Author: Kelly Amen

I’ve been trying to compose my thoughts on this subject for some time but wasn’t sure how to put my feelings into words. Let me begin by saying that the trends in healthcare today have become quite disturbing to me. The reason I feel this way is because I don’t believe there is very much incentive to find the cure for many of the diseases we as Americans suffer from. Most of these “lifestyle” diseases i.e., Obesity, Type II diabetes, heart disease, high blood pressure, arteriosclerosis, cancer and stroke, are caused by how we live our lives and namely what we’re exposing our bodies to, both inside and out. While it is our ultimate responsibility to know what is good for us we are being barraged with misinformation about what and how we should eat, drink, act, look, etc.

Healthcare prices keep on rising due to various reasons related to research and development of new technology and new drugs to treat all of these diseases, and the spread of these diseases to younger people in our country. Huge money is being made by all of these drug companies who develop these drugs. These drug companies are also responsible for testing them to measure the efficacy of these drugs weighed against the possible side effects of them. You only have to watch the many TV commercials advertising these drugs. I imagine that in order for these companies to be able to advertise, they must also disclose the possible side effects which are often numerous. It’s a travesty to me that drug companies are allowed to advertise to the general public with flowery ads depicting how much better your life would be if you took this or that drug and encourages you to “ask your doctor if so and so could be right for you”.

I don’t want to go as far as to say that there is a conspiracy to keep the public sick so that money can be made for insurance companies, hospital corporations, drug companies, huge agricultural companies, such as Cargill, Monsanto, and the like, but you do the math. Where is the incentive to tackle the one thing that could help to improve the health of the population?

When is it going to come to light that it’s the fuel (food) we put into our bodies? The food we eat is what becomes us and it is the food we eat that either heals us or makes and keeps us sick.

What I’m referring to are foods laden with pesticide residue, Roundup ready seed, chemicals used to increase shelf life and foods so processed that most of the nutrition is lost.

Until we educate the people about what’s happening with our food systems things will continue as they always have.

If you look at animals in nature you will see that they eat foods from their natural habitat and they don’t generally get sick, as a species. Man, however, has altered our food so much that most the the nutrition is lost in the processing of food and we don’t get the optimum benefit from the food. Obesity is driven by hunger and hunger comes because your body is hungry for nutrients that will make it run at its best. Eating processed foods robs the body of what it needs and hunger is again triggered because the body is starving for nutrients. Eating colorful fruits and vegetables,nuts and seeds, peas and beans, herbs and spices gives the body all the phytonutrients that our bodies crave. The foods that nature gives us give us all the nutrients we need to give us energy and keep our bodies running in top condition.

You only have to look at countries where the populations that were considered to be generally healthy  because of the indigenous diet of the general population. When a more “western” diet was introduced vis a vis fast food, their bodies responded by developing the same diseases that are prevalent here in the United States, such as obesity, high blood pressure, diabetes and heart disease..

I remember the slogan that Bill Clinton used when he was running for office. “It’s the economy, stupid!”

Today’s slogan coming from Washington should be, “It’s the food, stupid!”.

The bacteria in your gut can be one of your strongest allies in getting healthy…or it can be one of your worst enemies. Most people don’t realize it, but what they eat and how they live are changing the makeup of their gut bacteria.

Exciting new studies are coming out every day exploring the connection between gut bacteria and practically every other aspect of human health. The conclusion is clear: if you can change your gut, you can change your life.

Gut bacteria, which number more than 100 trillion cells, have more of an impact on our health than medical experts previously realized. But not all gut bacteria are created equal. Among other things, “good” gut bacteria improve digestion, strengthen the immune system, and manufacture the vitamins your body needs. On the other hand, “bad” gut bacteria can cause digestion nightmares, mental problems, skin conditions, and all kinds of other problems you’ll learn about in just a second.

A healthy gut isn’t made by trying to rid your body of gut bacteria altogether. It’s made by balancing the bacteria—limiting the bad guys and encouraging the good guys to grow. So let’s start at the beginning: how to figure out if your gut bacteria is unbalanced.

Are Your Gut Bacteria Imbalanced? 7 Things to Look for

How can you know if your gut bacteria are out of whack? It isn’t quite as easy as finding out if you have a fever. You can’t just take your gut bacteria’s temperature with a thermometer you bought over the counter. But there are common warning signs that something might be wrong. Keep an eye on them, and you’ll put yourself in the best position to get healthy.

Here’s what to watch out for:

Sign 1. Digestive Issues

When you think of the potential consequences of unhealthy gut bacteria, digestive problems are probably the first things that come to mind. Many doctors will prescribe drugs like Prevacid or generic antacids to help people struggling with these issues, but those medications only address surface level symptoms. They don’t get to the root cause of the problem, which is unhealthy gut bacteria. If you’re dealing with any of the following, you might have an unhealthy gut:

Sign 2: Mental Issues

Did you know the health of your gut could affect the health of your brain? It’s true. Scientists have already discovered that gut bacteria produce neurotransmitters. Now, they’re focused on another trend: people with certain mental disorders also tend to have disturbances to their gut bacteria.

Believe it or not, your gut could be to blame for certain mental disorders.

If you have any of these mental issues, your gut bacteria might be to blame

Depression and anxiety
Brain fog
OCD
Autism

Sign 3. Vitamin and Mineral Deficiencies

vitamin-deficiency.jpg
A healthy gut also plays an important role when it comes to helping your body produce and synthesize vitamins and minerals. When your gut bacteria is out of whack, your body has a harder time getting enough of the following essential vitamins and minerals:

If you’re deficient in any of the above (you can find out by getting a simple physical from your doctor), you might have an unhealthy gut.

Sign 4: Antibiotics

Sign 5: Chronic, Unmanaged Stress

Stress can wear you down, make you anxious, and increase your blood pressure… and it can also wreak havoc on your gut! Stress is inevitable, no matter how hard we try to avoid it. That isn’t an issue — until you let it go on for too long without managing it. Unmanaged stress raises cortisol levels, which can stop the gut from working properly. If you’ve been stressed for the past few months (or years, or decades) but haven’t acted to manage your stress, you’re more likely to have an unhealthy gut.

Sign 6: Skin Conditions

There’s been a lot of confusion about skin conditions over the years. Much of it comes from the common (but misguided) idea that the symptoms of a condition must appear in the same spot as the condition itself. For many skin conditions, the problem isn’t with the skin itself. It’s with an unhealthy gut. If you have any of these skin conditions, it could be due to unbalanced gut bacteria:
Acne
Rosacea
Psoriasis
Eczema

Sign 7: Autoimmune Diseases

Autoimmune diseases can be difficult to manage because the body is literally attacking itself. It can be even tougher to spot the source of the problem and address it there. But more research is emerging linking autoimmune diseases to unhealthy guts. If you’re dealing with any of the following, you just might be able to make your symptoms disappear by taking care of your gut:

Hashimoto’s
Rheumatoid arthritis
Inflammatory bowel disease
How to Balance Your Gut Bacteria in 4 Simple Steps

If any of the warning signs above look familiar to you, there’s good news! You can take action to improve the health of your gut. Doing so can prevent new medical conditions from arising and even reverse conditions that have bothered you for years.

Ready to get started today? Here’s how to balance your gut bacteria in four simple steps:

Step 1. Avoid Toxins

If you wanted to put out a fire, adding gasoline would be worst thing you could do! Unfortunately, that’s exactly what a lot of people with unhealthy guts are doing. They’re continuing to eat and live in a way that kills good bacteria, encourages bad bacteria to grow, and breaks down the integrity of their gut lining. Most of them don’t even realize they’re doing it.

The first step to reversing this trend is to avoid toxic foods. These include:

Grains
Conventional grain-fed dairy
Sugars, including fructose (check out 12 Painless Ways to Cut Sugar Out of Your Diet)
Unhealthy oils
If you’re already following a Paleo lifestyle, you’ve pretty much taken care of this step. Stick to a diet focused on vegetables, animal protein, and fruits, and you’ll create a gut environment that’s friendly for good bacteria and unfriendly for bad bacteria.

Avoid sugar, drugs and other toxins to maintain a healthy gut.

It’s also a good idea to avoid other modern toxins. Watch out for:

Non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (NSAIDs) like Advil and Ibuprofen
Antibiotics (as much as possible)
Pesticides

Step 2. Eat Fermented Foods

kimchi.jpgAvoiding toxic foods and environmental toxins is a great start, but not quite enough for optimal health. It’s time to get proactive about encouraging good gut bacteria to flourish. One of the best ways is to eat more fermented foods. These foods, commonplace in our ancestors’ diets, are full of good gut bacteria.

Great fermented foods include:

Going from eating no sauerkraut to say… two or three bowls a day might sound like a good idea. But resist the temptation! Adding too many fermented foods too quickly can create some nasty side effects. Start small—a teaspoon or two a day and work your way up to give your gut time to adjust.

Step 3. Take Probiotic Supplements

In addition to eating fermented foods (a great natural source of good gut bacteria), you can restore your gut health faster by taking a daily probiotic supplement. Our ancestors were a lot less concerned with hygiene than we are. This actually helped them pick up plenty of good gut bacteria along with the soil and other dirty things they encountered. You can use probiotic supplements to “make up” for that lost good bacteria. No eating dirt needed!

There’s a wide range of probiotic supplements available. And just like with gut bacteria, some are better than others. Dr. Tim Gerstmar laid down some excellent guidelines on which supplements to focus on:

Stay away from “bargain bin” prices. You get what you pay for.
Two reputable brands are Jarrow and Klaire Labs.
Make sure they’re potent. Dr. Gerstmar recommends at least 8 billion/dose.
Look for supplements that contain strains of Lactobacillus and Bifidobacterium.
Our recommended probiotic: Biotrust Pro-X10

Step 4. Manage Your Stress

One of the most powerful things you can do to improve your gut health (besides changing your diet) is to make “stress management” a priority. There isn’t a one-size-fits-all method to do this. The key is to pick something you enjoy and stick with it. Making time to manage your stress — whether you feel stressed or not — will reduce inflammation, lower cortisol levels, and improve your gut health.

Get plenty of sleep and take time to reduce your stress levels to improve gut health.

And make sure to get enough sleep! A sleep deficit raises cortisol levels (and harms the gut) just like any other type of stress. Shoot for at least 7 hours a night.

Change Your Gut, Change Your Life

More science is emerging every day connecting issues with the gut to issues throughout the body and mind. That’s good news for you! With knowledge and smart action, you can quite literally heal yourself from the inside out. The recipe for a healthy gut is simple. Avoid toxic foods and substances, add in some fermented foods and probiotics, and make managing your stress a priority. It won’t happen overnight, but it will happen. Changing your gut just might be the first step to changing your life.

When I set out to write about a particular cancer this week, I realized that no matter what cancer you are experiencing or are attempting to halt or prevent, good nutrition is required to set your cells straight and give them the best chance to heal and grow properly.Eating fresh organic fruits and vegetables are the best defense in fighting these diseases. Also by getting plenty of good, clean water along with adequate sleep and decreasing your stress level, you will be giving yourself the best chance to heal.

Eating fresh organic fruits and vegetables are the best defense in fighting these diseases. Also by getting plenty of good, clean water along with adequate sleep and decreasing your stress level, you will be giving yourself the best chance to heal.When choosing what fuel to put into your body, think of yourself as a thoroughbred race horse. You wouldn’t put chemically laden food, or all the other things that are allowed in all of

When choosing what fuel to put into your body, think of yourself as a thoroughbred race horse. You wouldn’t put chemically laden food, or all the other things that are allowed in all of processed foods out there into that race horse for it to function at it’s best. You would give that horse the best nutritional fuel for it to win the race.

We have to begin to associate what we’re eating with how our bodies are reacting to it and always keep in mind whether our food choices are serving us.

Following the 80/20 rule, choose 80% of the best whole foods you can to nourish your cells. For the other 20 %, choose wisely but slightly more indulgent foods to satisfy your likes, but that won’t overwhelm your system. This is a great rule to eat by and I encourage you to try it.

I wish you Happy and Healthy Eating!

An article from Cancer Treatment Centers of America Website:

Receiving a diagnosis of pancreatic cancer is considered a grave diagnosis. Many patients having Pancreatic cancer don’t present for diagnosis until in later stages of the disease, mainly because there are usually few symptoms affecting the patient.

Development of Pancreatic Cancer

Pancreatic cancer develops in the tissues of the pancreas, an organ located behind the lower portion of the stomach. The pancreas aids in digestion, metabolism and insulin production. Cancer may develop in either the exocrine glands or the endocrine glands of the pancreas. About 95 percent of pancreatic cancers begin in the exocrine glands (the cells that produce the enzymes or “digestive juices” that help break down proteins, fats and starches).

Pancreatic cancer affects the body’s ability to digest and absorb vital nutrients from food. This may cause nausea, taste changes, weight loss, fatigue, decreased appetite, fullness, pain, gas, diarrhea and constipation. Over time, these symptoms may put patients at risk for malnutrition.

Having good nutrition is so important during treatment for pancreatic cancer, no matter the stage of the diagnosis.

Because part of the pancreas is removed during surgery, the part that remains after surgery may not be able to produce enough enzymes to properly aid with the digestion of food, and patients may not be able to digest or absorb the fat from the food they eat. When undigested fat remains in the stool, it causes diarrhea and poor nutrition. Patients may also experience bloating, excessive gas production and abdominal cramping. Consequently, the goal for these patients is to eliminate or reduce diarrhea, restore adequate nutrition, prevent weight loss and manage bloating, cramping and gas.
Patients who have had a Whipple surgery are more likely than those who have had a distal pancreatectomy (another type of pancreatic surgery) to have insufficient enzyme production.

General recommendations following pancreatic surgery

• Take the prescribed amount of pancreatic enzyme replacement products with all meals and snacks.
• Gradually start adding solid foods. The timing of this varies from individual to individual.
• Avoid high-fat, greasy or fried foods.
• Eat 6-8 small meals and snacks daily to prevent feeling overly full. Small meals are easier to digest. Space meals 2-3 hours apart.
• Drink at least 6-12 cups of fluids each day. Lack of fluids may lead to fatigue, light-headedness and nausea.
• Take small sips of liquids with meals. Drinking too much fluid at mealtime may cause the patient to feel full quicker or increase nausea. Drink liquids an hour before or after eating to avoid feeling full.
• Drink beverages that contain calories, nutrients and protein, such as juices, smoothies or nutritional supplement drinks. It is acceptable to drink small amounts of these at mealtimes or to use nutritional supplement drinks or protein smoothies as meal/snack replacements.
• Avoid alcoholic beverages.
• If the patient is nauseated and has an empty stomach, small bites of dry foods are often better tolerated than liquids.
• Avoid eating concentrated refined/simple carbohydrates if symptoms of glucose intolerance or dumping are present. Glucose intolerance symptoms include increased thirst, frequent urination, blurry vision and fatigue. Dumping symptoms usually occur within 2 hours after eating and include flushed skin, dizziness/lightheadedness, weakness, abdominal pain, nausea, vomiting and diarrhea.
• Discuss with your doctor or dietitian the use of a multivitamin or individual vitamin supplements. Calcium and the fat-soluble vitamins A, D, E and K may be necessary if malabsorption-induced diarrhea is present. Ask a healthcare professional for a proper dosage of individual vitamin supplements.
• If anemia occurs, ask the doctor whether iron supplements or injections of vitamin B12 may be helpful.