Q & A with Dr. Hull

Aspartame And Hunger
Q: Could increased hunger be one of the detox symptoms of aspartame? If so, why?

A: Increased hunger is actually a sign of good health. It is best to eat smaller portions throughout the day, eat whole foods and drink plenty of water, and let your tummy growl.

A diet without aspartame and the fake sugar chemicals means a diet of better food choices, drinking more water and more pure natural drinks, and better general well being. This typically means you are sleeping better, exercising more, and are healthier. So, increased hunger goes hand-in-hand with good health and better eating habits with more efficient digestion.

Aspartame Addiction
Q: I am addicted to diet iced tea and have been drinking it for about 6 years. I think I may be having some side effects from the aspartame inside the tea, but I am unsure and would love to stop drinking it. I am very interested in the detox.

A: It is not uncommon to feel your body's dependence and/or addiction to the chemicals in aspartame. These sugar substitutes keep your body supplied with the energy you need to keep going every day. But sadly, this is a false addiction, which is one reason why aspartame IS addictive. Aspartame is not supplying you with healthy nutrients to fuel activity, but you keep using these products because you need the fuel. It's like having a leak in your car's fuel tank. Simply replace your body's need for food/fuel with the real thing - actual food that your body gets better mileage from!

You would enjoy my detox book I wrote to educate people about this very thing, and actually my Detox Kit has a CD Q&A interview about detoxing and a great new aspartame DVD that helps explain this in real-life terms. You should check those out; it is worth it, I believe; especially as you are making such major life shifts and big changes in your daily lifestyle.

Learn all you can about aspartame and detoxing from its toxins so you can have a clear roadmap to what's ahead!

Detox Questions
Q1: I see that you test for heavy metals. However, I know I was exposed to agricultural chemicals in the 60s and 70, as I grew up on a wheat farm. I know my dad used DDT, and the seed wheat was treated with who-knows-what, mercurial something-or-other. Also as a child, I occasionally handled liquid mercury (quicksilver) my dad had in a glass vile. I'm sure there were other herbicides, pesticides, fungicides used on the crops as well as solvents in his shop.

Do you think a hair analysis would show any of these past toxins?

A1: I think you would benefit greatly from knowing what has remained inside of you and what has not. It is prudent with your past history to do the hair test - if anything, it will give you some peace of mind because you indeed have a background of toxins that may be of concern.

It is so unfortunate that the countryside and farming communities that once were the purest in the nation, have become some of the most polluted regions due to the onslaught of chemical technology and farming.

Q2: For the past couple years, I have been experiencing some unusual symptoms:

Thyroid tested low, was put on thyroid med, then tested ok, so taken off meds.
Hair loss.
Flu-like body aches.
Tingling in my legs.
Chronic fatigue.
Most recently, polymyalgia-type symptoms.

In addition, I got most all my very large, old, leaking amalgam fillings replaced. This was about 2-3 years ago.
Now, it's my understanding that you test for heavy metals, which would be helpful, but what about these agricultural chemicals? I thought the body naturally eliminated heavy metals, so unless you are regularly exposed, they are eliminated, right?

A2: Good questions but the answers are reversed - many agricultural chemicals don't make it into the hair, but the heavy metals used to make them do. Most heavy metals are too dense for normal body excretion, like your mercury; so they will remain stored away in tissues like fat, your body organs, and the various glands in your body. This is why over the years, toxins accumulate and burden the body, and as time goes on, the toxins build. Now that toxins are in our food supply, like MSG and aspartame, people are walking toxic waste dumps - the body can't take much more of it, and illness results.

Toxins like those found in fertilizers typically contain chemicals that will breakdown inside the body into noxious chemicals, but some of the chemicals do not register as heavy metals in the hair. They are more commonly seen in the blood shortly after exposure, but just because they cannot be "seen", this doesn't mean that they have not scarred your body tissues. They are just not detectable in the hair, skin or nails like the heavier metals that keep their original chemical form.

Let me know if you have additional questions. You are looking for answers in the right places. Your health history and history of chemical exposure, along with any other toxic metal levels, and your nutrient levels compared to your toxic history will provide an excellent profile for what's going on inside your body - all shown in the hair analysis.

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Posted December 2008 | Permanent Link

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