Almost everyone at the Gerson clinic seems to start slowly rather than launch into 13 juices and 5 enemas a day as prescribed in ‘Healing the Gerson Way’, Charlotte Gerson’s helpful book.   ‘When people do the full protocol too soon, they can get into big problems and end up with an ulcer or in the emergency room,’ says Dr Cervantes. ‘It took me one year to get one person back on track after they had done this.’

In the run up to arriving at the clinic, Laura was told to do 3 juices and 1 enema a day.  At the clinic, she was immediately put on 3 enemas and 8 juices.  4 days later she was upped to 3 enemas and 10 juices. Five of the juices contain a potassium compound called Kemsal K which is dissolved in water and 3 juices contain drops of Lugol’s iodine.

Eventually most patients do the full 13 juices and 5 enemas a day.  But if you follow the book, you get only 6 hours sleep each night. But Dr Cervantes has a revised schedule that allows for more sleep. He recommends his patients do their 5 enemas at 6am, 10am, 2pm, 5pm and 9pm.  If you are clever and make the coffee, gruel etc the night before (gruel lasts for 12 hours), you can get almost 8 hours sleep. We’re big on sleep and are already scheming how Laura can steal back another hour to get 9 hours zzzzzz.