Most of us do not realize how toxic a world we live in, or how rapidly our already toxic world is changing for the worse. Each week we hear and read about new sources of toxic exposure and how they can impact our lives.
For instance, in 2002, a study was published looking at the levels of toxins found in the stools of newborn babies. The shocking results show significant levels of heavy metals including lead, mercury, and cadmium, as well as a number of insecticides including Lindane, Malathion, Diazinon, Parathion, DDT, Pentachlorphenol, Chlordane, and Chlorpyrifos.
In 2005, the US Department of Health and Human Services added 11 more compounds to its list of 246 cancer-causing agents in humans,ii and in all likelihood this already long list will increase as industry goes on producing new chemicals.
A further serious problem arises from the fact that the toxic effects of such chemicals might go largely undetected until extensive damage has been done to people’s health. This is so because the symptoms of toxicity often mimic symptoms found in other disease processes.
We can therefore carry a significant toxic burden without realizing the harm it is doing to us, as we attribute our failing health to other causes. During my many years of medical practice I have interviewed thousands of people whose illnesses I have been able to trace back to toxic exposures which had previously gone un-noticed. Only when the underlying toxic influences were discovered, could treatments be initiated, often producing a remarkable improvement in health.
In describing to patients how toxins affect our health, I often find it useful to refer to the “TILT Phenomenon.” “TILT” is an acronym that stands for “Toxin Induced Loss of Tolerance,” and it also suggests a tipping–point, which causes a system to tilt, so that a sudden re-distribution of weight occurs.
When our cells are exposed to toxic influences they can resist up to a point, but when they lose their tolerance and begin to fail, a shift or “tilt” occurs. Our intricate cellular processes are then thrown out of balance; cellular dysfunction, and even cellular death, can then occur, depending on the extent of toxic exposure.
For most of us, our toxic burden grows slowly over decades by way of exposure to substances we are used to in our environment, such as herbicides for our lawns, various household cleaning agents, molds in our homes, lead found in multiple products, and even mercury amalgams (silver fillings) in our teeth.
When our bodies fail to tolerate the accumulated effect of such ongoing exposure and we reach a tipping point, a state of imbalance causes a sudden descent into ill health, as if the heavy end of the see-saw were to come crashing onto the ground.
Find out more about what you can do to improve your health by doing your due diligence.
This is an excerpt taken from Dr. John Cline’s book, “Detoxify for Life!”
