Guest guest Posted August 17, 2005 Report Share Posted August 17, 2005 Good morning, Yesterday I bought litmus paper to test the pH of my body fluids according to the alkalizing advice I've been reading lately from Victoria Bouchenko and other sites like this: http://www.essense-of-life.com/info/phpaper.htm My first results are a little confusing, they seem to be reversed from what's recommended on the site: ph Oral Other ideal 7.4 6.6 tested 6.2 7.4 (not sure if spaces will display properly) Has anyone else had this result? Am I doing this right? Thanks for your help. Nick Hein Morgantown, WV Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted August 17, 2005 Report Share Posted August 17, 2005 > Good morning, > Yesterday I bought litmus paper to test the pH of my body fluids > according to the alkalizing advice I've been reading lately from > Victoria Bouchenko and other sites like this: http://www.essense-of- > life.com/info/phpaper.htm FWIW, this page has a few things wrong. pH stands for " pondus hydrogenii " or " potential hydrogen " , not " parts of hydrogen " . Also, strictly speaking, these strips aren't litmus paper -- that would just turn red/blue as a very non-quantitative test of acidic/ alkaline. Here's a really good page with easy-to-understand information about the multi-indicator strips and the whole acid/base/ pH deal. http://www.sambal.co.uk/indicators.html I'm alarmed at the claim that the ideal pH for urine is 6.6. While urine does tend to be slightly acidic, an average of 6.6 would tend to favor urolithiasis. I shoot for 7.0. Higher than that is hard to achieve and favors brushite stones. My zwei pfennig on " alkalizing " is that it misses the idea that body fluids vary widely in their natural pH levels, and I'm wary of altering the body's natural balance without a specific medical need and supervision. Also note that dietary pH doesn't necessarily equate to the pH of a given bodily fluid. Citrus juices are acidic, for example, yet increase urinary pH. I'm prescribed potassium citrate to alkalinize my urine because I'm cystinuric -- most people aren't, and I need to be careful that I don't go *too* alkaline. > My first results are a little confusing, they seem to be reversed > from what's recommended on the site: > ph Oral Other > ideal 7.4 6.6 > tested 6.2 7.4 Urinary pH varies over the course of the day, often lower in the morning. To properly test urinary pH, you need to capture a full (and exact) 24 hours' worth, mix it up, and test that. Saliva pH no doubt varies according to what and when you last ate, eg. > (not sure if spaces will display properly) > Has anyone else had this result? Am I doing this right? These test strips are okay for casual educational purposes, but they are *not* precise or accurate, and the indicators tend to not be very stable over time, so after 6-12 months (which they may have passed before they get to you) they give a significantly different result. For medical purposes, you really do need a testing method that's accurate, precise, repeatable, and subject to calibration. This means a pH meter. http://www.automatedaquariums.com/hanlit.htm I have the Hanna HI98129, which measures pH to .01 and also does temperature, conductivity, and total dissolved solids. More basic units that only measure to .1 and/or only measure pH are quite affordable, and even mine was only $125 plus the cleaning solution and calibration packets. (Yes, I was a chemistry major in college before switching to applied math) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted August 17, 2005 Report Share Posted August 17, 2005 Hi Nick, Interpreting the significance of the pH of bodily fluids is much more complicated than most authors, especially web authors, acknowledge. In " Conscious Eating " Gabriel Cousens provides some of this picture. In particular he describes how different individual body chemistries can be, and how specific foods can have an alkalinizing or acidifying affect depending on the particular body chemistry. Additionally there are many different problems where the body attempts to compensate for some underlying imbalance by shifting the pH. In these cases eating to shift the pH back to " normal " will just mask the underlying problem, or maybe even accentuate it. After doing a lot of medical reading on the subject, the conclusion I came to was the pH of different bodily fluids is the end result of many complex balances, and it takes a lot of knowledge and medical testing to correctly determine what conditions are effecting a person's pH balances, and what the implications of those conditions are. Many of the reasons why the pH has become unbalanced have to do with a poor diet like French fries and pop that has burdened the body with gunk that needs to be cleaned out, or an unbalanced diet of a few foods that provides an excess of some nutrients and not enough of others. Eating a very broad diet of unprocessed organic living food avoids many of these problems in the first place. Sometimes a pH imbalance is caused by some problem other than diet. Since the body has a lot of capacity to heal itself, if its being adequately nurtured, I decided to focus my effort on improving the breadth and quality of my raw, organic, living food diet, and support my body's underlying ability to be healthy. By breadth I mean including foods from as many different plant families as possible, and eating a mix of greens, fruit, and soaked seeds. I'm also inclined to believe that deep down we know what we need, and so I try for as much breadth in my diet as possible, and let my intuition decide which foods I eat most of on any one day. The more I do this, the more I can hear messages from my body, and the better I'm doing. May your day be filled with clarity, grace, progress, and warm laughter, Roger - " Nick Hein " <nick.hein <RawSeattle > Wednesday, August 17, 2005 4:43 AM [RawSeattle] pH testing > Good morning, > Yesterday I bought litmus paper to test the pH of my body fluids according to the alkalizing advice I've been reading lately from Victoria Bouchenko and other sites like this: http://www.essense-of-life.com/info/phpaper.htm > My first results are a little confusing, they seem to be reversed from what's recommended on the site: > ph Oral Other > ideal 7.4 6.6 > tested 6.2 7.4 > > (not sure if spaces will display properly) > Has anyone else had this result? Am I doing this right? > > Thanks for your help. > Nick Hein > Morgantown, WV > > Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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