Flax Facts, What you need to Know about the Oil/Protein Combination.

In 1986 there was a landmark book published by William Fischer titled “How to Fight Cancer and Win”.  In it Fischer revealed the work of Dr Johanna Budwig, a 7 times Nobel Prize nominee for her work in nutrition.  Because she was in East Germany, very little was known of her work in any western countries prior to this time.   What Dr Budwig focused on during her later years was the role of fats in the human body.  More specifically, the difference between bad fats (saturated/trans) and good fats (unsaturated).  Early on she discovered just how important the essential fatty acids or EFA’s were in preventing and possibly even removing conditions of disease.  More importantly, she concluded that the essential fats required a protein source in order to make them water soluble and maximize their effect in the human body.

What are” Essential Fatty Acids”?

Essential fatty acids, or EFAs, are fatty acids that are required in the human diet but which must be obtained from food as the body has no way of producing them internally. There are two closely related families of EFAs: ω-3 (or omega-3 or n-3) and ω-6 (omega 6, n-6.) Only one substance in each of these families is truly essential, as the body can convert one omega-3 to another omega-3, for example, but cannot create an omega-3 from scratch.  Think of the EFA’s as the “highly unsaturated fats”.

So what is the “Oil/Protein” combination and why is it important?

Upon analyzing fatty substances, we come to the fatty acid chains with 18 links, and can observe that the links are, in places, not so firmly attached to each other.  The chain is fragile there, loose; it absorbs water easily-as if you were to fray a smooth silk thread in one place and then draw it through water.  The frayed part absorbs water, or dye, more easily.  In the same way, these fatty acid chains with their weak, unsaturated connections, form protein associations very easily.  The fatty acids become water soluble through this association with protein. 

The moment two unsaturated double links occur together in a fatty acid chain, the effects are multiplied and in the highly unsaturated fats, the so-called “linoleic” acids, there is generated a field of electrons, a veritable electric charge which can be quickly conducted off into the body, thus causing a recharging of the living substance—especially of the brain and nerves.  These highly unsaturated fatty acids play a decisive role in the respiratory functioning of the body.  The lack of these highly unsaturated fatty acids paralyses many vital functions.  Primarily, it cuts off the air we breathe.  Just as we cannot survive without air and food, we cannot survive without these fatty acids, thus they are termed “essential”.

What happened to these “EFA’s”?

Since 1902 the fats have been solidified by industry in order to make them more easily handled, commercially marketable, longer lasting and slower to turn rancid and more easily spread for convenience.  These unsaturated fats have been chemically treated so that their unsaturated qualities are destroyed, the field of electrons removed.  Their ability to associate with protein and thereby to easily achieves water solubility in the fluids of the living body---all this has been destroyed.  These fats are no longer active at the surface and capillary level, which means they can no longer flow into the capillaries.  The solid fats which are not water soluble and cannot associate with protein are no longer capable of flowing through the fine capillary networks.  The blood thickens and circulatory problems arise.  It would take a book to go into all the individual organic abnormalities and to the enormous complexity of the effects of the fat metabolism on all the vital functions.  Suffice to say, every cell of the body is affected.  

So..now what, where do we get these EFA’s and how do we create the proten combination??

According to Dr Budwigs research, the oil protein intake which produces the best synergistic effect is a simple combination.  Raw, unrefined flax oil and cottage cheese.  Why?  Flax oil contains the correct ratio of EFA’s; linoleic to linolenic, and cottage cheese is rich in the sulpherated protein that combines well with the EFA’s to create the easily assimilated, electron charged fats our bodies require, but cannot manufacture.  Seems almost too simple but Dr Budwig dedicated her professional life to it and thousands of people to this day will tell you her research and treatment saved their lives.  A few words about flax seed because the risks involved are high in the commercial manufacturing of this very sensitive product.  The optimal fats are, of course, the most oxygen-active ones.  When flax seed is rough ground, the beneficial fatty acids, that is the threefold unsaturated ones will spoil rapidly---within 10 to 15 minutes.  Make sure the product you use has been pressed and packaged in a light and oxygen free environment to insure it has maximum potency.