This disorder may be described as one of malassimilation from the stomach, liver, kidneys, and intestines, but to the trained student it is better described as a condition in which the capacity of the body to burn or use grape-sugar has become chronically depressed. It is usually supplemented by a lack of physical exercise and elimination of body-poisons.

Diabetes - The Cause

From the above explanation it will be seen that diabetes, like all other diseases of the digestive organs, is caused directly by errors in eating - overconsumption of carbohydrates (sweets and starches), and albuminoids. These errors are augmented by inactivity, causing lack of assimilation or utilization of nutritive elements.

Diabetes - The Symptoms

The symptoms of diabetes are intense thirst and appetite, copious passing of urine and the presence of excessive quantities of sugar and uric acid therein.

Diabetes - The Remedy

The selecting, proportioning and balancing of the daily menu, together with an observance of the natural laws hitherto laid out, will prevent diabetes, but after it has made its appearance the remedy lies in simple and limited feeding.

The sufferer should be put upon a rigid diet of fresh vegetables, nuts, fruits, and salads. If the body has not been trained to accept these foods, the diet might consist of the following:

Bloodless (white) meats Eggs.

Fats - reasonable quantity (Olive-oil, butter, cream) Fish

Fresh vegetables Green salads - generous quantity Nuts

Diet in extreme cases of diabetes

If the patient be overweight, the diet should consist largely of subacid fruits and nuts. If underweight, the heavier or sweeter fruits, such as bananas, pears and prunes, should predominate, together with a liberal quantity of sour milk.

In extreme cases the patient should be required to subsist upon Pignolia (the pine) nuts, and green or fresh vegetables uncooked. The writer knows of a gentleman suffering from a very advanced case of diabetes, who, in utter despair, adopted a diet consisting entirely of pine nuts, merely because they appealed to his taste, while nothing else did. A noticeable change for the better was seen in a week, especially in regard to the amount of sugar passed in the urine. He adhered rigidly to this diet for nearly three months. He then added green salads and carrots, and the seventh and eighth months a few fresh cooked vegetables, and was pronounced thoroughly cured before the year had expired. This might have been due partly to the limited bill of fare, but undoubtedly it was largely due to the food elements contained in this wonderful product of the Italian pine.

In Cases Of Diabetes, Omit

Condiments

Confections

Irritants

Pastries

Red meats

Stimulants and narcotics

Sweets

White flour products

Eat

All fresh vegetables, cooked - preferably in casserole dish

Bananas and nuts

Baked potatoes

Coarse whole cereals thoroughly cooked - small quantity

Fish

Milk (sour)

Very ripe subacid fruit

White meat of fowl

Drink an abundance of pure water.

In treating diabetes, foods containing starch and sugar should not be wholly eliminated from the diet, but should be administered in limited proportions, or such quantities as the body could use. Starches and sugars contained in cereals and legumes, however, should in extreme cases be omitted because they are difficult to digest and to assimilate. If the digestion is impaired, the body is likely to cast out these valuable nutrients through the kidneys, rather than labor to digest and to assimilate them. The starches and sugars found in fresh vegetables (See table, Vol. Ill, p. 614), are easily digested and assimilated, therefore in cases of diabetes the body will use or appropriate them, as this entails less energy than that required to cast them out.