Saturday, November 20, 2010

Sick & Tired of Being Fat?

With all the diet books and diet foods on the market it’s incredible to see that about one third of Canadians are either overweight or obese. Losing weight is not just about being slim and sexy! It may be a matter of life and death. Life quality. Earlier death. Excess weight escalates the rates of conditions such as high blood pressure, heart disease, and diabetes. So why do so many of us fail at dieting? Why are we too tired to exercise?



There are multiple issues. Usually one factor alone will not cause obesity but when you add two or more together you’ve got a prescription for failure. Go through this mini questionnaire and check off which of the following apply to you:



__Do you have stress at work or are you unemployed against your best efforts?

__Do you have stress in the family?

__Do you have insomnia or other sleep challenge?

__Do you find the thought of exercising overwhelming?

__Do you feel like you just cannot live without your “treats”?

__Do you eat less than 10 servings of fruits and vegetables per day?

__Do you consume more than one cup of coffee a day?

__Do you consume sugar or fried foods on a daily basis?

__Are you tired all the time?

__Do you get depressed in the winter (SAD) or are you mild depressed on a regular basis?

__Do you have amalgam fillings?

__Have you had any unusual exposure to toxins?

__Have you eaten a lot of fast foods in your life?



Saying yes to any two of the above will put you into the danger zone for gaining and storing weight. Years of eating fast food, junk food, MSG, sweeteners and other chemicals combined with environmental toxins can lead to a hormone imbalance in the hypothalamus, thyroid or adrenal glands which all help to control our weight.



How can you know which diet is best for you? First of all you need to eliminate all toxic fake food. Combined with several short periods of daily exercise—like a 10 minute walk or bouncing on an exercise ball while you watch TV, increased water consumption and getting an extra hour of sleep may be all you need to start losing. Once damage is done to the glands though, further action is necessary.



Eliminating very acidic foods will also help. Pork, farmed salmon, dairy, sugar and white flour are the most common offenders. These will cause inflammation which will lead to tiredness and pain, leaving you exhausted and unmotivated. Consuming a diet high in raw vegetables, greens and fruits will give you energy, help your body to detoxify and typically weight loss will ensue. If you switch overnight to a completely raw food diet, you may be expelling too many toxins at once so be sure to use a safe detoxifier to remove heavy metals and volatile organic compounds so as not to overburden your liver which will stall weight losses.



If you fall off the diet wagon just start over the next day rather than giving up. Concentrate on becoming healthy, energetic and feeling good right into your 80’s and 90’s.



*This article is not meant as medical advice and upon embarking on a weight loss or exercise program you should be checking in with your health care practitioner of choice.

To safely detoxify while on a fat release program contact me at detoxexpert at gmail dot com.

Thursday, June 3, 2010

Eliminating Skin Problems Forever

Have you tried different lotions and potions for acne, psoriasis, eczema or other skin conditions and had no visible or lasting result? You are not alone! Our skin is the biggest organ for eliminating toxins and is really a reflection of what is going on inside of us.

Stress plays a major role. Why? First of all we are being exposed to unprecedented amounts of toxins in our food, air and water. These toxins can get stuck in our liver which slows down its ability to detoxify stress hormones. That explains why at certain times of the month for women we may get an extra pimple or the unwelcome pimple shows up just before an important occasion. Second, stress contributes to acidity in the body. Excess acid is one more burden on the liver.

Eliminating stress is easier said than done but regular exercise is a big help. Instead of grabbing a chocolate bar, how about grabbing a skipping rope? Even a few minutes can produce some “happy hormones” which make us feel better. If you exercise enough to sweat, be sure to rinse off though. You don’t want the sweat toxins to be absorbed back into your skin.

Water will also help your liver and bowels to flush out toxins. Distilled and reverse osmosis are acidic waters and should not be used regularly if you want to improve your pH. Now that summer is here, increase your fresh fruits and vegetables, preferably raw, organic and local. Live enzymes in raw foods contribute to cleansing and rather than just drinking plain water, foods like melons provide water and minerals that help the skin. Increasing raw foods rapidly can result in rapid detoxification which may temporarily worsen the skin. I would suggest taking a liver support at the same time to avoid this. Aim for 75% raw in your diet and you will be sure to see a change.

Top foods to avoid are sugar, dairy (unless raw), processed flour, artificially treated fats and oils, chemical additives and pork. Also, don’t eat microwaved foods since microwaving damages the molecular structure and the food is no longer recognized as healthy by the body. The stove really doesn’t take that much longer and is worth the extra effort.

Avoiding toxins in your personal care products will go a long way to avoid toxic overload and lessen the burden on the elimination organs. For those who are fortunate enough to remember living before the industrial revolution, you will unlikely remember any people with skin problems. A bit of olive oil or coconut oil can do wonders for the skin. Again, be sure to use only organic. Whatever goes on your skin does not have the benefit of being broken down in your stomach and processed by the liver first. Read labels, especially on sunscreen. Sun is healthy in moderate amounts but putting toxic chemicals on your skin and then heating them up can be dangerous.

If you have taken antibiotics your body may be missing important strains of bacteria. To fix digestive issues which contribute to leaky gut and skin problems take a full spectrum probiotic. Absorption is important and all the good supplements and food are useless if your digestion and liver are not in order.
Heavy metals such as mercury (amalgam fillings are the biggest source), cadmium, arsenic, and more block important receptor sites for minerals that are needed for healthy skin. These also disturb the liver and contribute to stress and skin problems.

For safe sunscreen, cosmetics and probiotic superfood visit www.goodskinforlife.com.

Sunday, May 30, 2010

Feel More Energetic!

You not only are what you eat you will feel what you eat. Your body replaces nearly 98% of its cells in about two years. You literally have a different physical body than you had two years ago! If we replace the old cells with healthier new ones we can reverse illness and improve both our physical and emotional state of health and our energy levels will increase quickly.

Some people have all their organs functioning perfectly at a high energetic level. Others seem to be lacking the bio-energy needed to stay healthy. This is shown by a general lack of energy, skin and bowel problems, immunity problems such as colds and allergies, joint and muscle pain, psychological and sleep disorders to name a few. This can be changed. How?

Usually various factors must be looked at. First and most important is what goes into the body: food and water. To maintain an environment that disease cannot grow in the body must be kept in an alkaline state. This is done in varying ways.

Diet: Add more raw organic fruits and vegetables. These foods contain lots of fiber and will also help absorb toxins in the digestive tract and will boost your energy levels.

Every function of our body requires essential fatty acids, yet nearly everyone is deficient. Hemp oil is well balanced and tasty. Use double the recommended amount for several months until you’re balanced. Avoid processed fats and oils.

Water: You must drink sufficient water to maintain energy levels. RO and distilled are quite acidic. Chlorine is extremely acidifying to the body and should be avoided. Drink filtered water, not coffee for an energy boost. Avoid sweetened drinks.

Bowel Function: It’s been said that all disease starts in the bowel. Some foods like meat can take up to 72 hours to pass through the system. Can you imagine what a piece of meat left on your kitchen counter in mid-summer would smell like? That’s what’s happening inside your body! Dairy products will coat the duodenum with mucous making it difficult to absorb nutrients.

Weight: Toxins are stored in fat cells so maintain or lose weight if necessary. Exercise will also give you energy. Just do it!

Detoxification: Some people’s bodies will not detoxify well on their own. A few ways the body can be helped to do this is by regular use of ionic foot baths, saunas, skin brushing, zeolites.

Stress: How we handle stress is also one of the differentiating factors of how we heal. If we haven’t learned to deal with the daily challenges of life in a non-stressful way, it can literally make us sick. Our emotions are preceded by thought. Change the thought which changes the emotion which changes the hormones and in turn changes the mood and our stress level.

This article was originally published in May/June 2009 issue of The Herbal Collective. If you have questions post below and I'll write further posts. Just tell me what you want to read about!





Saturday, May 29, 2010

Beautiful Skin Comes from Within


The manufacturers of beauty lotions and skin care products will have you believe that beautiful skin comes in a bottle or jar. While it is important to cleanse your skin and allow it to breathe, it is also important to keep you inner elimination organs functioning at top notch so that the skin will not have so much work to do with eliminating toxins.

When we go through hormonal changes, our liver gets clogged up and toxins will look for another place to exit. Usually this is via the skin in the form of pimples or acne, especially if our bowels are also not functioning properly.

Fortunately, these things can be remedied. It may not be an overnight process but within a few weeks to a month, these skin conditions can be remedied with a good cleansing program and dietary changes. The worst offenders are typically sugar and pasteurized dairy products. Simply eliminating these may show benefits quite quickly. Food additives and refined oils are two further products that should be eliminated.

Certified organic produce also contains more enzymes and minerals that contribute to healthy skin. Eating raw fruits and vegetables leave enzymes intact so they can go to work to clean up waste in our bodies. Drinking freshly pressed juices is a quick way to cleanse your blood and give your digestive system a rest from work so that your body can work on healing.

A few colonic treatments may be helpful if constipation is severe. This will speed up the elimination process. A good probiotic will rebalance the bowel flora so that the colon will start working properly. Look for a probiotic that has a full spectrum of bacteria and is packaged with the food it eats to ensure that it will still be alive by the time you take it. Eating a diet high in healthy fiber will contribute to daily cleansing of the colon and maintaining healthy bacteria.

Light exercise, saunas, skin brushing and drinking lots of alkaline water will further help to eliminate toxins. Beware of reverse osmosis or distilled water also known as “dead” water which tends to be quite acidic and are not suitable for everyday use. When in doubt, test with a pH strip. Our cells need bio-energy and dead water will not provide it. Using alkaline water has improved the skin tone and color in many people who have kidney disorders.

To lighten the load on the liver it’s important to remove chemicals from everyday use. This includes personal care products that you wouldn’t feel safe eating, air fresheners and paraffin candles, estrogen containing products, cleaners, scented detergents, drier sheets and other such items that are not necessary. When you have MCS (Multiple Chemical Sensitivities) you quickly learn that these items are not necessary to stay clean or healthy.

Removing heavy metals like lead and cadmium from the body will free up the mineral receptors responsible for calcium and zinc uptake that will also contribute to healthy skin.

For those who want to know what skin care products I recommend you can take a look at my site www.goodskinforlife.com. Pure, certified organic and safe enough to eat. Creating a barrier between your skin and the toxic environment will go a long way to protect your skin from the outside. The next blog post will be about cleaning up the inner terrain so follow this blog!