All posts by Jules

Dementia: Causes and Avoidance

Dementia is a common word for memory failure, vocabulary loss, diminished problem-solving, and the loss of other cognitive abilities that are significant enough to conflict with everyday life. Dementia for older people is fairly common, especially for the over 80’s, and Alzheimer’s syndrome is the worst form of dementia. However, the common belief is that there is nothing one can do if diagnosed with either dementia, or Alzheimer’s, when in fact, the causes of the memory failure and other cognitive failings are manifold, and most of them are within our grasp and power to address and mitigate.

What is Dementia?

Dementia is the general concept of cognitive decline and includes the loss of other essential skills. Dementia, not a particular disease, is an overarching term — like coronary disease — that includes a wide variety of unique medical disorders, including Alzheimer’s. Pathological shifts in the brain trigger abnormalities categorized under the common word “dementia.”

Signs of dementia can differ significantly. These can include:

  • Short-term to long-term memory disorders
  • Difficulty concentrating
  • Difficulty in carrying out typical tasks
  • Losing track of a conversation
  • Confusion about the time or place
  • Changes in mood

To purchase this book, click here

What Causes Dementia?

Dementia develops from brain cell insults. These small insults, such as trauma, inhibit the capacity of neurons to interact in a correlational fashion. If neurons cannot interact regularly, there might be an impairment of thoughts, actions, and emotions.

While most brain changes that cause dementia are thought to be irreversible and, left to their own devices, may increase with time, many declining cognitive processes, are experienced in the absence of ‘true’ dementia.  A differential diagnosis is not to be taken lightly as many conditions, including nutritional deficiencies and lifestyle habits, may have symptoms that mimic dementia, or even Alzheimer’s, especially in the early phases.

  • Depression
  • Medication side effects
  • Excessive consumption of alcohol.
  • Problems of the thyroid.
  • Deficiencies in vitamins.

How to Diagnose Dementia?

In short, no definitive examination exists yet to assess whether anyone has dementia.  Doctors diagnosis Alzheimer’s as well as other forms of this disease based on careful psychiatric records, clinical evaluation, diagnostic testing, and irregular shifts in perception, daily function, and actions of each severity. Doctors may assess if an individual develops dementia with such a substantial degree of certainty. However, making a diagnosis of a condition, which is, in effect, giving a name to a set of symptoms, is very different to finding out what the ‘cause’ of the condition may be and of course, establishing the cause is helpful if one wants to prevent degeneration or even reverse the condition.

How to Treat Dementia?

Dementia care relies on the cause. Find the cause and hopefully one is on the way towards treating the condition.  However, for more advanced dementia, namely Alzheimer’s disorder, the common belief that no remedy or therapy delays or prevents its development is proving flawed.  The work of Dr Dale Bredesan has shown that diagnosed Alzheimer’s, certainly in its early stages, can be reversed, so before giving up, there are protocols and lifestyle changes that can be made that may prove very beneficial.

How to Avoid Dementia?

Recent evidence indicates that there are measures we can and should do to lessen the probability of moderate cognitive disability and dementia for older people.

Some of the contributing factors for this condition, like age and genes, cannot be modified but it is helpful to note that simply because we have the genetic propensity for a particular condition, it does not mean we are assured of getting the condition, and both dementia and Alzheimer’s are no exception.  Experts continue to investigate the effect of other contributing factors on neurological function and the avoidance of dementia.

Key Takeaway

Dementia is an umbrella terminology for anything related to memory loss or INABILITY to recall memories due to damaged neurons. However, this condition is preventable, as stated in several studies. So, people should care enough to prevent this condition from happening.

 An extract from ‘Where Did I Leave My Keys?’ A summary of activities, – the why’s and how-to’s, having been discussed in great detail in the book.

Look at what you achieved? You…

  • Addressed whether your memory is still sharp and faced whether you need to do something about it before it got worse.
  • Threw away foods and spices that contain MSG or Aspartame in order to protect your neuro- transmitters.
  • Addressed some of your own habits. Ones that you know are detrimental to brain health.
  • Added more magnesium rich foods to your diet.
  • Added a mix of colourful foods to your diet in order to eat a rainbow daily.
  • Added some colourful fruits and veggies to your shopping basket, every time your shopped.
  • Made a gorgeous salad, filled with a rainbow of goodness.
  • Watched a few funny movies and tried to see life from a more positive perspective to assist your telomeres.
  • Took a media holiday to give your brain a break from news disasters and negativity.
  • Spent some time in the sun
  • Added a manageable time schedule for exercise, a few times a week.
  • Reviewed your blood test results.  Had some brain- important ones retested.
  • Added more omega 3 and green tea to your daily intake.
  • Tried a new blueberry and chia smoothie.
  • Added zinc to your diet.
  • Addressed your hormones, especially if you are peri-menopausal or menopausal.
  • Limited yourself to only one insulin promoting treat a day.
  • Had your thyroid properly tested with TSH, free T4 and free T3 measured.
  • Added apples and berries to your daily diet to activate sirtuins.
  • Added holy basil, lemon balm and lavender to your herb garden
  • Enjoyed some deliciously prepared broccoli several times in the month.
  • Checked your homocysteine levels.
  • Checked your gene SNP’s with a knowledgeable health practitioner.
  • Started adding turmeric to your stews and eggs.
  • Downloaded a few brain- developing programs onto your phone and practiced every day.
  • Monitored your prescribed medication to see if it affects brain health.  Discussed safer alternatives with your doctor.
  • Added Brussels sprouts to your meal a few times a week.
  • Became aware of potential toxins in your daily habits.
  • Reviewed your own daily schedule and habits and incorporated brain-healthy changes wherever possible.

Intermittent fasting. The ONE change to lose weight…and keep it off.

While the title may seem simple, and it is… keeping weight off is not about just:

  • Taking a diet pill
  • Exercising for an hour every day
  • Calorie cutting

It is more about intermittent fasting to keep insulin down.

Combating weight gain, or losing weight, is not easy. We are told so many conflicting views it is hard to sort out the beneficial information from the useless. Many of us have tried to cut back on our intake, and have even succeeded in losing some weight, but in a few short weeks have gained it all again.

Weight gain (or loss), is about the balance of our hormones, and the two biggest impactors in this subtle dance, are insulin and cortisol.

Understanding how to make the food choices that will benefit us, when faced with a buffet table, is more easily sustained when we can understand ‘why’ certain choices are better than others. Why does insulin play such a big role and why do I gain weight when I am stressed?

The 4 brief explanations linked below, will help you understand more about what goes on in the cells that adds weight to our hips…or bum, and what we can do to combat this challenge.

Faced with choices, many of us become paralysed by the sheer magnitude of differing views and end up doing nothing, but if one can make just ONE change, intermittent fasting and in so doing, addressing insulin, is the first on the list.

The Benefits of Intermittent Fasting:

2020 has taught us that none of us is immune to tragedy and health susceptibility with the COVID pandemic, and according to the Centre for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), the top five comorbidities are hypertension, obesity, chronic lung conditions like TB, COPD (chronic obstructive pulmonary disease), asthma and cystic fibrosis, diabetes, and cardiovascular conditions like coronary heart disease, congenital heart disease …

One of the most impactful changes we each can make for ourselves is to lose weight, but despite the profound benefits of doing this, the practicalities are challenging.

At the end of 2020, I sent out a series of short, lunchtime lectures to help you understand how insulin (even if you are not diabetic) negatively impacts health and weight gain.

Thank you for your feedback, and here is the series of lectures. Starting with the one on intermittent fasting. If you are like me you may want to just jump into the best practical solution but the other three lectures are worth going through to help you understand why intermittent fasting is so beneficial. Enjoy and please connect with me if you have any questions.

Intermittent Fasting: Benefits and How To Add This To Your Life.

The previous 3 lectures that will help you make the necessary weight loss changes are as follows:

Lecture one: https://youtu.be/W9Vn2MYpRo0
Lecture Two:
https://youtu.be/ocbVQIW7wSw
Lecture Three: https://youtu.be/yYAWvUtZL1I

In addition. As mentioned in the lecture, here is the link for the full weight loss course at the special price.  You pay only 15 dollars, but for a limited time.  This offer ends on the 23 February 2021

Click this link to view the course getting the Body You want By Understanding The Body You Have:

Have fun, and please connect with me if you have preferences for other lunchtime lectures.

In Vitality

Jules

Ps:  For appointments; WhatsApp me on  084 770 5943. 

I am also on Signal and Telegram

Xpert ‘Lifestyle’ Support

Just a quick October shout out from Jules. The end of the year is fast approaching and I hope, with the world opening up, that this will also mean an opportunity to spend some leisure time on the beach. If the COVID lock-down has driven you, as it did me,- to the fridge for nibbles, then the following courses may be of huge benefit. For a free health overview, email Jules on health@live2ahundred.co.za, and request your questionnaire. Fill it in and send it back to me and I will assess your present health status.

It goes without saying though, to become an ‘Xpert’ in anything, we need to invest time. This includes becoming an expert in our own health, as well as any lifestyle skills we may wish to up-skill.

Books, courses and other valuable self-help material will be available here.

Weight Loss and Health Courses

  1. Belly fat and the number one fat making hormone, Insulin. This course is free.
  2. Getting the body you want by understanding the body you have: Click course curriculum for more detail.
  3. Fundamentals in Depression: Click Course curriculum for more detail.

Book for self improvement

  1. Ignite her Fire:

‘Ignite Her Fire’ is for all men looking to fully understand what women like in the bedroom and how, exactly, to satisfy each woman.

Restless Leg Syndrome

This year has dissipated in a weird and creepy way, and I cannot believe it is September already.
I suspect it is the stressful world in which we are living at the moment but restless leg syndrome seems to be on the rise.  The following information may help reduce the unpleasant sensation of restless leg, if you are a sufferer.

Restless Leg Syndrome.

Described as the inability to relax the legs and an oversensitive, though painless discomfort. Some people describe it as a feeling of insects crawling over their legs… really horrible for them.
It usually occurs at night, while trying to fall asleep, and relief may be obtained by moving the legs or walking. (Clearly not conducive to a good night’s sleep.)  Legs may continue to move even while the sufferer is asleep, resulting in a disturbed night for the partner. (double wammy!)

The cause of Restless leg is unknown, although there are conditions which are associated with it.

  • Iron deficiency. (Even mild).  Please get an iron profile done. 
  • Depleted magnesium and folate.
  • People on kidney dialysis
  • Pregnancy
  • Heavy smoking
  • Advanced age
  • Hypertension
  • Diabetes
  • Lack of exercise

Your doctor may prescribe tranquilizers, drugs used to treat Parkinson’s, epilepsy or sleeping pills.  All of these may contribute to a more restful night in spite of the continuing syndrome but before trying the stronger, allopathic medicines, try the following.

  • Take an iron and magnesium supplement.  Please don’t just go onto an iron supplement without getting your iron and ferritin levels tests.  Either come to me or go to your GP, and get a test done.  If you have too much iron, it is extremely inflammatory, so supplements, even ‘over the counter ones’, are not to be taken lightly.  Magnesium, on the other hand, is a wonderful and safe supplement and far too many people are deficient in magnesium, especially if you are diabetic or have Insulin Resistance. Choose a supplement that has at least 200mg of ELEMENTAL magnesium.  Don’t think that because the box says…1000mg magnesium citrate, for example, that there is 1000mg magnesium in the tablet. There isn’t.  Most of it is the citrate part.  Slow mag, for example, has very little magnesium in each tablet.  If you have muscle cramping or your eyes twitch, there is a very good chance you are magnesium deficient. Take between 400mg-600mg elemental magnesium at night.  Magnesium relaxes the vessel wall and allows the muscles to relax. Solal has a very nice option.  It isn’t cheap but I believe SO worth it.  Magnesium is also important for insulin management, plus is involved in over 300 metabolic processes, so not to be ignored.
  • Improve circulation by increasing exercise.
  • Take supplements that improve circulation such as; 

                  Ginko Biloba. 120mg, horse chestnut. 2.5g, butcher’s broom.1.5g.

  • Valerian and passionflower to help you sleep. I have also listed some tips for better sleep.
  • Omega 3 supplementation.  Up to 3000mg per day is safe and effective.  Monitor your body if you have a cardiac condition.  Omega 3 is great for hearts

Try these treatments for at least 6 weeks before considering stronger measures.

To sleep better, the following tips are very helpful, regardless of whether or not you have restless legs.

Sleep Advice

  • Plan for 8 to 9 hours in bed. even if you are only resting
  • Get into bed before 11pm
  • Avoid late afternoon naps
  • Keep daily naps to 20-30 min only
  • Have a light meal at night
  • Finish all eating 3 hours prior to going to sleep.
  • Avoid drinking more than 4-8 ounces of fluid before going to bed.
  • Have a soothing bath before bed to raise your core temp. It is the drop in temp that will allow you to sleep. Add a cup of Epsom salts.The magnesium is relaxing.
  • Start to dim the lights about half an hour before you plan to go to bed.
  • Especially the blue ones. TV, computer, cell phone or android, all emit blue light and blue light blocks melatonin secretion.
  • Place electrical fields at least 5 feet away from your head.
  • Do not leave your cell phone on and near your head.
  • If you need to work on your computer or watch TV, Cover your eyes with amber or yellow glasses to filter the blue light. Blue light disrupts melatonin release.
  • Practice belly breathing or meditation before bed.
  • Ensure your pillow is the correct height
  • Make sure your feet and hands are warm
  • Take time in the morning to face the light for about 10 minutes

Avoid Stimulants

  • Avoid alcohol 3 hours before bed. Avoid any caffeine after 2pm. Including coffee, coca cola, flu medications or decongestants.
  • Avoid Aerobic activity after 6pm
  • Chamomile and herbal teas before bed may relax you

Supplements

  • 5-HTP – 50-300 mg 1 hour before bedtime
  • Taurine – 500-2000 mg 1 hour before bedtime
  • Magnesium/Calcium – 250 mg /500 mg is a typical dose OR magnesium citrate or glycinate 400-800 mg at bedtime.
  • Calming Herbs – Lemon balm, Passion flower, Valerian root

Re-Inventing Yourself

Need a complete new life? 

What happens when we are tired of who we are now?  We are unhappy about our body, exhausted always chasing money to no avail, or struggling with a disease that appears to be winning? We have been to psychologists and life coaches, tried affirmations, stuck photo’s of fat people on our fridge, written new year resolutions that we have stuck to for only 1 day.  We chase our tail every day, struggling to keep up with the demands of job and family and yet our life is not improving.  What is left for us to try that doesn’t cost a fortune and is scientifically credible?

Believe it or not we carry the tool to change our life with us every day.  Our brain!

Find out how to do this and enjoy using your first ‘Future Now’ move

Contact Kelly on health@live2ahundred.co.za to order your own personal Future Now Movie for any challenge you want to resolve.

There are thousands of documented scientific tests that validate that conscious intention, in other words, what we deliberately focus our intention on, has a direct effect on our life and what is attracted into our life.

The most dramatic experiment was done in 1995 by Rene Peoch.  He wanted to see if day old chicks could influence a random event. He dressed a random event generator (REG) up as a mommy chicken and allowed the chicks to imprint with the machine when they hatched.  A REG is a machine that turns one way or another and will respond approximately 50% either way.  The more events in the random experiment, the more the machine will respond equally one way or the other.

Then they placed all the day old chicks down one side of a corridor and sent the machine down the corridor where the baby chicks could see it coming.  As the machine approached, the babies, imprinted with that machine as ‘mommy’, began to chirp and clamor for attention as long as they could see the machine.  They repeated the experience many times and found that in 75% of the cases the machine turned towards the clamoring chicks.

What this shows is that focused attention can affect the activity of an inanimate machine. If day old chicks can influence a machine, imagine what the developed human brain can influence if used properly. In fact, mainstream science has documented the concept that there is a 99.8% probability that our consciousness has a direct effect on our life. (Dr Larry Farwell, a Harvard trained physicist) http://www.larryfarwell.com/consciousness-dr-larry-farwell-brain-fingerprinting-dr-lawrence-farwell.html

So what part of the brain played a role in getting us to where we are at present? How did this happen and what can we do to change it?

The Subconscious Brain

You may not realise that your unconscious mind is the primary driver of your whole reality as it is. It helps to determine how much money you earn, how healthy you are, how happy you are and what you believe to be true in your world.  It even affects things like whether you are a good sales person, husband, wife, mother, father.  Will you become addicted to food or alcohol? How you manage your job and whether you are liked or despised.

Your unconscious mind shapes and colours all your experiences in life and the great news is that we are able to influence and change the subconscious mind and in so doing, change the whole pathway of our lives towards more prosperous, happier, and more healthy.

As our brain, specifically our subconscious brain, was the major influence in getting us to where we are now,  we can use the same techniques to move into a completely different life. However, like anything, this is a skill that needs to be learned and practiced to achieve the full benefit. Understanding the workings of the subconscious mind and then applying the concepts, will help create a new future and a different reality to the one you have experienced up until now.

Does this sound like whoo hooo weirdness to you?  Let me explain how this happens and even more importantly, how we ourselves can change our very future by repeatedly and regularly, for a short time every day,  manipulating our brain waves and changing the focus of where we place our attention.

Every time we think, respond, speak, feel, remember, learn, move  or use our brain in any way, an electrical signal flows along the nerves, forming a pathway. As a capable adult we have developed millions of neural pathways and these have developed into patterns that allow us to quickly store and retrieve information,  as well as perform the many task we do automatically on a daily basis. Automatic responses are energy saving.  Having to think about how to drive, for example, would very soon exhaust our energy, so our brain develops, through repetition, a neuron pathway that becomes automatic and does not require thought.  The neurons in your brain fire electrical signals 24/7.  As you repeat activities and thoughts, these waves follow the same patterns until the neurons become hardwired to facilitate the repeated patterns. – A little like a path that is worn through the bush through repeated hiking.

These patterns reflect your thoughts, emotions, moods and even your biological chemistry.  They reflect what you do, what you think and indeed, who you are. . The Science of Mindfulness

This is good in many ways but attached to each of these regular and automatic pathways is also a cascade of the same hormone and neurotransmitter releases in the body.  This is great if the pathway is a positive one but what if the pathway triggers the release of excess cortisol or inhibits serotonin? If this is the case then the physical responses in the body, brought about by those neurotransmitters, may be detrimental when they flow day in and day out.  In this case the thoughts, patterns, habits and boundaries in our life remain the same, day in and day out and this prevents growth, not to mention ages us beyond our years

As you yourself have, through developing your own unique habits and thoughts,  created the hardwired neuron pattern, you yourself can undo these patterns, with a little effort, by creating new patterns . Future Now Movies can help you do this.

Specifically, the creation of a new neuronet will, over time, uncouple the neurons in the old net, (and inhibit the release of the accompanying reactive neurotransmitters and hormones) making it ineffective and allowing you to function with a whole new neuronet. (with a fresh combinations of hormones and neurotransmitters)

All of this is done at the level of the subconscious mind.  In fact, our subconscious mind does most of the work.

Busy Subconscious activity!

We each have a little bundle of nerves at the base of the brain called the Reticular Activating System.  Your RAS is tiny, but incredibly powerful.  It’s the “networking center” of your subconscious and it decides what to allow through the gate into your waking conscious mind.

The Reticular Activating System
How Your Brain Controls Your Attention

It filters over 40 million tiny bits of data that your subconscious mind is processing… every single second and allows only 40 of those bits to reach the conscious mind.  That is a very busy system indeed.

So how much information does it let you actively think about? Just 40 bits! This filtration system is subject to habit formation if you allow it.  In other words, it will repeatedly allow the same type of information to reach your conscious mind. So when you dwell again and again on the same thoughts, these thought begin to affect your actual physical state.

To establish new neuronets and allow the old patterns to uncouple, one needs to affect and influence what information is filtered from the RAS and the subconscious, into your conscious brain.

How do we begin to change how the subconscious mind affects our life?

We have all heard of affirmations.  The problem with affirmations, as many of us have experienced,  is that most of the time they do not work. This is because they are not being used correctly.  When we repeat an affirmation with our mind fully conscious, our analytical brain is able to dismiss that affirmation outright because usually we are making affirmations to try and change something we are presently experiencing.  So when we affirm, ‘I am slim and healthy’,  because we are ‘not’ presently slim and healthy but want to become that way, our thinking brain, the neocortex, overrides the affirmation because the thinking brain knows that at this time we are NOT slim and healthy. So we need to be sneaky and slip the affirmation into the subconscious part of the brain.

So we need to get a little sneaky.  We need to slip that affirmation into the subconscious part of the brain.

 

How do we do this?

We change the frequency of the brainwave and at the same time, we show it another option, reflecting the messages and visuals of what we are wanting the subconscious to ‘see’.  

A Little about Brain Waves

Different brain wave patterns  reflex different states of mental alertness and are associated with different parts of the brain.

  1. Beta 13-40Hz
  • Daily activities, conscious thoughts, conversations and active thoughts are performed in Beta.
  • Beta is associated with alertness, being awake, but also worries, fear, paranoia, anxiety anger and moodiness.
  • Too much beta weakens the immune system because it triggers the flow of cortisol, our stress hormone.

2. Alpha 7-13Hz

Meditation phase begins in Alpha • Mind Chatter calms

·         Great For Learning & Studying because it allows the mind to be more receptive. Creative Ideas Flow , Reverses Brain’s Aging ,  slows compulsions and Habits, Fears, Phobias diminish

·          Calm & Peaceful • First Layer Of Subconscious Mind •

·         Increased ability to Focus • Relaxation Begins • Calming Neurotransmitters are released ie. Serotonin • Endorphins • Good For Anxiety, Depression, Stress, Panic • Increased concentration • Happiness • Confidence .

·          Great for super learning. Improved memory

3. Theta 4-7Hz

  •        Deeper Meditation • close to Sleep • open to vivid dreams and images and creative visualization. Opens our mind to collective connections
  •        Allows subconscious problem solving • enhanced creativity •  Intuition • Inspiration  Trance state • GABA release • Stimulates immune system •
  •         Allows release of appropriate neurotransmitters ie Serotonin, Endorphins , Acetylcholine,  lowers Cortisol, Sleep Better
  •        Increased feeling of connection.  increased problem solving skills. Increased motivation.
  1. Delta0-4Hz
  • Deepest Meditation : Healing and beneficial. Associated With Deep, Dreamless Sleep. Unconscious To Super-Conscious Part Of The Mind.
  • Our healing happens at this level. Beneficial to Immune System , cellular renewal , increased longevity

Meditation is a very successful way of accessing Theta brain waves.

Meditation allows us to access the wealth of interesting data held in the subconscious. Meditation allows us to ‘Change our Brain”  literally… through the process of neurogenesis. Training the brain, using Beta or Theta waves, combined with images and affirmations, influences the subconscious, allowing the messages to access the brain and thus benefit the body.

But training the brain to generate neurons requires repetition and practice.

Training your brain, using theta or alpha brain waves and programming the subconscious by using images and affirmations that address the subconscious, has visible benefits in the body.

How to change your brain

A quote attributed to Henry Ford at the height of his success sums up visualization incredibly well: “Whether you think you can, or think you can’t… you’re right.”  So we need to practice a new thought pattern in our daily life and cement this into our subconscious.

Why are Alpha and Theta brain waves so helpful?

Theta is a frequency that taps into the subconscious.  Why is this helpful?  Because when we wish to adopt a new idea, or an affirmation we hope will change a state we experience, in order for the mind to adopt that idea, we have to get the idea away from the conscious, analysing part of the brain and into the subconscious, non judgmental part.  Alpha and Theta wave patterns are where this happens.

This can be very helpful to us when we want to create a new reality.  Our neocortex generally does not like new ideas very much. It likes to be able to predict the outcome of a change.  Even wealth is a problem for the neocortex to accept because although it seems positive, the neocortex cannot predict how the outcome will impact your survival (the neocortex is all about survival) so it will reject the new idea as ‘foreign and risky’.  In fact, our brain is outright resistant to anything new, particularly if there is already a preconceived idea that we are already believing, so in order to sneak a new thought into the brain and for the brain to accept the new thought, we have to prepare the brain.

How do we do this?

Conscious affirmations are not successful at changing the subconscious for the obvious reason that conscious thoughts are ‘conscious’ and will have little impact on the ‘unconscious’ because the unconscious is hidden from view.  Just as Dory needed to speak whale to the whales, you need to communicate messages to the unconscious mind …. unconsciously.

Easier said than done.

The language of the unconscious mind is a subtle language of emotion and feeling. Product marketers know this very well.  They appeal to your ‘feelings’,  often fear, when they are wanting to get a message across.

In the same way, we can influence our subconscious to re-program our reality by offering it lots of positive and emotive stimulus that triggers feelings in us. Essentially, we want to broadcast a commercial that ‘sells you…to you’. For example, messages to you showing…..losing weight, eating healthy food, loving life as a slim person….. coupled with pictures and music to help change your brain waves to the more suggestible Theta waves, will have the same success as watching adverts that try and con you into feeling inadequate because you do not drive the right car, or wear Guess jeans. And whether we admit this or not, adverts have a very high success rate.

While we can accept that meditation and positive thoughts and specially directed affirmations and imagery will have success in assisting us in changing our lives, for most of us, the time needed to get into that meditation, as well as the focus required to keep our attention on the picture of the ‘new you’ without our mind shooting off in all directions, is beyond us.  This is where Future Now Movies come in.

Shortcut to your OWN  unique, subconscious message

‘Future Now Movies will create a unique movie for your unique challenge.  Each movie is custom constructed to reflect images and affirmations, with Theta or Alpha sound waves, that will depict the result you are wanting to create in your life. Future Now Movies  gives you the combination of a chosen wave of music that is either Alpha or Theta in wavelength that will access your subconscious, plus  visuals that represent images of the new state of being you wish to achieve, plus  affirmations that imprint the new state you wish to settle in your subconscious.

What replaying ‘Future Now Movies’  will do,  is recondition your subconscious to a new future, experienced in the mind NOW, as you watch your own movie. It sneaks the idea into the subconscious and bypasses the state of reality that the conscious mind is aware of.

During the time you are watching your unique Future Now Movie,  the music that accompanies the specially and personally designed movie, takes the message into the Theta or Alpha brain wave state.  These brain wave states reflect the subconscious mind and are thus allowed into the memories, ideas and habits that the subconscious mind stores.

Repeating these messages carves a new neuronet which, in turn, stimulates a whole new set of neurotransmitters, hormones, enzymes until you become a completely different mix from the old you and because you now resonate at a different frequency, you attract the same towards you.

Common changes people want to facilitate:

  1. Weight Loss
  2. Prosperity and Wealth
  3. Stress Free
  4. A loving Partner
  5. Travel
  6. A New Job
  7. Healing

How do I use my movie?

  1. Find a quiet moment. You only need 6 minutes. Preferably first thing in the morning and last thing at night. (remember to wear yellow glasses to cut the blue light at night time)
  2. Start the movie but close your eyes for the first run through. Listen to the music and take deep breaths. Visualise the night sky, as though you are looking out into inky black nothing. Focus on your breathing.  Listen to your own breathing and with your eyes closed, see the inky black of the night sky. Allow the music to flow through you.  Listen at least once to the whole music element of the movie .
  3. Open your eyes and start the movie again. Watch with no sense of judgment. You are looking at the future you. If you reach a part you particularly like, touch your heart with your hand and allow yourself to feel the joy and wonder you would be feeling if that moment was NOW.

Remember that in effect,  in a focused state, the brain does not know that it is NOT real. The brain cannot distinguish what is reality from what is imagined.  It is only when you allow your conscious neocortex to analyse the movie and TELL you it isn’t real, will the brain know it is a movie. So just allow the movie and sounds to wash over you with no analysis or judgment at all.  Just enjoy this movie of YOU as though the future is NOW.

Contact Kelly on health@live2ahundred.co.za to order your own personal Future Now Movie for any challenge you want to resolve.

For approx. the same price as a Pedi,  you will have your own, unique movie.  You can order as many as you wish, for as many challenges as you have.  Each movie is around 2.45 to 3 minutes and will contain pictures of you as well as images supporting what you wish to change.

FREE access to your first Future Now movie on this post

Stress has a huge impact on longevity, disease outcome, sleep, and well being. To gain full benefit of your first Future Now Movie, (click to full screen and turn audio on)

In Vitality

 

Jules

 

 

Quick Aside: We actually perform this rather mindless movie watching every time we watch TV.  We are repeatedly exposed to the horror, violence, negativity and unpleasantness with each episode of Game of Thrones and then we wonder why we feel road rage.

Choosing what we expose our own (and our children’s) subconscious to needs careful thought.  For a child, watching violence in cartoon form is still absorbed as violence and for our teenagers, playing war games on their computer steeps their subconscious in war and violence. We cannot really be surprised then if out teenagers treat us and others with aggression and disassociation. Advertising is the worst of insidious brain washing we are exposed to. We like to believe that we retain our free will but we do not realise that the more often we see a particular advert, the more it imprints on our brain.  Why else do you think advertisers will spend R1000’s for a billboard?  It is because they know that countless cars follow that route to and from work on a daily basis and the message drops into the subconscious of the drivers.  If a company manipulates the subconscious with their own message, why don’t we use the same process to drop a message we have created that will benefit us.

How easy is it to expose our subconscious only to what is loving and warm and connecting?

If you really want to achieve your Future Now goal then go on a media break and stay away from the news, movies depicting aggression or violence and even people who are negative and drag you down.  Expose your subconscious to you living a wonderful life, sleeping better, earning more money, being healthy, losing weight etc.

 

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Help! My Body Hurts all over.

My Body Hurts!

What is happening when your body just hurts all over? 

Many patients have non- specific pain in both joints and muscles, have tried anti- inflammatories that work for a bit and then stop, and yet, according to their doctor, are showing no signs of arthritic changes.

The body is a web and symptoms are never in isolation. What else may be happening that will help to diagnose the cause of the chronic inflammation? Interestingly, in the extraction and investigation of the cause, there are 2 possibilities that may contribute to Chronic Inflammation.

1. Kryptopyrroles (what????)
2. Vitamin B6 deficiency

Pyrroles are normal by- products of hemoglobin synthesis. Pyrrole disorder is a genetic (but fairly common) over- production of Pyrrole molecules.  Pyrroles, in themselves, have no function in the body but they love zinc and B6 and bind to these substrates, pulling them out the body when the pyrroles are excreted.  The result of this is a functional deficiency in both zinc and vit B6.  Why is this important? Because the depletion of both zinc and vit B6 manifests in some unpleasant signs and symptoms, one of which is Chronic Inflammation.

What are the signs and symptoms of Vit B6 Deficiency?

A vitamin B6 deficiency can, over time, cause symptoms including:

  • Changes in mood, such as irritability, anxiety and depression
  • Confusion
  • Muscle pains
  • Fatigue
  • Worsening of PMS symptoms
  • Symptoms of anemia which may also be associated with iron deficiency or vitB12 deficiency.

In a study published in the Journal of Nutrition, researchers compared blood levels of vitamin B6 and 13 different indicators of inflammation in 2,229 adults enrolled in the Framingham Offspring study.

Although previous studies have linked low blood levels of vitamin B6 with various signs of inflammation, such as C-reactive protein (CRP), researchers say this is the first large-scale study to look at the relationship between the vitamin and a variety of inflammation indicators.

The results showed that people with the highest overall inflammation score based on the 13 different indicators had the lowest blood levels of vitamin B6.

The reverse was also true. Those who had the highest blood levels of vitamin B6 had the lowest levels of chronic inflammation.

http://www.webmd.com/heart/news/20120619/low-vitamin-b6-linked-to-inflammation#1

What about a zinc deficiency?

  • Skin, nails and hair. Zinc deficiency may manifest as acne, eczema, xerosis (dry, scaling skin), seborrheic dermatitis, or alopecia (thin and sparse hair).
  • White spots on nails
  • Mouth ulcers
  • Diminished Vision, smell and taste. …
  • Compromised Immune system.
  • Poor Appetite.
  • Poor Cognitive function
  • Psychological disorders.
The following is a questionnaire to narrow down any possibility of pyrrole involvement.

PYROLURIA

If you have mood disorders, alcoholism, OCD or are bipolar, there is a possibility you have problems with pyrroles. However, signs and symptoms of B6 or zinc deficiency may not mean you have pyrroles in the urine but it is a good idea to check out any low nutrient status .

Both Pyrolurea and nutrient deficiencies are easily corrected.

YES NO
___ ___ Do you sunburn easily? Do you have fair or pale skin?
___ ___ Do you react poorly to stress and avoid stressful situations?
___ ___ Do you have poor dream recall or only nightmares?
___ ___ Is it hard to recall what you’ve just read?

___ ___ Are you anemic or easily fatigue
___ ___ Are your eyes sensitive to bright lights?
___ ___ Do you sneeze in sunlight?
___ ___ Do you get frequent colds or infections?
___ ___ Are there white spots on your fingernails?
___ ___ Are you prone to acne, dermatitis, eczema, or psoriasis?
___ ___ Do you have stretch marks on your abdomen or thighs?
___ ___ Do you prefer not to eat breakfast or even experience light
              nausea in the morning?
___ ___ Are there severe mood problems, ADHD, mental illness, or
              alcoholism in your family?
___ ___ Is your hair thin and sparse or do you have prematurely grey
               hair?
___ ___ Have you been described as anti- social?
___ ___ Did you reach puberty earlier or later than normal?
___ ___ Do you frequently feel anxious or unreasonably fearful?
___ ___ Do you have frequent headaches?
___ ___ Do loud noises bother you? May also relate to a magnesium deficiency.
___ ___ Have you noticed a sweet fruity smell  to your breath or sweat when ill or stressed?
___ ___ Do you have a poor appetite or a poor sense of taste?
___ ___ Do you have any upper abdominal pain? Do you easily get a stitch when running?
___ ___ Do your knees creak when bending or ache?
___ ___ Does criticism offend you?
___ ___ Do you have frequent mood swings and/or severe PMS?
___ ___ Do you tend to carry excess fat in your lower extremities (a pear-shaped figure)?

If you answered yes to more than 8 of the symptoms, it is worth investigating further.  In this day and age, the possibility of simply being nutrient deficient, rather than having Kryptopyrrolia, is very possible but the impact of untreated nutrient deficiency grows as we age and some small changes to diet, as well as adding carefully chosen supplements is very do-able.

Healthy Eating on a Budget

Healthy Eating on a Budget_Something New for Breakfast
Something new for Breakfast

Is Eating Healthy Expensive?

 

Food is medicine and the right nutrients, from a good diet, go a long way in supporting the body to begin the healing process itself.  However, often when I discuss this with my patients, they express the impression that healthy food is so expensive.  This is a myth.  Healthy food is only expensive if you add it on top of all the unhealthy snacks and treats we consume in our day but if you take into account the following tips for healthy eating, in fact, changing your diet away from food that diminishes health to that which enhances, will also save you money.

  1. Markup.

Many convenience foods include a heavy markup in the final price.  Convenience foods are packaged in boxes and containers that require their own manufacture, printing, labeling and marketing.  When you are faced with an array of 20 different breakfast cereals, each one vying for your attention and each with its own marketing strategy, you can be sure that you are paying for that marketing.  To top it all, we have the wool pulled over our eyes with labels like ‘9 vitamins added’ when the quantity of vitamin is barely more than a wave over the manufacturing vat.

  1. The True Cost of Convenience.

All those special designer coffees, take away’s, readymade convenience meals in their special, microwavable containers, are not only expensive but take their toll on our health and energy.  If I could factor in the true cost of poor meals, in time away from work, visits to the GP or specialist, extra money when we go over our medical aid threshold, the cost of the food would be astronomical.  Pain is masked with prescription drugs.  Energy is lifted using temporary energy drinks, or high sugar ‘Energade’ that lifts one temporarily, only for us to crash an hour later, requiring another take away cappuccino.  All hidden drains on our finances.

Another factor to consider is the cost to the economy.  Feeling sluggish, with brain fog, migraines and poor health also affects productivity.  Companies have to take this into consideration.  Many do, with Wellness Centre’s and health care professionals on the premises but people use these Centre’s when they are ALREADY feeling unwell.  How much better for productivity if employees never needed these Centre’s because staff felt well and vibrant.

The only benefit to readymade food is the time we save, but how much of that time we feel we do not have, is a result of the vicious cycle of low energy that results from… a poor diet.  We work all day and come home starving and want to just crash in front of the TV.  Often our family life suffers because communication plummets with our children.  They are also in front of the box, or behind their cell phones.  Children too have lost their energy to play and interact, because a poor diet saps them as well. Is this really ‘living’ or just existing on that hamster wheel with no joy and no motivation to go out and try interesting and special activities.

The price we pay is larger than we think and it becomes a downward spiral, that requires more and more effort to get out of, like swimming against the current.

We do not need to spend more to eat healthy!

Even if time and money aren’t on your side, you can still eat healthy. This is one of the most common misconceptions I hear. I understand the challenges of trying to eat well with limited financial resources, limited time, or both. But you don’t have to be rich or retired to eat well and take care of yourself.

Good quality, healthy food need not take time to make, nor cost a lot.  We don’t need to cook with ‘special’ ingredients.

The top items purchased in supermarkets are:

  1. Sugar
  2. Nicotine
  3. alcohol
  4. Caffeine
  5. Canned drinks

These are all addictive substances.  Just giving up, or even cutting back on the above, will substantially free up funds for healthy food.

Healthy food is also very accessible. Shop in the outside aisles of the supermarket, or even better, get a group of office friends together and order online from an organic veggie market that will deliver.  Then you can divide the produce between all of you.

Preparing healthy food, with the right equipment, is super easy.  A steamer does your veggies for you.  Then a quick turn in the frying pan, in a dab of butter with spices, will add a delicious flavour and take less time than waiting for the pizza delivery.  Sauces can be made in bulk over the weekend and will keep for 4-5 days in the fridge.  Have 10 recipes on hand, that you can easily rotate, that require only small tweaks to feed you and your family during the week.  Over the weekend you can be more adventurous.  Preparing large quantities of a delicious chicken casserole that can be stored in smaller containers in the freezer will also save time and energy

 Ideas for budget healthy cooking

  1. Keep a journal for a week. Record what you eat and the costs for 1 week.  Add everything. At the end of the week, review what you must have and the cost and what you can do without, and what you will save.  This will be an enlightening experience.
  2. Choose a few items from your journal that you can do without. For example, don’t buy that convenience coffee every day — these add up to R100’s a year! Extrapolate the costs of these items over a year to see what you will save by eliminating them.
  3. Buy in season. Local is better  Order from local markets who will deliver.  Form a veggie group with a few friends in your office.
  4. Learn the Dirty Dozen. Organic and grass fed is more expensive and sometimes there is no firm guarantee you are indeed getting organic but the more you can, the more you will avoid GMOs and have better health. To learn the most and least pesticide-ridden foods, visit this link.
  5. Frequent family owned grocery stores. Search out cheaper sources of fresh, whole foods in your neighborhood. Support the small businessman.  It may appear that his food is more expensive but it is putting the circle of money where it belongs, within your own neighborhood and not in big corporate hands.
  6. .Keep some essentials on hand. Develop around 10 easy, cost effective and healthy meal plans you can rotate. Have the ingredients available at home at all times so you don’t get stuck eating food that doesn’t make you feel well or help you create the health you want. You will only need to plan this once.
  7. Create a “food club”. Have coworkers share the responsibility of making lunch for the group once a week or every two weeks. You get to eat real, home made, fresh food and only have to cook a few times a month. Or create a “supper club” with a group of friends; rather than go out to dinner, once a week or once a month rotate dinner parties at one another’s homes. Sociable and healthy.  Swap recipes to build your recipe base.
  8. Buy some items in bulk.  Certain items keep well and are cheaper in bulk, such as rice, some spices and coconut for example
  9. Make your own salad dressing with lemon juice, olive oil and spices.  Far cheaper, tastier and more healthy than the store bought one that is full of MSG and other preservatives.

Healthy Eating on a Budget
Healthy Soups

  1. Cut up the salad ingredients every weekend and store in glass containers in the fridge.  Then all that is left is to toss in the lettuce. Add colourful fruit to your salad. Pears, naartjies and well washed strawberries.
  2. Change your breakfast ideas. Eating cereal just because it is convenient is very unhealthy. Consider a new breakfast mindset with brown rice and lentils for example or oats and nuts. Oats make an easy breakfast. (not instant oats). Either make a large pot for the week, or cook as needed, in the microwave with cinnamon, raisins and apple.
  3.  Protein does not always mean meat. Beans and lentils are nutritious and easy to make in advance.  Be cautious of tinned beans as many are loaded with sugar. Both keep well in the fridge and can be added to precooked brown rice for a quick, super healthy, breakfast.
  4. Make soups in advance. In winter, slow simmer a large pot of ‘everything colourful you can add’.  Either divide and freeze or keep in the fridge and serve a small bowl daily, to cut your hunger while you wait for dinner to cook.  This will prevent the tendency to eat biscuits and unhealthy snacks because you arrive home starving.
  5. Make double of everything.  Most foods, except for fish, will store well for 3 days in the fridge. Make double quantities and either freeze or eat 2 days later.
  6. Share quick healthy recipes with your friends.  Start a competition for the most healthy, with quick and easy as a criterion.

 

Fruitcup.

 

Dry Skin, Flaking Nails and Adding Good Fats

Thick,dry Toenails
Thick, dry Toenails

Many patients come to me with dry, itchy skin, cracked heels and flaking nails. The first question I ask is, ‘What does your diet look like?’ and almost invariably, their diet consists of highly processed foods, foods cooked in sunflower or canola oil, take away foods, and the occasional salad or vegetable.  Alternatively, the opposite is true.  The patient has removed all fat from their diet in an attempt to lose weight and the result, in both case, is problematic.

Our body needs good quality fat to function optimally.  Every single one of our approximately 100 trillion cells, is surrounded by a fatty membrane. In addition, the precursor to our hormones, is cholesterol, so a balance between saturated fats and Omega 3, with minimal omega 6, (with the exception of omega 6 oils such as evening primrose), is essential for health.

So how do you know if your body is not getting enough good quality fat?

  • Dry skin and cracked heels
  • Inflamed and painful joints
  • Dry, flaky nails
  • Hard ear wax
  • Small bumps on the backs of your arms
  • Memory and mood problems
  • Hormonal imbalances
  • Poor stress management
  • Weight gain
  • Cancer
  • Diabetes

While the body is an interconnected web and some of the conditions mentioned have a cascade of other contributory factors, low and poor quality fat intake is a player in poor health, in contrast to the outdated belief that fat is bad for you.

Not one of us would consider building our house using poor quality bricks and cement and yet we continue to feed our body with food that ultimately leads to poor health and in some cases, catastrophic  challenges such as cancer. Far better is developing a practice of feeding the body with high quality materials that will result in prompt and efficient repair, high energy and efficient cellular communication.

Poor quality fats result in a cell membrane that is stiff and rigid and not soft and fluid. A fluid membrane allows the transference of nutrients, vitamins and hormones that assist the cell metabolism.  In contrast, when the membrane is rigid and inflexible, the receptor sites are distorted and do not offer docking sites conducive to efficient transfer.

In addition to that, because communication between cells is poor, this increases susceptibility to inflammation, immune problems and DNA damage, as necessary vitamins and minerals are also prevented from reaching their targets. Consuming healthy fats also helps us absorb the important fat-soluble vitamins A, D, E and K.

Dry Skin-corn oil
corn oil

 

What foods must I avoid

  • Processed foods. These contain cheap fats, high levels of omega 6 and trans fats
  • Sunflower oil, canola oils, cottonseed, safflower, corn oil

Please see the following article on oils and fats used in processed foods.

Deep fried take away and commercial foods.

We all love that heady smell of take- away chips. That delicious aroma of salt with a touch of vinegar, crispy edges, soft inside. Yum. Or what about that quick mid afternoon snack of crisp chips, purchased from the vending machine or the company kiosk.

Aside from the sublime eating pleasure, what are we really putting inside our body and is it worth it?

A few years ago, we were told that saturated fats were lethal for heart health and that margarine or ‘heart healthy’ tubs of spread were suddenly a healthier choice. Food manufacturers were delighted with this. Liquid fats such as sunflower oil, corn oil and canola oil are cheaper than butter and coconut oil but the downside to these liquid fats, is that they destabilize and deteriorate quickly. Light and heat negatively affect their chemical structure. To stabilize these oils, manufacturers ‘hydrogenated’ them (combined them with hydrogen atoms using a nickel catalyst) and lo and behold.. a longer shelf life. However, this process produced trans-fats which are deadly to health. There are no safe minimal levels to trans-fats and as consumers have become aware of this, manufacturers have been forced to re-look at the way they produce their processed foods. Many processed foods such as biscuits, popcorn, frozen pies, pizza, coffee creamers and many others, still contain hydrogenated fats and margarine. Indeed margarine is still sold as a ‘healthy’ alternative to butter in spite of undisputed evidence that it is not healthy at all. On the contrary, it is downright risky.

​ Now few people are unaware of the dangers of trans-fat. We look for labels that state, NO trans-fats and we believe we are doing the right thing. We use sunflower oil to fry at home and because sunflower seeds are plants, we again believe we are making healthy choices. Butter bad, sunflower oil good!

Some manufacturers have reverted back to the liquid, more unstable fats and this is where the ‘hidden’ dangers lie.

Buying deep fried ‘slap’ chips for example.

Dry Skin-French-Fries
French Fries

The oil in the deep fryers is re-used repeatedly and the degraded oils have health as well as practical disadvantages. One of the practical disadvantages is a ‘mist’ of polymers that clings, like a varnish, to stoves, extractors and even the clothes and hair of the cooks.

Health-wise, the aldehyde, caused by the chemical breakdown, is extremely toxic and has been cited in scientific journals as being responsible for several diseases such as cancer, Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s. So even though manufacturers are eliminating trans-fats, the alternatives with deep fried foods, is not much better.

​​
What alternative is now emerging?

The latest oil for frying is high in Omega 9. (That’s sounds better we think) We see combinations of omega 3, 6 and 9 in the health shops. Surely this is a healthier alternative. But is it?

Sadly, at high heat, omega 9 (including olive oil) denatures into acrolein, (acrylamides) a strong smelling, possibly carcinogenic aldehyde that irritates the eyes and respiratory tract. The oxidised monomeric triglycerides produced at high heat have also been linked to cardiovascular disease and type 2 diabetes.

Every time the oil is reheated, it breaks down still further and oils in factory settings are sometimes reused for up to 2 weeks. That is a lot of breakdown happening.

That is not the only assault to our health. The oils used are also treated to make them acceptable for commercial use. They are certainly not gently pressed and virgin, as we would hope from our salad oil. They are known rather as RBD oils. RBD stands for refined, bleached and deodorised.

This process involves the seeds being crushed and the oil extracted using solvents such as hexane. Then more chemicals are used to remove as much of the solvent as they can from the residue (not all is removed). The result leaves a bit of a gummy residue, which is then ‘degummed’ using acids or enzymes. At this point the oil is already hot and breakdown has begun.

Oh yes… and now it’s a bit smelly and not very appetizing so now the process of bleaching and deodorizing starts, using clay and then heating it to very high heat, at least twice, to get rid of the smell. ( I am smelling a rat by now!)

Food manufacturers also add chemicals to the oils to extend the ‘fry life’. Some of these are the same chemicals that are added to resins and varnish. One of these is actually the same chemical, propylene glycol, you put in your car as anti -freeze. After that, an antifoaming agent is added (a type of silicon called polydimetholsiloxane) plus an anti-splatter (Lecithin.) (Whew, I recognise that name, thank goodness.)

Oh yes, I forgot. Now there is an emulsifier added and sometimes filters are used such as silica, bentonite and perlite, to filter out the gunk from the previous day.

Deep fried commercial foods include: chicken nuggets doughnuts, chicken Kiev, yet when I looked on the label, none of the above was mentioned. This is because they are ‘processing aids’ and not additives, and therefore there is no legal requirement to mention them, but they certainly do not evaporate into thin air once the food is on my plate, about to enter my body.

In the US, the acrylamide produced by the high heat has been classified by the US Environmental Protection Agency as a ‘probable carcinogen’, especially to children. Crisps and chips have been identified as the biggest source of acrylamide in the diet of children.

Take Away Point

We all love these convenience foods but the impact on health can be profound. I suggest you have a ‘food holiday’ once a month, where you allow yourself a day of enjoying the foods you love, but have abstained from for the month. You will possibly find that your enjoyment of them changes over time but if you really feel like a ‘cheat’ from health, you know there is a day allocated to enjoy them.

Dry skin-healthy fats
Healthy Fats

 

What shall I add to my diet?

 

  1. Omega 3. Around 2g per day. Alternatively, add sardines and other small oily fish such as herring. Salmon is wonderful for Omega 3 but sadly most salmon is farmed and full of mercury. omega-3s,  help lower levels of bad fats (triglycerides) and raise levels of good fats (HDL). Omega-3 fats make blood more slippery, reducing the likelihood of artery disease.

Dry Skin-Omega 3 Supplements
Omega 3 Supplements

  1. Healthy Omega 6 from whole nuts and seeds such as Brazil nuts
  2. Organic ground Flax seeds or flax seed oil. Add the oil to your salad. Do not heat either olive oil or Flax oil
  3. Coconut oil for cooking or frying. Coconut oil has beneficial medium chain triglycerides. Organic butter from grass fed cows is very beneficial. Use ghee if you are sensitive to dairy.  Butter also does not denature at high heat as oils do.
  4. Avocado and olives

 

In Vitality

 

Jules

Why Don’t they make Wine Flavored Water?

 

 

Wine flavored water please?

Drinking water is the first action we can take that will make a huge difference to our health.

1. Water helps the kidneys to clean out metabolic toxins. An unhealthy, overweight body leads to a greater toxic load on the kidneys. Water flushes this out, keeping kidneys functioning. 
2. Toxic overload on the kidneys means the liver must take up the slack. As the liver’s role is to metabolize stored fat, it cannot perform this function fully if it is also handling the toxins the kidney cannot deal with.
3. A poor water intake leads to constipation and an accumulation of toxins that leach back into the system, resulting in sluggishness, bad breath and again, an overloaded liver.
4. Water prevents fluid retention. If salt intake is too high, the body will retain water to dilute the salt. In addition, if water intake is too low, the body will perceive this as a survival problem and retain every drop it can. This leads to misleading weight gain, as well as swollen ankles and legs. 
5. Water assists muscles to function optimally. The greater the muscle performance, as well as the higher the muscle mass, the higher will be the basal metabolic rate. 
6. Water helps to alleviate headaches caused by dehydration.
7. Water improves the tone of your skin. 
8. Water dilutes the concentration of cancer-causing agents in the urine and shortens the time in which they are in contact with the bladder lining. 
9. Water lubricates your joints and reduces joint stiffness and pain. 
10. It helps to suppress the appetite by offering a calorie free option to ingest instead of food.

How much water is enough?

We need to drink between 8 – 10 glasses of water per day. The easiest measure of whether we are drinking enough is to always ensure that our urine is clear or a very pale yellow, with no odor.
Don’t wait till you feel thirsty. We may be desensitized to the sensation of thirst, so drink water anyway.
If you are trying to lose weight, drink a glass of water an hour before each meal.

Wine and cooldrinks do not count!.

What about cool drinks and fruit juice?

Wine flavored water-unhealthy choice
Unhealthy fluid choice



All juices, including fruit juices, will just make you fatter without adding even one, tiny smidgen of benefit to your body. 

8 Reasons to give up cool drinks and fruit juice

1. Juices, including fruit juices are LOADED with sucrose and high frutose corn syrup. They are poison to your system and although fructose has been touted as being a healthier choice, this is a myth of epic proportion. Fructose is particularly bad if you are trying to lose weight or if you are diabetic. Giving even diluted fruit juice to your children will not only result in them developing the taste for the sweetened fluids, but will start, at an early age, the liver degeneration that fructose brings with it. 
The most ubiquitous form of fructose found in foods and drinks is ‘’high fructose corn syrup’’. Sugar and HFCS are not equivalent in the body. Using HFCS, which is sweeter than sugar (and cheaper as well), beverage manufacturers add what amounts to 17 spoons of sugar to a can of cool drink. This adds up to a staggering amount of sugar.

In addition:
– As there is no chemical bond between the sucrose and the fructose in HFCS, the body does not actually have to digest them and so the sucrose impacts directly on the insulin, resulting in huge spikes of insulin, and the fructose goes directly to the liver triggering lypogenesis, which is the formation of fat and cholesterol. When an overload of fructose is repeatedly sent to the liver to be metabolized, it causes cirrhosis of the liver similar to that of chronic alcoholics. 
– Fructose from HFCS also erodes the lining of the intestines, leaving small holes where toxins and partially digested proteins that should remain in the gut, are now able to flow out into the blood stream, leading to inflammation and allergic responses.
– Fructose neither stimulates insulin, nor Leptin, therefore does not help regulate appetite, which is handled by these hormones. 
– Fructose, from fruit, has a similar response in the body as does HFCS but this is minimal if we eat the fruit whole and do not just drink the fibreless juice.

3. Drinking a can of fizzy cool drink a day can accumulate to an added pound of fat a month and studies have shown that people who drink diet drinks do not lose weight. The chemicals in these drinks cause a cascade of hormonal and physiological responses that can actually lead to weight gain. Naturally the reverse will also apply. If you drink regular cool drinks and you make the decision to stop and drink water instead, you will exponentially accelerate your weight loss. A can of cool drink can contain anything between 90 and 150 calories per drink.

4. Canned and other sugar based drinks ( including the tonic in our G and T ), are highly acidic. As a result they cause more tooth cavities than eating sweets. As well as this, the high acidity leads to increased risk of osteoporosis. The higher the percentage of phosphates in the cool drink, the lower the level of calcium. Calcium and phosphate are inversely related to each other. The higher the intake of phosphates, the more the body will pull calcium from the bones to try and supplement the calcium deficit. Canned drinks are very high in phosphates.

5.High phosphoric acid in canned drinks promotes kidney stone formation 

6. Research has also shown that drinking more than 1 soft drink a day is associated with an increased risk of developing metabolic syndrome. Metabolic syndrome describes a group of symptoms such as elevated cholesterol, elevated blood sugar, elevated blood pressure, central obesity or low levels of LDL, (good cholesterol). Having 3 or more of these symptoms increases your risk of developing diabetes and/or cardiovascular disease.

7. A high intake of sugar leads to an increased risk of early breast cancer.

8. Sugar feeds cancer cells and has been connected with the development of cancer of the breast, ovaries, prostate, rectum, pancreas, biliary tract, lung, gallbladder

May I swap to sugar free cool drinks?

Sadly the answer to this is NO!

Sugar free cool drinks contain aspartame or similar chemicals. The aspartate in aspatame is a neurotoxin that actually kills off neurons. Long term use of any product containing aspartame may lead to chronic conditions such as:
• Memory loss
• Epilepsy
• Multiple sclerosis
• Parkinson’s disease
• Neuroendocrine disorders
• Aggravation of diabetes
• hypertension

Aspartame also causes increased levels of phenylalanine, leading to decreased serotonin. This causes emotional disorders such as depression, as well as schizophrenia and seizures in sensitive people.
Furthermore, the ester bond in aspartame breaks down to formaldehyde and methanol,
Of even greater concern is the fact that a 1litre aspartame sweetened beverage contains about 56mg of ‘methanol’. The US Environmental Protection Agency states that methanol is considered a poison and limits the consumption to 7.8mg per day. If one adds all the hidden aspartame laden products such as chewing gum and diet foods, it is possible to consume as much as 250mg of aspartame daily. The symptoms of methanol poisoning include:
• Vision disturbances
• Headaches
• Nausea and stomach upsets
• Muscle weakness
• Memory lapses
• Behavioural disturbances
All artificial sweeteners have a similar reaction in the body. It does not matter what the manufacturers call them! A healthy alternative is a plant called Stevia but even Stevia will decrease your sensitivity to insulin so save it for special occasions.

Some interesting facts about water usage.

• A bath uses about 90litres of water
• A shower for 5 min about 40 litres
• Running water while brushing teeth 10litres
• Toilet: each flush 15litres

It takes:
• 10 Litres water to make a sheet of paper
• 40 Litres to make a loaf of bread
• 140 Litres to make a cup of coffee
• 1300 Litres to make a kilogram of wheat
• 4800 Litres to make a kg of pork
• 10855 Litres to make a pair of jeans
• 15500 to make a kg of beef
• 16600 to make a kg of leather

We would save more water not eating a kg of beef than we would if we choose not to shower for 6 months!

What about my coffee?

 

Wine flavored water-coffee
Coffee

Coffee, in particular the caffeine contained within, stimulates the central nervous system and is a wonderful beverage if we are feeling sluggish and need a wake up and in moderate quantities, coffee is considered to be reasonably safe but drinking coffee does have several health risks worth knowing.
• Caffeine is addictive
• Over 1000 chemicals can be found in roasted coffee and at least 19 of these are known to cause cancer in rodents.
• Coffee can damage the lining of the gastro intestinal organs, resulting in gastritis and ulcers
• Caffeine in coffee can cause anxiety and irritability as well as sleep disorders
• Certain chemicals in coffee have been shown to raise the levels of LDL, thus raising cholesterol.
• Caffeine in coffee is able to cross the placental barrier and affect unborn babies, whose systems are unable to excrete the chemicals as adult systems can.
• Heavy coffee drinking during pregnancy has been linked to a greater incidence of stillbirths 
• Coffee causes an increase in homocystein levels. Homocystein is a risk factor in cardiovascular disease.
• Caffeine increases the levels of cortisol in the body and increased cortisol is linked to increased  visceral fat.
• Caffeine dehydrates the body, increasing the effects of skin wrinkles and ageing
• Some studies have linked coffee drinking with an increase in hypertension.
• Coffee affects the absorption of iron
• Examples of other products that contain caffeine are tea, cola, chocolate, red bull
• Caffeine saturates all body tissues and fluids, including breast milk. The half-life of caffeine is  4-6 hours.
• The amount of caffeine in coffee and tea varies based on brewing times and methods. General    guidelines for beverage caffeine content include the following:
• Brewed coffee (8 oz) – 120 mg
• Instant coffee (8 oz) – 70 mg
• Iced tea (8 oz) – 60 mg
• Hot tea (8 oz) – 60 mg
• Caffeinated soft drink (12 oz) – 50 mg

Well, at least may I have some alcohol!

Wine flavored water-alcohol
Alcohol



Moderate (2-3 glasses a week) use of alcohol can be a pleasant, generally safe experience but long term or excessive use of alcohol can lead to:

• Liver damage such as cirrhosis or alcoholic hepatitis.
• Increased risk of cancer in multiple organs
• It increases the risk of cardiovascular events by causing a deterioration of the heart muscle as  well as raising blood pressure, blood lipids and risk of stroke.
• It compromises the immune system
• Causes physical abnormalities in the developing fetus
• It leads to sleep disorders
• It drains vitamins
• Alcohol offers no benefit to the body in terms of nutrition
• It is ONLY a source of empty calories. Even the anti oxidant effects are outweighed by the  systemic damage.

The Toilet is my Friend

The Toilet is my Friend!

 

The toilet is my friend-toilet frog
Toilet Friend

Fibre is what cleans out the lower intestines and adds bulk to food. The best news about fibre is that:

• It helps keep you full
• It contributes no calories to your meal
• Helps you lose weight faster
• By helping your body transport fat and calories through your digestive system, it causes some calories and fat to be    excreted in your faeces.
• Soluble fibre coats the intestines, reducing the amount of fat absorbed.
• It takes longer to eat.
• It moves food quickly through the lower intestines, minimising the time toxins remain in the system
• Helps prevent constipation, haemorrhoids and diverticulitis
• It helps to balance cholesterol levels
• It slows the impact of carbohydrates, preventing sugar cravings and insulin spikes
• It lowers risk of developing colo-rectal cancer, irritable bowel syndrome and haemorrhoids.
• Leads to a more efficient absorption of water and minerals

Generally between 18g to 24grams of fibre are beneficial, with 25g –30g being optimal. It is found in bran, psyllium, vegetables, pulses, lentils and oats. When fibre is added to a diet, weight will begin to go down while the converse is also true, when refined foods are eaten, weight will either remain high or begin to climb. Initially though, if you are used to more refined foods and you swap to high fibre, you may experience some windiness. This is because fibre is fermented in the large intestines by the bacteria living there and this process produces methane, hydrogen and carbon dioxide. These side effects, while initially uncomfortable, are just part of the transition process and will settle as your diet improves. Introduce fibre more slowly into your diet and this will minimise the problem. Sometimes, as soon as we ingest more fibre, we become constipated. This usually happens if we are not drinking enough water. You can avoid this by increasing your water intake.

Soluble and insoluble fibre.
Insoluble fibre is the husk type fibre. This acts like a broom and ‘sweeps’ the colon clean. It can sweep quite quickly so we need the soluble fibre to slow it down. Soluble fibre absorbs water and forms a gel like colloid in the stomach. This slows down the time it takes the stomach to empty and this contributes to how soluble fibre decreases the glycemic impact of the meal. The food enters the intestines more slowly and from there, more slowly into the blood. Without the carbohydrate sugars spiking in the blood, the insulin also rises more slowly.
• Introduce the fibre slowly, over a four-week period.
• Vary your intake of veggies and fruits.
• Stay away from all processed foods. These do not benefit the body in any way.
• Drink at least 8 glasses of water per day.
If you are being treated for any health disorder, please check with your doctor before beginning a high fibre diet.
Do not overdose on fibre. Too much may cause the body to become depleted in minerals and vitamins.

Foods that are rich in fibre include fruits, vegetables, brown rice, wholegrain pasta, whole meal bread, nuts, seeds, and bran. Foods that are high in soluble fibre are fruits, vegetables, lentils, beans, and outs. Foods high in insoluble fibre are: whole meal bread, brown rice, fruits, and vegetables. It is best to eat a combination of soluble and insoluble fibre.

Some interesting facts about your colon, called your large intestines.

• It is about 6 feet long
• It serves to dehydrate liquid waste material
• Your appendix is attached to your colon
• Your rectum is a storage pouch that retains feces until your large intestines contract to expel the contents.
• Your colon is contracting all the time in moves called peristalsis.
• Your emotional state affects your colon health.
• While 90% of the water you take in is absorbed by the small intestines your colon also has special cells that reabsorb water and some nutrients, as well as cells that release mucous that lubricates the large intestines.
• When waste material moves through the bowel too quickly for water to be reabsorbed, you will experience diarrhea.

Constipation.

When waste travels too slowly, too much water is absorbed, leading to constipation. Constipation leads to the development of little pouches in the colon wall, called diverticuli. Small bits of old feces can get lodged within these pouches, leading to diverticulitis and other problems.

Causes of constipation

• Sporadic, small meals that do not elicit peristaltic contraction of the intestines
• Not excreting when you feel the urge to do so.
• Poor water intake
• Poor fibre intake
• Poor intestinal health
• Stress

Preventing constipation

• Eat 3-4 larger meals during the day, not 5 smaller meals. This promotes the stretch receptors in the stomach, which, in turn, trigger peristalsis
• Do not suppress or delay the urge to go. The longer the waste remains in your bowel, the more water will be absorbed from it. In addition, the toxins will also be reabsorbed.
• Drink lots of water
• Consume plenty of fibre rich food
• Consume healthy fats, particularly omega 3.
• Maintain healthy bacteria in your intestines by taking probiotics
• Maintain low stress levels