The Body Ecology Diet: Recovering Your Health and Rebuilding Your Immunity

Rating:
Summary: Finally - A Book/Diet that Covers it ALL
Review: For those of us who have suffered autoimmune disorders along with the accompanying chronic candida/parasites that go along with it - this book is a treasure.

After my own personal journey of 10+ years with CFS/FM, Lupus and MPS I can say that for me, this book was the final 'piece' to my health puzzle. I had been dealing with Chronic Candida problems for years - I had colon cleansed, liver cleansed, gotten off all prescription drugs but still "hit a wall" in my health, and was not able to completely get well.

In working with many people on candida support groups over the years, and in my own health I have discovered that most grains are detrimental to digestive problems and indeed can stop complete recovery. Most people suffering from auto-immune and Chronic Candida disorders are suffering from malabsorption - and have Leaky Gut syndrome. Eating Grains, dairy and most fruits - which are recommended by many book authors can make one sicker, and go into deeper distress. Donna is *right on the money here*, she knows and understands these complications and tells the reader "straight" - right from the beginning.

I have *never* found the Anti-Candida Diet popular amongst those seeking to reclaim their health. This book is no different - and the negative reviews are possibly because people are looking for a 'quick fix', or a magic pill to get well. Chronic health problems do not happen overnight - and one will not get better overnight either.

Donna covers some of the most important aspects to complete health recovery - an example is "Food Combining" rules. This is vitally important to recovery and as she says: "eating foods that are not compatible in the stomach causes fermentation. This fermentation produces alcohol and sugars and yeast feed off these sugars and multiply rapidly, creating more toxins in the body." and also - "People with candidiasis have weak digestive tracts. Improper food-combining further weakens the digestive tract by causing it to work inefficiently until it slowly breaks down."

Colon cleansing and liver cleansing are also important aspects of this book and this is also sound truth for recovery.

Though Donna does promote her own supplements/products - if one is truly interested in living the lifestyle recommended in the book - kefir, cultured vegetables, coconut(s) (their oil and meat) can ALL be found elsewhere - very inexpensively. We make our own cultured vegies, kefir and kombucha for pennies a day, without the promoted 'starters' in the book.

Too many people are sick because they don't want to get down to business and take responsibility for their own health - this book challenges the politically correct health folks out there and really gives answers for those who are SERIOUS about getting well - for good.

This book has helped change my life and I highly recommend it.

WendyJM1

Rating:
Summary: the body ecology diet
Review: From a non-professional view, I believe this type of research and thinking is a step ahead of where most AMA Medical professionals are at this point in the history of medicine! We need continuous public discloser of the reliable research that has been done in these areas of "NATURAL HEALTH" and support for continued unbiased research into these areas. Danny Hawkins

Rating:
Summary: I wish I had known this years ago.
Review: I can't even remember how long I've suffered what I thought were unrelated symptoms; allergies, asthma, chronic back pain, indigestion, inability to lose weight despite exercise and what I thought was healthy eating. I had gone to countless doctors, acupunturists, etc but finally found a chiropractor who also practices Chinese medicine who told me all of my ailments could be traced to one thing; Candidiasis. She had me buy the book and told me to adhere to the diet for 3 weeks to start, then see how I'm feeling and responding.

Well, it's been a week and I have to say within a couple of days I saw a tremendous difference in everything. I don't wake up sneezing like I used to, asthma is much less frequent, no belching or gas after eating and no bloated feeling even hours after eating like before. If this is just from one week, I am positively buzzing to see myself in 3 months or more.

Yes, it is a major change from the way I was eating and yes, it takes some time, organization and adjusting. But I can't express with words how much it is worth the efforts. Even after my symptoms are gone, I will definitely stick with a slightly less restrictive version, but still stay pretty close to this.

How validating to find that there was a good reason for all of these ailments and that they are indeed connected. I only hope Western doctors soon learn to embrace this type of diagnosis. Do yourself and your body a huge favor and buy this book. Then try the diet and see what I mean.

Rating:
Summary: What an over priced peice of crap
Review: I was completely annoyed by this book, its lay out was less then intelligent, its content was mostly telling you how useful the diet, which was never laided out in an understandable way, was going to be, and the diagrams were pointless.
The only perk to this book was a large number of helpful recipies in the back, but all in all, I thought this book was useless mumbojumbo about 'inner ecology' that was no use to me. I have candida and have chosen to take Nystatin and change my diet, and this book gave no provisions for that or even seemed to consider there might be another way of controlling yeast.
What I was looking for was a comprehensive book about what can be done, what specifically to avoid, something that made me understand better what I needed to do to get healthy. Instead this book pushed its products and life style on me in an uncomfortable and obnoxious manner.
I would most certainly NOT recommend this book, I would recommend doing research online and deciding for yourself what will work, instead of taking this load of crap at face value.

Rating:
Summary: Are you in perfect health?
Review: If not, read this book. It is wonderful in the way it helps you understand what has been behind all those nagging symptoms and the general feeling of "unwell". This book opened my eyes and helped me get healthy again at a time when I was desperatly sick with (according to the doctors) "nothing". Everyone who lives and eats in the Western world should read this book.

Rating:
Summary: Good idea but could be better executed
Review: It's hard to even get to the content of this book because it is written so poorly. There is no index and no rhyme or reason to the order of the book. The ghost writer has advanced degrees from Stanford (or somesuch) and apparently has never written a book before this vanity effort.

The content is so so at best. The author has no formal education in biology or medicine and wants everyone to eat raw, rotten cabbage. Beyond that, she seems to buy into the blood type diet just to have a hook into modern bad science.

All in all, save your money and get a good nutrition book from the library.

Rating:
Summary: REBUILDING THE IMMUNE SYSTEM!
Review: The crux of this book is in proposing a way for readers to create a brighter healthier future for themselves. It is written for people who have symptoms of a weak immune system and want to boost their immunity, as well as holistic health care practitioners and doctors. The authors cover chronic fatigue syndrome, cancer, AIDS, food allergies, frequent digestive problems, headaches, muscle or joint pains,depression, memory loss,skin rashes, sensitivity to tobacco, perfume, chemical odors and a litany of other conditions which they relate to Candidiasis, an overgrowth of yeast in the body. A self-assessment medical history questionaire in the book is helpful. The authors believe that getting well is more dependent on healthy eating rather than massive doses of medicine or vitamin pills. A Body Ecology Diet plan and meal menus are included as well as tips on both "inner" and "outer" cleansing of the body. There are testimonies from people whose health improved after following the suggestions given in the book. Data is presented in a straight-forward, and clear manner. A plausible alternative.

Rating:
Summary: Good idea but could be better executed
Review: This book is typical of its type. It's written and produced by a well-meaning individual who has good information not available from mainstream health professionals, but has no formal scientific or medical background to lend credibility to the effort.

This would not matter as much if the book were written or edited by a professional. There's also the matter of the related products the author promotes liberally throughout the book and the high cover price. For me, these factors along with poor organization throughout hurts the book's potential and author credibility.

Fifteen years ago, I was introduced to another version of this diet. Having fallen off the wagon and experiencing the same debilitating symptoms, I initially was very glad to have stumbled across the book. Unfortunately, I find this book well intentioned but complicates instead of streamlining the process of getting well.

For instance, there's a warning against eating nightshade vegetables (peppers and tomatoes are mentioned) but there are recipes for "new potatoes" (another nightshade vegetable), which I take to mean red potatoes, but I'm not sure because there is no distinction made as to exactly what kind of potato you can eat. Also, the author says she's against sesame seeds, but offers no explanation as to why they should be avoided.

She also extols the virtues of kefir and claims it's superior to yogurt but doesn't offer a full explanation as to why she believes it. Yogurt has been a first-line defense against yeast infections for years. True, both yogurt and kefir contain beneficial bacteria. But kefir, she says, also features yeast but there's no information on why kefir works better than yogurt or even why this yeast is safe to consume. This is important because the people who need this diet have digestive tracts overrun with yeast. Her explanation is simple yet incomplete: kefir offers "more nutritive value" than yogurt. There's more information about kefir on her website, but it's pretty skimpy, too.

I also take exception to the recipes that call for cauliflower and cabbage. These vegetables are known gas producers (whether raw or cooked) and for people with sensitive digestive tracts, I can't help but wonder at the logic at work here. Ditto for carrots. Most diets to combat yeast steer away from them.

I'd love to make "Baked Eggs" but can't find the recipe. Overall, the recipe section could be better organized and include more recipes.

As a reader looking to implement the diet correctly, there are too many instances where crucial information is placed too far out in the section or chapter. This is particularly true when it comes to caveats or usage instructions. This information needs to be mentioned up front or in a sidebar at or near the beginning of the topic. For example: For seven pages we hear how wonderful kefir is, but author's first mention on when to introduce the stuff doesn't show up until the eighth page. If you get too caught up in the enthusiasm of kefir's healing benefits and rush off to make some, you'll miss the warning to not start it until 2 to 3 months into the diet. Advice about juicing follows a similar and confusing path. It was frustrating to find additional information about certain principles mentioned later, far from the their original introductions.

The Shopping List in the appendix is a good idea and nicely done. It's condensed and easy to follow. The index, however, doesn't fare as well. It needs to be more complete and in some versions, according to the author's website, the index has been left out entirely! There are also too many typos for a seventh edition [at this price].

Because so much information flows through the book's nearly 300 pages, you have to be really dedicated to slog through it and extract a workable program for yourself. In addition, the author's own experiences intermingled throughout get in the way because aren't especially meaningful to the reader or go on too long.

It's too bad because the diet offers hope and real potential to people with chronic immune and/or digestive problems. I know from personal experience how difficult it can be to produce a book on a difficult subject and I hope the author will take my gripes in the spirit they are meant: to take a fundamentally good thing and make it better.

Rating:
Summary: Great content, poorly organized
Review: This book needs a good editor.

For example, there is no clearly defined section on getting started with the diet. Instead, the authors force you to read the whole book and extract a sentence here and a paragraph to assemble your own list of "dos and don'ts" when first starting on the diet. If you are suffering symptoms, this "forced" research project can be torture, and cause you to make painful mistakes early on if you haven't read the entire book cover to cover, AND highlighted and underlined relevant passages, AND compiled those marked passages into an action plan for yourself first.

There is a lot of great information in the book, but it is organized so badly that it forces the reader to finish the editor's job and make their own outline for getting started. I'd pay [again] for this book if they would do that for me.

Rating:
Summary: An amazing book
Review: This is an extremely interesting if rather difficult to practice book. It's all the more amazing for the fact that Ms. Gates is not a doctor, not even really a health professional (or maybe that's exactly WHY she hit on such a brilliant streak!)
It incorporates some of the also very interesting strains of Natural Hygeine's Food Combining theories and Dr. D'Adamo's Eat Right For Your Type book. But we found her descriptions varied from what we knew of those other disciplines. For me personally, it also seemed to bring together the health guidelines in the Baha'i Faith our family follows.
There was, I don't know if there still is, an interesting web site for it that I used for a while.
The basic theory is that if you eat this way, you'll be clearing out mainly yeast but it can also take care of lots of other problems.
The only thing is that it is a very, very difficult diet to practice in total if you do anything but stay home and deal with food all the time.
However, as much as you can do it, that's how much benefit you might be able to gain from it.
I will say I suspect the cultured cabbage made me a little depressed; I finally stopped it. I do keep with some of the general guidelines. My family got some benefit from relief of AD/HD, allergies and some other things; when we get overloaded we go back more strictly on the diet till things get better.
I'm sure there are some people who won't get any benefit from it or might even be harmed by it, as with anything we try on ourselves. So as usual, decide based on your own situation if it might help, or try on a trial basis and see what happens.