Autumn Classes! Fermented Foods in the Kitchen

What have you been looking for? An easy detox, improved digestion, more stable mood, greater energy?

Join me in the kitchen and I will teach you how to accomplish this and more!

Kefir is chock full of probiotics-all the good bacteria your digestive tract needs. Much of your immune system and serotonin production is housed in your gut. Reestablishing the microflora ecosystem will help you feel healthier, happier, more balanced.

• Promotes Healthy Detox
• Rehydrates the Body
• Aids in Weight Loss
• Enhances Mood
• Boosts Energy
• Reduces Allergies and Candida symptoms
• Makes a good hangover cure
• Lifts Depression, Fatigue and much more!

Cultured or Fermented veggies, think sauerkraut and kim chi, are also probiotic-rich. They keep for months in your fridge, just a small amount is medicinal and

• Helps heal your stomach, liver and intestines
• Clears your skin
• Improves your energy
• Tones your intestines and flattens your stomach
• Eases digestion
• Eliminates joint pain
• Enhances immunity

We will get creative in the kitchen

• Learn to make kefir with young coconut water from the mineral rich coconuts at your local market
• Learn to culture your favorite veggies

 COMING UP! Saturday, November 6 at 4 pm

Elemental Health 2225 W. North Ave, Chicago 
$50 Go home with recipes, starter liquid and exactly what you need to feel better!
Pre-registration by November 3 required to hold your space. No refund on cancellation. No walk-in registration


Past classes at Elemental Health

Sunday, September 12 at 6 pm or Tuesday, September 14 at 6:30 pm

VITAL JUICE exclusive class for subscribers 
Sunday, September 19 at 4 pm. Pre-register

Past classes at Be Optimal Holistic Health Center
Saturday, October 9 at 2 pm

Be Optimal Holistic Health Center 1249 Waukegan Road, Glenview

Dare to Feel Alive Again!

The majority of my practice and the majority of the people I come across in my daily life have something in common. They each tell me their own unique story of having too much to do in too little time, not getting enough sleep, and their minds are just ricocheting from thought to thought and from task to task. This is followed by a varied through rather typical list of physical and emotional concerns.

That's not what life is meant to be! My heart goes out to each person who shares their story, and I try to offer a sentiment or a technique that will guide them through. Knowing that I have plenty of insight on nutrition and herbs can be useful for the physical symptoms of stress and overwhelm and techniques for the mind and the spirit, I decided to do more.

Join me in my tele-training seminar

Tuesday, August 10 at 7 pm Eastern Time 

Dare to Feel Alive Again 

Simple, yet Powerful Techniques to Reduce Symptoms of Stress and Dis-ease & to Feel Alive Again!

Food, Inc.

The movie's buzz was loud in the vegan, raw, macrobiotic communities months before it released nationwide. Links for Food Inc. were constantly popping up on my Facebook page from friends, practitioners, chefs, green activists, journalists, and businesses. If you've read or heard excerpts or synopses as I have of Michael Pollan's Omnivore's Dilemma, you will have some idea what this movie contains.

Viewing Food Inc. will literally open your mind's eye to the politics and corporate monopoly of the American food industry and to the abuse to animals and detriment of it all to your body. It is difficult to stomach, but what you are actually eating is even more difficult.

According to Food, Inc., "Our nation's food supply is now controlled by a handful of corporations that often put profit ahead of consumer health, the livelihood of the American farmer, the safety of workers and our own environment" ...and it's happening with our government's consent.

Here are some highlights from the movie Food, Inc.:

• Monsanto has patented "Roundup Ready" genetically engineered seeds that are made to do well with the herbicide, Roundup. If farmers save seed, a long-held farming practice of putting seeds aside from every crop to use again, Monsanto can sue them for violating the seed patents. Monsanto has won millions of dollars in lawsuits, literally changing the way farmers are allowed to farm.
  


• Meat and poultry manufacturers have stringent regulations that require farmers to squeeze poultry or cattle into dark, cramped warehouses so that the animals can grow fat quickly. These animals are sick and can barely walk. They lie in their own feces and need antibiotics to make them healthy. Antibiotics that are now part of our meal when we eat non-organic meats.
  


• Government regulations and farm subsidies have shifted our food supply from good calories to bad calories, like a proliferation of corn and soy. If you've ever wondered why fruits and vegetables are so much more expensive than processed foods, this is why. Subsidized crops like corn, wheat and soy are finding their way into so many foods as main ingredients, fillers or damaging sweeteners, like high fructose corn syrup. Subsidies make them much cheaper and poor families diets tend to suffer the most.
  


• Cows are fed diets of corn, which is harmful to their natural digestive systems. The corn creates an acidic condition, when they require a neutral pH. This has caused harmful bacteria to thrive, particularly E. coli.
  An added tidbit : 95% of a McDonald's meal is corn products from the meat to the bun to the condiments to the corn syrup to the shake.
  

Food Inc. does offer great suggestions and hope for what you can do to change the way you eat AND the way our nation eats.

What are some changes that don't include creating a farm in your home?

1. Educate yourself on the dangers of processed food and sugar. Make small changes to a whole food, processed- and sugar-free diet.
   


2. Strengthen your immune system and therefore your digestion with probiotics. Processed food destroys the gut health creating an imbalance of healthy to unhealthy bacteria. Taking probiotic supplements and drinks, eating fermented foods and drinks will all replenish the healthy gut flora
   


3. Eat healthy fats. Learn which are and which aren't. Avoid any in the clear plastic bottles at the supermarket, they are processed rancid oils. Choose olive oil, coconut oil, hemp and flaxseed oils, walnut and almond oils, evening primrose, among others.
   


4. Choose organic wherever possible. Certain fruits and vegetables absorb more toxins than others. Definitely choose organic meats.
   


5. Take time to detoxify. Take your time and add healthy choices individually and remove the unhealthy ones at the same pace. Allow three months of your Spring or Summer to cleanse your system of all it has accumulated, and continue to make healthy choices thereafter.

Raw Ecology Diet Rejuvenation Program

Here is an amazing program for everyone and a great introduction to raw food by Gina Laverde. Pop over to her blog and read her personal journey with food and healing.

This is a 6 week personalized and guided program for an accessible price: $149 or $250 if you and a friend join.

Definitely check it out!

A Dose of Methyl Paraben?

I delivered week two of food to my friend last night. We got to catch up. Mom looks great! I had a perfect wintery night chatting in the kitchen; a cup of tea in one hand and a three week old sleeping on my chest for a few hours. My friend and I will always discuss health, healing and wellness and other silly things. I've not had my own child, yet have a wealth of information from my stint as a nanny, as a day care teacher, and always as a friend of a new mom. She had a doozy for me this time.

First, the little guy gained a half a pound his first week. According to the pediatrician that's unheard of for an exclusively breast fed baby but other healthy friends' MDs said the same thing. Next, the doctor shared that Vitamin D is missing from breast milk. That's not exactly true. Yes, I know it is winter and I know we live in that northern area most deficient of Vitamin D. My friend does give the little one daily sun baths which definitely compensates, and thanks to his fair skin tone he needs less than 2 hours each week of sun exposure. Regardless, the pediatrician prescribed infant Vitamin D drops. Vitamin D is sort of like the missing link in the body's absorption of calcium and phosphorus. The doctors are concerned about bone and heart health. The prescription remained unfilled, but when the now 3 week old started with a few sniffles Dad picked it up from the pharmacy.

When mom looked at the ingredients, she was shocked. Should I really knowingly give my child methylparaben, polysorbate 80, sodium hydroxide, red food dye, and caramel coloring just to get a dose of Vitamin D? Am I being a negligent mom by knowingly depriving my child of a vitamin or by knowingly feeding my child synthetics? Many of my friends have chosen to postpone or abstain from all vaccinations. That is a personal educated choice. Children's immune systems are fully intact by age two. My personal choice would be to keep their systems clean and pure of synthetics at least until that age. Most of my friends have chosen to use only glass bottles, natural cloth diapers, organic pesticide-free food, and all those other good things. Here blatantly on a label for all to see are chemicals preserving and coloring a vitamin easily sourced from the sun, oily fish and fish oils and fortified milk.

First of all, red food dye and caramel coloring is apparently to appease the parents' vision and palatability because a 3 week old isn't seeing much right now. Caramel coloring is an emulsifier as is Polysorbate 80 – keeps the ingredients combined. Polysorbate 80 is a common emulsifier in cosmetics, vitamins, vaccines and even ice cream and milk products and has been proven to damage fertility. Sodium hydroxide is a pH buffer. Hello, if you didn't use synthetic ingredients you wouldn't need to buffer the medication.

Then comes the methyl paraben. I understand medicine needs preservatives but there are natural alternatives like soy lecithin and beeswax. Parabens offer an inexpensive way to increase the shelf life of products and to inhibit the growth of bacteria, molds and yeasts even though they are known to be highly toxic. Scientific studies have found that parabens have the potential to cause cancer. The estrogen activity of this ingredient has been directly linked to the development of certain cancers, including breast, prostate, ovarian, and uterine.

Health conscious folk have been lobbying for years to have laureth sulfates, parabens, and phlatates removed from personal care products. Product ingredients can be searched on cosmeticdatabase.com and the site includes a risk ranking and the effects the ingredient has on the body. Cosmetic companies have made some changes but for the most part, consumers are absorbing chemicals with every use. Unfortunately, I found no resources for medications free of synthetics.

Research: Autumn births and asthma connection

A recent study out of the Asthma Research at Vanderbilt University states babies born in autumn months – 4 months preceding the peak cold and flu season – are more likely to develop asthma. Genetics predispose the development of asthma, but environmental exposure to viruses may activate the genes.

Autumn, Metal element season in Chinese Medicine, is related to the Lung and the Large Intestine and our immune system. The mucus membrane lining of the digestive tract, lungs and sinuses are our defense against infection. Dry membranes are open to viruses and bacteria and membranes congested with thick mucus hold onto the bacteria. Both states can contribute to frequent or recurrent infections.

Autumn is the season when nature begins to contract and move inward. A person born in this season, open and exposed and no longer in the protection of the womb is definitely not heading toward a more reserved, hibernated state. Any infant will be susceptible to infection in the first few months of life. The lung is the last organ to mature in fetal development and continues to develop during early childhood, so it would be understandable respiratory issues could be a concern.

That being said, I know twelve or more Autumn-born people. Without any time-intensive research, funding or controls, I can say only one of them has had asthma since childhood and recurrent immune system imbalances with no genetic predisposition; another has chronic genetic colon issues; and another has a Metal personality but no Metal physical imbalances. If I extend autumn to August 30, a 14-month old with a genetic predisposition to asthma has experienced multiple colds and ear infections in her first year. The remaining people have Fire and Earth imbalances. So from my unofficial research, genetics would contribute to respiratory imbalances and the season of birth, in theory would as well, but contributes to about 20% of the Autumn-born people in my life.

I don't think a parent can prevent a child from developing asthma but you can influence your infant's respiratory health. My advice is to keep the little one completely clothed, including a cap. In Chinese culture, caps are worn for the first year. Wind, the element that carries infection, can enter through the open fontanel or at the nape of the neck causing colds in infants. Keep the home environment free of drafts and free from humidity and dryness. Use vaporizers and humidifiers with a drop or two of essential oils with antimicrobial, antibacterial or antiviral qualities. As a breastfeeding mom, keep your body healthy and balanced through diet, exercise, and rest (when you can!).

Essential Oils (the short list)

• Cinnamon Leaf
  
• Cypress
  
• Eucalyptus
  
• Grapfruit
  
• Lavender
  
• Lemon
  
• Sweet Orange
  
• Patchouli
  
• Spearmint
  
• You may find some great blends as well like Thieves from Young Living Oils

Acupuncture for Fertility cont'd

Here's the piece that the Today Show did on the use of Acupuncture for Fertility.


http://today.msnbc.msn.com/id/26643631/

Acupuncture for Fertility

My fall newsletter isn't up on the website yet, but this post does link to the pdf of the workshop series.

Here is a little information on how Chinese Medicine can assist with the fertility process.

Acupuncture and herbs can assist in whatever fertility journey a couple chooses, whether assisted only through holistic methods or assisted through both holistic and hormone therapy. Understanding the basic physiology and

the signs of fertility and monitoring those signs daily can further assist a couple on their journey. Many times lifestyles need to be altered even just temporarily, and other lifestyle or dietary additions are beneficially implemented. And, as with any journey, this one requires time and patience.

Acupuncture is noted to relieve stress. Our regular lives of home and work and all that is in between can cause stress, add the many lifestyle changes needed to monitor and regulate fertility cycles, and the weight of the outcome of the process and the time and patience needed, your body is definitely in fight or flight mode. Shallow breathing, increased respiration, altered blood circulation, heightened external awareness, poor sleep. All these responses are activated by the stress hormones released from the hypothalamus. The hypothalamus also releases some of the initial inhibiting and releasing hormones responsible for fertility. When our bodies are focused externally in fight or flight mode, the internal focus of pelvic blood flow, oxygenation, and just general homeostasis is compromised. The hypothalamus is less able to assist in the fertility cycles.

Acupuncture is able to regulate menstrual cycles allowing for a better prediction of ovulation. Acupuncture increases pelvic blood flow increasing the endometrial lining which is the earth for the embryo implantation and its nourishment. Acupuncture can increase sperm count, integrity and sperm motility.

Acupuncture can assist the hormone therapy fertility process as well. Side effects of the hormones received can be reduced, hormones are regulated, ovulation, egg quality and the number of follicles can be improved, immune system can be strengthened, decreased chance of miscarriage and increased chance of live births.

A practitioner will implement a treatment plan including frequency of acupuncture treatments based on menstrual cycle, Western medical imbalance or hormone therapy schedule; monitoring techniques, dietary, supplemental , and stress reduction suggestions specific for you.

While pregnant, a woman can experience relief with acupuncture from morning sickness, from water retention, low energy, assistance with gestational diabetes or poor glucose clearance. Acupuncture can assist in altering breech positioning and can assist in labor induction. Post partum, acupuncture can assist in regulating lactation and assisting with postpartum depression and physical recovery.

If you would like more information or would like to attend the fertility workshops, just call or email me.