Ms. Fay Knight, aged 56 years, married with three children was living in
Saratoga, California, USA in Dec 2003 when she had responded to my questions. To
give an idea of the past history of her case,
at the age of 22 years, about three weeks after the birth of her first
child, one fine morning when she got up, she felt extreme body pain, though the
earlier night she was normal. Her case was so severe that even blinking an
eyelid plunged her into intense body pain. Check-up revealed that she was having rheumatoid
arthritis. And after four months of medicinal therapy, the acute pain reduced,
but she found the continuation of medicines unhelpful. Further every medicine was known to be having
side effects, likely to affect other organs of the body. In 1982 she realized
enough was enough, & decided not to take any more medicines, even against
the advice of her rheumatologist. She discontinued this treatment & found a
controlled diet and homeopathic medicines equally good or bad. Then she had to
take recourse to a wheel chair. At one point she decided to undertake a fast
for 3 days & pray, for religious reasons. This was a turning point, as her
symptoms disappeared. As a result of her own research on this subject, she
found about True North Clinic, which modifies the diet of the patient and also
does supervision during a water-fast. She undertook a fast for 3 weeks &
for the first time in 26 years, she did not have pain. She participated in two
more fasts along with diet modifications since she found that water fasting
helped natural healing. Her diet strictly consisted of fruits and vegetables,
along with brisk walking, swimming & aerobics etc. This helped her to live
a normal life with better overall health. Her activities were limited due to
damaged joints & wasted muscles, though she wanted to be active & also
help others.
Q In which parts of the body mainly, the pain was
experienced & whether it was intermittent or continuous. Did you have pain
in the joints?
The pain is in the joints. Mainly in the
limbs, but I have had pain in almost every joint of my body including jaw,
collar bone, ribs etc. The pain wanders from one joint to another, most often
hands, elbows, knees & feet.
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Q What exactly did
you eat/drink during the first 3 days of fasting? Was it limited to water or fruits
or something else?
For two days prior to fast, just raw fruits
and veggies. Fast is distilled water only and at the end of the fast one
restarts to feed with fresh squeezed juice for some days according to the
length of the water fast.
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Q What were the religious reasons for fasting?
I am a follower of Lord Jesus Christ and
decided to fast and pray because I was finding my illness overwhelming.
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Q How did you get
the idea of fasting?
It is recommended as a spiritual discipline in
the Bible.
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Q Did the symptoms
disappear completely? If yes, for how many days?
Yes, the symptoms disappeared completely. On
the 3 day fast, they returned as soon as I started to eat, but after longer
fasting, they remained in remission for years.
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Q Please give the
name of the book, its author, publisher etc. which you were reading and which
stated that fasting helps arthritis.
The book is Fasting and Eating for Health by
Joel Fuhrman & published by St. Martin’s Press, New York. I will send you
the web site of this Doctor from whom you can order a copy of the book which
states very clearly that research indicates this approach works for rheumatoid
arthritis (and many other diseases). True North Clinic also sells his books.
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Q who is running the True North Clinic? Please give its
address and e mail ID.
I will send you their web link.
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Q What were the exact modifications to the
diet?
No foods of animal origin. No tea, coffee etc.
(just water to drink). No refined, packaged food. Most food raw.
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Q What are the
details of water fasting?
Rest is essential and also supervision, if it
is longer than 3 days. You will be able to get more information from the True
North Clinic and from Dr. Furhman.
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Q What exactly did
you eat/drink during the 26 days of fasting?
It was 21 days of fast-the rest was re-feeding
time. I drank only distilled water.
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Q What are the details of the next 2 fasts?
They were the same but only each was of 14
days duration with 7 days to re-feed.
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Q As per the para:”Regimen” in this column, the problem
does not appear to have been resolved fully and you have to have a rigid
control on your diet. How long you have to have these controls?
The diet is for life. That is why the problem
is not fully resolved I think- because I have not been 100 % disciplined with
the diet and even a little straying affects me. My problem was that the disease
was so far advanced- I had been suffering from the disease since I was 20. I
believe if it had been caught earlier I would have been fully cured so I would
not have had to be quite so rigid with the diet. As it is I still have the
disease and the diet keeps it to a very low level of activity. My other problem
is that I have some deformity due to long duration of the disease and my
muscles are quite wasted. As I am now over 50, it is difficult to build muscle,
so I am inclined to get injuries and strains as I exercise. All these problems
would be overcome in a younger or less advanced case.
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