The toes were black.
The pain was no fun.
The diagnosis was gangrene.
The prognosis was worse.
He was supposed to report to the surgeon the following day for hospitalization.
The only question was just how much of the foot to cut off.
My friend in this example had a good outcome.
We prayed and he was healed immediately - the day before surgery! But what if..
...
? The American Diabetes Association states that 71,000 nontraumatic lower-limb amputations were performed in people with diabetes in 2004.
* As a graduate of Dr.
John Christopher's School of Natural Healing, I was prepared for the "What if..
..
?".
Gangrene is a condition that sometimes occurs in diabetes.
Whether it is due diabetes or some other cause, it has been successfully treated with herbs.
What if he had not been healed? What else could be done? Conventional medicine did not seem to offer anything.
I was prepared to offer an alternative.
One case that comes to mind involves another poor person with a gangrenous foot.
This time a hot decoction of marshmallow root containing lobelia was placed in a tub deep enough to immerse the limb.
This was replenished for next several hours until the person was comfortable enough for bed rest.
The limb began to turn a more healthy color and was eventually healed.
These two humble herbs accomplished what modern technology could not.
But gangrene is just one of several dreaded conditions that often result from diabetes.
Two others are blindness and kidney failure.
Let's get down to the basics.
Once the condition of diabetes is treated via diet and lifestyle are there any herbs to help? Yes! A good combination is that of cedar berries, golden seal, uva ursi, cayenne, licorice root, and mullein.
(The cedar berry is the one from Juniperus monosperma.
The term monosperma refers to the fact that the berry has just one large stone.
) This blend has been used specifically to improve pancreas function and has had the result in people being able to get completely away from using insulin in Type II diabetes.
So why isn't it good to use insulin? Doesn't 't insulin cure diabetes? No.
Not only is injected insulin not a cure but some not so desirable things can happen when using it.
First, we are aware that our own internal insulin production begins to be shut down because of a feedback mechanism within our bodies.
This makes us more and more dependent on the injected insulin.
Second, the use of insulin encourages people to eat without regard to blood sugar.
They just think that the insulin will take care of it.
What really happens is that the extra blood sugar due to bad eating habits is turned into fat by the insulin influence on the metabolism.
We have probably all heard that obesity can lead to heart attack and other disease.
Now lets talk about the blend of herbs (cedar berries, golden seal, uva ursi, cayenne, licorice root, and mullein) we mentioned have been used to reduce insulin use.
They are not the cure.
They are used along with good nutrition and good lifestyle to reduce and eliminate injected insulin usage in Type II Diabetes.
They do not replace the insulin, but rather help the body to heal so that we produce our own insulin and use it properly.
Eventually, we want to depend on nothing at all but our own metabolism to manage blood sugar and avoid all those nasty diseases that so often go along with diabetes.
Here is the disclaimer: do not remove yourself from insulin without medical supervision.
The idea is to show that the blood sugar is on a downward trend, making it desirable to lower the insulin used until, finally, it is discontinued altogether.
No responsible practitioner wishes to continue treatment after the healing has happened! I invite your to visit my blog, http://natural-healingwithherbs.
com, to ask questions or make a comment on this topic or other natural healing topics.
* See http://www.
diabetes.
org/diabetes-basics/diabetes-statistics/