Functions: necessary for bone formation • helps blood coagulate • plays a role in activating certain enzymes • assists in regulating capillary and cell permeability • important for nerve-impulse transmission and muscle contractions.

Deficiency signs and symptoms: rickets (in children) • osteomalacia (in adults) • osteoporosis (thinning of bones) • joint pains • muscle cramps • heart palpitations • insomnia • cramping of muscles • nervousness and irritability • numbness and tingling of extremities • tooth decay.

Calcium’s enemies: chronic stress • alcohol • high protein diets. CHLORIDE

Functions: necessary for maintaining the body’s acid-base balance • essential for stomach acid • helps preserve body fluids. Deficiency signs and symptoms: fatigue • weakness • heart irregularities • cramping of the muscles. Chloride’s enemies: fad diets and starvation diets.

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Your thoughts are the key. Thoughts become beliefs; thoughts and beliefs together help determine whether “good” or “bad” messages are sent from your brain to the rest of your body, including your immune system. What you think can literally make you sick—or healthy.

Your mind is like a factory, filled with assembly lines producing chemical messages. Speeding along the various pathways in your body, the messages bring happiness, depression, health or disease. How do you know what the message will be? You create many of the messages with your thoughts. You, and only you, determine if they are messages of joy or despair.

What are some of the “bad” messages? Anger and rage result in the production of large amounts of epinephrine (adrenaline) and other powerful chemicals. Long-term manufacture and release of these strong substances can lead to elevated blood pressure, heart disease, ulcers and other problems. Depression and self-doubt spur the synthesis of hormones such as cortisone. Cortisone is an important and necessary body substance, but too much of it can have a deadly effect on your immune system, encouraging infeciions and even cancer.

The messages you want to see spread through your body are those of health and happiness. And for that you must look to hormones such as the endorphins. As I explained in a previous book, DLPA to End Chronic Pain and Depression (1985), the endorphins, produced by various cells in your body, are responsible for lifting your mood and blocking certain kinds of pain. It’s postulated that chronic pain and depression are related to a deficiency of endorphins in the body.

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STOCK

Whenever you steam or cook vegetables, save the water to use as stock in soups. Store in a covered glass jar in refrigerator.

BETA CAROTENE FRUIT SOUP

creamy. If you prefer soup thicker, add more banana. If you prefer it thinner, add more fruit juice. Chill and pour into soup bowls, or mix with crushed ice and drink. Top with parsley.

Serves 4 to 6.

SHIRLEY’S ZUCCHINI SOUP

2 lbs. zucchini 3 onions

4 cups chicken stock 1/2 cup skim milk 1 tsp. curry powder

Cut zucchini into 1/4-inch slices. Thinly slice onions. Put zucchini and onion slices in stock, and cook until very tender, about 20 minutes. Puree vegetables and stock in blender. Add 1/2 cup skim milk and curry powder to taste. Serve warm or chilled. Makes a thick, tasty soup.

Serves 3 to 4.

VEGETABLE BARLEY SOUP

3 carrots 1 bunch broccoli

3 potatoes, medium 2 tomatoes, medium 1 onion, finely chopped 1/2 cup barley 3 cups water or chicken stock 1 tsp. basil

1 tsp. oregano 1/4 tsp. dill

1 tsp. vegetable seasoning

pinch of chopped parsley pinch of chopped mint

Wash vegetables. Slice carrots, cut broccoli into small pieces and dice potatoes and tomatoes. Set aside. Saute onion, put in pot with barley and water (or stock) and bring the mixture to a boil. Then reduce the heat and simmer until the barley is almost done, about 30 minutes. Add the vegetables and spices; continue simmering until the vegetables are tender. Check water while soup is simmering; add more if necessary. Add the fresh parsley and mint just before serving.

Serves 4 to 6.

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Crucifers are also cancer-fighting Super Foods. The crucifer family includes broccoli, brussels sprouts, cabbage, cauliflower, kohlrabi and kale. Even the very conservative Committee On Diet, Nutrition and Cancer, of the National Academy of Sciences, agrees that crucifers, along with carrots and spinach, are important cancer fighters.

Eating crucifers encourages the formation of substances, called indoles, in your intestines. Studies have shown that indoles help prevent some kinds of cancer. The beta carotene, vitamin C and fiber in crucifers also work against cancer.

Besides fighting cancer, crucifers are good for your health in general. They are full of CCs but have very little fat and no cholesterol. All in all, they’re just what the doctor—your “doctor within’—ordered. Broccoli is an excellent crucifer that not only supplies you with indoles and other cancer fighters but generous amounts of beta carotene and vitamin C as well.

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