However you do it, living smoke-free is worth the pain and effort. No matter the method you choose to help yourself quit, the same bottom line will always apply: you just have to do it.

A doctor once asked me how many times I had tried to quit. When I told him the embarrassingly high number that I thought proved me to be incapable of ever quitting, his response made me believe that one day I would be successful. He said, “Good job! You’ll never quit if you don’t try. Don’t quit trying to quit! You’ll get it right! The people who don’t quit are the ones who don’t try.”

I did finally get it right. I learned a few lessons along the way.

Addiction is Multi-Faceted

There is so much focus on nicotine addiction, the buzz would have you believe that nicotine, or the lack thereof, is the only reason it is so hard to quit. This belief supports sales of nicotine patches, nicotine gum, and e-cigarettes. But nicotine wasn’t my main addiction; it was gone in a matter of days. There is so much more associated with the habit of smoking that smokers find appealing and habit forming. For me this included:

• The Deep Inhale and Exhale
• The Paraphernalia
• The Camaraderie
• The Break

The Deep Inhale and Exhale

The act of sucking in and blowing out smoke is as addictive as nicotine. Add to this the whole oral fixation and hand to mouth thing and you have a behavior that is hard to replace when you quit. But there is a way to offset some of this loss. And no, I am not talking about e-cigs or vaping.

What To Do: Deep breathing as taught for yoga and meditation really helps replace the loss of the inhale and the exhale of cigarette smoke. If you need the hand to mouth connection as well, buy some short, fat, plastic straws and use them to replicate the action.

The Paraphernalia

Many of us buy things we like that are associated with our smoking habit such as special lighters, ashtrays, and cigarette cases. Sometimes we develop rituals around these items as well.

What To Do: In the weeks before your target date to quit arrives, get rid of every single one of these items.

The Camaraderie

When smokers are forced to ban together in a designated area, an easy acquaintance develops. Small talk flows freely when you have a habit in common. For those of us who are shy, this makes daily interaction in the workplace as well as interaction with total strangers out in the general public much easier.

What To Do: If you miss the companionship and camaraderie of being a smoker, you need to make the effort to talk to others without the excuse. If you find it too difficult, volunteer your time somewhere that has a mission you admire. Shared values breed camaraderie.

The Break

The break is as hard to lose as the action of smoking itself. Unless we smoke inside while we are working or involved in an activity, we have trained ourselves to take a break from whatever we are doing to have a smoke. When frustration rises, you take a break. When you can’t think of what to do next, you take a break. When you get tired or drained, you take a break. When you get angry, you take a break. When you are brain dead, you take a break.

Just the act of getting away from the task, or the desk, helps your mood and helps you redirect. But in all honesty, here is where the nicotine kicks in, in another way. The nicotine boost helps clear your head and helps you feel refreshed. It is, after all, a stimulant. It may help you figure out how to solve whatever problem was giving you grief, and it gives you a jolt of energy.

What To Do: Give yourself permission to take that break. Walk outside. Do deep breathing. If you like, replace the behavior of smoking with something else. Blow bubbles. Play an instrument. Sing a song. If you are at work, take a brisk walk. Just don’t walk by the smoking area. And don’t substitute candy. Putting yourself on a sugar roller coaster will not help your mood or your abstinence.

The Steps That Prepare You for Quitting

Denial is part of the addiction. We sublimate the negative. We ignore the smell, the mess, and the cost of the addiction. And most of all, we pretend we are not engaged in a suicidal act. Yes, it is a slow suicide – a steady march toward heart disease, emphysema, and cancer.

Set the Date

Pick a date in the near future. If you can, pick a date that begins a 3-day weekend. Give yourself a few weeks to prepare.

Reality Check

Take the time to pull your head out of the sand and face the facts. What are the risks of smoking? What do your lungs look like? What are the odds that smoking will kill you or cripple your health? What does that crippling disease look like?

Pretend you are entering a debate on “Why to never smoke” or “Stop now if you’ve started” side. Do the research. Do it like your life depends on it. After all, it does.

Pros and Cons

Complete a written pros and cons list. Dig deep and be honest.

Calculate the Cost

How much money is this habit costing you? What else could you do with that money?

Maybe It’s Not Such a Good Idea To Announce You’re Quitting

You need to decide what works for you, but that also means it’s time to be realistic and stop doing the same thing expecting different results. Many people like to announce self-improvement goals to friends and families, but some studies have shown that doing this does not correlate into greater success.

Mix It Up

In the weeks leading up to your target date, consider switching your brand. One way to go is organic. Organic cigarettes are easier to kick. The other extreme is to change the brand you smoke each and every day, buy brands you hate, or try vaporizing, but be careful not to simply switch one addiction for another (and it should be noted that vaporizing may not be the healthy alternative people thought it was).

Embrace Health

It’s damn hard to be a health enthusiast when you are a smoker. You feel like a hypocrite. When you quit smoking, that conflict is gone. And the more health conscious you are before and during the process, the better you will feel and the easier it will be to quit.

Eating right evens out your blood sugar. A dip in blood sugar can cause an almost unbearable desire to smoke.

Plan ahead and shop ahead. Fill your kitchen with fresh whole foods – organic produce. If possible, cook ahead for your first few days of abstinence and make several salads filled with lots of vegetables.

If you don’t already know what constitutes a truly healthy diet and a healthy lifestyle, now is the time to learn and to start living right. This choice to embrace health will be a major factor that helps you abstain from smoking.

Avoid Triggers

Once you quit, avoid places where you smoked. If there is a place you frequented where there is smoking (like my old karaoke bar) don’t go! Declare your home a smoke-free zone. If you have friends who smoke, let them know you are quitting and that you can’t be around them for a while. Do not put yourself in the position where you could simply ask someone to give you a cigarette. They will.

If you are watching a movie where the characters smoke, change the channel. If you walk by smokers, look away. You don’t know your triggers yet – those sights and smells that make you crave “just one.” Don’t push it. Avoid them.

Don’t Argue With “The Voice”

We’ve all got a voice in our head. Sometimes it is the voice of reason. Sometimes it is our conscience. Sometimes, especially in our younger decades, it is the voice of our mother. But when we are trying to break an addictive habit, that voice is the voice of addiction. Or maybe it is the voice of the devil himself.

• Voice: You can have just one.
• Reality: It’s true. Maybe today you can. But tomorrow one is not enough.
• Voice: You can’t quit.
• Reality: Yes, you can.
• Voice: Not today. How about tomorrow?
• Reality: You’ve been saying this for years.
• Voice: It’s too hard. Cold turkey doesn’t work.
• Reality: The only way to stop smoking is to stop smoking.

When you start arguing with this voice, you often lose. The voice is persistent – relentless, actually. So just shut it down. Don’t answer. Simply remind yourself that you can do this.

The Night Before the Chosen Day

This is it. You’re ready. Your head is in the right place because you have reminded yourself about the reality of smoking – how it is impacting your life and your health. You have chosen health. You have chosen life and a life well lived.

You have already thrown away or given away all of your smoking paraphernalia. Before you go to bed, throw out all of your cigarettes. But tossing them is not enough. Breaking them is not enough. Drown them. And do the same with your cigarette butts. If you don’t, you will dig through your trash. You don’t want to do that. It makes you feel… well… at the very least horribly addicted, which gives that voice energy when it says you can’t quit. Thoroughly wetting all cigarettes and cigarette butts makes smoking them impossible.

Get a good night’s sleep. Tomorrow will be the start of your new life.

How To Stay Quit

Okay, you’ve done it. You have woken up to the first day of the rest of your life. You have chosen to live smoke free. For the next 2-3 days, stay home! Do not put yourself closer to a place to buy or bum a cigarette. Besides, you are going to want to sleep a lot for the next few days.

You will be detoxing from nicotine and a host of other chemicals you have been inhaling. There are things you can do to help this process:

• Drink plenty of clean, pure water – distilled or spring water and cranberry lemonade.
• Eat right. You need a nutrient dense diet. The 80% raw diet is great.
• Vitamin C helps with cravings as it flushes out your system.
• Complex B vitamins help you relax and sleep. It’s “nature’s valium.”
• Sleep all you want. Relax. Read. Watch TV. Live in your PJs for a few days.

What To Expect After You Quit Smoking

As the days go by, you will think about smoking less and less. The day will come (fairly soon!) when you realize you had not thought about it all day. Don’t dwell on this thought because “the voice” will kick in. Just acknowledge it and move on.

If you do find yourself next to a smoker, one of two things will happen. You will want to breathe in that smell as if second hand smoke is heaven or the smell of smoke, even the faintest whiff, will make you nauseous. Oh yes, your sense of smell will probably improve. You’ll probably be able to smell a smoker from a distance.

On one day you will see a group of people standing outside smoking and you’ll think about how stupid they look. The very act of doing what they are doing will look wrong and you will feel grateful that you are not one of them. The next time you see a group of smokers you may have the opposite reaction. They may look like the “cool guys” and you wish you were with them.

Unexpected things will trigger you or surprise you. Acknowledge them and move on.

The less time you spend thinking about, talking about, worrying about, or even congratulating yourself about the fact you have quit, the better. You will find weeks pass. Months pass. With each passage of time the pull lessens. Instead of focusing on the issue of whether or not you smoke, focus on ways to improve your health on an ongoing basis.

What To Do If a Crisis Occurs

A horrible fight with a spouse, the death of a friend or family member, losing a job…these are the worst triggers. When something big happens, your instinct will be to reach for that crutch.

What will happen? You’ll get a headache. You’ll feel sick to your stomach. Your heart will race. You’ll have trouble sleeping. And you’ll be trying to bury your guilt and frustration with the fact that you are smoking. How is any of this going to help the situation when you and your family are in crisis?

This is a good time to practice deep breathing. Take extra B vitamins. Handling the stress in a healthy way will not only help you remain free from your addiction, you will actually handle the situation better for yourself and for your loved ones if you use healthy rather than unhealthy coping mechanisms.

What To Do If You Backslide

Stop again immediately! Do not let a little slip define you. Now is the time to review all that information you saved about the horrors of smoking and review your pros and cons list that you haven’t looked at since the day you quit. Drown the cigarettes. Throw away the lighter. Just do it again – now. Don’t wait a week, a month, or a year to start over. Just do it. If you wait too long, it might actually be a year or two before you convince yourself to have another go at it. So why waste the time?

Simple Stop Smoking Protocol

Lots of good ideas right? But maybe a bit overwhelming, so let’s put most of what’s above into a simple protocol, throw in some nutrition, and feel free to make the necessary adjustments that makes this the perfect program for you.

1. Pick a Date

Regardless of which path you take and how you do it, pick a date. Give yourself some time, but burn that date into your subconscious as the date you know that you will be smoke-free from that point on. Remember it. Believe it. Know it. No matter what else you do, no matter what else happens, you will never smoke beyond that point.

2. Learn to Breathe Properly, and Practice Constantly

When you breathe properly, your diaphragm, your stomach, and your ribcage expand, not the upper chest. Fully exhaling is important, too. Remember, you are breathing in oxygen rich air and releasing carbon dioxide and toxins.

Have you ever watched babies breathe? Their stomachs rise and their rib cages fully expand with each breath they take.  Watch and learn.

3. Switch it Up

In the weeks before your target date, try a brand that doesn’t add additives to increase addiction, roll your own, don’t smoke in the car, break up your routine, etc. When you need to smoke, give it 10 minutes no matter what, and spend that time breathing properly.

4. Do Squats

Exercise. Squats help detoxify the body and keep the organs healthy. Work up to a sweat, and breath heavily and deeply.

5. Address Other Issues

If you’re a long-term smoker, you’re likely to be dealing with some health issues like hypothyroidism, hormonal imbalances, periodontal disease, and asthma. Be sure to address them, and address them naturally.

6. Detoxify

Detoxify now, and keep doing it until you quit smoking. The focus should be on flushing out heavy metals toxins, carbon, other carcinogens, and all those other toxins that come along with smoking that increase your body’s cravings. Drink lots of cranberry lemonade and eat lots of salads. It’s also a perfect time to repair the gut and balance your flora, which will in turn heal your endocrine system and balance your hormones.

Also, take a good antioxidant, try Shillington’s Huff and Puff Formula to help detoxify the lungs, and always have B vitamins on hand. Smokers are constantly depleting their B vitamins, which leads to emotional issues and addictive behaviors. See the links above and the related reading section below for more information on breathing, healing the gut, and hormones. See the first article for our salad and cranberry lemonade recipes.

Recommended Supplements:

• CoQ10 50mg with Vitamin C – Douglas Labs (antioxidants)
• Shillington’s Herbal Snuff Formula (clear sinuses and revitalize sense of smell, but buyer beware, it’s not for the faint of heart)
• Shillington’s Blood Detox Formula (detoxify the blood of toxins, stay well while sinuses drain)
• Shillington’s Total Nutrition Formula (chelate heavy metals, lots of nutrients)
• Shillington’s Tooth Gum Formula

Related Reading:

• Detox Cheap and Easy Without Fasting – Recipes Included
• Gluten, Candida, Leaky Gut Syndrome, and Autoimmune Diseases
• Total Nutrition – Make your own Homemade Multivitamin and Mineral Formula
• Top 5 Foods that Detox Heavy Metals and Toxins – With Protocol
• How to Breathe

If we ever wanted to see the end of a piece of legislation, it would be the DARK Act. If you are not familiar with it, this legislation is aimed at taking away our right to know what we are eating. States will not be able to legislate GMO labeling. The DARK Act completely blocks efforts to label genetically modified foods.

What it’s really all about is big business, corruption, and empty biotech promises and lies.

Big Business

This may seem a little off topic, but this fact about big business is really interesting. According to the Small Business Administration, as of 2010, the United States was home to 27.9 million small businesses and only 18,500 large businesses. In this case, a large business is defined as a business employing 500 or more employees. Yes, that’s right; 99.7% of the businesses in the United States are small businesses with 500 or fewer employees. So how and why do these few businesses carry so much weight and influence?

Corruption?

What else could it be other than corruption and payoffs? Why would our elected officials, whose sworn duty is to serve the people they represent, be so hell bent on ignoring the rights and wishes of the American people? Why do they want federal legislation that denies the rights of Americans to know what they are eating and what they are feeding their children?

Do they really think biotech is the answer to world hunger when other countries are seeing through the propaganda and lies and realizing that genetically modified crops are not the panacea they are purported to be. In addition, they are contaminating other crops (heirloom, organic, indigenous) as containment is impossible. (Who can control the wind and the birds?)

According to the Center for Food Safety, here are the results of recent polls of the American people:

Biotech

They keep telling us genetically modified foods are safe, that fear of them is unscientific and frankly stupid. We know better.

Common sense tells us that growing and eating a food genetically modified to kill life (insects, infection, microbes), or modified to be able to withstand being drenched in chemicals designed to kill, not to mentiona all of the other agricultural poisons (that we end up eating) is not smart. Add to that the fact that the chemicals used to grow these plants are destroying farmlands, and it is a no brainer.

We don’t even need the studies showing us that GMOs cause cancer and reproductive failure in lab animals to know this is a bad, bad idea. And yes, these studies do exist. And yes, the biotech companies know they exist. That’s why they do short term studies to “prove” their products are safe and pretend the long-term studies that reveal the real and present dangers don’t exist.

What Can We Do?

On March 1, 2016, the Senate Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition, and Forestry again revived the DARK Act by voting on legislation, which is now headed to the full Senate. The bipartisan vote was 14-6 in favor.

This piece of legislation “…directs the Agriculture Secretary, in coordination with other federal agencies, to engage in a consumer education and outreach effort. Information will be science-based and related to environmental, nutritional, economic, and humanitarian benefits of agricultural biotechnology.”

While vague, its purpose is to strike down any attempts by individual states to require GMO labeling for food sold in their state. It claims biotech foods are safe and that this is simply an expensive marketing issue. (With a clear message that the American people are deranged and uninformed).

Tell your elected officials how you feel. Tell them that you don’t care that the World Health Organization claims GMOs are safe or that the Senate committee thinks they are safe. You still deserve the right to choose. We don’t need to be in the dark. Turn on the light. Label GMOs.

Related Reading:

• Understanding and Detoxifying Genetically Modified Foods
• Scientists Against GMOs – Hear From Those Who Have Done the Research
• Doctors Against GMOs – Hear From Those Who Have Done the Research
• How to Detoxify From Antibiotics and Other Chemical Antimicrobials
• How To Detoxify and Heal From Vaccinations – For Adults and Children

Sources:

• U.S. Polls on GE Food Labeling – Center for Food Safety
• Senate Agriculture Committee Passes Chairman’s Mark on Biotechnology Labeling Solutions – United States Senate Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition, & Forestry

We’ve seen it before. Over time, bacteria become resistant to antibiotics. Roaches become immune to bug spray. Weeds become immune to herbicides. Adaptation wins. Chemicals lose. Such is life.

The newest winner is lice. A champion strain of “super lice,” now reported in 25 states, is proving resistant to the chemicals commonly used today to kill them – both the over the counter and the prescription drugs. When are we going to learn that chemical warfare will always result in creating super bugs?

It isn’t necessary to poison lice with chemicals that harm us and our environemnt. You can kill them naturally by suffocation. Even if over the counter treatments and prescription treatments still worked, do you really want to slather neurotoxins on your child’s scalp? Or yours?

Natural Remedies for Lice and Super Lice

There are several methods to go to war on lice and a few preventative treatments as well. As always, the better you eat, the healthier you are, the less susceptible you are to infection both inside the body and outside. This is true for internal parasites and external parasites like scabies, fleas, and lice. If you’re dealing with any infection (or ailment for that matter), it behooves you to load up on fresh, raw vegetables; to eliminate processed foods; and to seriously restrict any excessively sweet whole foods (like grapes and bananas for instance).

Manual Delousing

First of all, check your child’s scalp on a regular basis – once a week at the very least if lice have been a recurrent problem in their daycare or school, daily if there is a current infestation.

Check all over the scalp, but pay special attention to the area around the ears. Look for lice and look little dark specks. If you find the dark specks, these are nits – otherwise known as eggs. You can use a nit comb to remove lice and nits.

Now, of course, the manual method works, but it is tedious and time-consuming. If you’ve ever tried to remove fleas from a cat or dog with nothing but a flea comb, you know the drill. But if you catch lice early enough and your child only has a few lice and nits, the manual method alone may work.

If you spray any area that has nits with apple cider vinegar (or dab it on with cotton balls), the vinegar will dissolve the “glue” that attaches the nit to the hair shaft, making manual removal much easier.

How To Smother Lice

Mayonnaise, olive oil, and coconut oil are all used to smother the little suckers. Some suggest beginning with an apple cider vinegar rinse, leaving it on until it dries, and using the nit comb as the first step. Some suggest doing this as the last step.

Cover the entire scalp with mayo, olive oil, or coconut oil. Oil can be used with or without the addition of essential oils (tea tree, rosemary, cinnamon, or peppermint oil are good choices).

Cover the head with a shower cap and leave it in place for 2-8 hours. Some say the little monsters can hold their breath that long. Other say 2 hours does the trick.

Don’t forget this important step: wash everything that could be infested with lice and use the dryer! Bed linens are not the only concern. Hats, hoodies, coats, clothes – wash them all at the same time you do a treatment. In fact, if you do the 8-hour treatment, wash the linens before and after.

One treatment will probably not be enough. If you miss one nit, it will grow up to lay 8-10 eggs a day. So… plan on repeating the treatment every 7 days for a few weeks. (Of course you may not find any lice and be home free after one treatment. But check carefully!)

Other Natural Methods of Killing Lice

Reports of using strong salt solutions or diatomaceous earth look promising. One mother successfully treated lice by using ½ pound of salt to 2 quarts of water. Her instructions are to pour the saltwater over the child’s hair while the child is in the tub,  leave on for 10 minutes, rinse, and condition. Repeat daily for 3 days and again every 7 days for 3 weeks.

Diatomaceous earth is a little trickier. You want to leave this dry powder on overnight after working it into the hair and follow with a vinegar rinse and nit comb. Since you don’t want to breathe this dust and you don’t want your child breathing it and you have to devise a method to keep this on the scalp overnight, it seems oil would be a better, easier method.

How To Prevent Lice Infestations

Yes, there are idiots out there who will say that your child caught lice because you did not keep his or her hair clean. Others say that lice prefer clean hair. Cleanliness is not the issue.

The one thing you are responsible for is the health of your child. Feed your child the best possible diet. All parasites do seem to prefer unhealthy hosts, and they all love sugar! If you do feed your child a healthy diet, and he or she still picks up lice, don’t waste your time looking for fault or blame. It’s time to deal with it in a healthy, responsible way.

In addition to diet, lice really hate essential oils and will avoid them. Spritzing your child’s backpack, coat, and hat with a spray of water and essential oils (10 drops of peppermint, rosemary, tea tree, or cinnamon oil to one cup of water) may deter lice.

Conclusion

Maybe the evolution of super lice is a good thing. Maybe the result will be  a revolution in awareness of natural treatments. Remember that the skin (scalp included!) soaks up any chemicals that are placed on it. Why would anyone ever want to expose their child to poisons, to neurotoxins, to anything that might harm your child this way?

One can only hope that Big Pharma doesn’t respond the way other scientists have – to replace a failing insecticide with a new, stronger one. They probably will. We’ll see.

Recommended Products:

• Diatomaceous Earth • Food Grade DE

Recommended Reading:

• Heal Cavities, Gum Disease, Naturally with Organic Oral Care – Toothpaste recipes included
• All About Fleas – Natural Remedies – Inside and Out
• Common Parasites and How to Kill Them
• Herbs and a Protocol that Eliminates Parasites from the Body

Epsom salt is not actually salt; it is a mineral compound, magnesium sulfate. It looks like large salt crystals, dissolves easily in water, and has many uses for health, beauty, and the garden.

There are different grades of Epsom salt, one for agricultural and one for personal use. For personal use, look for USP or the “drug facts” list on the label.

Why Take an Epsom Salt Bath?

Epsom salt baths are relaxing and therapeutic. They are a long known treatment for skin issues like eczema and acne, muscle soreness (well known within the bodybuilding community!), inflammation, bruising, swelling, and strained or torn muscles and ligaments. Epsom salt baths are also a wonderful aid for detoxing and an easy means to up your intake of both magnesium and sulfate.

Why We Need Magnesium

Magnesium is crucial to our health. It is a key mineral for metabolic processes that play a role in more than 300 chemical reactions in the body. It helps the body regulate enzymes and aids in electrical impulses, toxin elimination, muscle control, and more. The University of Maryland Medical Center site states, “Every organ in the body, especially the heart, muscles, and kidneys, needs magnesium. This mineral also contributes to the makeup of teeth and bones. Magnesium activates enzymes, contributes to energy production, and helps regulate levels of calcium, copper, zinc, potassium, vitamin D, and other important nutrients in the body.”

It is believed that most of us do not get as much magnesium as we need from our diet due to depleted soil and municipal water, which is stripped of minerals during the purification process.

How to Properly Take an Epsom Salt Bath or Soak

You will commonly see directions suggesting 2 cups to a normal size bath, more for an oversized bath, with a 12-15 minute soak. David Jockers DC, MS, CSCS, suggests a much more individualized measurement and a much longer soak. He recommends the amount be determined by the individual’s weight. The following is for a standard size bathtub:

• Children under 60 lbs: ½ cup
• Individuals between 60-100 lbs: 1 cup
• Individuals between 100-150 lbs: 1½ cups
• Individuals between 150-200 lbs: 2 cups
• For every 50lbs more – add an additional ½ cup of salts.

As for soaking time, he says the first 20 minutes pulls out toxins while the second 20 minutes allows the body to soak up the magnesium and sulfate.

He also cites the following contraindications: pregnancy, open wounds or burns, or cardiovascular disease (without your healthcare practitioners knowledge).

For muscle soreness an Epsom salt bath is one of the best things you can do, but if your goal is detoxification, first do a dry brush rub to remove dead skin and open up your pores. This takes about five minutes. Take your time. When you finish soaking, consider hot and cold hydrotherapy.

Combine Epsom Salt With Other Ingredients

You can add additional ingredients to your Epsom salt bath such as essential oils, baking soda, olive oil, coconut oil, apple cider vinegar, and more.

Essential oils are a natural compliment. The usual suggestion is 3-10 drops. Remember essential oils are medicinal. For recipes google “essential oils plus Epsom salts.” You will generate more than 400,000 hits.

Dr. Jockers suggests adding from 1 teaspoon to ½ cup of ginger or cayenne to “increase heat levels, which help you to sweat out toxins.” These herbs not only enhance the detoxification process, they are full of antioxidants as well.

Use Epsom Salt to Make a Compress or a Foot Bath

You can make a compress to relieve muscle pain. Start by dissolving Epsom salt in cold water with a ratio of 2 tablespoons for each cup of water. Use a cotton washcloth to soak up the solution and apply to affected area.

To create a footbath, use one cup of Epsom salt to a basin of warm water. Soak your feet to alleviate tired aching feet, sprains, and fungal infections of the feet or toenails. Footbaths also allow the body to soak up magnesium and release toxins (though perhaps not as much as a full body soak).

Use Epsom Salt as a Laxative

Epsom salt can be used as a laxative, though care must be taken. It is possible to overdose on magnesium that is ingested and there are several contraindications for this use. Check out this article on Drugs.com for more information and pertinent warnings.

Use Epsom Salt in the Garden

Epsom salt is used as a fertilizer and an insect deterrent in the garden and for houseplants. Roses, peppers, and tomatoes, in particular, tend to benefit from its use. A trail of Epsom salt sprinkled around an area deters slugs and raccoons.

Additional Uses of Epsom Salt

There are many ways to use Epsom salt. Here are a few:

• Remove a stubborn splinter. (Soak area for a few minutes prior to removal to decrease inflammation and swelling and to soften the splinter.)
• Clean out washing machine. (Pour 1 cup into machine and run through normal cycle.)
• Clean bathroom grout. (Use equal amounts of Epsom salt and dishwashing detergent.)
• Use as an abrasive to clean pots and pans.

But there’s nothing better than an Epsom salt soak when your sore. If you experience muscle soreness due to an autoimmune disease, check out Hypothyroidism – Natural Remedies, Causes, and How To Heal the Thyroid and Gluten, Candida, Leaky Gut Syndrome, and Autoimmune Diseases.

Related Products:

• Bath Salts on Green Lifestyle Market
• Omega-D3 – Nordic Naturals
• Fibrenza Systemic Enzyme (500mg) – HCP Formulas
• Boswellia – Pure Encapsulations

Further Reading:

• Detox Cheap and Easy Without Fasting – Recipes Included
• Reduce Muscle Soreness
• Homemade Calcium and Magnesium
• What Causes Cronic Inflammation and How to Stop it For Good

Sources:

• The Health Benefits of Epsom Salt Baths – OLM
• What is Epsom Salt? – Epsom Salt Council
• Magnesium – World’s Healthiest Foods
• Magnesium – The University of Maryland Medical Center
• Health Benefits of Epsom Salt Baths – Care 2
• Fertilize with Epsom Salts – National Gardening Association

It is no surprise that conventional doctors and alternative practitioners do not tend to see eye-to-eye on the subject of food allergies. While conventional medical doctors acknowledge type 1hypersensitivity reactions (immediate reactions), there is little belief in delayed, hidden, or unrecognized allergic reactions and the role they play in acute and chronic medical conditions.

Alternative health care practitioners are more likely to understand the role of hidden allergies – how they impact the immune system and the gut and how addressing and eliminating these food sensitivities are essential to restoring health. Undetected food allergies are often related to recurrent infections, autoimmune diseases, diseases of the bowel, and ADHD. The book, Nutritional Medicine, lists more than 80 food allergy related conditions and diseases.

Reactions can occur hours or days after ingesting an allergen and they may not occur every time the food is ingested, making the identification of offending foods difficult to impossible, especially when several foods are at fault. Since medical testing for food allergies works well for 1 hypersensitivity allergens but is inconclusive for hidden allergens, the only way to identify hidden food allergies is through a well-planned and executed elimination diet.

Before You Start Your Elimination Diet

First make a list of every symptom you have from the top of your head to your toes. List every ache and pain, every rash, every digestive symptom, etc. It doesn’t hurt to rate severity, too.

How To Do an Elimination Diet

A thorough elimination diet generally excludes the following:

• All known allergens
• All milk products including cheese, butter, yogurt, kefir, cottage cheese, etc.
• All corn and corn products including corn oil and high fructose corn syrup
• All artificial flavors, colors, and preservatives
• Chocolate
• Refined sugar
• Citrus (oranges, lemons, limes, grapefruits, tangerines)
• Wheat
• Soy
• Eggs
• Coffee and tea
• Alcohol
• Any food that is eaten 3 times a week or more
• Tap Water (Drink pure spring water or distilled water from safe containers)

Care must be taken if eating any processed foods. Read the label carefully to be sure the product does not have any ingredients on the elimination list.

While the list above may work well for an elimination diet, we recommend taking the elimination diet a few steps further.

• Eat only organic foods. You may be reacting to pesticide residues.
• For the duration of the elimination diet (which is hopefully followed by a healing diet) eliminate all processed foods.
• Eliminate gluten (wheat, barley, rye, spelt, kamut, triticale)
• Eliminate all sugars
• Eliminate nuts and seeds
• Eliminate trans fats, artificial sweeteners, MSG, and GMO foods

So what do you eat? Plenty of fresh, raw, organic fruits and veggies (except for corn and citrus fruits); meat if you desire (but be sure it is organic); rice, gluten-free oats, and other gluten-free grains;  organic oils (not corn); and organic beans.

If you experience severe withdrawals the first few days of the diet, vitamin C may help. Try taking 1,000 mg of vitamin C up to four times a day.

Before You Reintroduce Foods

After 2-3 weeks, if hidden food allergies were a problem, you should be feeling much better. Before you begin challenging your body with foods that were eliminated from your diet, go over your symptom list and circle every symptom that is no longer present and rate the severity of those that remain.

Now you want to reintroduce one food at a time to see which foods provoke symptoms. It helps to keep a detailed food diary at this point.

How To Reintroduce Foods

Reintroduce one eliminated food at a time (one a day) to check for a reaction. Make a note in your food diary as to whether or not there was any reaction and what the reaction entailed. If there was no reaction at breakfast, challenge yourself with the food again at lunch. If there was no reaction at lunch, challenge again at dinner. Whether you reacted or not, eliminate the food again and test the next food on your list the following day. Reactions include:

• Headache
• Nausea
• Bloating
• Cramps or stomach ache
• Fatigue
• Dizziness
• Rash
• Dark circles under the eyes
• And any symptom that has reappeared from your list

Some foods require special testing.

• Eggs – Hard boil the eggs. Test with egg whites one day and egg yolks another day.
• Dairy – Test milk, kefir, yogurt, and butter on the same day. Test individual cheeses one day at a time.
• Citrus fruits – test each one on a separate day. Lemon and lime juice can be added to water. For the other citrus fruits, eat whole fresh fruit.
• Corn – be sure you test with organic corn on the cob or frozen organic corn.

If you experience joint pain that is relieved through the elimination diet, challenge with a possible allergen (a food you have removed from your diet) every other day, instead of each day, as it may take up to 48 hours for joint pain to appear. Other reactions generally appear within ten minutes to 12 hours.

While identifying and eliminating allergens from your diet is an essential step towards regaining your health, it is more important to heal the gut and permanently remove unhealthy foods from your diet.

Foods To Eliminate For Good

So first, there is no reason to ever reintroduce artificial flavors, colors, preservatives, MSG, GMOs, trans fats, artificial sweeteners, or refined sugar back into your diet.

A Truly Healthy Diet

A healthy diet consists of 80% fresh, raw, organic produce. If you eat meat and dairy, it should also be organic. If you have any chronic health problems, especially any autoimmune disease, you probably suffer from a permeable gut, often called leaky gut syndrome. It would be wise to learn all you can about healing the gut, reducing Candida in your system, and increasing the good bacteria.

Heal the Gut to Eliminate Allergies

When you heal the gut and continue to eat a healthy diet, food allergies to dissipate, even severe allergies that have caused anaphylactic reactions in the past. It is also not unusual for someone who has eradicated their food sensitivities to find their allergies surface once again after just a day or two of eating refined sugar or drinking alcohol, which promotes Candida, inflames the gut, and causes allergies. If food allergies are potentially a result of vaccine damage, check out the leaky gut article below and How To Detoxify and Heal From Vaccinations – For Adults and Children. Be sure to check out all of the following articles for more on eliminating allergies permanently.

Recommended Reading:

• Gluten, Candida, Leaky Gut Syndrome, and Autoimmune Diseases
• Allergy Free in Five Days (foods, dander, dust, seasonal, etc.)
• 80% Raw Food Diet

Sources:

• Nutritional Medicine by Alan R. Gaby, M.D.
• The Simple Elimination Diet That Could Change Your Life Forever – Mind Body Green

I admit it; I love jewelry. My collection is pretty impressive. When Drops of Joy Jewelry asked me to do a product review, I didn’t warn them. They had no idea I was a hard- to-please, discerning collector who would tell it like it is with no hesitation. But there was no need. I loved the locket they sent to me.

The company is aptly named. Drops of Joy is a reference to their jewelry’s functionality. That’s right, this is jewelry with a purpose – aromatherapy diffusion. They brag by stating, “Our jewelry smells better than yours!” There is another way this company spreads joy. They donate $2.00 for every item sold to St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital. St. Jude is the charity hospital that never charges families for travel, housing, food, or their child’s treatment.

The locket I received is called the Sunburst Diffuser. It is both beautiful and surprisingly sturdy. This is not the typical, delicate, silver-plated jewelry we’ve come to know with a finish that will flake off or hinges that will bend and break. This is a locket made of hefty, solid, stainless steel with a strong magnetic closure. I found myself playing with it – opening and closing it a dozen times because I liked the feel and weight of it.

The locket comes with three responsibly sourced leather dots. To use the locket as a diffuser, simply saturate the dot with your choice of oil or a combination of oils and insert it into the locket. If you are a vegan or for any reason you do not wish to use leather inserts, a substitution of felt inserts can be made upon request. You can also choose your length of chain (16, 18, 20, or 22 inches) for no extra charge. And shipping is free throughout the Unites States!

If you use essential oils, or even if you don’t, check out this lovely collection at Drops of Joy Jewelry. Stock up for gift giving, but don’t neglect yourself.

Zika History and Current Spread

The Zika virus was first identified in 1947 by scientists who were researching yellow fever in Uganda. They placed a caged rhesus macaque in the Zika forest. After it became sick with a fever, the researchers isolated the virus from its blood. In 1954, in Nigeria, the virus was first isolated from a human. Up until 2007, confirmed human infections were rare and were limited to Africa and Southeast Asia.

In 2007, an outbreak in Micronesia resulted in 49 confirmed cases and 59 unconfirmed cases. The infections were relatively mild with no associated deaths or hospitalizations. In 2013, the disease reached French Polynesia. In 2014, it reached Brazil and has continued an explosive spread through South America, Central America, and the Caribbean.

In most cases, the infection is mild. However, a possible, perhaps probable, link between the virus and microcephaly, a severe birth defect whereby an infant is born with an abnormally small head and incomplete brain development, has catapulted this disease from obscurity to the status of a public health emergency and worldwide headline news. Brazilian health authorities have reported more than 3,500 microcephaly cases between October 2015 and January 2016.

On their website, the World Health Organization states, “Agencies investigating the Zika outbreaks are finding an increasing body of evidence about the link between Zika virus and microcephaly. However, more investigation is needed before we understand the relationship between microcephaly in babies and the Zika virus. Other potential causes are also being investigated.” However, Colombia’s President, Juan Manuel Santos, says there is no evidence that the virus has caused an increase in microcephaly in his country, though they have diagnosed 3,177 pregnant women with the virus.

In January, 2016, The CDC issued a level 2 travel alert to areas where virus transmission is active: Brazil, Colombia, El Salvador, French Guiana, Guatemala, Haiti, Honduras, Martinique, Mexico, Panama, Paraguay, Suriname, Venezuela, and the U.S. Commonwealth of Puerto Rico. By February, the virus has been found in 20 countries in the Americas.

On February 1, 2016, the World Health Organization (WHO) announced that Zika is now considered a public health emergency of international concern. They estimate that the virus will spread throughout the Americas and will infect up to 4 million people by the end of 2016.

How is Zika Spread?

The primary method of transmission is through mosquito bites. There have also been confirmed cases of sexual transmission. The virus is found in saliva, urine, and semen. Semen has been proven to spread the virus. It is not known whether the virus can be transmitted from females to males during unprotected intercourse or through body fluids other than semen.

Symptoms of Zika Disease

The Zika virus is typically a mild infection. Up to 80% of those afflicted do not exhibit symptoms. General symptoms are a mild fever, a skin rash, conjunctivitis, headache, muscle and joint pain, and general malaise lasting for 2-7 days. More serious cases can involve neurological and autoimmune complications including Guillain-Barre syndrome, an autoimmune illness in which the immune system attacks the nervous system causing paralysis. (Most people afflicted with Guillain-Barre syndrome recover, though some retain muscle weakness.)

The treatment for most cases is the same as another other mild virus – rest and plenty of fluids.

Spread of Zika Virus to the United States

To date, all of the reported cases of Zika disease in the U.S. are from travelers who contracted the disease outside of the country and brought it home. One man was exposed and infected but had not yet exhibited symptoms before coming home and engaging in unprotected sex with his wife. Both tested positive for Zika when they become ill. A woman in Hawaii gave birth to an infant with a small head after catching the disease while visiting Brazil. There are no known cases of infections due to mosquito bites occurring in the U.S. as of February 7, 2016.

How to Protect Yourself from Catching Zika Disease

The same protocols for eliminating the threat of any mosquito bites apply. First, eliminate breeding grounds. Clean, cover, or get rid of containers that capture standing water. Use screens on windows, keep doors closed, and if you live in an area with a lot of mosquitos, consider sleeping under a mosquito net.

Long sleeves, long pants, and light covered clothing are helpful. You will be told to use insect repellent. Rather than cover your body with insecticide, make your own safe, mosquito/tick repellent.

If your partner has been exposed and you are pregnant or have been trying to become pregnant, use condoms. Scientists do not yet know how long the virus can be contracted after an infection, but this information should be common knowledge soon.

Genetically Modified Mosquitoes and the Zika Virus

Spraying reduces mosquito populations by 30%-50%. The recent release of GM mosquitoes in the CECAP/Eldorado district in Brazil resulted in a 90% reduction in the mosquito population. The release, made before the sudden Zika virus explosion, was targeting mosquitos that carry dengue and chikungunya. These are the same mosquitos that carry Zika. The dengue infection plummeted from 144 cases the previous year to only 1 case after the release of the mosquitos.

The popularity of the belief that genetically modified mosquitoes are responsible for either the spread of the virus or the rise in birth defects is baseless. Male mosquitoes feed on flower nectar; females feed on blood. Only male mosquitoes are genetically modified before being released into the wild. They are equipped with a “kill switch” that successfully kills their offspring before the larvae reach maturity (and can feed on anyone).

It is expected that millions of GM mosquitos will be released to combat the current epidemic.

Conclusion

The Zika virus is a mild virus, one that usually results in no symptoms at all or a low fever and a mild rash. Suddenly this disease is linked with causing a devastating birth defect. This correlation may or may not be causation. Many critics are questioning the probability, especially when comparing Brazil’s outcomes against Colombia’s. Some are suggesting the birth defects are due to Brazil’s practice of vaccinating pregnant women with both the DTP and the MMR vaccines and reminding us that rubella and pertussis components in the DPT vaccine are known to cause microcephaly. Other doctors suggest that a pesticide, Pyriproxyfen (manufactured by Sumitomo Chemical, a Japanese ‘strategic partner’ of Monsanto), which has been added to drinking water tanks to kill mosquito larvae since 2014, may be the source.  And of course, some continue to blame the new genetically modified mosquitoes. Although it seems unlikely that genetically modified mosquitoes are a factor, the outcome of these experimental practices remains unknown. What is clear is that something is not adding up. As always, we need to follow the money and see who is benefitting from the situation or who has something to hide. Unfortunately, the list of possible suspects continues to grow.

Further Reading:

• How Viruses Work and How to Prevent and Eliminate Them Naturally
• How to Deal with Mosquitoes Naturally
• Doctors Against Vaccines – Hear From Those Who Have Done the Research
• Lyme Disease on the Rise and Spreading Across America – With All Natural Tick Spray Recipe
• How to Cure Lyme Disease, and Virtually Any Other Bacterial Infection, Naturally

Sources:

• Zika virus – WHO Media Centre
• History of Zika virus – Zika Virus Net
• U.S. adds more countries to Zika travel alert – Reuters
• Colombia: 3,177 pregnant women with Zika; no microcephaly – Yahoo News
• Zika virus: WHO declares global public health emergency, says causal link to brain defects ‘strongly suspected’ – Washington Post
• What is the Zika Virus Epidemic Covering Up? – Green Med Info
• Argentine and Brazilian doctors suspect mosquito insecticide as cause of microcephaly – Ecologist