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"Eating to live" took on a special meaning for me last year. I thought I was eating a healthy diet that included vitamins every day. Yet, over the last three years, all sorts of nagging "quality of life" issues seemed to rain down upon me. I was sick of being sick, I was tired of being tired, and I wanted a diet that would solve my problems.

I had also received startling news from my internist. He told me that my liver was functioning like I was an alcoholic. This was particularly puzzling because a glass of wine at dinner did not exactly qualify me for AA. So, what WAS causing my liver damage? My doctor suspected the over-the-counter medications I took for my persistent acid reflux (GERD) condition. Cautions about liver damage are on many nonprescription medications, if you are able to read the minuscule print.

I began to re-evaluate my past drug usage with a critical eye.

* Years of pain medication due to endometriosis, a uterine disease
* Super antibiotics to cure a surgical site infection after a hysterectomy
* More antibiotics taken for persistent infections
* 15 years on the Premarin hormone after a complete hysterectomy
* Frequent use of antacids and acid reducers

Antibiotics were killing my natural immunity reserves on a regular basis. I naively thought that my multi-vitamin was my magic bullet for good health.

Further testing determined that I also had two small cysts on my liver. The truth finally dawned on me: What I thought was a healthy diet and lifestyle was, in fact, not keeping me healthy.

Good fortune smiled on me when I found my herbalist friend, Vaughn. He immediately pointed me toward his first rate health food store and introduced me to the world of herbal supplements. Vaughn educated me about enzymes and how they aid digestion. When I learned that toxins build-up inside the body and acid is overproduced, my persistent symptoms made sense. I first learned about the importance of an alkalinity rich diet from Vaughn.

Yes, taking too many drugs over the years had left residual damage, but herbal supplements alone would not solve my problems. I needed to re-educate myself to the truth of healthy eating and make a commitment.

It was difficult to break my old habits of easy-to-make, prepared foods with preservatives, snacks with empty white carbohydrates, and those enticing sweets. The book, "The pH Balance Diet"*, has been particularly helpful.

One of the first foods I embraced eating again was citrus fruit. I was told to avoid citrus because of my acid

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