Home Archives for HEALTH TOPICS GENERAL ADRENAL FATIGUE
July 12, 2014

Emotional Stress Impact on Health

I think a lot of people underestimate the emotional stress impact on health. Stressful emotions like anger, frustration and hopelessness can cause immune dysfunction and inflammation.

I experienced the effects of this personally a few years ago when I no longer had help for my two young sons, the older of whose Sensory Processing Disorder became severe because he was so stressed at having to share me with his baby brother.

My older son’s constant, and I mean non-stop, crying and screaming sent me over the edge.  I couldn’t deal with the fact that no matter what I did, he couldn’t be consoled.  That’s when I really began to know that there really was something wrong with him; he wasn’t just having normal tantrums.

The frustration of not being able to help him left me feeling rather hopeless, and it was made worse by the fact that no one I knew had a child going through this.

That’s when I developed severe irritability, middle-of-the-night insomnia, shingles (twice), bronchitis, recurrent infections, a case of poison ivy so bad I needed steroids (or thought I did at the time; now I know better), irregular cycles, severe adrenal fatigue, ovarian cysts and uterine fibroids, all within the space of a year or so.

Yes, stress can really do a number on your health!

The good thing is that I’ve learned how to overcome these health challenges and get my health back, but I will tell you that stress can cause all of these problems and more because it causes a constant “fight or flight” feeling that screws up your hormones, causes inflammation and leads to severe nutritional deficiencies and immune dysregulation.

I recently read the book “Healing the Gerson Way:  Defeating Cancer and Other Chronic Diseases”, and there was an interesting point made in there:  that typically, but not always, there is an extremely stressful event that occurs in a person’s life 18-24 months before they develop cancer.

I can think of a real-life example of that in a woman I know who recently developed breast cancer.  A couple of years ago, her house burned down, and she lost everything.  Although her family built a gorgeous new house, that was still a lot of stress for her to go through.

The more I learn about health, the more I understand that it’s not just about eating whole foods, although that plays a primary role in maintaining and/or recovering health:  Health is also about having the tools to cope with emotional stressors in our lives, whether that’s having a strong support network, a spiritual and/or meditation practice, exercise and a purpose in life.

Filed Under: ADRENAL FATIGUE, GENERAL, HEALTH TOPICS, STRESS
April 18, 2014

Bone Broth Benefits

Bone Broth BenefitsBone broth is one of the staples in my kitchen, and I’m hoping to make it that way in yours, too.  Our ancestors knew about bone broth benefits, but we’ve gotten so out of touch with traditional foods that we don’t realize how healing something as simple as bone broth can be.

Minerals

“Good broth will resurrect the dead” is a South American proverb.  The reason is that animal bones are full of minerals.

So many people are mineral deficient these days, especially those who eat a Standard American Diet full of processed foods that are typically void of vitamins, minerals and other nutrients.

Minerals are necessary for proper functioning of our adrenal and thyroid glands, which help us to deal with stress.  If you’re mineral deficient, you’re likely having a hard time managing stress.

Gelatin

When broth cools, the gelatin in it congeals.  Gelatin contains the amino acids glycine and arginine.  Glycine is helpful for achieving deep, restful sleep as well as for making glutathione, the body’s master antioxidant.  Arginine helps heal coronary blood vessels, keeps the plaque off of arteries and minimizes clotting.

Gelatin also helps heal the lining of the colon, and is especially helpful for anyone with digestive issues.  It’s great for building up hair and nails and because it contains collagen, it’s great for keeping your skin from sagging.

Gelatin has been found to increase cartilage in the joints, so it’s helpful for someone with arthritis.  Not only that, but gelatin is anti-inflammatory, so it can help reduce the pain of arthritis, as well as that of other conditions.

Deep, Hearty Richness

Bone broth is the magic ingredient I use to give my home-cooked meals a satisfying and rich flavor.  Anyone that’s eaten my food knows that it has a deep, hearty richness that comes from my homemade bone broths.

You can’t buy this flavor from a package in a store or even find it in most restaurants, as they use factory-made bases containing MSG or other free-glutamate “foods”.  You really need to make it yourself to taste the difference.  I use it for reconstituting grains and legumes, for sauteing and braising meats and vegetables and for the base for sauces and soups.

Be sure to use bones from pasture-raised or grass-fed land animals or from wild-caught (not farm-raised) fish.  When I buy meat, I buy it with the bone in and skin on.  Fat from the skin is full of fat-soluble vitamins and gives dishes another depth of flavor that’s impossible to duplicate with store- or restaurant-bought food.

I save the bones and store them in the freezer until I have enough to make a batch of bone broth in my slow cooker.

Here are some easy recipes for you to incorporate into your daily routine so that you, too, can realize bone broth benefits.

I wrote this blog post for Dr. Henri Roca, a functional-medicine MD.

 

Filed Under: ADRENAL FATIGUE, FOOD AND NUTRITION, FOOD CHOICES, GENERAL, HEALTH TOPICS, STRESS
April 7, 2014

Book Review: The Diet Cure

Now, you might think it strange that I’m writing a book review for “The Diet Cure” by Julia Ross.  While I am a health coach, I don’t specialize in weight loss.  Instead, I specialize in helping people recover from symptoms of chronic neurological and/or autoimmune issues like autism, ADHD, allergies, asthma, SPD, lupus, fibromyalgia, Lyme and more.

But I don’t like throwing the baby out with the bath water, so I read the book to see what’s in it for my clients.  There’s a lot!

In the book, Ms. Ross teaches us about adrenal, thyroid, yeast-overgrowth, nutritional deficiencies, fatty-acid deficiency, food sensitivities and blood-sugar issues, which are all common in my clients (both the children and their mothers) and how many of these issues can be controlled with diet (food choices) as well as amino acid therapy.

She recommends a whole-foods diet for all of these issues, as well as an Atkins-ish diet especially for those with blood sugar issues. It’s about the elimination of sugar with an emphasis on protein and fats to keep you full.  For anyone that’s ever done the Atkins diet, you know that one piece of bread will send you into a carb-lover’s binge-fest.

Ms. Ross provides us with the missing links for why the Atkins diet is not successful in the long run:

  • “Dr. Atkins did not know that carbs could be more addictive than cocaine.”
  • “Dr. Atkins specifically did not recognize the addictive power of grains, particularly wheat, for many people.”

The key to overcoming carb and sugar addiction is the addition of the amino acids that Ms. Ross recommends.

The book goes step-by-step into explaining how the factors I mentioned above as well as depleted brain chemistry and malnutrition from chronic dieting make it almost impossible to stay at a healthy weight.  Ms. Ross also shows us how to correct these imbalances.

Given that Ms. Ross has headed up the Recovery Systems Clinic for many years, she has dealt with the full gamut of different types of addiction (drug, alcohol and food).  She writes that the reason her clinic is so successful is because of the use of amino acid therapy to correct these biochemical imbalances in the brain and elsewhere.  It’s not willpower; it’s biochemistry.

When I read this book, I took a step back and looked at it from my perspective of not only a health coach but also the media director and a board member of Epidemic Answers, a non-profit that lets parents know that recovery is possible from autism, ADHD, SPD, allergies, asthma, autoimmune and more.

We let parents know WHY there is such an epidemic of children’s chronic illnesses:  it’s a perfect storm of the Standard American diet that is nutritionally deficient, the overuse of antibiotics, toxins in our environment, stressful lifestyles and gut dysbiosis (an imbalance of good vs. bad gut flora).

But when I read this book, I thought, “Huh.  All those women that have been on nutritionally deficient diets for years since at least the 1970’s are having kids, and those kids are being born with nutritional deficiencies that are compounded by gut dysbiosis, toxicity and stress.  No wonder we’re seeing such epidemics of autism, ADHD, allergies and more.”

Moms being on nutritionally deficient diets isn’t the only reason for this epidemic, but it certainly plays a key, overlooked role.

I’ll be hosting Ms. Ross on my upcoming webinar on April 23, 2014 at 1:00pm ET.  We’ll be discussing these imbalances and how to correct them with amino acids and diet, and you can sign up for your chance to ask questions here.

 

Filed Under: ADHD, ADRENAL FATIGUE, AUTISM / PDD-NOS, BOOK REVIEWS, CANDIDA, DIGESTIVE ISSUES, FOOD AND NUTRITION, FOOD CHOICES, GENERAL, GLUTEN SENSITIVITY, GUT DYSBIOSIS, HEALING FATS, HEALTH TOPICS, LEAKY GUT, LYME DISEASE, LYME DISEASE, MEDIA, NEUROLOGICAL DISORDERS, NUTRITIONAL DEFICIENCIES, SENSORY PROCESSING DISORDER, STANDARD AMERICAN DIET (SAD), TOXINS, YEAST INFECTIONS Tagged: , , ,
January 9, 2014

Sugar and Health: Cut Out the Sugar!

Sugar and HealthI’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again:  Sugar is as addictive as drugs!  Sugar activates the same pleasure centers in your brain that hard drugs like morphine and heroin do, and you get a dopamine rush from consuming it.  No wonder it’s so hard to give up!

Sugar is pushed on us by an agricultural policy that subsidizes corn and sugar, making it a cheap and addictive additive to processed foods.  Fifty years ago, the average American consumed about 20 pounds of sugar per year; these days, it’s around 130 pounds.  No wonder we’re an obese nation!

I think by now, we all know that sugar and processed foods can lead to diabetes and obesity, but here are some other reasons why you’ll want to cut out the sugar if you’re looking to improve your health.

Sugar and Health

  • Sugar feeds cancer.  Sugar in all of its forms, including high-fructose corn syrup, maple syrup, agave, etc., feeds cancer because it causes angiogenesis, the growth of blood vessels that feed a tumor.
  • Sugar suppresses the immune system.  Glucose, fructose, sucrose and other simple sugars cause a 50% reduction in the number of white blood cells that engulf pathogenic bacteria.
  • Sugar feeds Candida and other intestinal pathogens.  Candidiasis is a systemic, whole-body infection with the Candida albicans yeast.  Sugar feeds Candida and other intestinal pathogens, which in turn suppress the immune system.
  • Sugar causes inflammation.  Sugary foods cause an increase of inflammatory cytokines. An overproduction or inappropriate production of certain cytokines by the body can result in diseases like heart disease, cancer and autoimmune diseases.
  • Sugar ages your skin faster.  Wanna know why I look 15 years younger than I am?  I don’t eat much sugar.  The free radicals caused by its inflammatory actions age the skin (as well as what you don’t see on the inside).
  • Sugar uses up valuable nutrients to process it.  For example, it takes a LOT of magnesium to process sugar, and magnesium is both woefully deficient in the Standard American Diet and necessary to calm the central nervous system.
  • Sugar causes adrenal fatigue.  Cortisol, made by your adrenal glands, controls blood-sugar swings. Too much sugar can cause excess cortisol production, leading eventually to adrenal fatigue, where your adrenals can’t make enough cortisol to get you through the day with enough energy.
  • Sugar decreases your ability to concentrate.  A high-sugar diet leads to a lack of attention in children (and adults, too!) as well as an increase in adrenaline.
  • Sugar increases your appetite.  Sugar doesn’t tell your brain that you’re full and that you should stop eating, which is why you can scarf down a whole box of crackers or cookies and still be hungry.

Giving up sugar is hard, and sheer willpower probably won’t be enough to do it.  I’ve found that cutting out processed foods while adding in foods made from scratch and whole grains helps.

Let me be clear on what I mean by “made from whole grains”.  I mean food made with the whole brown rice, millet, quinoa, oats grain/kernel, not flakes or flour made by grinding up these grains and seeds.  I mean food made with the whole wheat berry, if you eat wheat, not bread or cookies or waffles or pancakes made from whole wheat flour.  I mean whole oat groats, not oatmeal.  Grinding a grain into flour increases its glycemic load, meaning it can raise your blood sugar very quickly.

Looking for some dessert recipes that aren’t too sweet and don’t have too much sugar?  Try out these favorites:

Filed Under: ADRENAL FATIGUE, CANCER, CARDIOVASCULAR DISEASE, DIGESTIVE ISSUES, FOOD AND NUTRITION, FOOD CHOICES, GENERAL, GUT DYSBIOSIS, HEALTH TOPICS, INFLAMMATION, NUTRITIONAL DEFICIENCIES, OTHER DISEASES, STANDARD AMERICAN DIET (SAD), SUGAR, TYPE 2 DIABETES
August 9, 2013

Stress and Food Choice

Stress and Food ChoiceYou’ve heard it before:  everybody is super-stressed these days.  Personally, I think a lot of it has to do with technology creep into our daily lives.

Technology was supposed to make our lives easier, and it does, but it also has allowed work and distractions to creep into our personal lives, causing stress because there is no separation and no boundary between the two.

I grew up in a family that had a chemical/technical translation business in the home (before there were personal computers!), and it was dysfunctional enough then without the separation of work and personal lives.

I think it’s worse for people these days.  No one really goes on a true vacation any more because everyone brings their smartphones with them, which allows employers, clients, soccer teams, etc., to reach them even during down time.

So what can you do about it?  Here’s one very important thing you can do, and I’m not saying it’s going to be easy, because if you’re stretched for time with an overloaded schedule, it’s one of the things you’re likely not doing on a daily basis:  cut out the processed food.

Stress and food choice can be like a chicken-or-the-egg game:  which came first?  Processed food can exacerbate stress, and stress can lead to processed food cravings.

What Is Processed Food?

When I say “processed food”, I mean anything that comes in a bag, box or can.  I also mean 99% of all restaurant food and prepared foods because these typically contain ingredients that I don’t consider healthy, such as added sugars, preservatives, additives, canola oil, soy oil or other vegetable oils.  (Want more info about these unhealthy oils?  Check out the Weston A. Price Foundation.)

The main reason to cut out processed food is because doing so will have an enormous impact on your health, both now and in the future.  You’ll feel better, have more energy and get sick less often.  You’ve probably heard this before, but why is this the case?

Processed foods typically contain refined sugars/carbohydrates and refined oils, two of the most unhealthy “foods” there are.  Not only do they cause inflammation, which is a key component of any chronic health condition, but they also cause reactive hypoglycemia, which stresses your adrenal glands, which reduces your ability to handle stress and lower inflammation, which means you crave carby/bready/sugary foods that can raise your blood sugar quickly.  It’s a vicious cycle.

In addition to being nutritionally deficient, these “foods” also cause nutritional deficiencies in order to metabolize them.  It takes something like 50 molecules of magnesium to process one molecule of sugar.  With Americans consuming 130 POUNDS of sugar every year, it’s no wonder most people are magnesium deficient these days!  Magnesium is a critical mineral that is essential for relaxing the central nervous system.

Here’s What You Can Do

So here’s what you do:  once or twice a week, cook a big batch of something that’s easy to throw together, like chili or stew.  Eat half during the week, and freeze the other half for later.  Do the same with whole grains, like brown rice or quinoa; you can freeze whole grains, too.  (Need recipe ideas?  Click here.)

Every day, you’ll need to cook fresh vegetables.  Sounds hard, but it’s not, and it really doesn’t take too much time.  My favorite ways for cooking them quickly are roasting with a little olive oil and sea salt, steaming or sautéing with garlic, olive oil and sea salt.

Try this for a week or two, and see if you don’t feel better.  I’m betting you’ll be able to handle stress a whole lot better than you did before.

Filed Under: ADRENAL FATIGUE, FOOD AND NUTRITION, FOOD CHOICES, GENERAL, HEALTH TOPICS, INFLAMMATION, NUTRITIONAL DEFICIENCIES, STANDARD AMERICAN DIET (SAD), SUGAR Tagged: , , , , ,
May 31, 2013

THE “R” WORD

road to recovery signYou may or may not know my personal recovery story. I have recovered my 2 sons, now ages 5 and 7, from sensory processing disorder (SPD), asthma, allergies, acid reflux and eczema with a biomedical approach, which means correcting nutritional and hormonal deficiencies, removing toxicities and correcting gut dysbiosis.

I’m still working on failure to thrive, mitochondrial dysfunction, hypothyroidism and persistent eczema in my older son. In addition, they both had developmental delays, and my older son had severe hypotonia as a baby.

I have recovered from immune dysregulation, in which I had shingles twice, the worst case of poison-ivy ever, bronchitis (which I’d never had before), constant sinus infections and constant colds that would last 3-4 weeks at a time.

My older son had immune dysregulation, too, when he was younger: he would go to preschool, get sick and be out for at least a week at a time, then go to school the next week, get sick, and the cycle repeated ad nauseum (pun intended).

I also had severe adrenal fatigue, which was caused by dealing with my older son’s severe SPD.

Adrenal fatigue caused middle-of-the-night insomnia, in which I would be awake for hours at a time in the middle of the night and be so dead tired the next day that 3 hour naps wouldn’t help.

I later learned that adrenal fatigue was the cause of the onslaught of my “female problems”, which I’d never had before: a suddenly irregular menstrual cycle, a uterine fibroid and ovarian cysts.

I also found out I have two types of anemia: iron-deficiency (the more commonly known about kind) and folate-deficiency. I learned how these and most of out other problems can be tied back to gut dysbiosis and its chronic infections, especially Candidiasis.

I also discovered that I am hypothyroid and that this may have played a large part in my sons’ problems when I was pregnant with them.

I found out that I was loaded with heavy metals, especially mercury and lead, which are the most neurologically damaging. I immediately had my sons tested and found out they were full of them, too.

It’s been very hard going through this, as most people, even most doctors, don’t know about the causes of all these problems. They don’t understand that all of these problems are related, and they certainly don’t know that recovery is possible.

We got a lot of help from changing our diets and seeing a naturopath, a functional-medicine doctor and a holistic nutritionist, as well as from me doing never-ending research about how all of these problems are connected.

We’ve recovered from so much, although there is still more work to be done. In any case, we are so much better off now than we were 4 years ago, when all of these problems hit a crescendo.

I want people to know that recovery is possible, which is why I joined the non-profit Epidemic Answers. We seek to educate parents about the causes of these problems as well as let them know that recovery is possible.

In fact, we’re making a documentary film to show the world that recovery is possible because most people just don’t know that.

Most people don’t know that a child can recover from autism or asthma or that an adult can recover from an autoimmune disease, even multiple sclerosis or rheumatoid arthritis.

If you want to learn more about our film, you can find out more by watching this video or by visiting our website. Please help us get this film made!

 

Filed Under: ACID REFLUX (GERD), ADHD, ADRENAL FATIGUE, ALLERGIES, ANEMIA, ASTHMA, AUTISM / PDD-NOS, AUTOIMMUNE DISORDERS, CANDIDA, DEVELOPMENTAL DELAYS, DIGESTIVE ISSUES, ECZEMA, ENDOCRINE ISSUES, GENERAL, GUT DYSBIOSIS, HEALTH TOPICS, HEAVY METALS, HYPOTONIA, MULTIPLE SCLEROSIS, MULTIPLE SCLEROSIS, NEUROLOGICAL DISORDERS, OVARIAN CYSTS, RECOVERY STORIES, RHEUMATOID ARTHRITIS, SENSORY PROCESSING DISORDER, SINUS INFECTIONS, STRESS, TOXINS, UTERINE FIBROIDS Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,
May 28, 2013

BOOK REVIEW: IT’S ALL GOOD, GWYNETH PALTROW’S COOKBOOK

Gwyneth Paltrow It's All Good book coverMy husband bought me a copy of Gwyneth Paltrow’s cookbook, “It’s All Good:  Delicious, Easy Recipes That Will Make You Look Good and Feel Great” the other day for my birthday.  I have to say I was pleasantly surprised!

She openly talks about the health problems that she had that led to her needing to make dietary changes.  I can relate because I’ve had to do the same for myself and my children.  [Read more…]

Filed Under: ADRENAL FATIGUE, ALLERGIES, AUTOIMMUNE DISORDERS, BOOK REVIEWS, ENDOCRINE ISSUES, FOOD AND NUTRITION, FOOD CHOICES, GENERAL, HEALTH TOPICS, HEAVY METALS, HORMONAL ISSUES, INFLAMMATION, MEDIA, OVARIAN CYSTS, PARASITES, STRESS, TOXINS Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , ,
May 16, 2013

ADRENAL FATIGUE

exhaustionI became severely stressed when I began taking care of my two boys without any help because that’s when my older son’s sensory issues and “fight, fright or flight” issues really kicked in.  [Read more…]

Filed Under: ADRENAL FATIGUE, ANXIETY, CANDIDA, ENDOCRINE ISSUES, GENERAL, HEALTH TOPICS, HORMONAL ISSUES, IMMUNE DYSREGULATION, INSOMNIA, IRREGULAR CYCLES, NEUROLOGICAL DISORDERS, OVARIAN CYSTS, SENSORY PROCESSING DISORDER, SINUS INFECTIONS, STRESS, TOXINS, UTERINE FIBROIDS Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,
May 6, 2013

HOW MY SON’S SENSORY PROCESSING DISORDER CAUSED MY SEVERE HEALTH DECLINE

tired womanHaving a son with a developmental delay was very hard on me.  He didn’t walk until he was 20 months old.

This was extremely hard for me because he didn’t walk until 3 weeks before his little brother was born, and I was having to carry him everywhere.

I suppose the bright side is that he didn’t weigh a whole lot, given that he was also a failure-to-thrive baby.  [Read more…]

Filed Under: ADRENAL FATIGUE, DEVELOPMENTAL DELAYS, ENDOCRINE ISSUES, GENERAL, HEALTH TOPICS, HORMONAL ISSUES, IMMUNE DYSREGULATION, INFERTILITY, INSOMNIA, IRREGULAR CYCLES, NEUROLOGICAL DISORDERS, OVARIAN CYSTS, RASHES, SENSORY PROCESSING DISORDER, SINUS INFECTIONS, STRESS, UTERINE FIBROIDS, YEAST INFECTIONS Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,
April 25, 2013

WHAT IS GUT DYSBIOSIS?

fungal myceliaGut dysbiosis — this topic is the motherlode.  It’s one of the two core (in my opinion) reasons for the explosion of chronic childhood illnesses we see today.

Gut Dysbiosis:  A Common Link Among the Epidemic of Children’s Chronic Illnesses

First, let’s discuss the numbers behind this epidemic:  How many kids did you know when you were growing up that had autism, ADHD, acid reflux, allergies, asthma, developmental delays and/or mental health issues?  [Read more…]

Filed Under: ACID REFLUX (GERD), ADHD, ADRENAL FATIGUE, ALLERGIES, ANXIETY, ASTHMA, AUTISM / PDD-NOS, AUTOIMMUNE DISORDERS, BIPOLAR DISORDER, CANDIDA, DEPRESSION, DEVELOPMENTAL DELAYS, DIGESTIVE ISSUES, EAR INFECTIONS, ECZEMA, GENERAL, GUT DYSBIOSIS, HEALTH TOPICS, HYPOTONIA, INFLAMMATION, LEAKY GUT, NEUROLOGICAL DISORDERS, OCD, RASHES, SCHIZOPHRENIA, SENSORY PROCESSING DISORDER, SINUS INFECTIONS, TOXINS, YEAST INFECTIONS Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,
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