12 Steps to Whole Foods

Achieving an Alkaline Inner Terrain
smoothies and almost inevitably detoxify. Then I bring it up again in Chapter 10, because it’s the first thing to
consider upon waking up dehydrated. And here again, in our last chapter, I ask you once again to think about
your water intake all day long.
Are you drinking 8-10 glasses daily? Before I leave it behind for the third time, I want to reiterate: it’s the
single most important thing you do to nurture your physical health! The type and quality of water you drink
deserves your attention.
Shouldn’t I Avoid Drinking Water Because It’s Contaminated?
We know we should drink water, and yet we’re afraid to drink it because it’s so full of toxic chemicals. The fact
is, even with the chlorine and fluoride and other additives from the average municipality, flushing the body
with water is still preferable to allowing those same chemicals (absorbed from food, air, and anything
containing water) to build up in the body by not drinking much at all. After all, it’s water that is most likely to
cleanse our organs of chemicals in the first place.
This reminds me of the organic produce debate I’m often confronted with: eat some organic produce or none at
all? Similarly, eating lots of raw plant food, even if it has been sprayed with chemicals, is better than not eating
it, because your alternatives to meeting your calorie requirements (animal foods and processed foods) have
much higher concentrations of pesticides and herbicides. (But, wash your produce well, and buy or grow
organic when you can.)
I don’t say this to downplay the problems in our drinking water supply. I highly recommend making it a high
priority to get clean water, not just water. The Environmental Protection Agency sets MCLs (maximum
contaminant levels), which allow for some toxins in our water—they enforce standards only when water is
found to contain more than the MCL of any chemical. And they enforce only when the offending polluter or
municipality is caught in occasional tests.
Contaminants commonly found in drinking water, according to the EPA’s Web site, include microorganisms
such as cryptosporidium, E. coli, and giardia. Disinfectants and their dangerous byproducts are also usually in
our water supply—such things as chlorine, bromates, and chlorites, which are known to cause cancer and
anemia as well as liver, kidney, and central nervous system problems.
Inorganic chemicals found in our water include arsenic, fluoride, asbestos, cyanide, lead, mercury, nitrates, and
nitrites. Organic chemicals like dioxin, xylenes, and benzene are also highly dangerous. And the final category
is radionuclides, like radium and uranium. They are, obviously, radioactive and cancer causing.
Chlorine is pervasive in our water supply as a disinfectant, and even if you drink filtered water, you absorb
more chlorine through your skin in one shower than you could ever drink in a day. Fortunately, for a few
hundred dollars, you can have a plumber install a carbon filter on your water source to the whole house, to
remove almost all of the chlorine, in the same low-tech way a Brita pitcher removes chlorine (but nothing else)
from drinking water.
Lots of companies are selling various technologies. You can get confused and disillusioned studying
oxygenated water, hydrogen water, PiMag water, and various “energy” waters—all of which are scientifically
unproven to help us. More commonly, many people rely on bottled, spring, reverse osmosis, or distilled water
to simply avoid pollutants.
326 12 Steps to Whole Foods
© Copyright Robyn Openshaw