Sunday, December 4, 2016

Are you full of Cr@#p? Step one to Healthy Living: Robust Digestion


In order to produce heart beat, breaths, energy in the form of ATP (the list goes on) our body is constantly producing waste, toxic waste*.  Good news, our bodies are also constantly eliminating this waste.  as long as Good In = Bad out all is well and we are in ‘homeostasis”.  But, in most of us, our BAD IN is on the rise.  I used to ask my patients how many bowel movements they had per day, looking for the perfect answer of 2-3 a day, 1 after each meal, and so rarely got it, that I now ask, “How many bowel movements do you have a week”.  With 5 now the norm.  Quite literally my friends, we are now a society that is full of crap.

 Why is this the case?  Poor food choices, inflammation, dysbiosis, slowing down of our metabolism, slowing down of our organ processes, inefficient elimination pathways producing generally sluggishness.  And for those of you thinking, oh, all I need is a coffee (or a glass of milk…or any substance typically on the ‘food that causes inflammation and sensitivities list) and I’m as regular as clock work – think again.  That coffee does the trick because it is irritating the mucous membranes, causing inflammation – so yes, its helping to some degree, but it is not indicative of a healthy robust digestive system. 

The first step for any wellness program is to create a healthy digestive track, with a minimum of 2 bowel movements daily, well formed, no heart burn, or gas, or bloating – even if those things are now ‘common’ doesn’t mean that that in normal.


Examples of potentially dangerous toxins / free radicals: *Ammonia, aldehydes, alcohols, hydroxyl radical, superoxide anion radical, hydrogen peroxide, oxygen singlet, hypochlorite, nitric oxide, homocysteine, cardon dioxide, bilirubin, adducts (often implicated in Fatty Liver disease).

Sunday, April 10, 2016

Eating a healthy diet, exercising and still not losing weight?



We have always known that stress leads to weight grain, and at the very least inability to lose weight.  Knowing that cortisol  is our body's 'stress hormone' it has taken a big part of the blame so far, but now we can add another stress hormone to the list of culprits - ANGPTL8 or betatrophin.

A new study shows that stress causes a hormone ANGPTL8, also knows as betatrophin to be release.  Betatrophin is a protein that regulates fat metabolism by decreasing the expression of a fat fighting enzyme, called adipocyte triglyceride lipase.

Just one more reason that stress management is so important when it comes to weight loss, as are setting realistic expectations.  I see so many patients come into my office who are exhausted, stressed out and anxious, but what they want to work on is weight loss.

It's pretty hard to talk someone who is hell bent on trying to lose weight to switch their focus to increasing energy and stress management, but it's all about removing the root cause, and once the root cause is discovered and removed, results will follow.

It also gives one more argument for stress reduction.  I have recently started getting my patients to spend a few minutes each day doing HeartMath breathing using the EmWave pro.  I first read about HeartMath from an author writing about Weight loss, how he has his patients do heart math breathing before each meal.  If you haven't had a chance to do it, come on in to the clinic and give it a try.










Reference
BBA Molecular and Cell Biology of Lipids February 2016: 1861(2); 130-137