THE CURE FOR ALL DISEASES
Eating more potassium in food is a good nutrition project.
Bananas are the top choice. Fresh fruit salad and baked potatoes
and soup also provides a lot. Mixing potassium salt with regular
salt, half and half, for the shaker is another easy trick, even if you
only use it in cooking where the taste cannot be detected.
Potassium by prescription is often used by clinicians to conserve
body potassium during diuretic use. This need not be stopped (if
the pills are not polluted) although taking potassium pills is less
useful than salting it in because the adrenals will let any big dose
escape anyway. A sign of too much potassium is a slow pulse.
It may be necessary to wear some kind of incontinence un-
derwear. Try to avoid them at night, though, so the skin can
breathe freely. Bring a commode near the bed for the night, rather
than diapering your loved one (but don't call them diapers; say
“underwear”). Absorbent pants of all kinds are heavily
chemicalized. This is absorbed by the skin and adds to the toxin
level. Less will be absorbed if you powder the skin with corn-
starch first. Use them minimally and line them with tissue or
paper towel. Chair and bed pads, too, are chemicalized. Don't sit
on them with bare skin. To facilitate getting to the commode
quickly in the night, dress the elderly in a short night shirt, no
pajamas or long gown. Bed socks on the feet help with warmth.
Wash the body parts daily, around the urinary and rectal
outlet, using borax water. Follow with 5% grain alcohol. Put
washcloth in laundry after a single use. Nothing, not even brain
improvement, impresses and encourages an elderly person as
much as seeing the incontinence lessen. This bit of progress will
put him or her solidly on your side. When they believe in you, it
makes your task more rewarding. Remember to enjoy and cele-
brate your achievements together; don't make a grim business out
of it.