While "evil intent" may be over the top as a description of what's happening with adulteration of medicines manufactured in China, neither is it plausible that this is happening merely by accident or neglect. Time and again, it's been shown that prescription drugs not revealed on the label have been added to China-made supplements/herbal products, and the clear intent is to make them more effective while luring customers with a supposedly "natural" product. Check out the list of drugs found in Chinese supplements as indicated in this report. "...case reports showed that two or more adulterants were present in 14 of 15 Chinese herbal medicines. There was one death reported in these reports, and at least six potentially life threatening events. Suspicion of adulteration was based not only on adverse effects, but suspiciously good efficacy. Chinese herbal medicines may work because of the adulterants. Most people consider alternative therapies to be safe, and often do not mention that they are using them. Given that multiple adulteration of Chinese herbal medicines seems to be common, there is potential for problems, especially when other treatments are being prescribed. Imagine an older patient on NSAID and aspirin additionally taking a Chinese medicine containing indomethacin or phenylbutazone! We simply do not know what the rate of adulteration is. One UK study of 11 herbal creams showed that eight contained dexamethasone at concentrations up to 1.5 mg/gram of cream. In the absence of better information, we should assume that Chinese medicines are adulterated."

lydia -- the 100+ food Elisa test sounds very interesting. I may give that a try, eventually. I'm convinced that I have quite a few food allergies. I used to throw up when I was given white milk as a child. Never drank any once my mother figured out the cause. Except in elementary school when I was forced by a teacher and I threw up. Funny how I was able to drink chocolate milk, though. I read later (as an adult) that in fact the chocolate in chocolate milk reduces the allergic reaction. Anyway, regarding food allergies, I know I'm sensitive to wheat though I'm not a celiac. I am also sensitive to dairy. (Ask me why I can't give up my goatsmilk yoghurt, this is the last frontier for me, hope to give it up eventually.) I subscribed to the test at http://www.enterolab.com/ which is where I got the results about wheat and dairly. The test was expensive. I think over $300.00. Glad I did it though. Sounds like the Elisa test may give you the same results plus some. This food allergy thing is tricky, I think. One of our dogs now it seems has food allergies. I asked the vet to test and she said that testing for food allergies is not very reliable (for dogs). I wonder if this is true for humans? A food elimination diet was the only thing she could recommend plus eating only a particular type of dog food that was "engineered to have a small enough molecule size so it doesn't trigger the allergic reactions" (her words). I was amazed and am wondering if raw food has "smaller molecules" than cooked food, HA, HA. Perhaps moite's methods that she got from her doctor about measuring her pulse rate may be the best way. I'm going the simple route with this raw food diet (for now) because it meets many other needs also. I had a great day yesterday. I went the whole day without the "wave of tiredness" that comes over me every day after lunch. I hope it wasn't an anomaly. Bad news is that with the raw food diet, there is a "detox phase" initially where some claim that you are ridding your system of toxins. The detox phase can produce acne which is what I just got yesterday. I haven't had a pimple on my face for many years but I have two now. Oh well. If my energy level stays good, I'll have to add that as one more reason why I'm glad I found this diet. I was craving cooked food day before yesterday but managed to get by without it. Hopefully those days will get less in number. This was kind of like craving a cigarette after quitting, as I remember it many years ago. Keep us posted about your food allergies. I'm becoming more and more convinced that for some of us, they are literally killing us or are reducing our quality of life (for some of us) to a very very large extent producing chronic problems and diseases that mainstream medicine doesn't have a clue. In my case, I definitely feel like I've become a guinea pig for trying out different "cures". I'm hoping that raw food will by my answer. I realize that because there is no definite proof, I could be wrong on this but as my DH says, it's gotta be better than being so overweight and hungry all the time. We were killing ourselves eating cooked food so how could this be any worse.

I'm a firm believer in Dr. Abravanel's Body Type Diet. The book contains a multiple choice test, and by your answers you determine which "type" you are. The shape of your body (where your body stores the extra fat) and your food cravings are part of it. (For example, one of the questions is "when you're at a party, which food do you find it the most difficult to resist -- the chips and dip, the cakes and cookies... I forget the other choices.) There is a different diet to follow for each body type. I swear, after about a week on the diet your food cravings will vanish and you will feel healthier. As long as you correctly determine which type you are, and if you don't cheat on the diet, you will lose 4% of your total body weight in the first week, and 2% each week after that. You follow the diet for a set number of weeks, then you switch to a stricter diet for one week, then back to the regular diet for a set number, etc. That's to keep your body from hitting a plateau. It's been a while since I was on this diet, so I'm not certain of the number of weeks, but I think it was 3 or 4 weeks on the regular diet (and it's 1,200 calories), then one week on the stricter diet. You absolutely should be able to lose that 10 pounds by your wedding day.

Very depressing middle of the week. First, I had to "purge" for a colonoscopy. So on Wed. I only was allowed to drink, and my calorie intake was under 300. Then the day of the procedure, I only ate 916 calories, so my two-day total was just over 1200. And yet when I stepped on the scale this morning, I had gained almost two pounds, erasing almost three weeks of dieting. I know it is just a temporary spike, but of all times, this would not seem to be the day I would spike like that. It is also depressing that weeks of dieting can be erased in two days. Imagine if I had eaten a lot those two days! It just drives home the point to me that it is going to be very difficult for me to lose a lot more weight and keep it off. I'm happy I stopped gaining and my clothes still fit, but I really wanted to lose about ten more lbs . . . and keep it off. It's clearly not my calorie consumption . . . I also got depressing news on the gut end. Well actually not just the end, the whole GI system. I have acid reflux, even though I had no symptoms, but it has affected my esophagus. I have gastric ulcers (probably payback from using so much NSAIDs for migraine) and diverticulosis. So my diet is going to have to be even more restricted. I am very hesitant to start taking acid reducing pills every single day. It seems so extreme. But I can't imagine limiting my diet much more. Well, for now, out totally with caffeine and alcohol, no spicy foods, but tomatoes onions and garlic? I don't eat huge amounts of them, but I love Italian and other Mediterranean food and they are pretty ubiquitous for that . . . The treatment for diverticulosis is to eat more fiber, which I can hardly imagine since I eat whole grains and beans and vegetables and fruit every single day . . . more greens, boo rah! I love greens thankfully. It's just one more frustrating thing in my life.