The Foreword to The Health Seekers' YearBook Page 2
Upon closer examination, however, I found The Health Seekers' YearBook did not meet my standards. The YearBook was better than any Hygiene handbook I had ever seen, but it just did not come up to Hygienic accuracy throughout. "It needs work," I told her. "I can't condone a book or write a 'Foreword' to a book if I know that it has error in it." I then offered to edit the book. I was already busy working on my own manuscript. But since this book held so much merit, I put my work aside to help Victoria. I slowly worked my way through A Revolutionist's HandBook, in its photocopy form, correcting page by page. I revised it, keeping the physiology and pathology as correct as possible, using the simplified terms, definitions, and descriptions as Victoria desired. Today, The Health Seekers' YearBook is as close to being physiologically correct as possible under the circumstances. We must take into consideration the fact that you lose some of the preciseness when the exacting, technical descriptions of body processes are simplified for ease of reading. You can always go to Dr. Guyton's physiology textbook or enroll in physiology courses, if you need full specificity.
Over the next 12 months, we edited the entire YearBook, even the pages previously edited. Today, The Health Seekers' YearBook A Revolutionist's HandBook for Getting Well & Staying Well without The Medicine Men rates my full endorsement for Hygienic accuracy and honesty throughout. It is written in a joyful, powerful style. It is very readable writing, interspersed with many humorous, and sometimes dolorous, but always truthful pictures of the results of The Average American Life contrasted with The Hygienic.
Any of you who know Victoria realize that she is A True Revolutionist for the most fit, most healthy of all Americas possible, as well as a Rabble Rouser for Real Hygiene! In light of recent materials published under the banner of... "This is Natural Hygiene!" Victoria was inspired to present a complete and comprehensive handbook that presented... "The Full Hygienic Truth and Nothing but The Full Hygienic Truth" ...to The American People. By accepting the challenge to so present The Truth, The Health Seekers' YearBook was born.
Victoria's presentation of The Hygienic-Whole-Raw-Plant Diet is just one feature that sets this book apart from all others: she refuses to com
promise Natural Hygiene in dietetic theory or practice. It is her belief that Americans are ready to be most fit for life and that an uncompromised version of The Hygienic-Whole-Raw-Plant Diet is... "A Way of American Eating Whose Time Has Come!" She, therefore, refuses all which is utterly unHygienic. She refuses all flesh-based recipes. She refuses all dairy products. She refuses all processed condiments. She refuses all salt and pepper. She refuses all strong herbs and hot spices. She refuses all eggs; cooking alcohol; baking soda and powder; and refined grains, oils, and sugars. Perhaps most praiseworthy she refuses to make hers a "cookbook." Out of nearly 600 menus and recipes, only a mere handful of 30 cooked recipes are offered to ease you off conventional eating.
Those of you who have already tried to eat Hygienically, that is, plant foods in their uncut and uncooked state, exclusively realize how difficult it is in the beginning, while you are still longing for your favorite taste treat. We have our own conditioning to fight with, plus that of our family and friends who pull us back to The Standard American Diet (SAD). It is relatively easy for most people to begin exercising, to get outdoors into the fresh air and sunshine but when it comes to food cravings, watch out! This is why Victoria had devoted 6 chapters to diet. She begins by presenting the benefits of eating according to our biological endowments and the beautiful effect on our health if we so persist. Then, in detail, she contrasts "The Benefits of The Ideal Diet" with "The Health Hazards of The SAD Diet." Additionally, she not only provides you with encouragement you need to commence The Ideal Diet, she supplies chapters full of delightful meals so attractive and enticing that you will want to stay on The Wagon. These eye-appealing, mouth-watering meal ideas successfully compete with the conventional mode of eating! WHAT A BREAKTHROUGH!
Miss BidWell is honest with her menus. She informs her readers that The Ideal Diet must be vegetables, nuts, and seeds. These are to be served whole not cut up or fragmented, not sliced, diced, chopped, minced, juiced, or blended. And they are to be chosen exclusively from the plant kingdom only, excluding all animal foods without exception. This is True Natural Hygiene. She then goes on to define "True Transition Menus and Recipes" and shows you how different they are from The SAD Diet in all its highly toxic variations, some of which have been recently and inaccurately labeled "Hygienic" and "Hygienic Transition." We must always work toward perfection of our diets, even if we choose to use True Transition Foods and some manner of preparation.
