Most fruits, including citrus fruits, and most vegetables leave alkaline leftovers—minerals that can assist in handling dietary acid. Foods that leave an alkaline ash are called “alkaline ash-producing” foods. Remember, it’s the leftovers we’re talking about; the foods themselves aren’t necessarily alkaline. You might think that lemons or grapefruit would be strong acid producers. Actually, even though lemons and grapefruit are very acidic in their natural state, they leave an alkaline ash, not an acid ash. It’s meats, grains, and most nuts that leave an acid ash. We call these “acid ash-producing” foods. The ash of acid ash-producing foods contains fairly strong acid, especially inside your body.

Your body is designed to handle occasional skirmishes with acid ash-producing foods. The acid can be eliminated, but first, it must be neutralized—toned down, buffered, and made weaker.

No problem. You come equipped with neutralizing minerals that take care of the situation nicely. These minerals are part of your alkaline reserve. As long as you don’t abuse your neutralizing system, your internal environment chugs along smoothly. That’s the way you were designed.

The crunch comes if you abuse the system. Every time you eat foods that leave an acid ash that must be neutralized, you lose precious minerals. That’s no big deal for a six-year-old who still has a generous supply of neutralizing minerals. But eat mostly acid ash-producing foods at meals and snacks, day after day, month after month, and eventually, the built-in supply of neutralizing minerals will fall to crisis level. Even our hypothetical six-year-old could be headed toward an internal emergency in a few years. But who would connect a serious illness in an eleven- or twelve-year-old with all those hot dogs and soft drinks he’s lived on since his first tooth appeared?

Since your body is designed to survive, it handles the emergency by finding other neutralizing minerals from around the body to do the job. However, backup systems are short-term, crisis-handling solutions; they’re not meant for day-to-day operations. Backup systems are temporary help only. Despite our wealth of internal backup systems, most of us go through our days with much more acid in our bodies than is good for us. Too much acid leads to excess acidity, or acidosis. Our bodies can become toxic—they are being “poisoned” by too much acid.

You can get an idea of where you stand on the acidosis scale by doing a pH challenge as outlined in Dr. Morter’s pH Your Potential for Health booklet.

Then, you can make the gradual change in food and lifestyle choices, which will begin to help you rebuild your alkaline reserve.

 Link to Morter March Monday Rebroadcast: