Chapter XXII

What About The “Chronic”?  It Takes So Long

“Yes, Nature Cure is all right, but it takes so long.”  Now and then we hear this or a similar remark.  Our answer is:  “No, it does not take long.  It is the swiftest cure in existence.”

The trouble is that, as a rule, we have to deal with none but the most advanced cases of so-called incurable diseases.  People go to the Nature Cure physician only after all other methods of treatment have been tried and found of no avail.

As long as there remains a particle of faith in the medicine bottle, the knife or the metaphysical formula of the mind healer, people prefer these easy methods, which require no effort on their part, to the Nature Cure treatment, which necessitates personal exertion, self-control, the changing or giving up of cherished habits.  This, however, is what most of us evade as long as we can.  “Exercise, the cold blitzguss, no red meat, no coffee?—­I’d rather die!”

Afraid of Cold Water

The most-dreaded terror on the threshold seems to be cold water.  Undoubtedly, it has kept away thousands from Nature Cure and thereby from the only possible cure for their chronic ailments.  If we could achieve equally good results without our heroic methods of treatment, the sidewalks leading to our institution would be crowded with people clamoring for admission.

After all, this foolish fear is entirely groundless.  Cold water is no more to be dreaded than the bogey man.  It is one of our fundamental principles of treatment never to do anything that is painful to the patient.  We always “temper the wind to the shorn lamb,” the coldness of the water and the force of the manipulations to the sensitiveness and endurance of the subject.  Beginning with mild, alternately warm and cool sprays, which are pleasant and agreeable to everyone, we gradually increase the force and lower the temperature until the patient is so inured to cold water that the blitzguss becomes a delightful and pleasurable sensation, a positive luxury.

It is amusing to watch the gradual change in the attitude of our patients toward the cold-water treatment.  In some instances we have had to spend hours in earnest persuasion before we could induce a particularly sensitive person to try the first mild spray.  A few weeks later if, perchance, something interfered with the cold water applications, the patient would indignantly refuse to take the other treatment if there was to be no cold water.

There is certainly no finer tonic than cold water, no more exhilarating sensation than that produced by the artistic application of alternating douches and the blitz.

The real cause of this cold-water scare, we believe, is to be found in the boasting of the veterans.  When, with protruding chest and chin in air, they brag to the newcomers or to their friends about their heroism and the coolness with which they allow the cold-water hose to be turned on them, the listener shudders and exclaims:  “This cold water may be all right for you, but it would never do for me.”