern physicians did everything possible to make this natural process easier.

Don’t think that fasting should be used only for serious conditions and you can keep eating as long as the body can digest food. On the contrary, skipping a few meals at the onset of the disease is often sufficient to prevent a serious condition. If functional disorders are still insignificant, as indicated by a coated tongue, headache, feeling generally unwell, and other equally minor symptoms, short-term fasting is enough for the body to eliminate intoxication before developing a serious condition.

If a person undergoes fasting in a calm setting at the first signs of the disease, acute diseases will be mild and short-term in most cases. A patient feels less discomfort, pain is weaker, there’s no fever, weight loss is smaller, complications that follow the disease are rare, and its duration is much shorter than in patients who keep eating when they’re sick. There’s only one conclusion - as soon as you have the symptoms of an acute condition, such as a loss of appetite and high fever, start fasting at once, and you will recover quickly and without complications.

19.1.1. Fasting for acute infections (acute respiratory diseases, influenza)

Fasting is common and natural if you have any viral infection.

In fact, any acute infection manifested by inflammatory changes in the upper respiratory tract, runny nose, cough, sore throat, and fever is a detoxifying crisis. With its help, the body is trying to get rid of excessive nutrition and escape from overload, stress, and other adverse factors. The effectiveness of dry fasting is very high. Any inflammatory disease is treated 2-3 times faster than with normal water fasting.

Please be aware that inflammation can’t exist without liquid. Any inflamed area swells (swells with liquid). Microorganisms, such as microbes and viruses, can multiply only in sufficiently humid conditions. Water deficiency is extremely harmful for inflammation. The human body can withstand 10-day water deprivation (with low activity and high air temperature). Microbes die instantly without water.

Oddly enough, the body can synthesize water itself. It receives oxygen from the air and hydrogen from fatty tissues. Therefore, weight loss can reach 3 kg per day during dry fasting, but only at the expense of water. I must say that the body also has certain water reserves. Up to 2 liters of water is deposited just in the skin. There are water reserves in some body cavities (serous cavities) and internal organs. At the very least, the body can always withstand 5 days, even with an active lifestyle.

As I said, the effectiveness of dry fasting treatment is 2-3 times higher than that of water fasting. Acute respiratory diseases can be cured in just one day, influenza in 2-3 days, and pneumonia in 4-5 days. Of course, dry fasting is subjectively rather difficult and is accompanied by weakness. However, I met people who hadn’t felt weak during dry fasting, and even experienced mild euphoria.

Sometimes, we are in certain conditions that leave almost no time for normal treatment and even regular fasting. You can try dry fasting without cleansing the intestines during flights, trips with transfers, or in complicated conditions when it’s impossible to prepare properly. Subjectively, this type of fasting is tolerated with more difficulty, but its anti-inflammatory effect will be exactly the same. Since the treatment won’t take a lot of time due to its high effectiveness, the recovery period will also be short. Short-term therapeutic fasting, both water and dry, can be successfully used not only in treating colds but also in all cases of inflammation in any internal or external organs.

Fasting is equally effective for treating skin blotches and liver inflammation (hepatitis), inner ear inflammation and periostitis. Regardless of the location of the inflammation, the effect is always very good.

How to cure acute respiratory diseases in the shortest time possible? I really don’t know a more effective method than short-term fasting. Sometimes, sick people start fasting after stepping on the airplane ramp and they come off the plane completely healthy, thanks to short-term fasting.

Performance impairment is not the most important harmful effect caused by catarrhal diseases. On the average, only acute respiratory diseases take 25 years of our life. Pneumonia is the most common complication of influenza. As a rule, it’s a secondary bacterial infection. A combined infection (viral and bacterial pneumonia) develops more rarely. Primary viral pneumonia is a rare complication characterized by a high mortality rate. It develops when influenza is caused by a virus of the highest virulence. At the same time, rapid and deadly hemorrhagic pneumonia develops, lasting no longer than 3-4 days. True and primary influenza pneumonia primarily affects patients with chronic heart and lung conditions accompanied by pulmonary engorgement. Other secondary bacterial infections that often develop following influenza include rhinitis, sinusitis, bronchitis, and otitis. Influenza and acute respiratory viral infections are in the first place in the frequency and number of cases in the world, and they constitute 95% of all infectious diseases. Every year, up to 500 million people in the world get sick, and 2 million of them die.

So, you caught a cold at the wrong moment. Let's be realistic and try to determine your condition at once because it largely depends on the type of infection. If you have a simple acute respiratory disease, 1-2 days will be enough to cure you. If you have influenza, the case is more serious, and you will need at least 3 days to get better. If you’re unfortunate enough to get pneumonia, I saw only one patient who treated this disease in just 4 days of fasting.

There are more than 140 causative agents of acute respiratory diseases and only a few influenza viruses (different strains).

How to distinguish an acute respiratory disease from influenza? An acute respiratory disease is usually characterized by a mild fever (38°). Body temperature is usually about 37.5°-37.8°C. This disease lasts for no longer than 2 weeks if it’s not treated. Influenza is more serious. It’s considered a serious infectious disease characterized by a high fever (above 38°C) and it lasts over 3 weeks. Only your doctor can diagnose pneumonia, since the respiratory sounds and noises during chest auscultation (examination) are very specific. If you suddenly feel sick and have a sore throat and runny nose, start fasting immediately without delaying it even for an hour. Viruses are very tricky. They used to have a cellular structure in the past, but then they acquired a simpler structure in the process of evolution. A virus is just a DNA chain (there are also RNA-containing viruses) surrounded by a shell that makes it much easier for it to survive. A virus secretes special enzymes that dissolve the nasal mucosa and penetrates it. After penetrating the mucous membrane, a virus inserts its DNA into the mucosal DNA. As a result, the previously normal cell starts synthesizing viral DNA instead of its own DNA. In the end, it dies and a large number of viruses are produced and penetrate other cells.

The reaction develops like an avalanche, and it is very fast. Therefore, it’s necessary to start treatment without delaying it for a day or even for an hour. Dead cells secrete biologically active substances or BASs. Together with viral toxins, biologically active substances cause the inflammation that loosens cell membranes and contributes to the further and more rapid spread of viruses. After affecting the nasal cavity and the development of such unpleasant symptoms as runny nose and sneezing, trachea and bronchi are affected and such symptoms as cough, chest pain, and others develop. Initially, inflammation is viral, but then bacteria start multiplying in inflamed tissues. Under normal conditions, they’re incapable of parasitizing inside the body, which is why they are called conditionally pathogenic. In this case, after getting to the tissues weakened by a virus, they develop vigorously, just like viruses. Microbial inflammation starts dominating a virus at some point, and it lasts for a long time after viruses are eliminated from the body.

An acute respiratory disease causes so much stress to the body that microbleeds remain in the brain even after a complete recovery. That's what an acute respiratory disease is, although it seems harmless at first glance. Dry fasting is definitely an invaluable help in treatment. The combination of fasting with an acute infection helps the body to detox quickly and rest from the damaging effects of external factors.

The best option is to start fasting after the first signs of disease appear. If you feel even mild symptoms of a disease, stop eating and drinking at once. In this case, 1-3 days will be sufficient for you to eliminate it.

In reality, there are only a few people who are this attentive to their health. Therefore, most patients undergo fasting only when they encounter severe signs of respiratory infection, so treatment requires more time.

They'll have to fast for at least 5-7 days, which makes it pre-crisis fasting. It’s better not to overwork and avoid hydrotherapeutic procedures, enemas, and drugs. The best option is bed rest with gradual expansion as you begin to feel better. The crisis occurs sooner if you have acute infections (in most cases, on the 2-3rd day), but you need to fast until the symptoms of the disease disappear. Otherwise, you may need a prolonged treatment course. The body temperature is normalized in the first two days of illness. Instead of antifebrile drugs, you can apply cold water compresses to your head and great vessels (your groin and axillary cavities) and wrap your body in wet cloth.

When I’ve only started my work on dry fasting, I fell through ice while fishing on Baikal. It was -30 degrees Celsius, and I had to ride a motorcycle for about twenty kilometers. After this bath, I started having terrible pains in my forehead. The X-ray confirmed that I had acute frontal sinusitis. I couldn’t even lower my head due to the pain, and I had a fever (38°). It’s obvious that I didn’t have any appetite at all. I understood that liquid is always connected with swelling and inflammation, so I also stopped drinking water. My body temperature was normal on the third day, pain in my forehead was relieved on the fifth day, and I came out of fasting on the sixth day. The frontal sinusitis was no longer present, and I underwent dry fasting whenever I contracted influenza or acute respiratory disease. I’ve had no influenza or acute respiratory diseases for ten years.

In the past, when I got sick, I immediately underwent dry fasting for two or three days until all the symptoms of the disease disappeared, but these terms were usually sufficient. My immune system seems to be so well trained that I don’t get sick in the midst of any epidemic, and neither do my patients who underwent a dry therapeutic fasting course and no longer contract any respiratory diseases.

19.1.2. Dry fasting for the relapse of gastric ulcer or duodenal ulcer, chronic pancreatitis, cholecystitis, colitis, etc.

What causes this therapeutic effect?

- Inflammation can’t exist without liquid. Any inflamed area swells (swells with liquid). Microorganisms, such as microbes and viruses, can multiply only in sufficiently humid conditions. Shortage of water is extremely harmful for inflammation. It’s worth mentioning that, according to modern data, the cause of ulcers is infectious.

- Of course, the gastrointestinal tract has more rest than other organs during fasting. As it has been said, no food means no problems. There’s no need to excrete digestive juices, push food through all the sections of the intestines, spend a lot of energy on this process, neutralize, and excrete all of those substances that enter the body with food. Now, all the forces can be used to recover, including the restoration of the organs involved in digestion.

- During fasting, the gastric and duodenal mucosa is balanced and restored. It’s manifested through a decrease or complete disap-pearance of such symptoms as pain, nausea, heartburn, and vomiting. New ulcers are cicatrized and cicatricial changes in gastric and duodenal walls disappear. As mentioned above, experts from the Moscow Institute of Gastroenterology found that new stomach cells with light protoplasm appear in patients after a 28-day calorie restriction diet, and these are gradually transformed into mucoid cells within 20-30 days after the completion of diet-fasting therapy RDT[30]. These cells secrete mucus and substances that protect the stomach from damage. After repeated RDT courses, the stomach becomes very strong and capable of digesting any food even in patients with gastro-intestinal problems.

- Fasting greatly improves liver function. It causes a mild choleretic effect and restores liver cells. Patients with gallstone disease instinctively resort to fasting, which relieves pain and normalizes liver and gall bladder function. The liver is detoxified naturally: unwanted products are removed and stones are dissolved.

- Good results are achieved when treating a disease as grave as acute pancreatitis. 275 patients with acute pancreatitis underwent fasting treatment under the surveillance of Academician A.N. Bakulev in the Spasokukotsky clinic in mid-1950s. All of them were discharged in good condition. Based on this experience, it was concluded that fasting is beneficial in pancreatitis treatment, and our method is now widely used for its acute and chronic forms. 10–15 days of water fasting or 4–5 days of dry fasting are usually sufficient for a good therapeutic effect. The main principle of treating pancreatitis is relieving pain, shock and collapse, and ensuring the functional rest of the pancreas and its detox.

- There’s no other method besides fasting that almost entirely relieves the burden on the digestive tract. Thus, it’s no wonder that it’s so effective in treating different gastrointestinal disorders. We can only wonder at the ignorance of our medicine, which uses expensive medications, long-term examinations, and surgical procedures (instead of effective, fast, cheap treatment) that not only fail to cure patients but also turn them into people with chronic diseases who are disabled and constantly require medical services. That’s why you should be responsible for your health and start fasting to restore your appetite, excellent digestion, and healthy and regular stool.

19.1.3. Dry fasting for diabetes

In my practice, there were only a few patients with diabetes, because water fasting is very effective for patients with type II diabetes. This is what Dr. G.A. Voitovich, one of the therapeutic fasting experts, writes on the topic, “Since diabetes is a disease with origins in the nervous and endocrine systems, its treatment with dosed fasting is sure to bring positive results too – it’s our conclusion.

Moreover, we learned from foreign sources that doctors in the West, Japan, and especially in India have long considered diabetes to be one of the diseases treatable with fasting. However, in practice we rarely treated this disease in our department.

We started studying this subject more closely only after the all-USSR symposia on RDT when doctors from Armenia, Odessa, and other places reported on the successful treatment of even severe forms of diabetes with dosed fasting. We were particularly interested in the method used in Yerevan, where patients with severe diabetes, obesity, and gangrenous ulcers on their legs were treated with several 11-day RDT courses quite successfully while still taking hormonal medications, but at 5-10-times smaller doses.

Initially, we had only a few people with mild forms of diabetes who didn’t take insulin. During dosed fasting treatment, their blood sugar level dropped. During the recovery period, it increased again, but it didn’t go far beyond the norm. The general condition of these patients improved: weakness, itching, thirst, and increased appetite were eliminated. One patient with diabetes was cured completely at the initial stage, and has not relapsed for over 25 years.

Doctor G. Sarkisyan from the clinic of endocrine diseases in Yerevan conducted 2-3 fasting courses for 10-11 days in seriously ill patients. One patient was threatened with amputation because of foot gangrene. After two 11-day fasting courses, all the diabetic tests (sugar in the urine, sugar in the blood, etc.) improved considerably, gangrenous inflammation was relieved, amputation was no longer required, and the patient started to walk freely.

19.2. Dry Fasting for chronic diseases

Now, let’s try to find out what a chronic disease is in more detail.

If the vital force isn’t sufficient to fully recover the bodily function to its former (healthy) stable state, the body stabilizes its function in an intermediate state between being healthy and being sick. This intermediate state is called an indolent or chronic disease. A chronic disease is characterized by the fact that the pathogen remaining in the body wants to stay there and develop within it. In turn, the body wants to return to its original healthy state. In both cases, the body must use its vital force and adapt to functioning on the edge. It leads to activation of certain compensatory mechanisms, and the body of a chronically ill person keeps functioning in a more or less tolerable state as long as there is enough vital force to maintain them. As soon as the body can’t maintain the compensatory mechanisms that restrain a disease, there’s a new relapse of the disease and it conquers additional living space. In turn, the body keeps fighting it by forming new compensatory mechanisms, thus spending more vital force on their maintenance. As a result of the redistribution of vital force, the body disables a number of minor biological functions for the sake of survival. First of all, the sexual function is deactivated because it requires a lot of energy; the overall body tone decreases, there’s early aging with accompanying conditions, and the life expectancy decreases considerably.

Based on the above-mentioned facts, the process of healing the body is completed in stages. First, the level of vitality is restored through energy-saving mechanisms. It will transfer the body from one compensatory stage to another up to the last one (a state of complete health). The transition from one compensatory level to another will be marked by acute conditions: relapses of pre-existing chronic diseases that will eventually disappear. Every patient can get rid of any chronic disease completely only after going through a series of relapses. After every relapse, you will restore a previously lost function. At first, vigor will be restored, and then the signs of premature aging will disappear and the sexual function will be reestablished.

We’ve described what chronic diseases are in general. Based on my experience, I prefer the hypothesis of naturopathic physicians. Endogenous body intoxication is one of the causes of numerous chronic diseases, and it’s caused by a disruption in the normal functioning of the gastrointestinal tract and liver. The gastrointestinal tract is a common source of toxins. Food decomposes in the stomach and intestines because of either overeating or indigestion, and a certain part of the produced toxins is absorbed into the blood. Under normal conditions, the liver destroys these toxins, and the intestines and kidneys remove them. However, if the functions of these organs are disrupted, toxins enter the blood in such an amount that they overload these organs and the body is forced to look for some other way or method of getting rid of them. Have you ever wondered why the blood from the gastrointestinal tract must first pass through the liver before being distributed throughout the body? Why are nutrients that are absorbed into the bloodstream not spread throughout the body immediately? That appens because they are alien to the body and they would immediately cause an allergic reaction. They are transformed from ‘alien’ to ‘familiar’ in the liver. Only in this case can the body can use the nutrients obtained from food. Of course, body energy is spent on it. Therefore, any disorders or diseases of the gastrointestinal tract and liver will inevitably affect the effectiveness of the barrier gastrointestinal function in one way or another, even if they are asymptomatic. It’s clear that these changes will cause an increase in the supply of toxins from intestines, thus increasing endogenous intoxication. Of course, every person has a weak link in the body, so all the endotoxins will rush there, and all the pathological processes that lead to diseases will start there.

19.2.1. Dry Fasting for endointoxication and atherosclerosis.

Let’s examine this phenomenon using the example of atherosclerosis and hypertension.

Atherosclerosis is a consequence of malfunctioning intestines. After the age of 40, aging changes in intestines intensify, barrier function decreases, permeability of intestinal walls increases and more toxins start entering human blood. That’s why it seems that the body chooses a mechanism of storing toxins as one of the ways to fight the increasing endotoxemia. The main components of biological membranes (lipoproteins) circulating in the blood can become its participants. Lipoproteins can transfer different fat-soluble toxins to the liver, where they’re "recycled." Lipoproteins "capture" and dissolve toxins in themselves, thus binding them and making them safe for the body. However, the amount of toxins that the liver can metabolize is limited. When the body has a powerful and permanent locus of endotoxemia (and that’s exactly what happens if the barrier function of the intestines is impaired), the liver stops coping with its tasks. It simply doesn’t have enough time to process everything. As a result, the modified toxin-loaded lipoproteins circulate in the blood until they penetrate the artery walls. This is how atherosclerotic plaque formation starts. Since macrophages are attracted to them, we can assume that there’s a toxicogenic change in their structure. Of course, it’s just a hypothesis, although there is experimental evidence to support it. For example, animal experiments have shown that two- or three-time injection of intestinal flora’s bacterial toxins into the abdominal membrane causes sclerosis-like formations in arteries. It allows us to somehow understand the logic and biological meaning of atherosclerosis, though there are still many gaps in understanding the mechanisms of developing this disease. Why does it affect artery walls, not veins? Why does the body choose this inefficient way instead of improving detoxification processes? In general, when studying these and other processes in living organisms, we keep facing the logic of organ and body system adaptation to various harsh circumstances, as we still don’t understand it.

19.2.2. Dry Fasting for hypertension

Not only atherosclerosis, but also hypertension can be related to endointoxication processes. When we mentioned the development of atherosclerosis, we talked about the toxins that can only be dissolved in fats. However, there are also water-soluble endotoxins formed and stored in the body. In general, water is the main component of our liquid transport media (plasma, lymph, cerebrospinal fluid, tissue fluid). Water-soluble endotoxins will be primarily removed by kidneys.

Indeed, it’s very easy to transport them there in their free or bound form and remove them along with urine after their filtration through special nephritic membranes. Apparently, this is what happens in a healthy body. This mechanism of removing different endotoxins is confirmed by clinical observations of recent years. An increase in middle urine molecules in patients with mild or moderate endogenous intoxication and the development of different diseases prevents or weakens their accumulation in the blood. However, it was noted that a significant increase in endotoxins in the blood decreases the intensity of their excretion with the urine by the kidneys.

At first, these data caused some confusion. Why does the body reject such an effective detoxification method? Further experiments and studies allowed to partly shed light on the sequence of emergent events. A constant or sharp increase in the production of different endotoxins in the body leads to their accumulation in the structures of the kidney excretory system. The organ that is supposed to remove toxins becomes their target. Toxins have a destructive effect, kidneys start malfunctioning - the intensity of toxin elimination decreases. In our opinion, one of the signs of impaired detoxification, which is a kidney function, may be an increase in blood pressure.

Let’s explain that. As a special detoxification organ in the body, nephritic structures intensify the process of capturing toxins when endogenous intoxication increases, and these toxins can be partially stored on the filtration membrane and accumulate in the tubular epithelium. The kidney filtration membrane works almost like a standard filter. A negative charge on its surface is one of the most important conditions for the effective functioning of the kidney filter. This charge partially prevents blood plasma molecules from leaking through the filter, and they also carry a negative charge. These molecules primarily include blood proteins with a relatively low molecular weight, such as albumin. It prevents unnecessary protein loss in the body during urine formation. It’s interesting that under normal conditions the necessary blood molecules in humans are mainly negatively charged particles. In the presence of numerous endotoxins, especially medium molecular weight substances that carry a positive charge, filtration starts increasing. However, as the amount of excreted toxins increases, positively charged particles will accumulate on the surface of the filtration membrane increasingly more, thus reducing filtration efficiency.

Another mechanism of removing toxins through kidneys is a secretory mechanism based on the active capture of toxins by superficial cells (epithelium) of kidney tubules and their subsequent transfer to the ultrafiltrate flowing through tubules. Just like in the former mechanism of removing toxins through kidneys, the selective accumulation of toxins in the cellular structures of the kidney-secretion system inevitably leads to renal damage in the second mechanism. Kidneys simply can’t cope with their tasks, thus causing a mild renal failure. As a rule, pathological changes require serious medical attention. It’s noted that the amount of endotoxins increases in the urine when the condition of patients with different disorders starts improving following treatment. It indicates the recovery of the kidney detoxification function.

You may wonder how it is linked to blood pressure. The decrease in the efficiency of toxin removal by kidneys forces the body to seek out additional reserves. Indeed, the need to remove toxins isn’t reduced. On the contrary, it keeps increasing. Apparently, this occurs when the mechanism of increasing filtration pressure is activated. Filtration pressure is the difference in pressure between the intravascular space and the cavity where the primary urine is filtered. This difference depends on blood pressure. Thus, the body raises blood pressure to somehow compensate for renal failure during ongoing endogenous intoxication. People end up with hypertension.

In such cases, doctors can make the wrong diagnosis of hypertension if they focus only on the main symptoms without conducting a complete physical examination. After all, high blood pressure is only a consequence in this case, and its cause is different, namely, ongoing endogenous intoxication. Lowering blood pressure exclusively by taking vasodilators will eliminate symptoms, rather than the causes of the disease.

19.2.3. Why dry fasting helps fight chronic diseases

- Of course, during fasting the digestive tract rests more than other organs. The body directs all of its forces to restore the protective and neutralizing function of the gastrointestinal tract and the liver.

- Fasting improves liver function considerably. It causes a mild choleretic effect, restores liver cells.

- The body receives no food and water during dry fasting. Old and “dead” water is replaced with the living water synthesized by the body during dry fasting. If the body receives neither food nor “dead” water, numerous harmful substances don’t enter our blood. The body constantly detoxifies the blood. In fact, the same blood composition will be detoxified through the filter elements many times, which means that the blood will be almost perfect. Consequently, all the  blood-related processes in our body will be conducted almost perfectly. It’s all very simple, and that’s why our immune system gets a good rest.

- As we already know, toxins are burned on their own during dry fasting. In the absence of water, each cell triggers its own internal thermonuclear reaction. This process makes recovery faster. Reacting with a fever, the body causes a slowdown in the microorganism growth. It becomes easier for the immune system to track down and kill everything alien and altered.

- The concentrations of biologically active substances, hormones, immunocompetent cells, and immunoglobulins in body fluids increase during dry fasting. I’ve already mentioned that it’s very difficult for any infection to adapt to living without liquid.

- The second acidotic crisis and autolysis occur in a shorter period of time. If the autolysis of body tissues was the only source of nutrition at the beginning of fasting, autolysis acts like a natural surgeon during the second acidotic crisis.

- Sick, altered, and weak cells don’t survive extreme conditions. They die and degrade.

Thus, fasting helps to get rid of everything unnecessary, weak, sick, and harmful. The most important characteristic of fasting in patients with chronic diseases is the rapid elimination of waste products and accumulated toxins from the body – these are the causes of diseases, and a subsequent healthy lifestyle helps restore energy and health. It’s a mistake to assume that the body can get rid of all accumulated toxins by fasting only. The toxins that have accumulated over many years can’t be eliminated in the course of only a few days or even weeks. For patients with chronic diseases, three or more fasting courses are required to see a clear improvement, but each case is different. Everything depends on the overall health condition, but a patient’s persistence in achieving a stable therapeutic effect is the most important.

Preventive fasting courses repeated annually are a prerequisite for this persistence in addition to a series of (fractional) fasting within a few years if it’s required for full recovery.

19.2.4. Dry fasting for cystic tumors in the body

In this case, the body is better than any surgeon because it eliminates both the cause and the effect. When the body doesn’t receive any liquid, it can’t have any pathological fluid formations under such conditions, no matter where they are. Ovarian cysts are the pathological formations in ovarian tissues consisting of the cavity covered by a capsule and filled with fluid. Based on the content, cysts are categorized as follicular, corpus luteum cysts, mucinous, endometrioid, and dermoid. The duration of dry fasting is different in each case. Sometimes, a dry fasting course must be repeated to finally solve the problem.

Of course, it’s very difficult to treat conditions in the body separately. The body is an integrated whole. Mostly women and girls with gynecological disorders come to us for treatment. I could make the following conclusions based on my observation of them over the course of many years, in-depth research of medical literature, and studies of patient cases where therapeutic fasting acted as the cure. The causes of mastopathy, uterine fibromatosis, endometriosis, cysts, and other benign tumors are long-lasting and pre-existing chronic conditions in the body, chronic sites of infection, and sources of intoxication. In at least 90% of all cases it is chronic colitis. As a rule, nobody treats colitis, and it’s the cause of malfunction of all the organs and systems. More rarely, thyroid problems are the main cause of disease.

I like fasting because it treats the whole body. Most importantly, it eliminates both the causes and the effects of the disease. During fasting, the body directs its efforts towards healing based on the priority principle. It heals according to its own smart laws, contrary to our logic. The body directs all the forces to the most important organs and functions. I had many cases when people came to treat asthma or psoriasis. Not only did they improve their condition, but women also got rid of infertility. This is when I realized that the reproductive function is one of the most important ones for the body, which is the reason why it tries to restore this vital function first during fasting (of any type).

19.2.5. Dry Fasting for Infertility

Infertility is the inability to conceive. The term “infertile couple” is also often used in medical literature. It implies no pregnancy in a woman of reproductive age within three years of regular sexual activity without using any contraceptives. Approximately 25% of women in Russia are infertile. The percentage is even more terrifying in the West: 44%.

That’s why there is such a high demand for the services of surrogate mothers, and sperm banks are working 24/7. The nation is facing a problem that is all about survival, rather than simply infertility. Modern medicine still can’t solve this problem completely. Medical centers mainly treat the consequences of infertility, when it’s necessary to find its cause and treat it. Physicians often offer only artificial insemination attempts and rehabilitation treatment. However, these methods aren’t always effective. People come to us after trying most of the infertility treatment methods offered by modern medicine.

Current main causes of infertility:

- Anovulation: the egg doesn’t mature, so the sperm doesn’t fertilize it.

- Hormonal imbalance: both healthy ovulation and menstruation may be absent.

- Premature menopause: early menopause is rare, and it mostly affects women with congenital ovarian hypoplasia or aplasia.

- Ovarian dysfunction: ovarian dysfunction disrupts hormone production in the hypothalamus-pituitary system. As a result, the egg loses viability.

- Polycystic ovary syndrome: PCOS is characterized by the growth of cysts and two-fold enlargement of the ovaries, with a white coating of the ovaries. This condition impairs hormone metabolism and leads to immature follicles and no mature cells.

- Cervical canal problems: cervical mucus is so thick that the sperm dies after getting there.

- Cervical erosion.

- Fallopian tube obstruction or damage.

- Scarred ovaries: this condition can be caused by surgery. Scars prevent follicle growth and ovulation.

- Unruptured follicle: the egg remains in the ovary without participating in fertilization.

- Endometriosis: the disease disrupts oocyte maturation, egg fertilization and/or the attachment of a mature and fertilized egg to uterus walls.

- Uterine malformation: the egg can’t attach to the endometrium, the inner layer of the uterus.

If there’s no congenital pathology or absolute infertility, dry medical fasting is effective in eliminating many causes of infertility.

Dry fasting effects:

- Normalizes hormone level and treats ovarian dysfunction.

- Destroys all chronic infectious agents, eliminates cervical erosion and scar tissue, and restores normal vaginal flora.

- Gastrointestinal tract function is normalized, and its failure is one of the causes of gynecological disorders.

- A very high level of free sex hormones in the blood during fasting results in greatly enhanced sexuality. Contrary to popular belief, hunger increases sexuality, rather than decreases it.

Only very few women are affected by absolute infertility. In most cases, infertility is the effect and consequence of other conditions. The ability to conceive returned to many women after restoring their health. Based on their experience, fasting is invaluable in treating the effects and consequences of the conditions that caused their infertility. It’s worth noting that women who easily conceive, but have abortions because of their inability to carry a baby to term, can fully restore health through fasting and give birth to healthy babies. Elimination of the toxic state and subsequent improvement of their nutrition allow them to avoid abortions.

19.2.6. Toxemia in Pregnant Women

Toxemia in pregnant women is a multi-symptomatic condition that occurs when the female body fails to adapt to pregnancy. It’s characterized by significant changes in metabolism, function of the endocrine glands, cardiovascular and other systems, and in the level of electrolytes or hormones.

Various diseases before or during pregnancy, malnutrition, fatigue, nervous tension, and lack of sleep make women more prone to toxemia. Nausea, morning sickness, and vomiting aren’t a natural occurrence during pregnancy. However, if these symptoms are present, in some cases they quickly cease, while in others it may necessary to terminate a pregnancy to save a woman’s life.

The main cause is still the subject of many disputes. If we understand that this condition is unnatural for a pregnant woman, we can conclude that it’s absolutely necessary for her to take care of her body and health in the early stages of pregnancy.

Nature treats everyone equally. If a woman experiences nausea and vomiting during pregnancy, it means that her lifestyle had led to these symptoms, resulting in her suffering. These are explained by the intoxication of her body, not by pregnancy. Nature attempts to endow every newborn baby with health in an effort to continue life and give the finest qualities to any new life form. Therefore, nature is deeply concerned with the prenatal conditions of newborns and, particularly, their nutrition. Unborn babies get nutrition from the substances supplied to them by their mothers’ bodies.

If the blood of a pregnant woman meets the highest physiological standards for the embryo, the pregnancy will be calm and even pleasant. If it is intoxicated, the process focused on creating the best source of nutrition for the embryo needs to be launched. The physiological environment of an unborn baby, which is his or her mother's body, must be healthy for the embryo to have clean, healthy, and well-balanced conditions during the antenatal period. This means that not only the womb should be suitable for the development of a new life, but also the entire mother's body. If there is no general order, there may be no local order.

We observe how the metabolism of a pregnant woman intensifies and her previously dormant glands are activated. If a woman’s lifestyle is generally healthy, her health improves. The symptoms that she has experienced for a long time disappear and she starts feeling well. Nausea and vomiting are just a part of a general recovery. Intoxicated women are unsuitable to give birth to a baby. The toxins retained and deposited in the body are poisonous and must be eliminated. That’s why a radical detoxification process is needed, and it can be accomplished by temporary fasting. The stomach and the body of the intoxicated woman protest. They reject food, and the liver increases its excretory function. A lot of bile is excreted into the stomach and is eliminated through vomiting. Some women may even have food aversion – it’s what the body requires to detox.

When we realize that nature does everything possible to prepare a clean and healthy "home" for the emergence of a new life, we will understand the need to support these efforts and stop putting spokes in the wheel of life.

When a pregnant woman experiences mild nausea and vomiting, she should voluntarily stop eating at once. Of course, dry fasting is not allowed in this case. Arakelyan’s water fasting method is the ultimate solution. The fast should last 3-7 days and involve anti-stress and choleretic herbs. It won’t cause any harm to woman or her baby. Long-term fasting can be harmful, while a few days of fasting in the early stage of pregnancy will definitely help, especially women with morning sickness. A woman should go to bed and rest in warmth, put all of her fears aside, and relax mentally without taking any medication.

Practice proves that fasting for 3-7 days is sufficient to improve health and stop nausea and vomiting for the rest of her pregnancy. After fasting for a few days, eat fruits and raw vegetables before returning to regular meals. However, when I say regular meals, I don’t mean the common diet. Pregnant women are prone to overeating, especially when it comes to proteins. They really do need high-quality protein, but in small quantities. Fresh fruits and non-starchy vegetables are what they need the most. In normal cases of morning sickness, 3-4 days of fasting are sufficient to restore normal well-being, so that a woman will eat without problems in the future. There’s no reason to reject fasting in this condition and in such cases. Why would we need food in the presence of nausea, vomiting, and complete absence of appetite, when the body throws out everything that you eat at once? Fasting is the only logical way to improve one’s health.

19.2.7. Endometriosis

Endometriosis is one of the main causes of infertility. Nowadays, obstetricians and gynecologists attach great importance to it. Every third woman suffers from endometriosis, which can be the cause of a condition as terrible as infertility. Endometriosis is one of the most common diseases, which entails the cells from the inner (mucous) layer of the uterus appearing in uterine walls and the other internal organs. Endometriosis occurs increasingly more frequently every year. Besides, today the condition affects young women. In the past, endometriosis mainly affected women after 35 years of age. Now, it’s increasingly common in young 20-year-old women.

Causes of endometriosis. Endometrium and menstrual blood are eliminated from the uterus every month. Sometimes during menstruation, a detached part of the endometrium moves in the wrong direction, which is different from a regular one. It moves towards fallopian tubes, ovaries, and even other distant organs, such as lungs and perirectal or pericystic space, not into the vagina and then out of the body. The symptoms of this condition begin 2-3 days before menstruation, and they include spasms, pain radiating to the perineum or the rectum, and excessive bleeding. In many cases, endometriosis can go unnoticed for a long time. A woman may learn that she has this condition only during a visit to her gynecologist. The long-term inability to conceive may be the reason for this visit, because infertility is the main consequence of this condition.

What causes endometriosis? There are more than 40 hypotheses of its origin, but none of them are 100% supported by scientists and doctors. All that’s known definitively is that women who use intrauterine contraceptives (such as spirals), underwent any gynecological surgery (such as abortions, diagnostic curettage of the uterine cavity, cervical erosion coagulation, etc.) are more prone to endometriosis. Moreover, any abdominal surgery (such as appendectomy) or pelvic surgery (such as bladder stone removal) can result in endometriosis. Of course, neurohormonal disorders (pituitary gland disorders and conditions that affect other hormone-producing organs), weak immune system (resulting from exposure to toxic elements or radiation, microwave fields, and others) can result in endometriosis. Some scientists believe in a genetic predisposition.

Obviously, if there are many theories, the real cause of endometriosis is still unknown. Therefore, I think it’s best to depend on your healing powers and the wisdom or the body, your inner doctor who knows how to cure you better than professors and scientist.

19.2.8. Dry Fasting for Benign Tumors

The main therapeutic factor in treating benign tumors with dry fasting involves three mechanisms.

1. Only the healthiest and strongest cells and tissues with a perfect adaptation mechanism survive in extreme and harsh conditions with no water and food. It’s obvious that adaptation mechanisms to severe conditions are much weaker and flawed in any pathological formation.

2. The destruction of pathological cells (and not the healthy ones) during therapeutic dry fasting is also associated with the release of lymphoepithelial cells from the entire digestive tract. Refraining from food and water intake for many days creates conditions for the advancement of very powerful B-lymphocytes from their gastrointestinal position. They’re gathered from all lymphatic basins and nodes of the extensive digestive tract. Most of them come from the small intestine. All the mobilized B-lymphocytes are used for their intended purpose. They destroy and suppress all pathological tissues and cells. The immune system becomes several times stronger.

3. Autolysis (self-digestion) is one of the main mechanisms that can disband benign tumors. I’ve already described this remarkable process in the chapter 8 (What mechanisms does a dry fast trigger within the body?). I’ll try to explain it again in a shorter and simpler manner. When I describe this mechanism to my patients, I provide the simplest and most vivid example from nature, which is the common onion. It contains a new plant inside it surrounded by the nutrients sufficient to survive the rest period, during which it doesn’t receive any nutrients from the soil or air. The onion can sprout in a bucket or bag where it’s stored. It pushes out new shoots, and almost the entire bulb turns into green off-shoots very soon. The bulb gradually softens. Finally, only its cover remains as the growing plant digests the shoots and uses the bulb content. This means that the old is used to grow the new.

Let’s take a look at a simple furuncle, which most of us have probably encountered. At first, we experience swelling and redness, but then a furuncle disappears with the help of enzymes and immune cells.

The same thing happens with benign tumors during dry fasting and the second acidotic crisis. This is when autolysis functions as a natural surgeon. No surgery eliminates the causes of the disease, while fasting eliminates both its cause and effect. Uterine fibroids are a tumor formed from the uterine muscular layer. It affects women over 30. There’s evidence of an increase in the number of patients. The latest data prove that uterine fibroids affect younger patient groups. The main causes of uterine fibroids include hormonal imbalances, abortions, heredity, poor ecology, and adenomyosis. In addition, inflammatory gynecological diseases of different origins, IUDs, and difficulties in labor are other major causes of this disease. Uterine fibroids are a benign tumor that usually grows in the uterine muscular layer. According to statistics, more than 28% of women are affected by this disease.

I also had many cases when lipomas remained during fasting, but they dissolved two or three months afterwards, if patients followed all recommendations.

19.2.9. Mastopathy

This condition is characterized by non-cancerous changes in breast tissues in women. Mastopathy affects women of all ages. Women between the ages of 25 and 45 are particularly prone to it. According to statistics, this patient group is 60-80%.

Causes of mastopathy. Hormonal imbalance is the main cause of mastopathy. When the female body functions normally, monthly hormonal changes cause cyclical changes in breasts. Hormonal imbalance can cause mastopathy. Risk factors that increase the likelihood of mastopathy include: epididymitis; hereditary factors, i.e., breast disorders in maternal relatives; thyroid disease; liver and gallbladder disorders; diabetes, obesity, vascular diseases; iodine deficiency; stress, depression, irregular sexual activity; abortions, breast injuries, alcohol, smoking, radiation; no pregnancy or aged first-time mothers, short breastfeeding period; early onset of menstruation and late menopause.

Mastopathy is more treatable than all the types of benign tumors (except cysts). Firstly, the breast becomes immediately involved in the process of fasting. On average, it loses 10-15 g a day. Secondly, it’s always possible to palpate a tumor and find out whether it’s gone. Thirdly, it’s always possible to accurately apply leeches to a tumor at the end of a fast to achieve a huge potentiating effect. Leech saliva contains the enzymes that can dissolve the protective covering of the tumor, which facilitates the immune system. However, leeches can act in two ways: they strengthen a strong immune system and make weak immunity even weaker, thus triggering tumor growth.

Fasting always strengthens the immune system so that a tumor can’t grow in these conditions. It turns out that leech therapy boosts the therapeutic effect of fasting. When fasting is combined with leech therapy, its duration is much shorter.

19.2.10. Prostatitis and benign prostatic hyperplasia

Benign prostatic hyperplasia. The term "benign prostatic hyperplasia" means that a small nodule (or nodules) is formed in the prostate, and it grows and gradually squeezes the urethra. If the urethra didn’t pass through the prostate gland, the condition would have no symptoms at all.

Patients with BPH have problems urinating, and it’s the main symptom of this condition. BPH is a non-cancerous growth that doesn’t metastasize (spread to other organs). It’s the major difference between BPH and prostate cancer. According to statistics, half of the men over 50 years of age visit a doctor because of benign prostatic hyperplasia. It’s believed that this condition affects 85% of men over time. This percentage proves that benign prostatic hyperplasia is the most common urological condition. How does it affect the prostate gland?

Causes of BPH. The causes of benign prostatic hyperplasia are still unclear. It’s believed that this condition is one of the signs of male menopause. Thus, every elderly man can be affected by it. There are no proven links between the occurrence of BHP and sexual activity, sexual orientation, tobacco and alcohol use, urologic infections, and sexually transmitted diseases.

Prostatitis is an inflammation of the prostate gland (prostate). Chronic prostatitis is the most common urologic disease in men under 50 years old and it’s the third most common urological disease in men over 50 (after benign prostatic hyperplasia and prostate cancer). It’s the cause of 8% of all outpatient visits to urologists. The frequency of prostatitis increases up to 30-73% with age. The effect of the disease on the quality of life is comparable to myocardial infarction, angina, and Crohn’s disease. It also causes significant psychological and social problems in men of working age with prostatitis.

Prostatitis is caused by sexually transmitted infections due to the anatomy of the prostate (prostate gland). The causative agents of infectious prostatitis are bacteria, viruses, mycoplasma, ureaplasma, chlamydia, trichomonas, and fungus. Infections, mainly sexually transmitted, get to the prostate gland (prostate) from the bladder, urethra, rectum, and pelvic blood and lymphatic vessels. Prostatitis can be non-infectious. Prostatitis is acute and chronic. Chronic prostatitis is one of the most common inflammatory conditions of the urinary tract: about 73% of men are affected by it. I’ve treated many men with chronic prostatitis and benign prostatic hyperplasia. Of course, the condition was cured completely in some of them, while others recovered only partially.

The most important thing is to undergo several dry fasting treatments, a weekly dry fast with no water, undergo a preventative fasting treatment once a year, and follow all the doctor’s recommendations. Unfortunately, only a few patients are willing to do that, and it explains the return of these conditions after fasting.

It’s very difficult to help men who have taken very strong antibiotics. It’s paradoxical that infections become resistant, only the strongest bacteria survive, the immune system weakens, and immune cells stop functioning properly since there’s no need to fight infections if there’s someone doing it for you. In such cases, only a series of fasts can help. The first one cleanses the body, mostly from antibiotics, and strengthens the immune system. The second one starts healing, and the third one completes the process.

19.2.11. Dry Fasting for Bronchopulmonary Diseases

Bronchial asthma is a disease that narrows air passages, since hypersensitivity to certain agents causes their inflammation; airway constriction is reversible. This disease is becoming more common. The number of patients with asthma has increased by 42%, and their mortality rate has increased by 35% between 1982 and 1992. The course of the disease is becoming increasingly more severe, and it requires hospitalization more and more often. Bronchial asthma affects about 10 million Americans. The frequency of asthma is also increasing in Russia, and it affects at least 5-6% of the adult population. Nowadays, asthma affects more people than ever before despite all the publicized achievements and in-depth scientific research.

In patients with bronchial asthma, air passages narrow in response to the agents that don’t affect the air passages of healthy people. It can be caused by pollen, dust mites, animal dander, smoke, cold air, and exercise. During an asthma attack, bronchial smooth muscles spasm, and the tissues lining the air passages swell because of inflammation and produce excessive mucus. The diameter of air passages decreases (this condition is called a bronchospasm), and it’s harder for a patient to inhale and exhale. Some cells in the respiratory system, particularly, the so-called mast cells, play an important role in airway constriction. Bronchial mast cells secrete histamine and leukotrienes –substances that cause smooth muscle contraction, increase mucus production, and migration of certain types of white blood cells. Mast cells can produce these substances in response to foreign agents (allergens), such as pollen, dust mites, or animal dander. However, many people with no allergies are affected by a severe form of bronchial asthma. The reaction is similar when a patient with asthma performs any physical activity or inhales cold air. Stress and anxiety can also trigger the release of histamine and leukotrienes by mast cells. Eosinophils are another type of cells present in the respiratory system of people with bronchial asthma. They also secrete substances, including leukotrienes and certain others, which narrow air passages.

Most of all, I encountered the positive effect of fasting when treating patients with bronchial asthma when I worked at the Goryachinsk resort on Lake Baikal.

When I was still studying with Professor Y.S. Nikolayev, he told me that when starting treatment of bronchial asthma patients, you have to make sure it’s not hormone-dependent, and you will gain experience and achieve positive healing effects.

A mother and her daughter came for an appointment. The daughter was very thin and slouching. She looked like if she was 11 years old, although she was 14. She had an inhaler in her hands. By that time, I certainly had many patients with asthma, but none of them were this young and thin. Deep inside, I doubted whether to accept her as a patient, but then her tearful mother told me the following story, “My daughter went to a school disco with her friends, and she had an asthma attack there. For some reason, I was worried that day. I felt restless and anxious. I got off work and ran home. When I opened the door, I saw my girl hanging on a clothesline. Thank God, everything was fine and I managed to save her."

When I asked her why she did it, she told me: “Why would I want this kind of life? I’m afraid to even leave the apartment.”

Her mother told me, “As soon as we heard that asthma is treated with fasting at the Goryachinsk resort, we came here right away.”

Of course, after hearing this story, I couldn’t refuse them. The girl was patient and had very strong willpower. In general, I’ve noticed that almost all patients with asthma have a strong will and a great desire to recover. The disease and asthma attacks, which resemble death, probably impact their character. Her first water fasting period had lasted 14 days. After completing it, her weight was 36 kg, and I decided to end her fasting. After the first fast, she didn’t entirely stop using the inhaler, but her asthma attacks became milder and less frequent. She had regular fasting days and came back 1 year later. After the second fasting period, her asthma was cured completely, along with all of her gynecological problems. She gained healthy weight, and she now has two kids. I met her at the All-Russian conference on fasting therapy held in Ulan-Ude. I didn’t even recognize her at first because I saw a beautiful and feminine woman. When I asked her about her health condition, she told me that she has forgotten about asthma entirely.

My patient told me that his friend with bronchial asthma wanted to come to an appointment with me. I saw this “old man.” He was 64 years old, but he looked as if he was 80 because he was crooked, hunchbacked, and had severe asthma attacks. When there was no asthma attack, he was gasping and wheezing. He was wordy when talking about his condition, saying, “Damn it, it tortures me, especially in the spring, when I need to work. I’m a gardener, and when the attacks start, I fall right down on the ground. It has tortured me for over 35 years. I guess it’s time for me to die. Although doctors have treated me many times, nothing helped.”

The most important thing is that he’s never taken any hormones. That’s why he had a chance. That’s what I thought. I told him about our therapy and how to prepare for it. A month later, he came to our clinic in Altay. The most interesting thing is that during the preparation phase (he was on a vegetarian diet and cleansed the liver), he lost 10 kg. He used to eat meat three times a day. When he stopped eating meat, he started losing a lot of weight. Dry fasting therapy had a great effect on him, and he threw his inhaler out on the 4th day.

Of course, the Altay Mountains have a unique healing microclimate that greatly enhances the effects of fasting. He walked 5 kilometers a day (he covered this distance for the first time in the last 20 years), admiring nature. He got up early every morning and walked while the dew was still on the ground. His second fasting period had lasted for 9 days. When he was leaving, we somehow found his inhaler lying behind the sofa, but I was afraid that his asthma would reappear after returning to the ecologically contaminated city. We met 1 year later. He came to my appointment with a pocket full of inhalers that he habitually kept obtaining at the pharmacy. “I should go to the flea market and sell them,” he said sarcastically.

One day, my regular patient called me late in the evening. She said that her brother had a pulmonary abscess and he was supposed to undergo surgery. A pulmonary abscess is an infected fusion of the lung tissue, separated from the surrounding tissue by a capsule. It’s caused by microbial flora (in most cases, Staphylococcus).

Considering the powerful anti-inflammatory effect of DF and the fact that the body shouldn’t contain any pathological fluid during this period, I agreed to do help him. He has fasted for 9 days with relative ease because he had no appetite at all due to intoxication. I was surprised that he had calmly read books for 9 days, though almost all patients tell me that they usually have no desire to read books or watch TV. After 5 days of DF, his symptoms of intoxication stopped, along with the low-grade fever. When he came home and got an X-ray, and then went to see a surgeon, who carefully studied it and said: "Whoever assigned you to undergo surgery is a fool, because you have nothing in your lungs."(...)

Why is therapeutic fasting effective in treating bronchopulmonary pathology? Asthma attacks are a toxic storm that happens when mucus production can no longer handle the burden put on it.

The liver is one of the most problematic organs in patients with bronchial asthma. When we put leeches on the liver area before fasting, I’ve never seen good-quality blood. All the patients who cleansed the liver before fasting are always amazed by the detox results. Fasting cleanses the main filter very effectively. During fasting, the blood gets rid of all things extraneous, and the plasma becomes transparent and clean as a whistle, everything is balanced, including coagulation factors.

In this regard, therapeutic fasting cleanses the blood better than hemosorption or hemodialysis. As we know, bronchial edema caused by allergic inflammation is one of the main pathological mechanisms in asthma. When there is no liquid, bronchial edema and inflammation disappear on the 3rd day of dry fasting, and subsequently the adrenal cortex function of hormone (cortisol) secretion stabilizes gradually.

The function of the adrenal cortex reaches its highest point on approximately the 5th day of DF. The amount of glucocorticoids flooding the blood is three times greater than usual and has a powerful anti-inflammatory effect, thus suppressing all the inflammation sites in the body. After all, we know that glucocorticoids are the most powerful anti-inflammatory agents in the body. The action of free forms of glucocorticoids is another powerful therapeutic effect of fasting on inflammatory diseases.

At the same time, endocrine glands hypertrophy slightly during fasting. The parathyroid gland responsible for the immune system (thymus) experiences the greatest increase in size during dosed fasting. The remaining viral and microbial inflammation sites are destroyed during dry fasting. These factors achieve an integrated therapeutic effect in patients with bronchial asthma. What is the negative effect of inhalers? Why is it so hard to help patients with asthma who have undergone hormonal therapy for over 5 years? Allergic inflammation in the bronchopulmonary apparatus causes a complex of pathological reactions, which always delay exhalation. That’s why respiratory acidosis develops in the blood. It restores and then enhances the process of CO2 absorption by cells. This means that defense mechanisms are active even if a brief asthma attack occurs. Bronchospasm neutralizes the mediators of allergic inflammation. None of them are present in the blood during attacks. At the same time, asthma attacks activate the hypothalamus and the pituitary gland, which eventually improve the effect of neutralizing allergies through their channels as well.

First, this complex effect restores the patency of the tracheobronchial tree and then relieves asthma attacks without external assistance. Second, bronchospasms largely restore general bodily adaptation reactions and neutralize allergic inflammation. Thus, the effect of protection against allergic inflammation is preserved for a long time after the attack.

That’s why attacks are rare (1-2 times a year) at the onset of bronchial asthma, even if allergens are in regular contact with the body. Patients can have asthma attacks but live long if they don’t take modern medications. It used to be the same for asthma patients before the war because patients barely ever died from this disease and lived to a ripe old age.

Two drugs were released in the USA, England, and then Russia in the post-war years. It’s hormonal glucocorticoid therapy, where the inhalers impact nerve endings (adrenergic receptors of efferent cells). As a result, there were many seriously ill patients who encountered the threat of lethal outcomes, and then there were deaths. Nowadays, it’s a common occurrence. It turned out that the direct-acting sympathomimetics quickly activate cAMP nucleotides through nerve endings (cell membranes), stopping the bronchospasm immediately. However, these chemical compounds in the membranes bind with an enzyme (chemoreceptor) to form a protein that is undesirable (nonstandard) for the body. From this moment on, it’s gradually destroyed by the immune system. Thus, the functioning of the nerve cell receptor weakened by the disease is further aggravated by modern drugs, and then stops entirely.

Besides, the opposite effect is often present in cases when this chemoreceptor isn’t activated but blocked by the intermediate chemical compound degradation products. Receptors fail quickly – within 2-3 years or even faster. At the early stages of asthma, patients are forced to breathe in these or similar medications in increasing quantities and take substances harmful to nerve endings. They become dependent on these drugs. Finally, medications start acting paradoxically, and begin to cause bronchospasms. A life-threatening asthmatic condition develops, and it can lead to death if the glucocorticoid hormones (adrenal hormones) that can make these nerve endings function aren’t used by patients. At the same time, the hormones injected into the body ultimately destroy the immunogenetic system mechanism, thus creating a greater vicious circle and leading to the atrophy of the hormonal system.

At the onset of bronchial asthma, the disease can be stopped by different yoga techniques, acupuncture, segmental massage, cave therapy, or conventional cold water treatment. However, when patients become dependent on direct-acting sympathomimetics (inhalers) and hormones, only dosed fasting can help them break this vicious circle if they’ve taken hormones for less than five years.

19.2.12. Cardiovascular Diseases: Hypertension and Atherosclerosis

After 5-7 days of fasting, electrocardiogram results improve. They indicate an improvement in coronary circulation, while angina attacks stop completely. Blood pressure usually improves after 7-10 days of fasting (after an acidotic crisis) and remains healthy during the entire period of fasting.

This is not surprising. Our heart is under tremendous pressure throughout our lifetime in addition to different stress factors, physical exertion, and fatigue. We often don’t realize that food burdens the heart even more than difficult exercises. It’s not a coincidence that many heart attacks and myocardial infarctions happen after a hearty meal. Fasting gives the heart the rest it deserves. It no longer needs to pump a huge amount of blood to support digestion, and heart muscles launch self-healing processes.

After all, the heart practically doesn’t lose any of its weight during fasting. Blood circulation in the heart muscle improves, and its glycogen reserves increase. During fasting, there are practically no heart attacks, necrosis, or heart muscle inflammation. Heartbeat is restored and the heart rate decreases.

After fasting, the effect lasts for quite a long time, especially if the patients stick to a healthy diet. Fasting relieves heart overload and provides it with the opportunity to rest. With a heart rate of 80 beats per minute, the heart makes 115,200 beats in 24 hours. Shortly after the patients start fasting, their heart rate decreases, and may be as low under 60 beats per minute for a period of time. Ultimately, their heart rate becomes 60 beats per minute throughout the entire fasting period, thus resulting in 86,400 beats in 24 hours (28,800 beats less than the result before fasting). It will reduce the burden on the heart by up to 25%. Positive effects on heart activity are apparent not only in the decreasing heart rate but also in a healthy pulse. All of the above allows the heart to rest, repair its damaged structures, and restore tissues.

Fasting provides the heart with the needed chance to get rid of accumulated toxins. When toxemia is eliminated, cardiac tissues heal faster and better. Toxins stop irritating the heart, and it makes a striking comeback. All the above-stated facts apply to most heart diseases. However, there are some exceptions. Sometimes, we observe rare cases during fasting when heart activity is suppressed, and this condition requires ending the fast, because continuing it can be very dangerous.

All cases when heart diseases are treated by fasting must be carried out under the direct and personal supervision of a physician with experience in fasting. Unnecessary risks aren’t allowed in patients with such conditions.

Hypertension is one of the most common diseases that affect the cardiovascular system. It’s accompanied by a temporary or persistent blood pressure rise. The disease involves arteriole attenuation caused by the increased tonic function of smooth muscles in arterial walls and cardiac output changes. Hypertension often affects people with a family history of the disease. Soviet scientists claimed that the main causes of the onset and development of hypertension include nervous system problems, biochemical metabolic processes, predisposing factors (hereditary and age-related), atherosclerosis, and preceding kidney diseases.

I’ve already described my understanding of the development of hypertension and atherosclerosis mechanisms. It should be noted that high blood pressure is caused by excessive weight. Scientists have found that about 2 km of capillaries are required to supply blood to 500g of fat cells. Therefore, if a person gains 1 kg, their vasculature increases by 4 km. As a result of the overall increase in the vasculature length, which is about 100,000 km in adults, the load on the heart increases because it must conduct stronger and more frequent contractions to push the blood through all bodily organs and tissues under high pressure.

Combined fasting is perfect for obese patients. Many researchers state that this method leads to an earlier acidotic crisis and a greater reduction in the body fat mass. Patients with arterial hypertension attain a faster improvement of their condition, thus the term of the fast and the length of their inpatient treatment are reduced. This method is the technique of choice if the underlying disease is accompanied by obesity and edema syndrome.

Moreover, the combination of dry and water fasting is well tolerated by patients, has a healing effect, while reducing the total treatment length, and optimizes its timing due to an earlier onset of the acidotic crisis.

Atherosclerosis is the main cause of impaired blood supply to tissues and organs. Atherosclerosis (and the diseases it causes) is a top killer! There’s a misconception that atherosclerosis is the result of aging. Sometimes it’s associated with absent-mindedness or forgetfulness. Both statements are wrong.

First of all, atherosclerosis can affect young people, while old patients may not have this condition. Second, its symptoms are more diverse because it can affect the whole body from head to toe. Sclerosis literally means "induration". It can develop in lung tissues (pneumosclerosis), heart muscles (cardiosclerosis), kidneys (nephrosclerosis), and even bones (osteosclerosis).

Atherosclerosis, in fact, is a special form that affects large arteries.

Atherosclerosis is a metabolic disorder in which cholesterol (a fat-like substance) levels increase in the blood. Besides, lipoprotein (fat + protein) formation is increased. It penetrates the artery walls. At the same time, they accumulate cholesterol, followed by either plaque calcification or ulceration. The risk of atherosclerosis increases with aging.

Fasting has a huge impact on blood circulation. With an empty stomach and intestines, there are no obstacles to blood circulation in the abdomen, and its composition is improved. Congestion in the abdomen and the liver are eliminated. Fasting contributes to the restoration of the capillary circulation function in patients with hypertension. Blood vessel walls become more elastic during fasting. Blood cholesterol levels decrease, thus eliminating the risk of new atherosclerotic plaques. The subsequent strict dairy and plant-based diet with salt restriction helps retain the results obtained during therapeutic fasting treatment.

In patients with hypertension, fasting immediately affects its main symptom, namely, blood pressure. It is lowered starting with the very first days of fasting. Even in patients with persistent and long-term diseases, it’s normalized after 5-7 days of dry fasting. In most cases, blood pressure drops below the normal level by the end of the fast. It increases and reaches the norm during the recovery period. To maintain a positive therapeutic effect, regular short-term dry fasting periods are recommended - 1 day a week, 3 days a month, 7 days a year.

19.2.13. Neurological diseases: degenerative disc disease, protrusions, disk herniation, migraine.

According to a famous quote, "three doctors have four opinions." When it comes to vertebral degenerative disc disease, there are many opinions. When a patient asks about the cause of degenerative disc disease, a doctor can easily name a dozen causes. Unfortunately, it’s hard to find a clear and specific reason why the above-mentioned disease affected you and a particular vertebral area. There is even an opinion that degenerative disc disease is a "polyetiological and monopathogenetic" disease. It’s a beautiful term that simply means: "the same process is caused by different factors".

It should be noted that degenerative disc disease affects only Homo sapiens among the animal species on our planet. In literature, there’s also a statement that saber-toothed tigers were affected by it. I don’t know, I haven’t had the chance to check this fact, but the spread of degenerative disc disease in humans is truly global. It affects 99,(9)% of people. Degenerative disc disease is the most common disease of the musculoskeletal system that affects people of all ages.

The term osteochondrosis, as degenerative disc disease is called in Russian, is formed from two Greek words meaning "bone" and "cartilage". It’s a disease of the cartilage covering bones in the musculoskeletal system, mainly of the spinal cord, hip and knee joints.

Intoxication and immobility are the main causes of degenerative disc disease. These factors alter the intervertebral disc structure. Due to the uneven vertical axial load, the ligaments of the vertebrae (especially in the lumbar spine) stretch as much as possible on one side or the other because a standing person constantly “changes legs”. As a result, there is a dislocation of the vertebrae called spondylolisthesis. Besides, intervertebral discs gradually degenerate and the nucleus pulposus elasticity is lost. The disc loses its ability to act as a hydraulic shock absorber, and the axial load is transferred by it in the direction of the acting force. After a while, the outer layer of the disk cracks, and hernial bulges are formed. They compress blood vessels (which leads to edema and impaired blood circulation in the spine), spinal nerve roots, or, in rare cases, the spinal cord. In addition, there are degenerative changes in the cartilage covering the discs accompanied by the formation of a disk hernia in the vertebrae.

The main treatment for this pathology definitely consists of eliminating the edema, cleansing the muscles, ligaments, and joints from salt deposits, improving disk nutrition. I’ve been always amazed at how spine mobility and flexibility improve during fasting. Migraine (translated from French, migraine is the pain in one half of the head) is a recurrent paroxysmal headache, usually unilateral, caused by periodic narrowing and expansion of arteries in the brain. Women suffer from migraines 2-3 times more often than men, due to frequent migraine attacks during premenstrual syndrome. Men usually have longer lasting and more intense attacks. The causes of migraine attacks include: stress, nervous and physical strain, excessive alcohol consumption, smoking, being in an unventilated space, lack of sleep, fatigue, intoxication, changes in weather or climatic conditions, hormonal imbalances, etc.

19.2.14. Rheumatoid arthritis, ankylosing spondylitis, deforming osteoarthrosis, infectious polyarthritis

Rheumatoid arthritis causes chronic and progressive inflammation of joints. It’s one of the most common joint disorders. It affects women 2-3 times more often than men and its causes are unclear. Immunological disorders play an important role, especially the autoimmune process characterized by the production of lymphocytes and antibodies against bodily tissues. In simpler terms, an infection or chemical compounds alter normal tissues in such a way that the immune system starts treating them as foreign and destroys them.

Dry fasting is a total detox. It destroys all the infections and everything foreign to the body. Above all, DF qualitatively and quantitatively restores the immune system function, which is the most important one in the body; it strengthens the barriers of cells, organs and systems, reinvigorates the blood pool (microvasculature) and, last but not least, provides a long-term (prolonged) medical and preventive effect.

When I first started treating patients with dry fasting, my first patient was a man with rheumatoid arthritis. His fingers and toes were deformed, all his joints ached, and he couldn’t even get up without pills and injections. He agreed to undergo dry fasting at once. Before meeting with me, he underwent all the popular treatment methods: herbalists, healers, acupuncture, etc. "Sergey Ivanovich, I won’t be surprised at anything. I think it won’t be worse, but I intuitively feel that there’s a chance."

When I told him that he might suffer from insomnia during dry fasting, he said, “It won’t surprise me, as I’ve had insomnia due to pain for eight years.” He was a former athlete with a strong will. He tolerated fasting very well. When I checked on my patients, he either read or listened to music. After seven days, there were no changes, and all his symptoms were the same.

On the 8th day, I decided that I would stop his treatment on the next day, as it seemed useless and his condition did not seem to succumb to treatment. His joints started burning severely in the evening. When I checked him in the morning of the 9th day, I saw him performing push-ups, and he had tears in his eyes. He could perform them without pain for the first time in eight years. He fasted for eleven days. His joints stopped aching, their deformity diminished, the range of movement increased, and even a few rheumatoid nodules disappeared. He had no recurrences for the past seven years. His disability benefits were taken away, since he stopped going to the clinic, and now he works as a driver. He comes to Altay for prophylactic purposes every year. What if I stopped his treatment? I always wonder what would have happened in this case.

The biggest difference between dry and water fasting is that the second acidotic crisis is the most curative. It starts between the 8th and the 11th day. Sometimes, one night can decide everything, though this period is very difficult psychologically. We had many patients with rheumatoid arthritis. Of course, not all of them had such positive results. We couldn’t help some of them at all. What are the reasons for failures? Some patients cannot go through the necessary therapeutic fasting period, while others have a very long history of hormonal therapy, so that all the natural healing powers of the body are suppressed by chemicals.

People often write and ask me whether fasting can help with such an incurable and severe disease as multiple sclerosis? Multiple sclerosis is a chronic disease of the central nervous system, and it’s often unpredictable and progressive. Multiple sclerosis affects the brain, optic nerves, and the spinal cord. It leads to the disruption of corresponding bodily functions. The disease is characterized by the formation of randomly scattered demyelination areas (loss of myelin, a white fatty substance covering axons (nerve fibers). Incidence rate. Multiple sclerosis usually starts at a young age, but it can manifest at any age between 15 and 60 years. Women are more susceptible to this disease than men. The highest incidence rate is among Caucasians living in a temperate climate. The disease isn’t hereditary.

Over 300,000 people suffer from multiple sclerosis in the US. Multiple sclerosis ranks third on the list of full disability causes in the reproductive age after injuries and rheumatologic diseases. About 3,000,000 people in the world suffer from multiple sclerosis. The disease prevalence depends on geographical areas. The lowest rate is on the equator, and it increases to the north and the south. 10-70 people per 100,000 have multiple sclerosis in Russia. Its cause is unknown. There’s a belief that the disease can be linked to a viral infection in the early childhood and autoimmune processes in the central nervous system.

During recurrences, there are acute inflammation centers with a swollen medullary sheath. Several weeks or months later, local inflammation and swelling stop, leaving multiple scars or lesions called plaques. Meanwhile, the axons are preserved. This process explains why patients may experience a partial or almost full recovery. However, if a new locus of inflammation is near the old one, the recovery will be less complete.

Treatment. There is no treatment or preventative method with proven effectiveness. L.G. Shchennikov, a professor of traditional medicine and one of the main DF experts and practitioners (he now calls his method Healing Abstinence from water and food), told me about this case of the successful multiple sclerosis cure through dry fasting:

“Vladimir D. from Podolsk came for a consultation on Healing Abstinence from food in early September 2000. He was accompanied by his spouse. She was the one who found the recommendations on this method in the media and brought her husband in, explaining that it was their last hope. He asked her to leave the office for a while, and then he started to tell his story, which was full of pain and hopelessness. The middle-aged man turned out to be a former athlete and a boxer. His diagnosis - multiple sclerosis, made by doctors, ruined his career and left him with no hope for a productive life. (...) They offered treatment, but it only got worse. He had to use a wheelchair. The man was close to despair, and he didn’t see a way out of the situation. “I’m ready to do anything to get rid of the wheelchair and be able to do at least something on my own. Can you help me?"

-“You can help yourself, but you need a strong will and desire,” I replied.

-“It’s my only desire, and I have enough will - I’m a former athlete and a man. What should I do?”

His spouse came in. I explained to them the essence of this method in detail and offered him to undergo an 11-day treatment of healing abstinence from food and water. Vladimir and Elena answered that children were waiting for them in Podolsk and they needed to return. I gave them HA guidelines and said that Vladimir would be able to undergo his first full treatment course at home, especially with the support of relatives. I gave my recommendations and said goodbye after a 2-hour conversation. They thanked me and promised to call during and after the treatment and follow all instructions strictly. It seemed to me then that they really embraced hope for recovery.

A month later, I saw Vladimir and his wife again. They came to Moscow especially to meet with me. He came to the apartment himself, without his wife’s support. Their eldest son came with them. We went into the room and sat down. Vladimir started talking about his HA treatment and how everyone supported him, including his children. His wife underwent a 7-day course too. The results were apparent. Vladimir began to move around independently and his motor coordination improved considerably. He said that he gradually started to do housework — he made tables, chairs, and carved wood. I’m sure that this pastime will help him fight the disease. A goal had appeared in his life. Vladimir and Elena decided to undergo the next treatment course (11 days) together to improve and consolidate their results. Elena started thanking me for her husband’s results, but I told her that he had enough strength to help himself. I was really happy that they had such a wonderful and affable family. Vladimir underwent several more HA treatment courses and got a job in Podolsk.”

I believe that all of these amazing cases of healing depended only on people who tried to fight for their lives and chose the healing abstinence treatment. Imaginary obstacles and prejudices haven’t stopped them. Their exemplary courage and will helped them fight the disease. I want to note that the body definitely heals faster and the treatment is more effective at the early stages of the disease. That’s why I sincerely advise you to take care of your health as early as possible in order to prevent the disease from taking severe forms.

That’s what Herbert Shelton, a great therapeutic fasting promoter and practitioner, says about the treatment of multiple sclerosis:

“I remember one surveyor whose condition got worse so much that he was forced to quit his job and let others do it. He’s been under the supervision of the best Western neuropathologists for several years. They warned him from the very beginning that his condition would quickly worsen and honestly admitted that they had no cure for multiple sclerosis. They told him the truth. Nevertheless, after spending 7 weeks at the Institute of Hygiene, he left it, returned home, and resumed his job. It doesn’t mean that he had fully recovered after a 7-week treatment course, but he felt so much better that he decided to leave the Institute of Hygiene. It was a mistake, especially if we are to consider the severity of his disease. Unfortunately, many patients with multiple sclerosis make this mistake. They feel so happy that the most painful symptoms are gone that they often no longer want to make an effort to restore their health. They decide that they can take care of themselves. After an initial improvement, they believe that they can continue treatment at home as efficiently as under professional supervision. Sometimes they are lucky, but in most cases, they aren’t. The results of fasting can be much better under control and supervision.

The word "sclerosis" means coarsening or hardening. It’s associated with the hardening of a certain part of the body as a result of inflammation. In the nervous system, sclerosis is the excessive and unsystematic growth of connective tissues (connective tissue hyperplasia) of nerve cells.

Multiple sclerosis, also called disseminated sclerosis or Charcot's disease, is characterized by the hardening (sclerosis) that affects distinct areas scattered throughout the brain and the spinal cord. These hardened areas vary in size between a pinhead and a bean. They’re randomly scattered throughout the brain and the spinal cord. The autopsy revealed the damaged isolating layer of the nerve cells, which have fused with fibers. I emphasize that these data are autopsy results, which revealed that the cause of the disease is inflammation, not sclerosis or hardening. A person dies after suffering from multiple sclerosis for 15 or 20 years, and an autopsy is performed. The state of the brain and nervous system is examined very closely. It’s discovered that the course of the disease is reversible. Patients may have symptoms like tingling, prickling, ringing in the ears, tremor, fever, catalepsy, insensibility, numbness in different limbs and the body. Later, when the disease develops further, they suffer from weakness in the legs and difficulty walking, shuddering and involuntary sharp movements of legs, difficulty speaking, awkwardness, and hand tremor increases when they try to pick up or grab something. They have constipation and difficulty urinating.

Sometimes, these symptoms remain mild for a long time. They may even disappear completely, without recurring for many years. This symptom relief indicates disease reversibility at its early stages. About half of such patients become capable of working after being sick for 25 years. This fact demonstrates how slowly sclerosis may develop. There’s enough time for its effective treatment. I’ve previously stated that there are no identical cases in symptoms or disease progression. This statement is true not only for multiple sclerosis, but also for any other disease. There are no bacteria or viruses found responsible for this condition. Its cause is unknown. However, there’s an assumption that it may be of an infectious nature. No treatment has ever been effective.

How can we have successfully treat a disease if its cause is unknown?

Medical books usually state the following about this disease: “Its cause is completely unknown ... there is no specific or truly effective treatment ... it’s always a chronic disease... a complete recovery is very questionable ...” Of course, we can’t expect a full recovery if the cause of the disease is unknown. Moreover, we stubbornly don’t want to admit that we should consider unhealthy lifestyles and the environment surrounding a patient in search of its causes. These are true causes of organic and functional changes and bodily deterioration. We can say that the search for a specific cause of the disease is over. The time has come when we must finally admit that unhealthy lifestyles and bad habits cause this disease and impairment. When we realize and fix that, it will be possible to cure thousands of people who are now considered terminally ill patients.

I’ve never had any opportunity to treat multiple sclerosis at its early stage, so I can only assume that if such patients were treated by hygienists at once, their recovery rate would be higher. In fact, I could have brought some patients from a completely helpless state back to life and restore their work capacity. It surely proves the benefit of hygienists' program on restoring bodily tissues and functions.

Let's take a look at the general data relevant to fasting to fight sclerosis.

The first fast provides patients with noticeable improvement in their general condition. In many cases, bedridden patients get up and are able to move. A carefully planned diet, regular exercises, and sunbathing during the post-fasting period bring improvement and further progress.

The second fast further strengthens control over the limbs. I usually prescribed 3 fasting courses in these cases, and each one improved the condition of the limbs and control over them. After fasting, I leave the patients to rest in bed and add one or two light daily exercises that require increasing mobility and dexterity to perform them. The main purpose of these exercises is to gain dexterity, not to increase muscle mass or strength. I’m sure that daytime sunbathing is especially useful in further restoration of the nervous system. The diet should include fresh fruits and vegetables with a very limited amount of fats, sugars, proteins, and starch. I prefer vegetable protein - nuts and sunflower seeds.

It’s important to remember that sclerosis isn’t the initial stage of the disease. In the early stages, the disease is much easier to treat if the patients get rid of bad habits and improve their lifestyle in addition to cleansing their blood and getting rid of toxins. A full recovery is possible at the initial stage of the disease, not at its later stages, when there are irreversible changes in the nervous system. It’s important not to be too late!

I found interesting studies conducted by Italian scientists online. Fasting protects against multiple sclerosis. Fasting relieves the symptoms of multiple sclerosis and other autoimmune diseases. After refraining from food intake for 48 hours, mice with a condition similar to multiple sclerosis had much less brain damage during this period, showed better results in balance and movement tests, and they had noticeably milder symptoms of weakness and paralysis.

The author of the work, Giuseppe Matarese from the University of Naples, hopes that the combination of a diet and medication will allow to treat multiple sclerosis in the future. Nowadays, patients with multiple sclerosis are advised to eat until they’re full, and no one is going to prescribe fasting to them.

Matarese hopes to find elements of the diet that have the biggest impact on autoimmune diseases. Multiple sclerosis is incurable now (modern methods can only slow the disease down). Nevertheless, scientists have something new to offer. Leptin, a hormone secreted by fat cells after eating to kill cravings, is one of these findings. Matarese found that leptin production doubled in mice right before the onset of the disease, but leptin levels were close to normal in the mice left without food for 48 hours (similar to 7-10 days for humans). Matarese also found that neurons in damaged brain tissues produced leptin as well. Unfortunately, I mostly get calls from patients who cannot come to see me independently or take care of themselves. Therefore, I have no experience in treating such diseases.

Can dry fasting treat AIDS, viral hepatitis, cancer? People often ask this question on the phone and in their letters.

19.2.15. Can dry fasting treat AIDS and hepatitis C?

I have had no patients with AIDS in my practice, though L.A. Shchennikov told me that he had cases of treating this disease. I had a few patients with viral hepatitis C. A very illustrative example of the successful treatment of hepatitis C is provided below.

A man with a Ukrainian accent called me. He told me his story: “I was diagnosed with viral hepatitis C in 1999. I’ve repeatedly undergone different treatments and taken many medications. I only wasted a lot of money with no result. I found your website by chance, and I decided to try dry fasting. Liver cleansing was successful. I first underwent 2-day and 3-day dry fasting courses, and then I went to the Carpathian  mountains, where I underwent 5-day dry fasting on my own. I felt well, my liver test results were much better, and even the doctors were amazed. Can I come to you for a 10-day dry fast?”

Of course, I gladly agreed to treat him, as he was prepared and even those short fasting periods have already helped him.

He tolerated dry fasting well. He intuitively found his place of power on the banks of our river and went there every day. On the 9th day, he was excited and told me, “I was sitting in my place. It was raining, and I was praying quietly. Suddenly, the sky cleared a bit and sunrays seemed to pierce my body. It was incredible to me because it was still raining. I felt so good afterwards.” After returning home, he went to the Carpathians to undergo a 10-day fasting course on his own a month later. He once again repeated fasting two months after that. When I was on a business trip, I received a text message on my cell phone, “My test results are great, come see me, take a trip to the Carpathians.” Of course, it’s a joy to get such messages.

Another case. I got another call with a question about whether I treated hepatitis TTV. Honestly, it was the first time I have ever heard about this type of hepatitis. I had to browse the Internet for information. A choleric-tempered guy came for a consultation. He took frequent walks during the fasting period and he couldn’t find the right place for himself. He needed to be doing something all the time. His fast lasted for 7 days. Six months later, he came in for dry fractional fasting, underwent two fasting courses for seven and eight days, respectively. That time, he brought books and CDs and everything was fine. A month later, he went to Israel for an examination. He called me from there and said that he had a complete bodily examination, and doctors said that his liver and test results are just like a newborn’s.

Of course, not everyone can boast of such good results. Fasting didn’t help some people at all because undergoing several fasting courses is required to fully recover from such diseases. Alas, not all of them have enough patience and will to do that.

19.2.16. Dry Fasting against Cancer

It’s so difficult to talk about a serious disease...It’s so difficult to talk about a serious disease and avoid comforting lies while instilling hope. It’s even more important when it comes to cancer! I want to give an example of how to defeat this terrible disease with a strong will, a lot of patience, and fasting.

I had a single case of successful cancer treatment.

One patient brought his mother in for a consultation. Doctors accidentally diagnosed a small malignant kidney tumor without metastases. Since there was still a lot of time before surgery, we decided to try dry fasting. She had a positive mindset and tolerated dry fasting well. On the 9th day of fasting, she had a high fever. I’ve never seen anything like that during fasting. She got through the night, and the fever was gone in the morning. I realized that it was a real medical crisis because cancer cells die at high temperatures. Besides, she neither ate nor drank. When she was re-examined, the cancer was gone.

In most cases, I get calls from people who have cancer with metastases and who already underwent chemotherapy or radiation. I also had such patients, but I couldn’t cure anyone. I only prolonged their lives. The difficulty of treating cancer patients is that in order to recover, it’s necessary to:

- Completely change your lifestyle and diet, fully cleanse the body.

- Change your place of residence, preferably relocating to environmentally friendly places to relieve the immune system from the harsh effects of industrial poisons and toxins.

- If you are inclined towards fasting, do it before chemotherapy or radiation, since chemotherapy kills everything - not only cancer cells, but also immune cells.

- It’s advisable to undergo a series of fasting courses, drink anticancer herbs during the fasts until the malignant tumor is completely destroyed, or it will grow even faster.

- Even if you are cured after fasting, you will require preventative fasting courses for the rest of your life. Unfortunately, this requirement is unacceptable for 90% of patients. That’s why we don’t let such patients fast and try to help them with herbs. To prevent cancer, any type of fasting can be invaluable after major surgeries, since the latter only eliminate the effect, while the cause remains. If nothing is changed, the risk of cancer recurrence is very high. As I’ve already stated, the strongest and most viable cells survive during dry fasting. Even short-term dry fasting is a serious preventative measure against malignant tumors.

Here is a letter from one of my patients’ wife:

“Dear Sergey Ivanovich! My name is Natalia Mikhailovna, I called you about my husband's disease last week. He’s 47 years old. He underwent laparotomy, proximal subtotal gastrectomy in September 2005. He had massive intra-abdominal bleeding on the 1st day of the postsurgical period. He had peritonitis on the 6th day of the postsurgical period. As a result, he has a transverse colostomy in the large intestine. At his discharge: histology – moderately differentiated tubular adenocarcinoma infiltrating the stomach wall up to the muscle layer, no malignant tumor was detected on resection margins, hyperplasia in the lymphatic node. Diagnosis: cancer of the cardiac notch of stomach T2NOMO, 3rd group. The transverse colostomy was routinely closed on December 4, 2006. At present, his condition is stable, bowel and bladder functions are healthy. His weight is 59 kg (it was 47 kg in September-October 2005). Overall biochemical test results are within the normal range. Ultrasound of internal organs: diffuse changes in the liver and kidneys. Torsion of the gallbladder, cholesterosis of gallbladder walls. Anastomosis histology was normal in February. The lymph node in the groin is enlarged. The paracentesis revealed nothing serious. These are all the facts. Most importantly, if there is an opportunity, we want to come to you with my husband, Victor Stepanovich, for treatment on May 1, 2006. I’m looking forward to your answer.”

Unfortunately, after a CT scan of lungs, a microfocal malignant growth was found, which was a potential manifestation of metastases. They came to us in May. He underwent a 10-day dry fasting course. When he was reexamined, everything was fine. He comes to us for preventative care twice a year. He takes anticancer herbs between fasting courses. His weight is 64 kg now, his state of health is normal.

19.2.17. Dry Fasting against Skin Diseases

It’s well known that the skin reveals the state of internal organs, especially the liver and intestines. Once these organs start functioning slightly worse than usual, the skin color and tautness change, rashes and spots appear. The skin is very sensitive to the effect of different toxins, including those formed in intestines during digestion and those that are produced during metabolism. Some doctors understand what clues on the face indicate a particular disease. It’s true that even minor health problems affect our appearance. The facial skin is just like litmus paper that reacts to the slightest malfunctions in the body and reflects how the stomach, liver, intestines, pancreas, kidneys, and hormones function. The ability to see these signs allows people to recognize health problems early. It’s scientifically proven that 95% of known human pathologies are linked to bowel and liver malfunction. If the food is undigested within 24-32 hours, it starts rotting and turns into hardened deposits on intestinal walls. The poisons that accumulate in unhealthy intestines spread throughout the body via the blood, thus affecting the skin.

The skin is nourished by blood, not by external sources. Nothing but the blood nourishes the skin, that’s why all the money spent on “skin-nourishing” substances is a waste. Skin is a protective layer that comes into contact with many harmful substances and is subjected to different impacts. Fortunately, it has a very strong self-healing ability so that only very harsh impacts leave indelible marks.

Most skin disorders are associated with internal systemic diseases. Skin disorders are a sign of an excretive crisis in the body. When the body cannot remove unwanted substances in other ways, it starts actively getting rid of them through the skin, thus leading to its trauma and various changes. Human skin is comparable only to the liver and the brain in the number and variety of its functions. It contains nerve cells, blood vessels, glands, pigment cells, and fat – this water and gas-resistant layer covers the body like an envelope, separating sensitive internal organs from the external environment. It’s both a radiator and an air conditioner for the body as it regulates body temperature through sweating and maintains its fluid balance through the same process. The skin is a huge excretive organ. The surface skin area is very large. The body eliminated processed substances through it, just like it does through lungs, intestines, and kidneys.

The diet plays an important role in all skin rashes. It’s quite likely that a patient overeats. Excessive daily intake of starches and sugar is usually responsible for problems. In most cases, food is taken in combinations that are unfavorable for digestion: the habit of combining starchy and high-protein foods in one meal is enough to cause indigestion (metabolism problems) and skin inflammation.

When taking medications, you have to take into account that many of them may cause a rash. Of course, a suitable diet should follow preliminary fasting in patients with this inflammation. I want to state right away that there are no true skin disorders. There are bodily disorders that lead to skin damage. Therefore, it’s necessary to treat the whole body, not only the skin. Medicine in its current state can’t cope with the task. Topical skin treatments can’t achieve positive results if we don’t examine the state of the whole body.

Fasting and its general effect on the whole body can cope with any sign of skin disorders very effectively. Most signs of skin disorders are evidence of the body simply being unable to cope with the amount of harmful substances that constantly enter it with different products due to overeating, harsh environmental conditions, or because of a sedentary lifestyle that slows down metabolic processes throughout the body, including excretion, etc. This is what leads to many common skin disorders: dermatitis, allergic dermatitis, psoriasis, and others. Besides, a decrease in body defenses due to the overall suppression of recovery processes leads to different infectious skin disorders. All of the microbes and bacteria that are constantly present on each person’s skin and with which we peacefully coexist in everyday life, turn into pathogenic agents of different diseases when the body is weakened.

What does any type of fasting do for the skin?

- Amazing skin changes are the first thing noticed by almost all people who undergo fasting. After just one week of fasting, the skin becomes smooth, shiny, and youthful, and there’s nothing unusual in this effect.

- Fasting relieves the excretive load from the skin. With no incoming food, the body starts to actively get rid of excess substances in all possible ways and it uses them for vital activities. The body’s inner balance is gradually normalized - the substances required for its functioning are balanced, while everything unnecessary is used up or eliminated.

- Blood circulation in every cell in the body and skin cells improves. Therapeutic fasting thoroughly cleanses the body on the cellular level. The blood is cleansed and vessels remain clean. Body cells are replaced and updated. After long-term fasting, all of the skin is renewed. The skin becomes clean, and the body is rejuvenated.

- In patients with psoriasis, the immune system function is improved. The following simple example makes it clear. I think you will easily recall a period in your life when psoriasis retreated and you were in great condition without taking medications. It usually happens after a great vacation, sufficient daily sleep, positive emotions, proper and regular nutrition, etc. This is when the resources released by the immune system are often sufficient to fight this disease. It’s most likely that the effect is achieved by suppressing the non-contagious retrovirus. Most scientists support the point of view that specific defects in immune system functioning that don’t allow the body to neutralize it lead to reoccurrence. It’s obvious that a typical exacerbation of psoriasis occurs in late autumn and in early spring - when the human body is most susceptible to viral infections. Increased levels of pathogenic and potentially pathogenic microflora on the skin are a secondary problem. Microorganisms live and feed in psoriatic patches, and their byproducts only aggravate the situation. It’s possible to normalize immune system functioning through therapeutic fasting, but based on somewhat different mechanisms. Of course, it’s not as much fun as a good vacation, but its result is more stable and predictable.

- Normalizing metabolic processes. Patients often complain, "Liver problems led to exacerbation once again!" In reality, the connection works in the reverse manner. Skin disorders affect the liver. Many metabolic products are removed through the skin. However, the skin areas affected by patches, papules, and other types of rash can’t fully cope with this task. This is when the liver comes to rescue the damaged skin as it takes on its work. Fortunately, the removal of additional metabolic products doesn’t overload the liver. Things are different with toxic metabolic byproducts. The situation is further aggravated by the substances accumulating in the body for years because of the intake of medications without hepatoprotectors (to protect the liver). These are also caused by malnutrition and different bad habits. They are already capable of causing significant damage to the liver. In turn, the liver causes new skin rashes. It’s a vicious circle, but there’s a way out. It’s clear that the removal of numerous harmful and ballast compounds during fasting provides an improvement of all bodily systems for many months.

- Water-salt metabolism is normalized. Dry skin is alleviated. Skin changes are the most surprising during fasting. Even after one week of fasting, it becomes smooth and silky. It squeaks like that of a baby when touched. These changes are noticed by almost all patients who undergo fasting. Besides, positive skin changes are preserved for quite a long time even without subsequent healthy nutrition. If patients stick to a healthy diet, these changes become permanent. There are many skin diseases treated by fasting: dermatitis, neuro-dermatitis, allergic dermatitis, psoriasis (the main cause of which is impaired liver function), pustules, and different skin infections. It would be more correct to cite self-healing of the body due to fasting. The duration of the fast depends on the severity and duration of the disease. The more severe the skin disorder, the longer the fasting period. You’ll most likely have to undergo several courses that last 7-9 days and stick to a healthy diet in-between them. 5-7 days of dry fasting may be enough to treat mild disorders, but everything depends on the overall health. After all, skin disorders are the marker indicating quite a significant body malfunction. Therefore, it’s hard to say for how long a fast should last in one case or another. Of course, everyone wants to go through a medical crisis and recover immediately, but it’s not always possible or required.

19.2.18. Functional Nervous System Disorders

Depression can be called the common cold of mood disorders. Most people are affected by it in one way or another, either directly or indirectly. Your friends or family members can be its victims. Although depression is widespread, many people aren’t aware of what it is exactly, what causes it, and how it’s different from dumpiness and bad mood.

Depression is characterized by a number of very common symptoms, including chronic sadness, anxiety, frustration, hopelessness, and pessimism. Patients with depression often feel guilty, worthless, and helpless. They lose their interest in life and they’re indifferent to previously favored activities and hobbies, such as parties with friends or even sex. Insomnia, excessive sleepiness, and waking up early in the morning are common symptoms of depression. In my opinion, the main cause of depression is the endogenous intoxication of the body resulting in an extremely high level of toxins. Therefore, normal biochemical processes in the central nervous system are disrupted. Stress, trauma, and genetic predisposition are simply provoking and predisposing factors.

A long time ago I learned that patients aren’t interested in the outside world during fasting, and they’re more focused on nature, its beauty, health, and this treatment. The body does its best to survive. Based on the dominance principle, two types of stress cannot coexist in it simultaneously. The more powerful one wins. Dry fasting is a huge stress for the body. Unlike other types of stress, it’s controlled by the patient’s will and state of mind. That’s why all pathological symptoms disappear during fasting. A great desire and will to live emerge in patients. They become more calm, kind, and sympathetic.

I think that our spirit and body go hand in hand. Quality body detox helps restore the normal functioning of intestines and the liver, and the brain starts receiving high-quality nutrition and sufficient amounts of oxygen. All the biochemical processes that were disrupted are normalized and improve by an order of magnitude.

19.2.19. Dry Fasting against Obesity

Obesity is a chronic recurrent disease characterized by excessive adipose tissue accumulation in the body. The World Health Organization considers obesity an epidemic that affects millions of people. There were 250 million registered patients with obesity, amounting to 7% of the adult population in the world in 1998.

The diseases caused by overeating are humanity’s main enemies on the path to biological thriving. 60% of Americans are overweight, and it’s a remote cause of 300,000 deaths annually. The population of the Slavic countries resembles Americans in many ways because of the high-carbohydrate diet with chronic protein and vitamin deficiency. That’s why different types of fasting as a radical way to lose weight are popular in all developed countries, where millions of people with triple chins are concerned with this issue.

However, only a few people know the rules of healthy nutrition and therapeutic fasting. When it comes to obesity, which is treatable with fasting, there are thousands of fraudulent companies offering Herbalife and other super-panaceas that supposedly normalize people’s weight and endow them with excellent health without fasting. Many patients call us because they want to lose weight, so I will discuss this disease in more detail. After all, obesity is becoming the number one problem not only in Russia, but also in the United States of America.

Weight loss during fasting means the loss of excessive food, waste, fat, etc., not vital tissues. A person simply loses many kilos of diseases. The muscle mass decrease, but it’s the result of reducing the amount of fat in the muscles and the size of cells. Dry fasting barely decreases the number of muscle cells. According to studies, women lose a bit more than men during fasting. It is believed that this is due to a greater amount of adipose tissue in women. The metabolic rate in women is lower than in men, and weight loss is expected to be faster in men than in women. The proven fact is that the more overweight a person is, the greater the weight loss. Healthy people lose weight more slowly than sick patients.

Overweight patients lose fat much faster than thin people. Nervous and emotional people lose weight faster than someone calm and balanced. Patients who relax and rest lose weight slower than active and stressed patients. There is also evidence of a link between the state of the patient’s tissues and weight loss. Fat people with flabby and soft tissues lose weight very quickly, while fat people with dense tissues lose weight more slowly. Additional data suggest that drinking a lot of water maintains weight as it fills tissues with fluid, but it doesn’t interfere with the usual loss of solid substance. It’s also true that rapid weight loss mainly occurs at the early fasting stage. That’s why short-term fasting courses show greater daily weight loss on average than the long-term ones.

Besides, weight loss during the second, third, and fourth fasting courses is smaller than during the first one.

With proper use and compliance with all recommendations, even water fasting provides excellent results, but dry fasting is much more effective.

We mainly offer combined fasting to treat obesity, a few courses of dry and water fasting in a row. To achieve a stable and sustainable result, it’s necessary to follow certain recommendations, such as a dairy and plant-based diet, therapeutic mastication, fasting days every week, etc.

However, even regular weekly fasting courses combined with dieting can work wonders. I’d like to describe therapeutic mastication in more detail because of its exceptional value, especially in combination with dry fasting.

How to lose weight without dieting? Many people dream of losing weight or getting better while sticking to their eating habits. This goal is achievable if you chew food very thoroughly. At the beginning of the last century, this method was actively promoted by the American physiologist Horace Fletcher (see Note 25). He fell seriously ill when he was 44, and no company wanted to cover his insurance needs. Doctors diagnosed many ailments: excess weight, cardiovascular diseases, and gastrointestinal disorders. Most of all, he was troubled by his stomach problems. Observing the work of the gastrointestinal tract, Fletcher noticed that the food maximally saturated with saliva disappears from the oral cavity without swallowing. Later, this discovery was called the Fletcher esophageal probe. According to his recommendations, every piece of food requires at least 30 chewing movements, and the effect of the “esophageal probe” is triggered after 100 of them. After modifying his old eating habits, the scientist soon lost the excess weight, forgot about his illnesses, started exercising daily, and was in as good a shape as in his youth. Surprisingly, he ate 3 times less food than before. Taste sensations were enhanced, so that every meal turned into a small celebration! How to lose weight?

The famous Fletcher experiment made a huge impression at the West Point American Military Academy. It involved two groups: overweight officers and thin soldiers. During the experiment, all of them were restored to normal weight with the same diet plan only due to proper mastication: officers lost weight and soldiers gained weight. In the end, it was proven that chewing food thoroughly improves health and helps regain normal weight. The famous American millionaire John D. Rockefeller who died when at the age of 98 was an adherent of this method.

The benefits of chewing food thoroughly have been known in the East for a long time. Yogis claim that digestion (and even absorption of energy from food) starts in the mouth, and the food is well absorbed by the body only if it’s well crushed during chewing and abundantly moistened with saliva.

Many people remember the famous yogic saying, "Eat liquid food, drink solid food." It means that even liquid food (juices, decoctions, milk, etc.) must be chewed in the mouth, mixing it with saliva. Solid food must be chewed longer than usual to turn it into liquid. Yogis chew every piece of food 100-200 times for a good reason: one banana or a crust of bread can be sufficient for an experienced yogi. It’s noted that overweight people tend to eat too fast. In this case, the satiety center in the brain doesn’t have enough time to switch on. This process usually takes 25–30 minutes. No matter how much you eat during this period, true satiety will come later, so you shouldn’t eat fast. Active mastication improves blood circulation in the brain, heals the nasopharynx and gums, protects teeth from cavities (saliva neutralizes food acid and sugar).

All life forms on the planet (except the modern human beings) treat the process of digestion very seriously, trying to get everything possible from this process. Modern medicine defines digestion as a physiological process wherein the food entering the digestive tract is processed (mechanically and chemically), which is required for its absorption by the body. Proteins, fats, and carbohydrates contained in food can be digested only when they break down into simpler chemical compounds. These nutrients break down in the digestive tract with the participation of chemical promoters - biological catalysts or enzymes produced by the cells of digestive glands (salivary, gastric, pancreas, intestinal). These are a part of the juices secreted by those glands into the digestive tract lumen.

The subsequent absorption of the broken down substances and their transportation within the body ensures their delivery to the needy cells. The works of I.P. Pavlov[31] prove the following:

1. The nervous system controls the functioning of digestive glands.

2. The amount of secreted juices, their composition and properties depend on food products and other conditions (for example, a person’s mood).

3. All parts of the digestive tract function coherently and interact with each other.

4. The functioning of digestive glands changes when switching from one food regimen to another. The food is processed during prolonged mastication in the following manner. The food crushed by the teeth interacts with the secreted saliva and oral chemoreceptors that send information about its chemical composition to the brain. In turn, the brain provides information about the necessary changes in the chemical composition of saliva to create the best conditions for the subsequent processing and absorption of food. A portion of the food ground in the mouth and treated with saliva is absorbed into the blood right there. It allows to process most carbohydrates, satisfies a part of bodily nutritional needs very fast, eliminates overeating, and creates the most favorable conditions for digesting food in the stomach, duodenum, small and large intestines. Besides, carbohydrates (bread, cereal, pasta, potatoes) are digested mainly in the mouth and duodenum, while proteins (meat, fish, beans) are digested in the stomach. The most favorable conditions are created for separate digestion and the fullest absorption of proteins, carbohydrates, and other nutrients from food. We get a feeling of saturation much faster while eating 2-4 times less. The body spends less energy on digestion, and the saved energy is used by it to restore and heal every part of the gastrointestinal tract. All of this can be achieved after a 5-week course of long therapeutic mastication according to the following scheme.

Therapeutic mastication scheme:

• The first week - every spoon of food put in your mouth (breakfast, lunch, dinner) is chewed for 1 minute.

• The second week – chew food for two minutes.

• The third week – 3 minutes.

• The fourth week - 2 minutes.

• The fifth week - 1 minute.

Ideal method: one chewing movement for each present tooth and three chewing movements for each absent tooth. As a result, a conditioned reflex for prolonged food mastication is formed (30-40 seconds). Based on practice, prolonged therapeutic mastication treats almost all diseases because all the bodily systems are involved in this process: digestive, nervous, endocrine, and others. First and foremost, gastrointestinal diseases are treated: gastric ulcer, gastritis, duodenitis, pancreatitis, and even diabetes. Esophagus functioning is normalized (its diverticula are eliminated), just like large intestine functioning. The liver is cleansed, nervous diseases, thyroid gland disorders, and appendicitis are treated. Moreover, the weight is stabilized: it is decreased by up to 5-10 kg in 5 weeks, while thin patients gain weight. Metabolism normalizes.

Nutrition is an ancient and very important biological function of the body. When we read a newspaper, talk, watch TV, or eat while standing, we voluntarily destabilize the mental process associated with nutrition, thus causing harm to the body. Sooner or later, it may lead to gastrointestinal disorders, nervous diseases, and other health problems that are either directly or indirectly linked to nervous activity and painful symptoms.

Filling the brain with other non-digestion-related information and negative emotions lead to decreased blood circulation in the digestive system and different interconnected changes in the functioning of endocrine glands and microflora of the gastrointestinal tract. Therefore, people shouldn’t eat when they’re stressed. They should eat slowly and focus on sensations in their tongue and palate.

Secondly, we closely watch the process: chew the food thoroughly and slowly so that it turns into a soft mush and slips into your esophagus. It will be easily digested, and you won’t experience any discomfort, pain, heaviness in the stomach or intestines because of different food components. Food will be easily absorbed in the body that will digest its nutrients and absorb everything necessary for the blood to gain muscle strength, energy, and vivacity in general. The body can get rid of all the unnecessary substances and toxins through defecation and urination, thus supporting both digestion and the production of substances necessary for its functioning. Gastrointestinal microflora will function optimally. Since digestion will be excellent, waste products will be excreted without any difficulty. After getting out of bed in the morning, you will experience natural bowel movement without taking any medications. You will have regular and healthy bowel movements in addition to refreshing sleep. While eating, tongue and palate receptors send impulses to the nervous system that carry information about the food. It’s necessary for the tongue to be in contact with food for a long time, so that your meal time is prolonged. Distraction by other mental activities interferes with nutrition management. The brain must be aware of what happens in the mouth. Meditation (focusing on mastication in the mouth) during a meal contributes to a rapid feeling of satiety and acts as an anti-obesity remedy.

Therefore, it’s necessary to eat in a pleasant and relaxed environment, and all people can do that on their own wherever they are. Advances in the rapid elimination of diseases symptoms (but not their causes) with the help of different medications allowed the founders of modern medicine to put ‘Fletcherism’ on the back burner in the past. However, the current crisis of modern medicine makes the return to ‘Fletcherism’ and its modifications relevant. The author’s experience and practice prove that.

The prolonged mastication method has a number of benefits over the separation diet. They include the following:

- Therapeutic mastication is available to everyone and doesn’t require medical supervision.

- Therapeutic mastication is a process of separate nutrition in its pure form because any food consisting of proteins, fats, and carbohydrates is digested separately: carbohydrates are digested in the mouth and the small intestine, while proteins are digested in the stomach.

- While preserving the dietary habits, the body smoothly and gradually stabilizes the gastrointestinal tract and restores the natural capabilities of the immune system without disrupting the existing biorhythm system.

- Therapeutic mastication requires the least amount of energy to restore bodily systems compared to other methods. Therefore, the body’s energy reserves allow it to realize its greatest healing potential.

- Heals the whole body and all of its systems: digestive, nervous, immune, and others.

- A significant reduction in food intake (by 2-4 times) prevents obesity after a therapeutic mastication treatment course, reduces the energy required for digestion and the amount of toxins formed in the body, thus facilitating the functioning of the excretion system and contributing to its recovery.

- A conditioned reflex is naturally produced - the habit of prolonged mastication after undergoing a treatment course, which can be preserved for years if this treatment is repeated regularly. No other treatment options can provide this result, including any type of fasting.

- The sign that the therapeutic mastication course may need to be repeated is the appearance of tongue plaque in the morning.

My main concept entails the combination of two natural methods. Dry fasting cleanses the body and stabilizes metabolism very well, natural weight loss occurs, the stomach size decreases, and its normal volume is restored.

On the other hand, there are rapid regenerative processes in the body after fasting. Cells actively absorb nutrients. If people don’t limit their food intake during this period, their weight will quickly be regained and they will probably gain several extra kilos. If patients start using the therapeutic mastication method right after fasting, their stomach will never stretch, the body will completely absorb all the nutrients, and its restoration and rejuvenation will be optimal. I’ve never seen anyone who has gained weight when combining these two methods. On the contrary, the weight drops after fasting. Everything is very simple, as always. It only requires a bit of will and patience. I usually give these recommendations to all of my overweight patients: stick to a specific diet, cleanse the intestines and the liver.

One should start with weekly 24-hour water fasting course. Some patients underwent 24-hour fasting courses three times a week. In other words, they ate one day and fasted the next day. If they allowed themselves to eat too much, 24-hour fasting courses several times a week quickly made them lose the gained weight. After that, patients underwent a 3-day water fasting course. Only after that do they start dry fasting.

At our center, patients usually undergo a few courses of combined fasting. The treatment is as follows: 5 days of dry fasting, 5 days of water fasting, 7 days of fast completion, and then the cycle is repeated. It makes no sense to fast for more than 10 days, as the weight drops mainly in the first 7-10 days. After undergoing these treatment courses, it’s possible to naturally lose 15-30 kg or even more - everything depends on the weight and the goal.

Here are some simple tips for people who fail to stick to a diet. Their use helps achieve the general goal – to lose weight.

- To stop thinking about food, try doing something interesting, read a book, go to the cinema, or take a walk outside. Remember that boredom is your enemy and the ally of overeating and obesity.

- Put food on small plates to make it look like a larger amount. Put a small amount of food onto your fork or spoon, cut bread into thin slices to create an illusion of bigger portions. Eat slowly, and you’ll feel satiated sooner.

- If you need to visit friends, eat something dietary, such as a salad, before you leave, and it will be easier for you to resist the temptation to try something forbidden.

- If you are very hungry and feel that you can’t refrain from eating until the next meal, drink one-third of a glass of milk slowly, in small sips.

- It’s advisable to have scales at home to constantly monitor your body weight. Measuring your waist with a tape measurer in the morning constitutes proper control: 1 centimeter is one kilogram of weight.

- Try to avoid sweets departments and the company of people with a sweet tooth. Remember that a piece of cake stays in the mouth for 2 minutes. It stays in the stomach for 2 hours, but it remains on the hips in the form of excess fat for the rest of your life.

- It’s mandatory to exclude dishes and foods that increase the appetite from your diet: spices, smoked meats, etc.

- Hang a therapeutic mastication scheme in your kitchen so that it is always in front of you when you are eating.

- Ideally, it’s best not to eat after 6 pm.

- One of the main conditions of steady weight loss - you must pre-program yourself for the weight that you want to have. Take a piece of paper and use your left hand to write your desired weight in numbers and always keep it in front of you.

20. How does doctor Filonov debunk myths about dry therapeutic fasting?

Myth #1. People can survive 2-3 days without water. 30-40 hours after the last sip of water, severe dehydration starts and all vital processes are suppressed. After 50-60 hours, the body starts dying. A person dying without water has hallucinations, loses consciousness, and suffers from terrible headaches.

It’s one of the most common scary stories about dry fasting that I found online. Let's see what happens during the so-called dry or absolute fasting, when we stop not only eating, but also drinking.

Water constitutes about 70% of our body mass, it comes from drinking and in the food. In addition, about 400 ml per day is formed in the body as a result of the oxidation, mainly of fats.

When dry fasting, the amount of this metabolic liquid significantly increases and it meets the needs of the body for some time. The body also has certain water reserves. The skin alone contains up to 2 liters of water. There are water reserves in some bodily cavities (serous cavities) and in some internal organs.

The human body can survive without water for 12 days in comfortable conditions (in the mountains, near waterfalls and rivers).

From a physiological point of view, the body doesn’t experience a significant lack of liquid during fasting because up to 1 liter of endogenous (metabolic) liquid is released for every kilogram of broken down adipose mass (or glycogen) daily. The loss of body fluids (via skin-pulmonary perspiration and diuresis) is relatively small under normal temperature conditions, ranging from 1.5 liters to 2 liters per day. Thus, the shortage of liquid doesn’t exceed 0.5-1 liter per day, which is physiologically acceptable in conditions of reduced metabolism. Adipose tissue cells, adipocytes, are rich in fat and they’re living energy carriers. At the time of growth, the ‘sated’ times, their number increases with sufficient nutrition. When fasting, they become an internal source of nutrition. Adipocytes provide the body not only with energy and water, but also supply almost all the compounds required for living. One kilogram of adipose tissue is enough for 2-3 days of dry fasting.

Why should dry fasting only be conducted in nature? That’s because the body absorbs during dry fasting, and it should take liquid and energy only from the energy areas that are environmentally-friendly. According to scientific studies, a person may refrain from drinking for 10 to 12 days in a comfortable environment, or even longer in extreme conditions. It’s true that all living forms have incredible vital reserves.

Myth #2. Many people wonder where our exotoxins and endotoxins go, because we don’t conduct special cleansing procedures: enemas, hydro-colon therapy, or sauna treatment.

Every living organism is constantly exposed to adverse factors, both external and internal, in the course of its life. They cause intoxication or poison the body with harmful substances both coming from the outside and produced in the body. Toxins enter the body from the outside through breathing, skin, with food and water. Toxins are produced in the body as by-products of vital processes: cells divide and old cells die. If they aren’t removed from the body, they will poison it.

Muscle fibers are destroyed in the course of any physical activity. Any stress, brain functioning, and imagination trigger complex biochemical processes in the body, during which the used materials also turn into toxins that must be removed.

Nature gave all living creatures a wonderful mechanism that informs them that the body must be cleansed of toxins. As toxins accumulate in the human body (or that of any living creature), it signals that it needs to get some sleep and people may experience drowsiness and fatigue.

Principal detoxification of the body occurs during sleep, as it gets rid of the toxins that accumulated during the day or entered the body with harmful food or alcoholic beverages. After their consumption, sleep may literally descend upon you.

The same thing happens after taking certain drugs that cause drowsiness or sleeping pills that don’t simply lead to harmless sleep, but poison you in a rather sophisticated way.

You need to understand that if you feel sleepy after eating, it means that your food was unhealthy. Healthy foods don’t cause drowsiness. On the contrary, they should invigorate and provide energy. First of all, sleep is a short-term dry fast. After all, we neither drink nor eat while sleeping. This is when vital energy is released in the body to do its healing work.

Our body is a very smart and perfect system. When undergoing dry fasting, it switches on more powerful reserves and a neutralization system compared to water fasting. No matter how paradoxical it may sound, dry fasting is much easier to tolerate than water fasting, and it also achieves a better effect.

According to the value judgments of experienced dieters, the effect of dry fasting is 3 times greater than the effect of water fasting in the same time period. Dry fasting deprives body cells of any type of external nutrition because liquid nourishes them in the same way food does. Since nutrition and cleansing processes occur alternately, during dry fasting cells are only engaged in self-cleansing without wasting time and energy on anything else, since there’s no incoming water from the outside. The body also burns the waste and removes toxins much more actively during dry fasting because there’s no water intake. People usually have a fever during dry fasting. It accelerates metabolic processes, which is a great benefit for the body. More specifically, a body temperature increase accelerates biochemical reactions and the breakdown and oxidation of toxins and waste and increases the bactericidal action of the blood tenfold. It means that the blood becomes 10 times more dangerous for any harmful microorganisms.

Research proves the decreased viability of microbes. When body temperature rises, bodily detoxification accelerates, which means the removal or elimination of toxins and harmful substances. Chills and fever are an amazing process because of the enormous cleansing effect, and it switches on at the later stages of detox.

A fever indicates that not only physical diseases are eliminated, but the spiritual body is also cleansed. The vortex flow, the so-called energy shells where negative information is collected, is purified. Higher concentrations of biologically active substances, hormones, immunocompetent cells, and immunoglobulins in body fluids are achieved with dry fasting in the shortest possible time.

The enzymatic activity of special cells, macrophages, is one of the mechanisms of eliminating endotoxins in the body during fasting.

Phagocytic activity may triple after only 24-36 hours of dry fasting. In addition, phagocyte activity fluctuates throughout the year. Phagocytes are most active in May-June, and they are least active in November-February. They perform a phagocytic (from the Greek words "cell” and “eater") function. This process leads to autolysis, the breakdown of unhealthy and weak tissues. With its help, those substances that are least needed for vital body functions are absorbed and removed. Autolysis starts on the 2nd or 3rd day of dry fasting, and reaches its maximum on the 8th -10th day.

I’ve already mentioned the toxic properties of tap water. When food and “dead” or poisoned water don’t enter the body, the body actually gets a complete rest.

No enemas are required during dry fasting because there is no absorption of toxins from intestines due to the absence of water. Therefore, there’s no intoxication with dry fasting, unlike other types of fasting. Dry fasting is also much easier to tolerate physically.

Myth #3. Kidney problems may occur during dry fasting because of a huge burden on the kidneys. Dry fasting is one of the most dangerous cleansing methods.

On the contrary, when a person is on a diet or undergoes a therapeutic fasting course, the amount of fluid should be increased. After all, water removes excess salts and toxins (waste) from the body. Refusing to drink water is dangerous nonsense. The body is dehydrated and intoxicated with waste products instead of being cleansed.

Tap water in modern cities causes much damage because of its insufficient cleansing from industrial waste. Besides, it’s usually chlorinated. This type of water rapidly releases free chlorine, chlorine dioxide, and other chlorine compounds. They oxidize many things in the body that shouldn’t be oxidized. Chlorine also kills good bacteria that synthesizes the necessary vitamins. When water is boiled, bacteria are killed, colloidal dirt particles coagulate, water softens, volatile organic compounds and a part of free chlorine evaporate. However, the concentration of salts, heavy metals, and pesticides increases. When the chlorine bound with organic matter is heated, it turns into a terrible poison – dioxin, a powerful carcinogen. Dioxins are 68 times more toxic than cyanide. When we drink boiled water, it slowly kills us. When water settles for at least three hours, the concentration of free chlorine decreases, but iron ions, heavy metal salts, carcinogenic organic chlorine compounds, and radionuclides are hardly eliminated.

Distilled water (which had passed a vapor state) is unsuitable for permanent use, as it doesn’t contain the micronutrients required by the body. Its constant use leads to immune system disorders, cardiac rhythm problems, and digestion-related complications.

Water filtration may not provide the desired effect either. To know which filter to buy (coal, membrane, bactericidal, or combined), you must first have enough information about the water composition. It’s also necessary to regularly replace the filter because after a while it starts giving back accumulated waste products and the microflora that multiplies in them.

During dry fasting, the body doesn’t need to recycle water to the extent it does during regular food intake and with a normal drinking regime. It’s clear that the kidneys and the liver enjoy almost a complete rest during dry fasting, and things are different with water fasting. Their recovery is much faster when dry fasting. Therefore, its efficiency is doubtless, but practicality should still be considered.

For example, some people can’t undergo dry fasting for many reasons, but they can undergo water fasting.

After a 14-day water fasting course, I successfully completed fasting and started eating normally, but later I felt a heaviness in my kidneys. Prior to that, I didn’t even feel any disturbance in that area. It’s not surprising because I only drank water for the last 10 days of fasting, so my kidneys had to work hard. Other bodily organs successfully performed their preventive work.

When completing a 7-day dry fasting course, I didn’t feel any discomfort. You should try it yourself. After dry fasting, the body is more viable, recovers faster, and achieves better results. An average dry fast (7-9 day) can be easily tolerated, but it requires careful preparation and training.

When people discuss the damage that dry fasting causes to kidneys, it means that they don’t understand the processes that happen during fasting. It would be more correct to ask whether modern drinks and our tap water damage our kidneys.

Kidneys are the main excretory organ of our bodies. Moreover, they can be called a direct excretory organ because they filter the blood and remove excess water, unnecessary substances formed by metabolic processes in body cells, unused substances formed due to digestion, drug intake, etc. All of the above is diluted with the liquid filtered from blood plasma. It’s necessary to remember that almost all the liquid entering the body goes to the blood and undergoes many transformations (cleaned, structured, heated, or cooled). This process takes a lot of energy, and only subsequently turns into urine. Therefore, the quality of drinking water has a huge impact on our health.

However, kidneys aren’t a separate and independent organ. They’re an integral part of the body, which is quite strong. It’s nearly impossible to damage the kidneys during dry fasting. This damage is often a result of problems with other organs and systems, and it means that the whole body must be treated.

All bodily activities need to be restored to treat kidney diseases. Dry fasting is one of the ways to restore the lost health. It allows the body to internally eliminate all the disruptions in its activities. Only dry fasting doesn’t affect a particular organ or system, as it has a healing effect on all bodily organs and systems. Dry fasting provides a tangible positive effect for most kidney diseases. With conventional methods of treatment, the burden on the kidneys doesn’t decrease. On the contrary, it increases because kidneys process the decay products of drugs. The burden on kidneys is significantly reduced during dry fasting.

During the first days of fasting, there are significant urine changes even in healthy people. When coming out of a fast, there’s a persistent improvement in urine composition. The urine of a sick person quickly improves: protein, red blood cells, and white blood cells disappear, the amount of salts excreted in the urine decreases. The treatment of glomerulonephritis requires long-term intake of different drugs to relieve the exacerbation, which usually manifests as swelling and an increase in the amount of protein and red blood cells. After 3 or 4 days of fasting, swelling is relieved and the amount of removed fluid is normalized. Urine composition is completely normalized within a few days of the end of the fast and remains healthy.

Dry fasting is very effective in treating inflammatory diseases of kidneys and the urinary tract. The effect is achieved regardless of the pathogen type. Dry fasting was successfully used to treat sexually transmitted diseases in ancient times. In patients with pyelonephritis, fasting quickly relieves inflammation, solves urination problems (frequent or rare, painful urination), relieves low back pain and lower abdominal pain, and improves urine test results (leukocytes, high protein, bacteria, and salts disappear).

It’s necessary to remember that kidneys are very closely related to the liver. In most cases, kidney diseases are caused by the inability of the liver to perform its functions normally. Therefore, it’s important to conduct cleansing procedures before fasting and follow a diet afterwards. Properly conducted dry fasting is very often effective for most kidney diseases.

Myth #4. Fasting is a huge stress for the body.

Stress is an inevitable part of life. Stress is a special bodily state characterized by increased "alertness" and resistance to all damaging environmental factors without exception.

Our modern life is constant stress. Surgery is a huge stress for the body, especially for young women. Most importantly, the cause of the disease remains after it. Well, fasting is also a stress for the body, just like a cold, but stress shouldn’t necessarily be equated with harm. It's one thing when a person is hungry because he has nothing to eat, and there is a real threat of starvation. In this case, you can get seriously ill in two days. Something similar happens when a person gets lost or during DIY experiments, such as popular diets.

Dry therapeutic fasting is an entirely different thing because people don’t eat or drink voluntarily under doctors’ supervision, get medical help and psychological support. There are comfortable conditions and many recreational procedures. State of mind, mood, and preparation are very important for any type of fasting.

People shouldn’t force themselves to suffer without their favorite meals for a few days. One has to be in a positive state of mind. This is the only case that guarantees success because the brain neither recognizes danger nor sends hunger signals. It doesn’t produce stress hormones. On the 3rd day of fasting, the hormone serotonin starts being actively produced and brings feelings of inner harmony and satisfaction.

Abstaining from food (even if it’s voluntary) is stress for a living organism, which mobilizes bodily defenses to overcome a difficult situation, as it uses its endogenous reserves in the absence of exogenous nutrition. At the same time, everything less important for life support is used (processed) "according to the law of hierarchy", including inflammation products, adipose tissue, etc.

When the body is faced with physiological or natural stress, the activity of the endocrine glands increases and the autonomous nervous system is rejuvenation, in addition to improvement of other mechanisms. People involuntarily enter a state of increased activity: they need to look for food and water. The psychological background is altered, minor problems are no longer important. The mechanisms of biochemical detox are switched on: the burning of fat and liver glycogen stores enhances and the blood composition changes.

An experienced doctor regulates this process of managed stress.

Myth #5. Many nutritionists claim that people suffer from vitamin deficiency while fasting, the body doesn’t receive protein on time, and it burns structural proteins of its own tissues, primarily muscles, in addition to fat.

When it comes to vitamin deficiency, it’s absent during therapeutic fasting. The opposite opinion appeared in the media along with the study of different low-quality and fancy diets (rice, Japanese, Kremlin, etc.). Complete abstinence from food and water (it’s called a zero diet) is also criticized together with these diets. This is what nutritionists consider a possible vitamin deficiency during prolonged fasting. It’s assumed on the basis of a simple analogy: they say fasting should lead to vitamin deficiency if a diet that lacks sufficient minerals, micronutrients, and vitamins causes it. However, it turns out that the opposite is the case.

According to numerous studies, the body doesn’t waste energy on digestion, absorption, or excretion during therapeutic fasting. At the same time, the need for minerals is significantly reduced, and the body uses its current reserves more sparingly. That’s why there’s no vitamin deficiency while fasting even if this problem is often caused by mono diets that allows the consumption of refined and denatured food products.

The internal food reserve is the evolution benefit that increases survival chances of in the absence of food. These are high-calorie lipids dissolved in body fluids, liver and muscle glycogen, and specialized cells or adipose tissue. Cells of this tissue, adipocytes, are rich in fat and serve as living energy carriers. During the growth, their number increases with sufficient nutrition. They become an internal source of food while fasting. Living storage cells are an excellent solution to proper nutrition! Think about the efforts taken to keep food warm and in good condition for a long time at no extra cost!

During fasting, adipocytes provide the body not only with energy, but also with almost all its vital components. A person who conducts fasting properly doesn’t have any diseases caused by malnutrition. One kilogram of adipose tissue is enough for 5 days of proper nutrition! Even the body of a fit person consists of 25% of adipose tissue.

Dry or absolute fasting (without water) has two huge benefits. Patients lose less muscle tissue than adipose tissue. The loss of muscle and adipose tissue is almost the same as during water fasting. With dry fasting, adipose tissue breaks down 3-4 times faster than the muscle tissue because more than 90% of adipose tissue consists of water, and muscle tissue remains relatively intact.

A hundred years ago, academician V.V. Pashutin[32] found out that pathologically changed tissues are burned while fasting based on long-term and in-depth studies. Relieving the body from old, sick, dead, weak, flabby, decomposing cells and tissues is a powerful therapeutic effect for many diseases. After all, healthy tissues are renewed with no harm, thus causing the rejuvenation effect noted by all researchers, both ancient and modern. All vital organs - the heart, central nervous system, brain, and endocrine glands stay healthy and even significantly improve their functions during the therapeutic fasting treatment regardless of its length. These factors explain such a therapeutic fasting phenomenon as increased creativity in intellectuals - writers, musicians, inventors, and artists. Their performance improves immeasurably, the mind is clearer, and brainwork improves: thoughts become deeper, the circle of associations expands significantly, long-term and short-term memory improves, etc.

Competence in this sphere is required to criticize or reject therapeutic fasting. The main argument is as follows: fasting is a natural instinct laid down by nature in living organisms, and it’s necessary for their development.

Myth #6. The body can constantly renew itself, so there’s no need for any type of fasting.

It’s true that the body is a unique biological system that can rebuild and update its own structures literally on the go.

The body constantly builds itself anew, adapting to changing external conditions, which means that adaptation processes never stop. Recent studies prove that cells and cell systems possess an amazing ability: they can find worn and pathologically modified biological structures and replace them with new ones that are functionally better. Scientists call these auto-regulation mechanisms, and it’s the inner self-regulation of the body.

When people tell me that this mechanism works under any conditions, such as malnutrition and harsh environmental factors, I always have questions. Why do we get sick, old, and die if the body can constantly renew its own structures through auto-regulation? Why don’t the cell auto-regulation mechanisms work at their full capacity? Why do the systems responsible for the constant self-renewal of tissues become damaged? Why does their effectiveness decrease? Why are the body’s adaptive capabilities reduced? Why don’t these mechanisms reach their full potential?

Most people can’t answer these questions. The body is full of modern poisons due to malnutrition and harsh environmental conditions. Vital energy is spent on neutralizing these poisons and maintaining minimal vital functions. Modern studies show that the accumulation of exotoxins and endotoxins in the body reduces the opportunities for its adaptation and auto-regulation even in a healthy state. In this situation, the body can’t rejuvenate itself. We will never learn to manage our self-renewal powers with modern medical philosophy.

Therapeutic fasting is a very natural way to make it happen. Detoxification of the body stimulates the inner healing reserves and supports self-renewal systems. Practice shows that the renewal and rejuvenation of the body are greatly enhanced during dry therapeutic fasting. When outside cellular feeding stops for a certain strictly calculated period, it becomes possible to most effectively remove dead cells from tissues, use old cells, sick tissues, and cleanse systems and organs from accumulated waste and toxins.

Fasting can be considered a temporary halt of the conveyor belt for the preventive repair of those systems and mechanisms that can’t be repaired while the conveyor is in constant motion.

Myth #7. Fasting is ineffective for weight loss. People lose fat during a fasting course, but they quickly regain weight after switching back to their usual diet.

Of course, nutritionists are right to a certain extent. The thing is that rapid recovery processes begin in the body after fasting. Cells actively absorb nutrients. Weight will be regained quickly and people are quite likely to gain several extra kilos if they don’t limit their food intake during this period. Therefore, if the goal is only weight loss, not a complete change in the habits that had caused obesity, fasting won’t help you. You will only gain a few extra kilograms.

However, if you do change your habits and lifestyle, you can achieve excellent results. In addition to weight loss, there is a significant improvement in cardiovascular activity, high blood pressure lowers, shortness of breath and arrhythmia disappear, and the heart rate becomes healthy. Menstrual cycle is restored in women, while men’s sexual vigor improves. Psychopathological symptoms are relieved in patients with mental disorders. Subsequent observation of patients for up to 15 years showed that the weight remained at the same level as after the treatment in case of compliance with the recommended diet.

Even water fasting provides excellent results in case of proper use and compliance with all recommendations, but dry fasting is much more effective. It’s known that adipose tissue easily deposits water, making lipolysis difficult. Dry fasting relieves swelling, thus accelerating lipolysis. For overweight people, dry fasting is the most effective way to lose weight. It’s the best fat burner. After dry fasting, the weight is regained, but it never returns to its previous level. Unlike many other weight loss methods, fasting is free and, most importantly, harmless. People tolerate it more easily than numerous debilitating diets that do nothing but harm. Nutrition from one’s own reserves is perfectly balanced. The body takes only what it needs at the moment, not what is artificially taken from outside. What are the advantages of dry fasting over other weight loss methods?

- Fast and safe weight loss during fasting.

- Fasting is easier to undergo because there’s no constant feeling of hunger.

- The skin and tissues do not become saggy or flabby after the weight is lost.

- During fasting, weight loss is accompanied by an improvement of the body and overall well-being (it’s easier to breathe and move, constant fatigue disappears, indigestion and heaviness in the abdomen are gone, blood pressure is lowered, and the burden on the heart is decreased).

- Fasting helps improve eating habits, which is its key benefit.

To treat obesity, we prescribe a series of combination fasting courses (dry fasting and water fasting) in a row. To achieve a stable long-term result, one has to follow certain recommendations: a dairy and plant-based diet, the mastication method, 24-hour weekly fasting, etc. However, even regular dry fasting (every week) in combination with a diet can work wonders.

Myth #8. Many people believe that dry fasting can treat all incurable diseases, even the terminal stage of cancer.

Dry fasting can very effectively treat different diseases, especially at their initial stages.

However, even this method has its own indications, contraindications, and limits. This method is especially effective for inflammatory conditions. Short-term dry fasting can be successfully used not only to treat cold-related diseases, but also any inflammation of internal and external organs.

Dry fasting successfully treats skin boils, inner ear infections, periostitis, injuries, bruises, fractures, concussion, abscesses, colds, infections. Fasting can’t cure bone fractures, however, water deficiency leads to a quick decrease in swelling and inflammation. After a concussion, preventative dry fasting is mandatory. A concussion causes brain swelling, which leads to all subsequent problems. The faster the swelling is relieved, the faster the recovery. Long-term dry fasting is very effective in such serious diseases as rheumatoid arthritis, ankylosing spondylitis, deforming arthrosis, and many others. It’s also effective for ovarian cysts and benign tumors.

Unfortunately, this method is used after all the modern treatment methods have been tried and proven inefficient. People use it as a drowning man clutches at a straw. The body is completely poisoned by chemistry, hormones, and radiation. All the natural bodily defenses are completely suppressed and paralyzed, and a sick person feels hopeless and starts undergoing the longest fasting courses without cleansing and training the body first. In this case, serious complications and even death may occur.

In my practice, I have had to deal with such cases. Of course, I had cases of treating cancer at the initial stage, but those patients underwent a few dry fasting courses, relocated from cities to the countryside, and completely changed their lifestyle. That’s why they achieved good results. Other patients with cancer, who were fasting independently at home after chemotherapy and radiation, could only prolong their life and improve its quality. Everything should be done in proper time.

Of course, people can die during fasting; not from hunger, but because their over-nourished bodies are full of numerous impurities, which start to move about. Incurably sick patients may die while fasting, but they will die from their disease, not because of fasting. Likewise, they could die after eating. Tens of thousands of patients with heart disease die after a hearty meal.

You can die from your own stupidity if you don’t follow the rules of fasting (it happens, but very rarely), especially when coming out of a fast (if you eat everything you see). What does fasting have to do with that? Fasting is life! While our stupidity and limitations will surely lead us to death.

Myth #9. Many people write that dry fasting requires salt-water enemas and rinsing the mouth with water, as these procedures help undergo dry fasting.

During complete (water) fasting, the body switches completely to endogenous nutrition. This unique mechanism is ruined completely if people start drinking juice or eating apples during this period.

The same thing happens during dry fasting. Body cells start producing their own high-quality fluid from internal reserves during dry fasting. When water enters the mouth or intestines, this mechanism is ruined.

All of my patients who have tried to rinse their mouth with water say that they felt much better at first, but then the dry mouth sensation intensified several times so that it became almost impossible to continue fasting. Just like with salt enemas, there’s no cleansing effect, but thirst is triggered, making it almost impossible to undergo a full therapeutic dry fasting treatment course.

Sometimes, it’s acceptable to bathe and douse with cold water when coming out of the fast. However, if you tolerate fasting well, there’s no need for it. “Health is work, work is patience, patience is suffering, suffering is cleansing, and cleansing is health!”

Literature

1. Filonov, S. I. Suchoe lechebnoe golodanie. Mify i realnost (Dry medical fasting. Myths and reality), Barnaul’, 2008. Dry medical fasting. Myths and reality).

2. Filonov, S. I. Lechenie organizma sobstvennymi silami (Curing the body with its own strengths), Barnaul’, 2015.

3. Agadzhanjan, N. A., Katkov, A. Ju., Rezervy nashego organizma (The reserves of our organism), Moscow 1979.

4. Arakeljan, S. Budem zhit’ trista let? (Will we live three hundred years?) / review Trud, 2.10.1984, № 6

5. Bragg, P., Chudo-golodanie (The Miracle of Fasting), Saint-Petersbourg, Nevskiy Prospekt 2003.

6. Bulanov, Ju. B., Likvidacija ORZ kratkosrochnym golodaniem u sportsmenov (Short fast for the elimination of acute respiratory diseases in athletes).

7. Dorofeyev, Valerij «Treniruj svoi rezervy i zhivi chot’ do 200 let ili dolgozhitel’stvo i sport» (Train your reserves and live up to 200 years or longevity and sport) / review «Sport dlija vsech (Sport for everyone)»).

8. Kokosov, A. N., Luft, V. M., Tkachenko, V. I., Choroshilov, Lechebnoe golodanie pri vnutrennykh boleznej (Therapeutic fasting in the treatment of internal diseases), / «Mir mediciny» (The world of medicine) – Sankt Peterburg, «Lan’» 1999.

9. Lavrova, V. P. Kljuchi k tajnam zhizni (The keys to the mysteries of life), book 1, part 2, p. 177, Мoscow, 1999.

10. Malachova, M., Solomennikov A. Ochishchenie sorbentami (Purify with intestinal adsorbents), Nevskij Prospekt, Sankt Peterburg, 2002.

11. Malachov, G. P. Golodanie i zdorov’e (Fasting and health), Мoscow, 2003.  Primenenie razgruzochno-dieticheskoj terapij (RDT) v vosstanovitel’noj medicine. Posobie dlja vrachej (The application of the RDT diet therapy in rehabilitation medicine. Medical Handbook), Moscow 2005 (see below p. 137).

12. Nikolaiyev, Yu. S., Nilov, E. I., Cherkasov, V. G. Golodanie radi zdorov’ja (Fasting for health), Moscow «Sovetskaja Rossija», 1988.

13. Shelton, H., Golodanie i zdorov’e (Fasting Can Save Your Life ) - Moscow, 1996.

14. Suvorin, A. A., Metod Suvorina. Lechenie golodaniem (Suvorin's method. Treat yourself with fasting ), Moscow,1998.

15. Shchennikov, L. A. Tselebnoe vozderzhanie ot zhikdosti i pishchi (Therapeutic abstinence from liquids and food), Moscow, 2003.

16. Vojtovich, G. A., Izceli samogo sam (Heal yourself), Moscow, 1998.

Gallery

First European collective dry fasting practice conducted by Doctor Filonov (Bioenergy Resort, Salinera Strunjan, Slovenia, 29 June 2019 – 13 July 2019)

[1] Our monograph in italian: Digiuno secco. Gli ultimi sviluppi della digiunoterapia in Russia (Dry fast: the latest developments in fasting in Russia), Macerata, edizioni Simple 2017, brings together the translation of the two writings of S. Filonov and is composed as follows:

Suchoe lechebnoe golodanie. Mify i realnost - (Therapeutic dry fasting. Myths and reality), 2008. This book is reported here in an almost integral version, separated into the shorter chapters: Interesnye svedeniya o suchom golodanii (Interesting facts about dry fasting), Zenshchina, kotoraya ne est (The woman who does not eat), Solntseedy (The sun-eaters)

Lechenie organizma sobstvennymi silami (Curing the body with its own strengths), 2015 - the chapters regarding the vetero-slavic massage Staroslaviyanskie metody lecheniya (Vetero-slavic treatment methods) have been omittedy

[2] The Italian translation by V. G. Bani (La scienza del digiuno) was published on YouTube in April 2017.

[3] Nikolayev Yu.S. Golodaniye radi zdoroviya (Fasting for Health), Moskva,  Sovetskaya Rossiya, 1973.

[4] Taken from the first book by dr Filonov, Suchoe lechebnoe golodaniye. Mify i realnost - (Therapeutic dry fasting. Myths and reality), 2008.

[5] Cryptobiosis (latent life) is the collective name for a state of life used by some organisms to overcome periods of unfavorable environmental conditions such as desiccation, freezing, and oxygen deficiency. Cryptobiotic organisms are known from both the plant and animal kingdom (mainly among invertebrates). Cryptobiosis may be entered either within a specific life stage (for example larvae and eggs, spores of various fungi and bacteria, and pollen and seeds of some plants) or over the entire life cycle (in species of Protozoa, Nematoda, Tardigrada, Arthropoda, mosses, lichens, and algae, as well as some higher plants). In the cryptobiotic state, all measurable metabolic processes are interrupted. When environmental conditions return to being hospitable, the organism will return to its metabolic state of life as it was prior to the cryptobiosis.

[6] The razgruzochno-dieticheskaya terapiya (RDT) (“fasting-dietary therapy – FDT”) was based on the method of complete “water” fasting, developed by Professor Yu. S. Nikolayev and approved by the Ministry of Healthcare of the USSR in 1990, then revised and approved by the Ministry of Healthcare of the Russian Federation in 2005. The course of therapy consisted of three main periods: preparatory, fasting and restoration periods (see the Methodological Recommendations Primenenie razgruzochno-dieticheskoj terapij (RDT) v vosstanovitelnoy medicine. Posobye dliya vrachey (Methodological Recommendation for application of FDT (RDT) in Rehabilitation Medicine. A Manual for Physicians), Moskva 2005).

[7] Zakirov V. A., Klinicheskaya i funktsionalnaya kharakteristika bolnykh bronkhialnoy astmoy pri reducirovannoy (trednevnoj) rasgruzochno-dieticheskoy terapii metodami “vlazhnogo” I “suchogo” golodaniya, (Clinical and functional characteristics of patients with bronchial asthma treated with fasting dietary therapy (three days) and "water" and "dry" fasting methods”) // Nemedikamentoznye metody v lechenii i reabilitatsii bolnykh nespecificheskimi zabolevaniyami legkikh (Non-pharmacological methods in the treatment and rehabilitation of patients with non-specific lung diseases // Leningrad 1989, pp. 63-67.

[8] Khoroshilov I. E., Kliniko-gigienicheskye aspekty absoljutnogo golodaniya, St. Petersburg, 1994.

[9] Pashutin V. V. (1845—1901), Kurs obshchey I eksperimentalnoy patologii (patologicheskoy fiziologii) (The Course of General and Experimental Pathology (pathological physiology), St. Petersburg, 1902.

[10] Pevzner M. I. (1872-1952), Osnovy lechebnogo pitaniya (Fundamental of Therapeutic Nutrition), Moscow,1958.

[11] Kokosov A. N., Osinin S. G., Trofimov V. I., Razgruzochno-dieticheskajya terapiya bronkhialnoy astmoy (The FDT (RDT) in the treatment of bronchial asthma), Leningrad, 1978; Razgruzochno-dieticheskajya terapiyja bolnykh bronkhialnoy astmoy (The FDT in the treatment of patients with bronchial asthma), Tashkent, ed. Medicina, 1984; Opyt lechenija bronkhialnoy astmoy metodom razgruzochno-dieticheskoj terapiey (Experiment in the treatment of bronchial asthma using the FDT method), Leningrad, 1986; the guidelines for the Physicians Razgruzochno-dieticheskaja terapiya bronkhialnoy astmoy (The FDT (RDT) in the treatment of bronchial asthma), Leningrad, 1980.

[12] The Methodological Recommendations Primenenie razgruzochno-dieticheskoj terapij (RDT) v vosstanovitelnoy medicine. Posobye dliya vrachey (Methodological Recommendation for application of FDT (RDT) in Rehabilitation Medicine. A Manual for Physicians), Moscow 2005.

[13] Voytovich, G. A., Iztseli samogo sam (Heal yourself ), Moscow, 1998.

[14] The “Breatharians”.

[15] Polezhayev L. V. (1910-2000), was a Soviet and Russian biologist, author of important books about limb regeneration: Stimulyatsiya regeneratsiyi myshchtsii serdtsa (Stimulation of heart muscle regeneration) – Moscow, 1965; Utrata i vosstanovleniye regeneratsionnoy sposobnosti organov i tkaney u zhivotnykh (Loss and restoration of the regenerative ability of organs and tissues in animals) - Moscow, 1968; Transplantatsiya tkaney mozga v norme i patologii (Brain tissue transplantation in normal and pathological conditions), Moscow 1986.

[16]Alexis Carrel (1873 – 1944) was a French surgeon and biologist who was awarded the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine in 1912 for pioneering vascular  suturing techniques. He wrote the book Man, The Unknown. New York and London: Harper and Brothers, 1939.

[17] Charles Manning Child (1869 – 1954) was an American zoologist noted for his work on regeneration (especially on Coelenterates and flatworms) at the University of Chicago.

[18] Clive Maine McCay (1898—1967) was an American biochemist,  nutritionist,  gerontologist, and professor of animal husbandry at Cornell University from 1927-1963. His main interest was the influence of nutrition on aging. He is best known for his work in proving that caloric restriction increases the life span of rats, which is seen as seminal in triggering further research and experiments in the field of nutrition and longevity. (from Internet)

[19] Suren A. Arakelyan (1928-2002) was a famous Soviet and Russian veterinarian. He wrote a book about the method of medical fasting on birds and animal, Budem zhit Trista lyet (Let's live three hundred years).

[20] Paul Chappuis Bragg (1895 – 1976) was an American alternative health food advocate and fitness enthusiast. He wrote on subjects such as detoxification,  dieting, fasting, longevity, natural hygiene and physical culture. His books are very popular in Russia.

[21] Andrei Ivanovich Vorobyov (born November 1, 1928, Moscow) is a Soviet and Russian hematologist, academician of the USSR Academy of Medical Sciences (1986) and RAS (2000), professor, doctor of medical sciences, director of the Research Institute of Hematology and Intensive Care, head of the department hematology and intensive care of the Russian Medical Academy of Postgraduate Education (RMAPO). He has been the First Minister of Health of the Russian Federation.

[22] Alexander Leonidovich Chizhevsky (1897 – 1964) was a  Soviet-era interdisciplinary scientist, a biophysicist who founded "heliobiology" (study of the sun's effect on biology) and "aero-ionization" (study of effect of ionization of air on biological entities). He also was noted for his work in "cosmo-biology", biological rhythms and hematology.

[23] V. V. Frolkis (1924-1999), Ukrainian physiologist and gerontologist. In Kiev he headed the Department of Aging and the Laboratory of Physiology. His research interests covered all major fields of experimental gerontology with particular emphasis on neurohormonal mechanisms of aging and longevity. He developed the adaptive-regulatory theory of aging. He was the author of more than 700 works, including 25 monographs and 15 handbooks. His fundamental work is: Starenie i uvelichenie prodolzhitelnosti zhizni  (Aging and Lifespan Prolongation) (1991).

[24] Polyphepanum is an intestinal sorbent. Composition: hydrolysed lignin. The drug has a high sorption activity and general detoxification effect.

[25] LINEX is a probiotic that contains strains of living lactic acid lyophilized bacteria, which are natural for the microflora of the human intestine. The drug is indicated for the treatment and prevention of disorders of the intestinal microflora. It is categorized as a biologically active supplement.

[26] Horace Fletcher (1849-1919), nicknamed "The Great Masticator," was a well known and influential food and health faddist in early 20th century North America. Fletcher believed that prolonged chewing precluded overeating, led to better systemic and dental health, helped to reduce food intake, and consequently, conserved money.

[27] Aleksandr Zalmanov (1875-1965) was a famous naturopathic physician and gerontologist. He proposed a method of capillaries restoration with special bath tonic which includes organic turpentine. He claimed yellow and white bath tonic or emulsion can be used for treatment of different acute and chronic diseases, such as diseases of nervous system, polyneuritis, multiple sclerosis, leucaemia, presenility, chronic prostatitis, immunopathological diseases, allergies, chronic bronchitis, chronic pneumonia, sexual disfunction.

[28]  Old Slavic abdomen massage is an ancient Slavic technique (widespread among the Siberian communities of Old Believers) that originates in the distant past. This procedure does not require any medical equipment: during the treatment a specialist applies a dosed pressure with his/her hands to certain zones of the diseased organ at the required angle. As a result, the functions of the organs are being recovered and normalized. Dr. Filonov always associates the dry fasting practice with procedures and massages. On the very first day of dry fasting, he treats his patients with the Old Slavic abdomen massage.

[29] Smith L.W., Fay T., Temperature factors in cancer and embryonal cell growths, JAMA, 1939.

[30] RDT – this term was introduced in the 1960s by Professor Yuri Nikolayev (Razgrzochno-Dieticheskaja Terapiya - or fasting dietary therapy. See introductory article). Recently, RDT often indicates Russian Diet Therapy to differentiate it from others.

[31] Ivan Petrovich Pavlov (1849–1936) was a Russian physiologist known primarily for his work in classical conditioning. Pavlov won the Nobel Prize for Physiology or Medicine in 1904, becoming the first Russian Nobel laureate.

[32] Viktor Vasilyevich Pashutin (1845-1901) was a Russian patophysiologist, one of the founders of the pathophysiologic school in Russia and of pathophysiology as an independent scientific discipline. A substantial contribution to fasting therapy studies was made by V.V. Pashutin in his fundamental work Kurs Obshchey i Eksperimentalnoy Patologii (Course of General and Experimental Pathology) in two volumes, N.A. Lebedev's Typography, Staint Petersburg, 1885–1902.