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Yesterday I was supposed to have lunch with my friend Margaret, but she told me in the morning that she didn't want to walk to the restaurant where we were supposed to meet because she had painful arthritis in her foot.

I asked her, 'Do you want to hear what helped my arthritis go away?' and of course she did.

Then I told her about a strange little book I had read a few years titled 'Your Body's Many Cries for Water' by F. Batmanghelidj, M.D. The theory that Dr. Batmanghelidj proposes is that almost all bodily ailments, no matter where and how they manifest in the body, are usually caused by our body cells being chronically dehydrated, and that the cure for almost all illness is simply to get our cells properly hydrated again.

At the time I read this book, I had arthritis in my fingers so bad that I could not hold a cup in my hands, or turn a door knob. I often had very little energy.

Within a few weeks of trying Dr. Batmanghelidj's recommendations, my arthritis went away. Now whenever I get a few twinges, I simply step up my water intake, and the pain disappears in a couple of days. I have more energy now than I had twenty years ago, and I haven't really changed anything except my water intake.

Dr. Batmanghelidj had been a medical doctor living in Iran when he was arrested and thrown into jail on trumped up political charges. He was scheduled to be executed.

One night a prisoner in the same jail was brought to him for treatment. This prisoner was suffering terribly from an acute ulcer, and Dr. Batmanghelidj had nothing to give the man for his pain except water. To his great surprise, after a few glasses of water, the pain went away.

Over the course of treating other prisoners with nothing but glasses of water, Dr. Batmanghelidj found that he was able to help many serious conditions using water as therapy. When he was eventually released from prison, he conducted many experiments and found many conditions improved with this treatment.

He came to the conclusion that many physical ailments are simply a result of dehydration.

Among the many ailments that Dr. Batmanghelidj believes are really a result of the body being dehydrated are such varied conditions as allergies, asthma, lupus, arthritis, back pain, ulcers, high blood pressure and high cholesterol.

The book is somewhat hard to read because Dr. Batmanghelidj is not very skilled in writing in English, and he uses a lot of medical terminology, so it can be difficult for a lay person to understand some of it.

According to Dr. Batmanghelidj, only water counts as a hydrating beverage. Other drinks such as juices, milk, coffee, and soft drinks do not have this miraculous ability to reverse disease.

Dr. Batmanghelidj has developed a formula to figure out how much water a person should be drinking each day. According to him, a person should drink one fluid ounce of water for every two pounds of body weight.

Here is a quick summary of his proposed schedule:
About two glasses of water taken upon waking.
Then, one to two glasses of water taken half an hour before meals.
A glass of water two and a half hours after a meal.
Other glasses of water as needed.

Dr. Batmanghelidj also recommends adding a pinch of unrefined sea salt to each glass of water to help the body cells absorb the liquid.

Of course, not all people agree with Dr. Batmanghelidj's recommendations, especially not all other medical doctors. Some people think he is a medical quack, while others think his theory about dehydration being the cause of many ailments is not only simple, but correct.

It is very fascinating to read the letters to Dr. Batmanghelidj from people who say that following his regimen helped cure them of all sorts of longstanding medical problems.

The book 'Your Body's Many Cries for Water' is available at various on-line sellers, as well as in some bookstores.

If you wish to try Dr. Batmanghelidj's recommendations, please keep in mind that he says that it takes months for the body's cells to become dehydrated to the point of illness, and it can take months for the cells to become properly hydrated again.