Have You Had YOUR Healthy Bacteria Today?

Healthy bacteria. Is there really such a thing? You bet there is. Lactobacillus bacteria (most notably acidophilus and bifidus) live in your intestines as a critical ally to your overall internal health. This bacteria helps to break down your food for optimal digestion and assimilation, detoxify your digestive tract, lower the risk of funky pathogenic infection and even aids in the production of B vitamins. This healthy bacteria, or flora, also plays a role in the maintenance and strengthening of your immune system. In this way, it’s kind of like your “in-house” antibiotics, as it fights against the intruding bad forms of bacteria, like citrobacter or E. coli.

Unfortunately, many things from our external environment, including chlorine (in tap water), fluoride, alcohol, and yes, prescribed antibiotics, all conspire against it. And since there truly is strength in numbers in the case of your flora, the fewer of these little guys there are (and they do number in the billions, by the way), the less effective they can be in doing their job. Which brings us to the subject of probiotics.

Whenever we ingest a food or supplement that contains this healthy bacteria, it’s known as a probiotic. Certain fermented foods, for example, are renowned for having probiotic qualities, like miso, sauerkraut and pickles, which are fermented versions of soy, cabbage and cucumbers. And if you’ve ever heard about yogurt being “good for your stomach,” it is the healthy bacteria that is cultivated in its fermentation process that is getting the nod. The problem with yogurt, of course, is that its many downsides as a mucous forming, highly acidic, animal unfriendly dairy product far outweigh any incidental benefits you might get from picking up a little acidophilus. Soy yogurt or other plant-based probiotics are better choices.

That said, the best way to replenish your flora population is through a brief two-week program of taking a probiotic everyday on an empty stomach. My personal favorite is a product called Grainfields Australia. (Click here to see some of their different product options.) This is a carbonated beverage that, like most acidophilus supplements, will require refrigeration. It tastes kind of like unsweetened apple cider. It’s available at certain health food markets or online.

Otherwise, look for another non-dairy probiotic in the refrigerated section of your local health food store. Or, if you decide to go with a probiotic in tablet form, no prob. Just make sure that tablet (or capsule) is enteric coated, so that the good bacteria will bypass the acids in stomach and wind up in your intestinal tract, where it belongs.

Recreational Eating

Let’s face it; most of us really enjoy food and the social aspect of experiencing a nice meal with family or friends. So there will no doubt be special occasions like celebrations, holidays or even dining at your favorite vegan restaurant, where you might elect to indulge more than usual, just for the sensory experience. While it’s hard to quantify the long-term “damage” of this kind of isolated incidence of overeating, it’s probably safe to say that, as long as you’re following a Rock-Solid eating regimen for the other 35-plus meals or snacks that week, you’ll be okay. Should you choose to indulge, however, consider the following:

1) Fully Enjoy: Take your time. Eat your meal slowly and mindfully as you savor every bite. You will not only enjoy the meal more, but you will wind up eating less.

2) Digestive Assistance: The suggestion of avoiding liquids with meals is especially valid in the case of these special feasts. Drinking will only make things harder on your body. If you must drink something, do so sparingly. Also, as we’ll cover in a future blog on supplements, take an extra digestive enzyme or two during your meal to assist your body in the sizable task of digesting a meal like this.

3) Doggy Bag/Leftovers: Don’t feel like you have to eat everything in sight. When it is possible and appropriate, plan on enjoying some of this delicious meal (in smaller quantities) the next day. Be sure to request your doggie bag (or pull out your container) beforehand so you can set aside your portions in advance of the meal. Otherwise, there’s a good chance you’ll devour everything before you have a chance to take any home.

4) Mind Set: Many of us were told, “Clean your plate! There are people starving around the world.” We all can understand the good intention behind this familiar, cultural directive. An updated paradigm to this might be, “Acknowledge what’s on your plate! There are people starving around the world.” As we silently count our blessings and call to mind those less fortunate, we tend to be less rabid toward, and more grateful about, the huge meal in front of us.

Onward…

Are You Overtraining?

Training intensely without proper recovery time between workouts can lead to a little something called overtraining. This is a general level of counterproductive, physical fatigue that can manifest itself in several different ways, including any or all of the following:

• always feeling tired
• not looking forward to your next workout
• dealing with a series of minor injuries or ailments that don’t seem to heal
• just an overall feeling of going uphill with regard to training

When this happens, take a few days off from the gym and go out of your way to get more rest. Usually, after only two or three days of your sabbatical, you will feel markedly rejuvenated and ready to hit the weights again, stronger than ever. And when you do pick it back up, ease back into it, as you allow your body time to re-acclimate to your routines. Next thing you know, you’ll be back “in the zone”…

Lowering High Blood Pressure and Cholesterol…Naturally

A reoccurring question I get is about how to lower high blood pressure and/or cholesterol. And while I’m not a doctor and would never attempt to diagnose someone via the Internet, I will say this: these are seldom isolated problems, in and of themselves. They are typically symptoms of a lifestyle that’s falling short in a few areas. So in many cases, if you simply take care of the lifestyle and start living healthier, these symptoms improve radically.

More specifically, to lower cholesterol, stop eating it! Dietary cholesterol is only present in animal products. Accordingly, the most compelling and enduring evidence I’ve seen in lowering cholesterol and supporting heart disease reversal has been in strict, low fat, moderate calorie, plant-based eating regimens. Check out the work of Dr. Caldwell Esselstyn, Dr. Joel Fuhrman, and Dr. Dean Ornish, among others. These guys have collectively treated thousands of patients without surgery by emphasizing a radical dietary shift toward unrefined, high-fiber, plant-based foods.

Speaking of fiber, there is an awful lot of science that shows how raising fiber in the diet lowers cholesterol, as well. Soluble fiber helps to remove bile acids by binding with them in the intestines and escorting them out of the body. This causes the liver to convert more cholesterol to bile acids, which creates a drop in LDL (bad) cholesterol. This is how even as little as two to four servings of fruits and veggies can cause a 5% reduction. And this is also why you’ll see certain cereal companies making the claim, right on their boxes, that their product can lower your cholesterol. It’s all about the fiber.

High blood pressure is basically about your blood moving through your arteries at a higher rate of pressure than normal. The medical community’s response to this is usually to treat this symptom by prescribing drugs that thin your blood. But the wiser doctor will generally look to the lifestyle first to see why the blood pressure’s high to begin with.

A few lifestyle adjustments that should be at the top of your list would be:

• Reduce body fat levels if you’re overweight
• Quit smoking cigarettes if you smoke
• Eat more fresh fruits and veggies (work toward 10+ servings per day – no shit!)
• Try to keep your total sodium intake under 2400 mgs. per day, but preferably under 1800
• Exercise regularly
• Engage any number of relaxation/stress relief techniques like meditation, visualization and deep breathing
• Avoid alcohol and caffeine (although most medical folks say to “restrict” the total amount of it).

Finally, there are a number of whole foods, herbs and spices with medicinal properties that have been proven to have some affect on lowering high blood pressure and/or cholesterol. These include garlic, hawthorn berries (in tonic form), ginger, green tea and Cayenne Pepper. HOWEVER: If you have medical issues with cholesterol or high blood pressure and are looking to combat them in part with these natural remedies, ALWAYS CONSULT A HOLISTIC MEDICINE PROFESSIONAL ABOUT TAKING ANY OF THESE THINGS, ESPECIALLY IF IT’S IN CONJUNCTION WITH, OR AS AN ALTERNATIVE TO, SOME KIND OF MEDICATION YOU MIGHT ALREADY BE ON!!!

Until next time…

Scary-Ass Tap Water Troubles!

An especially disturbing report from an Associated Press investigation was issued this past week regarding trace amounts of pharmaceuticals in our tap water. These included antidepressants, antibiotics, heart medicines, various narcotics, steroids and even birth control substances. How did they get there?

• Since our bodies don’t absorb all of these lovely chemicals, some are excreted and flushed into our sewers.
• But sewage treatment plants don’t adequately remove these drugs from the water before it flows back into our rivers, lakes and reservoirs.
• From there, it’s filtered back through drinking water plants where they often fail to screen for drugs, as well.
• As a result, these trace levels of drugs flow freely from our faucets at home.

How rampant is this? This investigation found traces of drugs in 24 out of 62 major metropolitan water systems it tested. Drinking water in Philadelphia, for example, contained trace amounts of 56 different pharmaceuticals.

Now, to put this in perspective: we’re talking miniscule amounts here and no one has officially determined what affect this ultimately might have on human health. But still, we are seeing some disturbing things happening to some animals who are exposed to these tainted waters. As one freaky example, many male fish are developing female traits and are experiencing reproductive issues. This is likely due to their exposure to human birth control drugs.

So any way you want to slice it, it’s a strong case to drop the dough on a reverse-osmosis tap water filtering system at home, which is one of the only methods proven to successfully filter out these pharmaceuticals.

Animal Testing: Good News and Bad News

Three of the heaviest governmental proponents of animal testing have finally awakened from the madness. Just last month in a Science Magazine article, it was announced that the National Institutes of Health (NIH), the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and the National Toxicology Program (NTP), have joined together to sign a “Memorandum of Understanding” to develop and implement new methods of testing that do not involve animals.

It’s about fucking time.

So this is the good news. The bad news is that it will likely take around 10 years to make a full transition away from animal testing because…you got it; they need more tests! Extensive scientific validation is apparently needed for all the new testing modalities.

Even still, let’s ponder the significance of this for a moment. Three massive entities, who have collectively churned out billions of dollars and killed millions of animals through the years, are essentially throwing in the proverbial towel on animal testing. This is huge, especially when you consider how vested in the concept they’ve all been. Consider this:

• The NIH awarded the better part of 26 billion dollars in 2004 for various research grants that went toward laboratory studies, as opposed to human clinical studies.
• The EPA has mandated more animal-based chemical toxicity testing than any other government agency, allocating nearly all of its $600 million annual research budget on these despicable tests.
• The NTP has barreled through about a billion of the taxpayer’s dollars through the years by poisoning rodents with insane amounts of drugs, pesticides and other chemicals as a way to test for cancer.

Obviously, these entities have failed to make significant ongoing connections between what’s happened to these poor animals as a result of their “science,” and how it’s supposed to be of help to us humans…hence their new position.

In the meantime, I say we all play closer attention to which entities, companies, charities, universities, etc., still insist on testing, and stop supporting them.

To check out this article in USA Today:
http://www.usatoday.com/tech/science/2008-02-14-animal-tests_N.htm

To see a list of which companies support animal testing and which do not, go here:
http://www.caringconsumer.com/resources_companies.asp