by Joy Thompson | Dec 1, 2015 | Blog
Our immune systems are amazing and the more I learn, the more I am in awe of it. It works optimally when we feed and nurture it healthfully; it takes care of us, as we take care of it. Recently there was a photo going around on the internet that educates on this topic: “The flu is NOT a season! It is an inability to adapt due to decreased sun exposure and water intake, combined with increased sugar intake and stress. Create resistance! Create health!” Then I stumbled across this article and it fit the “season.” I have a couple of the supplements and remedies mentioned at my office for sale while supplies last. Battling the Cold and Flu Season, Naturally Seven top tips for fighting the common cold, flu, and staying healthy By Dr. Doni Wilson (taken from The Life Connection, December 2014 Let’s start with prevention: TIP 1: Avoid sugar and alcohol Two top enemies to an invincible immune system are sugar and alcohol. Dr. Doni recommends avoiding or minimizing sugar and alcohol consumption, as they both lower your ability to fight off viruses. Even just 8 tablespoons of sugar (as in 2 cans of soda), or fructose (such as in honey or ½ cup of orange juice) can lower your immune function for five hours after you consume it. That is because sugar inhibits the white blood cells that fight off bacteria, leaving you vulnerable to infections. A similar thing happens with alcohol. When you drink three or more alcoholic drinks (wine, beer, or liquor), your white blood cells are weaker and have a harder...
by Joy Thompson | Mar 13, 2015 | Blog
I have been challenged recently to chew each bite of my food for a minimum of 20 chews. This has been nearly impossible for me! I don’t even realize how quickly I eat and seem to chew only a few times each mouthful. Chewing is the first step in the digestive process and allowing the saliva to do its job is important for a healthful meal. A book I recently started reading (Gulp: Adventures on the Alimentary Canal by Mary Roach) is about our guts and digestion. Two quotes from the introduction make me smile: “Yes, men and women eat meals. But they also ingest nutrients. They grind and sculpt them into a moistened bolus that is delivered, via a stadium wave of sequential contractions, into a self-kneading sack of hydrochloric acid and then dumped into a tubular leach field….Lunch is an opening act.” “The early anatomists has that curiosity in spades. They entered the human form like an unexplored continent. Parts were names like elements of geography: the isthmus of the thyroid, the isles of the pancreas, the straits and inlets of the pelvis. The digestive tract was for centuries known as the alimentary canal. How lovely to picture one’s dinner making its way down a tranquil, winding waterway, digestion and excretion no more upsetting or off-putting than a cruise along the Rhine. It’s this mood, these sentiments — the excitement of exploration and the surprises and delights of travel to foreign locales– that I hope to inspire….” It’s funny how little we think of digestion. Like many of the automatic processes we have, we don’t pay much...
