I don’t tend to wear sunglasses, and I never wear sunscreen. I do burn easily if I have not taken the time to acclimate myself to the sun, so I will either wear long sleeve shirts and a hat, limit my exposure until my skin builds tolerance, or, more often than not, I’ll just burn.

I’m not recommending you go out and get sunburned, but I don’t think people should be so afraid of it. Sunlight is so important. It’s better to get burned a few times a year than to not get enough sunlight.

I work at my computer a lot. Sometimes I realize that I have gone more than a week without any significant sun exposure. Other times, I notice I am feeling depressed or I’m having trouble sleeping, or I’m irritable. My prescription: light sunbathing. I feel so much better after I spend some time soaking in the rays.

Dr. Holick wants us to get some sunlight and then put on sunscreen. I respectfully disagree. I don’t want to put toxic creams on my skin only to cook the ingredients in the sun. This seems like a recipe for skin cancer to me.

Sunlight is natural. When in doubt, go with what’s natural. It’s what we humans are programmed for. Almost every time, the natural choice is the healthy choice.

Michael Edwards

Editor in Chief

Seasonal Affective Disorder, or SAD, is a form of depression linked to lack of sunlight. Onset of symptoms occurs annually during winter months with more cases occurring in areas with longer and more severe winters.

Symptoms include low mood, feeling abnormally sad and weepy, hopeless, worthless and guilty, often with a preoccupation of death and dying. Concentration is poor and motivation is low with agitation, irritability, and restlessness. Sleep is difficult with delayed onset, early waking, and/or sleeping too much. Weight loss or weight gain is common. Physical symptoms are also prevalent and include headaches, generalized aches, pains, and lethargy. All symptoms of vitamin D deficiency.

Light therapy, UVB light, has been used successfully to reverse or diminish symptoms of SAD and to increase vitamin D levels. (Remember vitamin D is actually a hormone produced by the body after exposure to the sun).

Light therapy can be provided through artificial light—light boxes—or by the sun itself. Weather and work permitting, an hour or two in the winter sun, even on an overcast day, can produce benefits.

If you suffer from annual winter blues or from full-blown SAD, consider a move closer to the equator.

Recommended Supplements:

• Vitamin D – Thorn Complex
• B-Complex #6  – Thorne Research

Further Reading:

• Natural Remedies for Depression
• How To Be Happy
• Sun Therapy for Seasonal Affective Disorder
• Vitamin B6 and What You Should Know About it

MJ’s Herbals sent us their line of Herbal Salves to try. We love them! All of the ingredients are natural (most organic) and they work very well. Their line includes:

• Lavender E Salve – headaches, stress, cuts, scrapes, rashes, blemishes, tissue repair (vitamin E)
• Breast Balm – strengthens breast tissue, activates immune system and lymphatic system, softens scars over time.
• First Aid Salve – antiseptic, antibacterial, cuts, scraps, cracked lips, burns, rashes.
• Arnica Salve – bruises, overworked sore muscles, tendon injuries and sprains.
• Calendula Salve – slow healing wounds, skin ulcers, irritated skin (ideal for baby skin).

MJ’s Herbals should be in everyone’s medicine cabinet. www.mjsherbals.com

I was a senior in high school the first time I attempted a natural cure. One day my glands swelled up and my throat hurt so badly I could barely swallow. I looked like I had the mumps.

I’d read about the curative properties of vitamin C. At lunch, I drove to the drug store and bought a big bottle of chewable vitamin C. I chewed a handful of tablets and continued to eat one or two every fifteen minutes. By the end of the day all of my symptoms had vanished.

My second remarkable cure occurred a few years later. I had three deep warts on my hand that had been chemically removed, burned, and finally surgically removed. Each time, they immediately grew back. Worse yet, I had dozens of painful Plantar warts on the ball of my foot. I’d had the warts on my hand for more than five years, the warts on my foot for more than a year. A friend handed me a high quality vitamin E capsule and suggested I open it and spread the vitamin E on the warts. I did it to appease her. Imagine my surprise when all of the warts disappeared within two weeks with no further treatment!

The warts on my foot never reoccurred. Years later, the warts on my hand did reappear. One more dose of vitamin E and I have never seen another wart.

I wish I had learned more about alternative health care after these two early successes. Unfortunately, I followed the medical model to the detriment of my health. More on that later…

Human glyoxalase I. Two zinc ions that are needed for the enzyme to catalyze its reaction are shown as purple spheres, and an enzyme inhibitor called S-hexylglutathione is shown as a space-filling model, filling the two active sites.

There are several different kinds of enzymes. The ones I focus on typically are digestive enzymes and systemic enzymes.

Digestive enzymes like hydrochloric acid and pepsin are the primary things you need in your stomach to help digest proteins and minerals. They also help to sterilize the stomach and kill parasites, bacteria, mold, micro spores, etc. Ideally your stomach is the only place in your body that’s acidic, and it should be extremely acidic. After the mouth the stomach is the beginning of all chemical and digestive reactions in your body. You need all the atomic energy in there to break up the molecules and to get things ready and assembled for digestion. If you put protein like meat in water it will just set there; it won’t break down. Put the same protein in a strong hydrochloric acid and it will dissolve relatively quickly, and that’s what you want to have happen. You want things to dissolve relatively quickly. You don’t want food just sitting there rotting in your stomach. That’s the reason you need to avoid drinking fluids during your meals. They will dilute the acids. As you can imagine, taking antacids while you are trying to digest foods pretty much puts a stop to everything.

Digestive enzymes work in the stomach to digest food, while quality systemic enzymes are enterically coated to prevent contact with the stomach acid. This way they pass through the stomach into the intestines where they are absorbed by the body.

We are born with the ability to produce a certain amount of systemic enzymes. Systemic enzymes fight
inflammation, fibrosis (scar tissue), and viruses; modulate the immune system; and cleanse the blood. These enzymes are a kind of scavenger hunter. They go after foreign protein, things that shouldn’t be there. They’ll go after scar tissue, a cyst, bacteria, parasites, viruses. Virtually anything that doesn’t belong in your body is like food to these enzymes. We’ve even seen systemic enzymes kill heartworms in cats. And when you are young you can bump into things, fall, scratch yourself, and your body healed easily, and quickly, often not leaving a scar when you thought it would. You
didn’t have aches or pains, you healed so easily. But as they get older, the typical person does not ingest enough systemic enzymes and the body realizes it’s running out of them. So it begins to ration them, because if you completely run out, you can’t survive. Three days after you run out of enzymes you are dead. Your body always needs enough in reserve for the unexpected.

So you get into your 20’s and you don’t heal as quickly. You get into your thirties and you notice you scar more easily. You may even be developing permanent aches and pains. The reason you are running out of
these enzymes and not replenishing them is because you are not doing what you used to do, what all other animals do in nature, you aren’t eating living things.

When you pick an apple off of a tree, you get enzymes. When you eat an apple fallen from the tree a few days ago, you’re getting fewer enzymes. If you eat an apple off the shelf at the grocery store, well, you get the idea. It’s not rotten, it may have everything else you need, but the enzymes are gone.

Fish eat other fish, giraffes eat leaves, lions eat living prey, and we eat dead food. And we don’t heal like we should and we don’t digest our food like we should. We need these enzymes.

In Germany and Japan, two countries with the best healthcare in the world, you would be given systemic enzymes for almost any treatment. If you had kidney problems, they would include these enzymes in your treatment. If you were in an auto accident driving on the autobahn and sustained a spinal cord injury they would give you a retention enema with the equivalent of about 300 enzyme capsules to save you from major damage and reduce the possibility of major paralysis.

Dr. Kelly recommends Betaine HCl and Pepsin from Thorne for digestive enzymes and Vitälzym X for systemic enzymes.

Alzheimer’s. The word conjures up an image of a forgetful or confused elder. While this image is accurate for the earlier stages of Alzheimer’s disease, later stages are devastating. Alzheimer’s is a progressive, fatal brain disease that destroys every faculty, robbing its victims of dignity, personality, and cognitive abilities. In the late stages of the disease, victims lose control of bladder and bowel, the ability to feed themselves, and all ability to communicate.

There is no accepted singular cause of this disease and there is no known cure. There isn’t even a definitive diagnosis until post mortem dissection reveals an abundance of tell-tale plaques (deposits between nerve cells) and tangles (twisted fibers of proteins that develop within dying cells). Scientists have not determined whether these plaques and tangles cause Alzheimer’s or visa-versa. All they do know is that there is a definite correlation between Alzheimer’s and their occurrence as well as the amount of inflammation and brain shrinkage present. All of these changes occur as a part of normal aging, but in the case of Alzheimer’s, the changes are extreme.

More than 35 million people suffer from Alzheimer’s disease; 5.3 million are Americans.  The latest National Vital Statistics Report prepared by the CDC reports Alzheimer’s disease to be the 7th leading cause of death, while other reports place it as number 5.

Alzheimer’s is usually associated with advancing age, beginning at 65. By age 85, 45% of the population exhibits memory deficits indicative of the disease. Life expectancy post diagnosis averages 6-10 years, though some have lived for 20 years.

As the population ages and life expectancy increases, we face a daunting challenge: how to care for the 115.4 million people we expect to suffer from Alzheimer’s by 2050.¹

The Alzheimer’s Association website lists “Alzheimer’s Myths,” among them the suggestion that aluminum, Aspartame, flu shots, or mercury fillings are causal factors.  However, ongoing research is still investigating some of these possible causes.

The Fisher Center for Alzheimer’s Research Foundation reports that “aluminum does turn up in higher amounts than normal in some autopsy studies of Alzheimer’s patients, but not in all, and the aluminum found in some studies may have come from substances used in the laboratory to study brain tissue.” They conclude that scientists are still uncertain about the role aluminum plays in Alzheimer’s disease. ²

The Alzheimer’s Disease Research of the American Health Assistance Foundation is not ready to dismiss the metal connection, either. “Metals have been implicated in neurodegenerative diseases, although it is unlikely that any are the sole cause. For example, interest in a possible connection between aluminum and Alzheimer’s disease arose over 40 years ago, and the toxicity of aluminum has been the subject of much controversy since that time. However, aluminum has never been proven to be a direct cause of Alzheimer’s, and increasingly, evidence shows that Alzheimer’s disease is likely caused not by one, but by a combination of factors.”

Some studies show zinc levels are too low—some show they are too high. Some show a correlation to electro-magnetic exposure. Infant monkeys exposed to low levels of lead had higher levels of Alzheimer’s disease-related genes, elevated amyloid-beta levels and greater Alzheimer’s disease-like pathology in their frontal cortex. There is a correlation between Alzheimer’s and traumatic head injuries, type 2 diabetes, diet, education levels, cardiovascular disease, high blood pressure, elevated cholesterol, elevated homocysteine levels, inflammation,and oxidative damage (which is caused by free radicals).

Recent studies suggest a lifestyle that includes a low-fat, antioxidant-rich diet high in vitamins E and C (especially when the vitamin E comes from foods, not supplements) promotes a healthier brain. B vitamins are also essential to control homocysteine levels. Studies also show the importance of exercising the brain.

Genetics also play a role. Early onset Alzheimer’s, though rare, does run in families and up to 50% of the cases are linked to genetic defects (in 3 separate genes). The typical late onset Alzheimer’s also appears to have genetic links that affect the age of onset, though carrying the gene is not a sure indicator that the disease will develop.

Once again, do we need a study to tell us that toxic heavy metals known to cause brain damage and neurological damage are bad for the brain? No, we don’t.

If you haven’t as yet thrown out your aluminum cookware, boil water in an aluminum pan. Now pour the cooled water into a clear glass. Do you really want to drink that gray water? Cover a dish of spaghetti sauce with aluminum foil and make sure the foil touches the sauce. Leave it for a day and notice how the acidity of the tomatoes ate holes in the foil, dissolving aluminum into your food. Do you still want to eat it? Do you really want to cook with aluminum foil? Do you want to be injected with a vaccine containing mercury or aluminum? Do you want to eat fish contaminated with mercury?

Our brain is first and foremost an organ of the body. It requires good, healthy nutrition and as few toxins as possible in order to function well. Studies are showing definite correlation between diet and brain health as well as toxicity and brain health. So once again, don’t eat processed food.  You don’t need it. You body doesn’t want it. It isn’t good for you. Detox. Eat well. Exercise your body. And don’t forget to exercise your brain.

1 PR Newswire, More Than 35 Million People Have Alzheimer’s and Dementia Worldwide, According To New Report

2 Fisher Center for Alzheimer’s Research Foundation

Clear Eyes Without Cuts

How does a non-surgical treatment for cataracts grab you? As we age, cataract-related eye problems will only become more numerous. Estimates published in 2003 said that 42-percent of all blindness cases worldwide are due to cataracts and that 28,000 new cases were reported daily. These estimates also said that 43-percent of ophthalmologist referrals for Medicare patients were for cataracts. In civilized countries, mainstream treatment says surgery, even though there is up to a 50-percent chance of a relapse within two years and up to a 2-percent chance of surgical complications. In the rest of the world without enough trained eye surgeons, treatment may only be a shrug. Apparently, we need a non-surgical treatment that may help prevent and reverse the formation of cataracts.

A cataract is an eye problem consisting of proteins that fail to respond to the body’s natural antioxidants to remove Free Radicals to deal with oxidative stress. The proteins turn brown and yellow in the lens and cloud up vision. This process occurs during glycation or glycosylation, which is the process of how excess sugar binds with protein. Sugar is supposed to bind with proteins using enzymes, but if the body gets too much sugar this process happens differently and many bad results follow from these Advanced Glycated End Products (AGE). Glycation and oxidative stress are paired stressors on the body and cataracts are one possible outcome.

So, if there are just enough reasons to avoid surgery how do we prevent cataracts? Of course, Dr. Appleton will find at least one study that directly says sugar helps cause cataracts. In a recent study conducted in Pakistan, the researchers found that higher fructose levels in the blood led to reduced antioxidants and created conditions that could predict cataract formation.ⁱ

However, even if a cataract patient stops with the sugar the condition can continue to get worse. What to do? Much research has centered on variations of the antioxidant L-carnosine in an eye drop solution. Eventually, trial and error settled on N-acetylcarnosine as being the best way to get the L-carnosine into the eye without it breaking down into histamines too soon, so that it can work to clear up the oxidative stress that clouds vision.ⁱⁱ

A 1-percent solution of NALC dropped into the eye at least twice a day fights with the Free Radicals in the lens by binding with the glycation products that would otherwise bind with various proteins in the lens. The makers of Con-C, one such NALC formula, report consistent results above 80-percent improvement for all classes of cataract patients, even those who had vision problems for more than 20 years all without side effects.ⁱⁱⁱ

For most patients, it takes at least three months for the changes in the eyes to become noticeable as improved vision.
Obviously, the reminder to consult a medical professional before starting any treatment applies here as well, but you now have some alternatives to discuss before you go under the knife. To be fair, Con-C shares the market with another similar formula called Brite Eyes. We presume an equal effectiveness.

www.nancyappleton.com

http://nancyappletonbooks.wordpress.com

ⁱ Gul, A. et al. “Role of fructose concentration on cataractogenesis in senile diabetic and non-diabetic patients.” Graefes Arch Clin Exp Ophthalmol. 2009 Jun;247(6):809-14. Epub 2009 Feb 6.

ⁱⁱ Babizhayev MA, et al. “N-Acetylcarnosine and histidyl-hydrazide are potent agents for multitargeted ophthalmic therapy of senile cataracts and diabetic ocular complications.” J Drug Target. 2009 Jan;17(1):36-63.

ⁱⁱⁱ Babizhayev MA, et al. “N-Acetylcarnosine sustained drug delivery eye drops to control the signs of ageless vision: Glare sensitivity, cataract amelioration and quality of vision currently available treatment for the challenging 50,000-patient population.” Clin Interv Aging.2009;4(1):31-50. Epub 2009 May 14.