Does the simple act of reading that word make you squirm? How often do you find yourself squatting on the porcelain throne, tears streaming down your face, as you strain and push, hoping you aren’t giving birth to hemorrhoids or anal fissures? Do you poop several times a day, or do you go days between the urge?
Are you’re looking for that one thing, that one trick, that one pill that’s going to have you defecating easily without having to change your diet? We highly recommend permanent, well-researched diet changes with lots of raw produce to permanently alleviate constipation, but for those who don’t feel like this is an option, or for those on medications that slow bowel movements, the one you’re looking for is Shillington’s Intestinal Cleanse Formula.
What is Constipation?
Constipation can be defined as having hard, dry, difficult-to-pass stools or by the frequency (or rather infrequency) of passing stools. It can also be indicated by the appearance of the stool and whether the stool is completely evacuated from the rectum after a bowel movement.
You may have heard that it’s within the “healthy range” to have three bowel movements a week or even one a week. We beg to differ. While there will naturally be some variation in frequency, a healthy gut processes food fairly quickly and consistently. A healthy body is efficient when it comes to ridding itself of waste.
Preferably, you want to have a minimum of 1-3 soft, but well-formed, easy to pass bowel movements a day. We contend that the ideal is one bowel movement for every meal. After one eats a meal, the urge for a bowel movement typically comes shortly after food begins to leave the stomach to enter the small intestine. If that sounds like too many, imagine having one bowel movement a week after eating 3 meals a day for 7 days. You’ve been packing that food into your intestines before eliminating any of it. How gross is that? What about 3 day’s worth? That’s still a lot of food waste packed and crammed into your body. Also, when defecation is easy it’s generally very fast. Frequent poopers probably spend less time on the toilet overall than those who need a book to do their business.
Healthy Poop
Healthy poop is well-formed but soft. The Bristol Scale offers a visual of normal stool, constipation, and diarrhea. It’s not always accurate; there are other variables thank can affect density and size, but it’s good to know:
Conventional Relief from Constipation
These methods are just a way to treat the symptoms, not the cause.
Glycerin Suppositories
Glycerin suppositories are tapered pieces of hardened glycerin that are inserted into the rectum. Once inside, body heat melts the glycerin, which provides lubricant to aid in passing the bowel movement.
This seemingly innocuous treatment, which has long been prescribed for babies, may not be as benign as once thought. There are drug interactions, allergic reactions, and other side effects with glycerin, and suppositories are known to weaken the bowel muscles if done repeatedly.
Mineral Oil Enemas
Like with suppositories, there are drug interactions, allergic reactions, and other potential side effects with glycerin.
Other Enemas
Enemas are also known to weaken the bowel muscles if done repeatedly. Body Ecology recommends a variety of enemas to cleanse the colon such as enemas with apple cider vinegar, burdock tea, lemon juice, etc, but we do not recommend regular enemas for health maintenance. Instead, we recommend enemas for acute care only, and we recommend cultivating a healthy ecosystem that does not need to be washed away for health reasons.
Herbal Teas Known to Help with Constipation
Spearmint Tea
Senna Tea
Dandelion Tea
Licorice Root
Black Tea
Peppermint
Burdock Root Tea
Green Tea
Clove Tea
Tulsi Tea
Exercise
Exercise is crucial to physical health, and it may also help alleviate your constipation. If you are a couch potato, get up and move. Walk, swim, rebound, squat, get moving. If you can squat, squats can help alleviate constipation and other issues as well. If you can’t squat try laying on the floor, getting up off the floor, lying back down, and repeating while alternating how the legs are used. And of course, there’s yoga! meet Adrian. Then follow her on YouTube and do her 30-day challenge. It’s life-changing. A few weeks later and you will love her and you’ll love yourself for doing it.
Eliminate Chronic Constipation For Good
The two most common causes of constipation are the two things most easily remedied – dehydration and a poor diet. If you want to rid yourself of constipation, you must drink enough water, and you must eat a diet filled with real food, optimally, a diet consisting of 80% fresh, raw, organic produce. Yes, real food, not processed garbage out of a box, a can, a jar, or a plastic tray you pop in the microwave. Ok, maybe it’s not an “easy remedy.”
The Constipation Elimination Diet
The recommended daily intake of water varies with gender, age, and other factors including how much raw produce a person eats. Check out this article at Healthline for more on water intake. An additional way to increase your fluid intake is drinking by cranberry lemonade throughout the day. Cranberry lemonade will also help you detox your liver and kidneys, boost your immune response, and improve all major bodily functions.
Raw produce provides the fiber and bulk to create healthy stools, and it provides the fiber needed for a healthy gut. Beneficial gut bacteria thrive when 80% of your diet is made up of raw, organic, produce. And a healthy gut is essential for overall health, proper digestion, and proper elimination.
If you think the 80% number sounds too difficult, eat one super salad each day filled with a variety of vegetables. Your body will thank you. Not only will you be filling your body with nutrient dense foods, you will be naturally detoxing on an ongoing basis through the food you eat. And in between meals, eat a piece of fresh, raw, organic fruit. For more on diet:
For extra help add several prunes and/or figs to your daily diet.
Posture on the Throne
We weren’t built to poop on a chair. We were built to poop from a squat. You can either squat in the woods or improvise. The knowledge that a squatting position is best for elimination is not news (I learned about it more than 40 years ago). But the idea is gaining in popularity to the point that posture aids, called squatting potties or toilet stools, are now readily available for purchase. Basically, these are footstools designed to raise your feet when you sit on the toilet and slide back out of the way when not in use.
For an immediate fix, try any low footstool you have on hand or make one with books or magazines. The point is to mimic the squatting position, which aligns the large intestine and rectum for ease of elimination.
Invest in a bathroom stool whether constipation is an issue or not. Correct posture will certainly help to avoid straining and aid in proper elimination.
Dr. Shillington offers the Intestinal Detox and the Intestinal Cleanse formulas for detoxifying the bowels. If you need to move your poop, there’s nothing more effective than Shillington’s Intestinal Cleanse formula. It also kills parasites, heals the intestinal tract, and is a healthy means to promote bowel movements for those who have trouble defecating. Shillington’s Intestinal detox draws out old fecal matter from the walls of the intestine, while it removes poisons, toxins, heavy metals such as mercury and lead, and more (heavy metals are another common cause of constipation). Due to the charcoal and clays in the Intestinal Detox, it actually slows things down a bit, and the two also work very well together to heal the gut.
Abzorb is another big recommendation. It’s a systemic enzyme, so the capsule does not release until it is inside the gut. It’s also a probiotic, and an effective one at that. Taken with food Abzorb makes for a very effective digestive aid. Taken without food, Abzorb will begin to clear away old fecal matter, and it offers a host of other benefits (read more about enzymes here).
Sugar Leads to Depression – World’s First Trial Proves Gut and Brain are Linked (Protocol Included)
It’s official. If you’re keeping up with the latest science, you know that the gut is inexorably linked to the brain. This year researchers found a correlation between depression and mood swings in men and high sugar intake.1 Last year a study showed probiotics could help with reducing the risk of depression.2 A growing body of evidence is proving that healthy people’s microbiota has a lot in common with other healthy people’s microbiota, and diseased people’s micro-biota also have common traits.3 They’ve been talking about how the gut may affect the brain and the immune system more and more for the last 20 years. Mainstream medicine is slowly figuring out that our gut’s microflora correlates directly with our health, and sugar and other junk foods do not promote healthy gut bacteria.
World’s First Trial Shows Improving Diet Can Treat Major Depression
Depression is one of the world’s most prevalent and costly medical disorders. It may be surprising to read “World’s First” in regards to a trial study establishing a link between diet and depression, as many would guess that this kind of study has done before. It hasn’t been, but headlines proclaiming that healthier diets may decrease the risk of depression have been appearing in the news more frequently. That is the work of Director of Deakin’s Food and Mood Centre Professor Felice Jacka and her team. She’s published numerous epidemiological (survey-based) studies reporting that eating an unhealthy diet shows you are more likely to be depressed. The studies were based on questionnaires. They were not actual diet experiments. They have simply educated guesses that hadn’t been tested in the real world yet. Until now.
Professor Jacka said the results of her team’s new study may offer a better approach to depression.
We’ve known for some time that there is a clear association between the quality of people’s diets and their risk for depression.
This is the case across countries, cultures and age groups, with healthy diets associated with reduced risk, and unhealthy diets associated with increased risk for depression.
However, this is the first randomised controlled trial to directly test whether improving diet quality can actually treat clinical depression.” – Professor Jacka
The Study Details
Professor Jacka’s team recruited 67 men and women. The participants had severe depression and also reported eating a relatively unhealthy diet. Most of them were taking antidepressants and/or were in regular psychotherapy.
Half of the participants adhered to a Mediterranean diet while they attended dietary support sessions with a nutritionist. The others continued eating as usual (unhealthy), but they were required to attend social support “befriending” sessions. Everyone’s depression symptoms were graded using several different tests.
Encouraged foods included: whole grains, fruits, vegetables, legumes, low-fat/ unsweetened dairy, raw unsalted nuts, lean red meat, chicken, fish, eggs, and olive oil
Beverage information: maximum two sugar-sweetened beverages per week and maximum two alcoholic drinks per day, preferably red wine.
The Study Results
People in the unhealthy diet group improved a statistically insignificant amount, and those in the healthy diet group improved their symptoms with a full third of them fully reversing their depression. It’s also important to note that this was done with conventionally accepted dietary protocols. It should be noted that these “healthy” diets are not that healthy. Imagine the results a more radical approach could have achieved.
How & Why (gut bacteria, B vitamins, etc.)
In another study, scientists from McMaster University wanted to test how mice with different gut bacterial conditions deal with stress.4
The baby mice were stressed from 3 to 21 days old by being separated from their mother for 3 hours each day. This experiment was conducted with mice that had different gut bacterial conditions. One group of mice was grown completely free of bacteria in their guts and kept in a sterile room to prevent bacteria from affecting their behaviors (germ-free mice). The other group were regular mice that were exposed to an ordinary, complex range of bacteria. The last group was a germ-free control group that hadn’t been separated from their mothers. The baby mice with normal gut microbiomes that had been subjected to early-life stress showed an unusual increase in the stress hormone corticosterone. They also exhibited signs of depression as well as anxiety. The germ-free mice, meanwhile, behaved similarly to the control mice, showing no symptoms of anxiety or depression. It is interesting to note that these mice also had elevated levels of corticosterone, just not symptoms of depression. Naturally, the control group showed no elevated stress hormone or altered behavior.”
These results indicate that the bacteria in our environment contribute to our mental health and behavior.
Next, they exposed the germ-free mice to bacteria taken from the stressed group. As the bacterial composition of the germ-free mice changed, so did their metabolic activity and their behavior. After a few weeks, the previously symptom-free mice were now showing signs of depression. Finally, the researchers wanted to see how the control group reacted when they were exposed to bacteria from the stressed mice. In this situation, the mice didn’t start showing symptoms of depression at all.” – IFLS
Our brains are running off of the energy our gut and our lungs are producing. If our gut is producing an unhealthy chemical environment, this effects the whole body including the brain.
Stop eating sugar and processed foods. Yes, the depressed brain wants to reach for the nearest comfort food (donut, pizza, what have you), but the mice have proven that’s probably the last thing you actually need. The brain and the gut are intertwined and cultivating your beneficial bacteria with raw, fresh produce; soaked and sprouted nuts; and antibiotic-free, pasture-raised meats is a necessary part of any healing process. You don’t expect a mechanic to work on your car without tools. Why expect the same from your body?
Most people reading this who are really looking for answers to help with their depression are not going to be able to take on an entirely new lifestyle filled with shopping at farmers markets and cooking all of one’s own food. Think of this is the long-term goal and take baby steps towards being more connected and in touch with your food. Also, check out How I Overcame Depression NaturallyandI’m Depressed.
Stop with the germaphobia
If you carry a small bottle of disinfectant on your keychain or find yourself constantly rubbing your hands together in a strange imitation of someone over a campfire, step away from the sanitizer. You’re doing more harm than good. Most commercial sanitizers contain harmful ingredients like triclosan, parabens, and sulfates. They also contribute to the inability to fight diseases naturally.
Exposure to harmful bacteria teaches the body how to naturally fight infection. It’s why we suggest that small children spend time playing in the dirt. But antibiotics, hand sanitizers, and household cleaners have taken that away from us, along with the beneficial bacteria. Beneficial bacteria is the gatekeeper to the immune system.
Play With Nature, Get Dirty
Speaking of sticking your hands in the dirt…do it. When you’re depressed, the last thing you want to hear s some random person chirping at you about how you should “just go outside…” but seriously…do it. Vitamin D is your friend.
If you’re near water, you’re in luck. Humans respond to water on a primal level.
Exert Yourself
This one is kind of like the go outside one…you gotta do it. Make it something simple. Maybe swap getting in the car for walking somewhere instead. Play your favorite music or enjoy some people watching.
A depressed brain is likely in short supply of feel-good endorphins and neurotransmitters.
Sleep Well
Make yourself go to bed. Stop looking at your phone. In fact, take a cue from babies, nature’s original fussy sleepers. Or at least a cue from their parents – nighttime routine. No, you’re not in a onesie (are you?), but many of the tricks used by hopeful parents can be modified to help you.
Bath, with soothing essential oils (because you’re an adult now!) or other pleasing spa products? Check. Soothing music/white noise/smoothly voiced NPR podcast? Check. A ridiculous book you don’t necessarily want anyone to see you reading? Check. Momma knows best, but you’re still a grown ass adult. Have fun planning a decadent pre-bed routine. Also, check out Insomnia – A Comprehensive Look with Natural Remedies.
Almost everyone in the world who is dealing with chronic health issues or chronic mental issues has an abundance of Candida and heavy metal toxicity, along with a lack of beneficial bacteria. Diet alone can fix this for most people, but when the head is not working well, choices don’t usually go well either. B vitamins can help alleviate depression until the healthy gut microbes develop. Good fats (click here) are a must for people who can’t assimilate Bs properly. For those dealing with depression, a diet rich in B vitamins and healthy fats is a very good start. Supplements can be used to accelerate healing and eliminate all the other ailments and used to kill Candida and promote healthy bacteria.
This is my favorite for killing anything fungal, but it also works on parasites and other pathogens. If you have had yeast infections, athlete’s foot, see floaters, have BO, or eat the way everyone in modern countries do, you’ll want this supplement. There are tons of other choices for killing yeast (click here), but I don’t know of anything that does a better job for the money than SF722. Candida can become fairly immune to many other antimicrobials but studies have shown that this does not happen with SF722.
Probiotics
Probiotics help fix everything int he gut, including breaking down and removing things that shouldn’t be there, like heavy metals. A healthy gut detox the body all the time. Often touted as the cure everything supplement for the well-informed, probiotics are something most everyone is familiar with these days. What most do not know is that the vast majority of probiotic supplements on the market are ineffectual at best, and many actually feed yeast. How the probiotics are processed and preserved make all the difference. It’s not an easy task to produce good probiotics; our stomach acid is designed to kill it. Two of my favorites are FloraMend and Bio-K (the latter is not available in our store, but it is at most health food stores and Whole Foods). I don’t recommend taking a probiotic with antimicrobials. A really good probiotic should come out on top, but you are reducing its effectiveness when you combine it with compounds that kill. For instance, I would take SF722 all day and a probiotic at night and early morning, or vice versa, where I take the probiotic with food and the SF722 late and early. Different digestive issues can favor one over the other so try both ways and see what works for you.
Don’t take them with antimicrobials, and make sure they are high-quality supplements. Anyone without an appendix should take a probiotic every day with every major meal for the rest of their life. Your appendix secretes out beneficial bacteria when you don’t have enough. Take them on an empty stomach as noted or with food to help digest food inside the gut. I recommend mixing it up each day, but I do recommend caution when taking systemic enzymes. Too many systemic enzymes can cause issues, they can start to eat away at the body, so I don’t just grab a big handful like I do with SF722. I personally take 4-6 a day on an empty stomach, and I take more with food as needed.
One antimicrobial you can take with probiotics is olive leaf extract. It’s great for maintenance but it’s not a yeast serial-killer like SF722 (otherwise it would damage the probiotic). It’s a fine supplement, and but it’s not going to do much of anything all by itself. I like Abzorb best right now for a probiotic. For more on systemic enzymes click here.
Magnesium
Magnesium is an old home remedy for all that ails you, including ‘anxiety, apathy, depression, headaches, insecurity, irritability, restlessness, talkativeness, and sulkiness.’ In 1968, Wacker and Parisi reported that magnesium deficiency could cause depression, behavioral disturbances, headaches, muscle cramps, seizures, ataxia, psychosis, and irritability – all reversible with magnesium repletion.” – Psychology Today
A small study reported that over-the-counter magnesium tablets significantly improve depression in just a couple of weeks.11
Magnesium is a foundational supplement, like calcium. In the modern world, there is a tendency to become deficient in this vital mineral, and this effects every single function of the body! Not having enough magnesium is like not having enough oil in the car. Something is going to break down sooner or later, and in the meaning time, things will not be running as well as they should.
Poop Easy
For some, the gut needs more help to eliminate properly. Everyone should defecateonce for every meal, and maybe once or twice more for those who also snack on lots of calories throughout the day like I do. Shillington’s Intestinal Cleanse is the best I know of for healing the gut, killing parasites that may reside within, and getting the bowels regular. Shillington’s Intestinal Detox helps eliminate heavy metals and anything positively charged (like most pathogens), and it slows down and firms up stools. It also helps heal the gut and rebuild a healthy biofilm. Together the two supplements have synergistic properties, and they can be taken together to help balance the gut. It’s a very effective combination, but if the budget is tight, get the one that suits your needs. Note that if you have chronic constipation and have not tried magnesium yet, Shillington’s Intestinal Cleanse may not be necessary with a good magnesium supplement.
Conclusion
We rely on bacteria to survive and yet many aspire to live in an antibacterial world. We know certain heavy metals are incredibly toxic to us, but we excuse them in vaccinations and light bulbs and sushi. Most of us know that fresh, raw vegetables pull our heavy metal toxins, but we grow conventional vegetables with such a heavy toxic load that they no longer have their natural chelation properties. For most people, when it’s all said and done, our physical well being affects our mental well being more than anything else in our lives. Our entire body is built on what we eat. Our heart, our gallbladder, our appendix, our fingers, our eyes, our noise, our brain – they all need the right nutrition to function properly. Nothing in the body gets healthy and stays healthy for long without fixing the gut first, and that includes the brain. If you’re looking for the easiest thing you can do, a little baby-step just to get you started, get the SF722 and Abzorb and some B vitamins. I can’t stress enough how much almost everyone in any modern country could use SF722 to help fix the gut. Get some sunlight or a D vitamin and some good fats. Start squatting every day, just a few to start with and build up daily. And get into some nature, be it walking or gardening or whatever. Another good option would be CBD oil. It’s showing a lot of promise with depression.
Fungal Infections – How to Eliminate Yeast, Candida, and Mold Infections For Good
Most, maybe all of you reading this, have Candida, even if you’re perfectly healthy. You have other fungi too. We all do. When the gut is healthy some fungus and lots of bacterial microbes live in harmony with us. Like bacteria, there will always be some fungi within us. Candida likes the human body. It’s the most common infectious fungus, typically responsible for oral thrush, skin rashes, eczema, psoriasis, athlete’s foot, vaginal yeast infections, and so much more. It’s one of our main microbes. Studies show that up to 90% of the population has Candida Albicans within them, but some (like me) suspect it’s closer to 100%.
Candida albicans is by far the most commonly known, accounting for about 50% of all cases of recognized fungal infections around the world. There is also Candida tropicalis, Candida glabrata, Candida parapsilosis, Candida krusei, Candida lusitaniae, and probably more, but let’s just call it all “Candida” for simplicity’s sake.
The most important point you should take away from this article is that Candida is not the “bad guys” any more than bacteria or other microbes are. With few exceptions, pathogens are simply responding to their environment. We understand this concept in biology well, but this concept gets ignored regarding the human body as it relates to disease. The fact is that the microbes all around our body are primarily based on the eco-system inside our gut, which is dictated primarily by the food they have to eat, i.e., the food we eat. You can take the nicest, friendliest bacteria from the gut, place it in a sanitized petri dish, introduce some sanitary junk food with simple sugars, and those bacteria are not going to look or act like our friendly little symbiotic fellows much longer. Microbes are very good at evolving to their environment, and we have a lot of different kinds. Even if you’re missing most of the beneficial bacteria that you should have, you still have a huge array of symbiotic microbes.
Candida and Bacteria
This single-cell organism, Candida, reproduces asexually and thrives on dead tissue, scar tissue, dead and decaying cells of any kind, and simple sugars from food. On that note, most all pathogens prefer to feed on simple sugars and dead or decaying cells. They are our garbage collectors. The problem is that their mere presence causes irritation (for various reasons, including gasses they release). This irritation leads to damage, so if a colony of a certain type of microbes has enough to eat in an area where they should not be, this can damage the area, giving the microbes more food, thus the vicious cycle of disease.2
Pathogens like simple sugars the best,1 but when they don’t get as much as they are used to they tend to get irritated and then turn hostile. This causes more nearby cell damage and decay which hurts us and feeds them.
When the body is in homeostasis, the microbes are balanced and the gut is healthy. When the gut is healthy, the gut doesn’t leak the wrong things into the body.
Gut Balance
When we eat foods that are best for us (like raw vegetables and herbs) the most beneficial microflora go to work. Happy with plenty of food and reproducing, they crowd out everyone else, and these guys help regulate and even produce lots of vitamins hormones as they break down protein molecules. Proteins that have not been digested thoroughly by our gut bacteria will not be digested well by us. These proteins entering the body will be looked at as “foreign proteins” which is antigenic to the body (causes immune response).3
Many of the bacteria that harm us tend to move quickly and come across as generally more agitated under a microscope. Healthy gut bacteria under a microscope look like a decent bunch of fairly slow moving microbes, just doing their thing. There are plenty of slow-moving bacteria and amoeba and other pathogens that move slowly, but looking at good bacteria, you can visually see how they can gently protect the body and crowd out or at least slow down pathogenic proliferation. Gut bacteria and mouth bacteria have a lot in common and bio-dentistry is on to this.
Check out the different behaviors of bacteria and other pathogens under a microscope. A fun experiment is to eat some raw vegetables like a salad, and then take a large saliva sample, put it under the lens in a petri dish, and find the bacteria swimming around in your mouth. See how fast they move. See how many there are. Now drink some soda or something else terrible, and get it all in your gums and everything. If you’re a smoker, do that too. In 10 minutes take another sample. The microbes are different. They’re fast and they seem angry. If you like videos, here’s a video. Note what they say about diet. I find it both wonderful and frustrating how close conventional wisdom has gotten to understanding the impact food plays on our microbes.
But we live in an antibacterial world. And while superbugs are coming to destroy us all, we’ve done a remarkable job of killing off and suppressing bacteria, for both good and bad. I had the urge to type “both good and bad bacteria,” but that’s the misnomer. Microbes are not good or bad (though for simplicity’s sake I will refer to them this way). The “bad” bacteria are just doing their job, and the beneficial bacteria that are friendly to us can mutate and become pathogenic under poor-health circumstances.
Just a quick, barely relevant fact: There are many strains of e. Coli and salmonella that we know of that often exist in our gut and cause us no harm.7 The pathogenic, virulent forms are a result of factory farming. 8 These two superbugs that kill us so often are a result of some badass e. Coli or salmonella that was actually tough enough to survive and escape the incredibly acidic and antimicrobial environment of a factory-farmed cow or chicken, respectively. It’s not only metaphoric of how our gut works. Consider the parallels between how microbes adapt and our justice system, or our drug wars, or how we fight terrorism. We as humans behave like microbes in a myriad of ways. We could learn a lot…
Also, our fruit has much more sugar in it than it used to. Even if one never eats refined foods we get more sugar from fresh fruit than we ever would have in nature before we started selectively breeding our food (hybridization). In other words, even if you’re eating the perfect modern paleo diet, you’re not eating like a paleo at all, unless your bananas look more like this:
So, as a population, we eat fruit with tons of easily absorbed sugar, we eat refined foods, and we do lots of stuff to kill our gut flora, like GMOs, antibiotics, pesticides, and herbicides, etc. But Candida is really hard to kill. We often eliminate most or all of the microbes in our gut and much around our body with antibiotics, but Candida spores cannot be killed so easily. They wait, dormant, patient, just lying around for up to 6 months.4,5 These spores will survive anything we try to do to get rid of them. As soon as they sense a hospitable environment (food, i.e. sugar) they will come to life and proliferate.6
What Causes An Overabundance of Candida?
You get the idea by now, but mostly, it’s an overall poor diet with too much sugar. At least 95% of the problem is sugar. Refined foods are sugar to the body. But there are a lot of other things we do that allow Candida to flourish and run our lives:
Chemical birth control
NSAID pain relievers
Steroids
Factory farmed meat
Chronic constipation
Alcohol
Recreational drugs
Mercury toxicity (like dental fillings)
Other heavy toxicity (like from vaccines)
Extreme stress
Vitamin and mineral deficiencies
Here’s How Candida Takes Over
Candida is hanging out in the gut of a person. Said person eats a bunch of nasty food with toxins that kill our most beneficial flora, along with refined foods that quickly break down into simple sugars that do an efficient job of feeding pathogenic microbes. The person gets sick. The person takes antibiotics. The prescriptions may also kill off the Candida in the gut too, but not the spores. Said person then, hopefully feeling better by now, eats as he or she normally eats. Candida reactivates its lifecycle. They proliferate with little to no competition. Once that Candida is feeling crowded and has outgrown its home in the gut, Candida will grow out of its simple single-cell yeast form and into a filamentous, mycelial, virulent fungal form, growing root-like tentacles (hyphae) that drill deep into the mucosal lining of the gut, poking “holes” into already an irritated and inflamed, gut lining, resulting in a leaky gut.9,10 (Click here for more on mycelial fungi.) Now Candida and all kinds of other crap (excuse the pun) can leak into the bloodstream and travel throughout the body. Candida can infect every organ of the body. When it takes the fungal form, it creates a toxic biofilm that protects itself against things that would normally kill it (like antibiotics). It may or may not be Candida that is causing what ails you, but there is at least a very good chance that Candida opened the door to the pathogen at some point.
When Candida makes its escape, it proliferates into the bloodstream, and consequently, all around the body. If you smashed your elbow in a football injury 17 years ago there is still a tiny bit of scar tissue there, and that’s one of the places that Candida will set up a home outside the gut. When they don’t have sugar they will feed off of scar tissue and other “dead” cells.
Now the body is overwhelmed. The Candida will travel all over the body, but it will usually be eliminated from the blood fairly quickly. Maybe said person goes and gets a blood test, but you can read here why tests for Candida aren’t very accurate. The toxins that Candida leave behind get filtered out by the liver, eventually, hopefully, but the virulent Candida itself will be purged from the blood as the body’s immune system goes into high gear. Now the body has satellite infections of Candida all over, spread throughout. Every ache we have from an old injury is most likely hurting when there is pathogenic activity. When we wake up in the morning we are at our most achy in large part because of reduced blood flow and movement leading to more pathogenic activity. And again, this is a good thing in a balanced body, as they are taking out the garbage.
Picture that body full of Candida satellite infections. If the person eats sugars the Candida get fed, gets happy, proliferates, probably does another bloodstream ride to spread out, and that’s that. When one restricts the sugar, what do Candida eat? Us. Dead or weak cells. It kinda hurts. Feed the Candida another burst of sugar (or toxic food that damages the cells enough to feed the Candida that way), and the Candida leaves us alone for a bit. This is obviously overly simplistic, but it should show how easily and symbiotically Candida can cause poor food cravings.
There are antifungal drugs that can kill off Candida, but again, not the spores. Once those spores are all over the body, they will stay hanging around for up to six months, waiting for food.
This same sort of thing happens with other pathogens too, but Candida is the key. It literally opens the doors for other pathogens (and food particles that needed more digestion, and lots of other “crap”) by creating the holes in the gut. Other things can create this extra permeability as well, but Candida opens the gut fast and typically does it often.
Candida and Wheat
Candida causes lots of unexpected and fascinating problems that connect a lot of dots for those with chronic health issues. Take wheat for instance. A protein found in Candida called HWP-1 is identical or highly homologous (nearly identical) to two gluten proteins, alpha gliadin and gamma-gliadin. These proteins are known to stimulate immune cell responses in people with celiac disease. In other words, Candida, the yeast responsible for oral thrush and vaginal infections (and so much more), contains the same protein sequence as wheat gluten and therefore could trigger celiac disease.
It gets worse. The gluten protein is similar to protein structures in the nervous system and the thyroid tissue. The body will turn on these proteins shortly after it begins reacting to gluten. This is the essence of chronic autoimmune disease.
How To Know if You Have Candida
This is a hard one for most people to swallow, but if you’re sick, you’ve got Candida. As we’ve established, it’s not about “catching it.” If the gut is not balanced the gut has an abundance of Candida and other less-than-beneficial microbes. If any of the following pertain to you, Candida or not, it’s time to balance the gut by fixing the diet.
Allergies
Skin issues
White tongue
Floaters in vision
Itchy feet or hands or ears
Prone to any other infections
The allergies concept is especially hard for many, but it’s true. If you have food or seasonal allergies, stop blaming genetics and accept that the body’s biology is out of balance. For more on this, check out Candida Overgrowth Symptoms.
How to Prevent Candida Overgrowth
First of all, stop thinking of microbes as the bad guys. That’s not the case, not at all. Think of them more like humans. Picture yourself as you grow up in the worst war-torn part of the world you can imagine. Drone strikes, little food, toxic water, and a brain that functions half as well as yours does. How would you react to your environment? What’s the best way to fix the problem? Fix the environment. And it’s also the only way to prevent the problem in the first place.
Drink lots of water, and feed the body foods that the friendliest microbes love. Flushing the body is critical because there are lots of gasses and other toxic substances that accumulate in the body with an abundance of Candida. It slows the bodily systems, causing sluggish liver and kidney functionality.
Here are three articles on diet. The information will prevent Candida infestations in the body, as well as any other pathogen, and in most cases, with patience, this diet/lifestyle will eliminate Candida and other diseases as well.
The first one has my salad and cranberry-lemonade recipe. I suggest everyone eat and drink like that every single day.
The Best Supplements for Killing Candida, Yeast, Molds, Other Funghis
First and foremost, just pack the gut with good food. Eat a big salad. Picture the intestinal tract and imagine it being packed full of vegetables and herbs. If you’re one of those health-food hating virulent microbes, you’re at least not going to be reproducing while you’re being squeezed out by salad and salad loving microbes.
Cut out all refined foods because they feed pathogens. Cut out all toxic foods because they kill the good guys and damage the gut which feeds the pathogens. If you suffer from allergies, you eat too much sugar and/or refined foods (or drink alcohol regularly). Cut out the sugar and the allergies go away. See the above articles for more on diet. Most people don’t need supplements and can get rid of every single health issue they have with just diet. On the other hand, with the intense sugar cravings that Candida causes, supplements can not only speed up the process of getting well, they can balance a person’s body just enough to help ensure better choices are made and the supplements also compensate for the bad choices. But therein lies the rub. Most people are just looking for that one supplement that’s going to ease some of the pain their lifestyle causes. And while that one supplement should be SF722, in my opinion, the most common way someone uses such a supplement is to take enough to feel the pain relief they seek while they keep making poor food choices until more pain relief in one form or another is needed. The only difference between supplements and prescriptions in the way most people use them is that supplements don’t have the toxic side effects. But my point is that without the right diet, just consuming supplements will not create homeostasis. That said, here are the top supplements to take for Candida control:
This is my favorite for killing anything fungal. There are tons of other choices (click here), but I don’t know of anything that does a better job for the money than SF722. Candida can become fairly immune to many other antimicrobials but studies have shown that this does not happen with SF722. SF722 is antimicrobial so it can kill some of the good guys, but it doesn’t seem like it’s very good at killing bacteria compared to some other compounds. This is a benefit when dealing with Candida.
How to Take SF722
I’ve known people that take more than 60 in a day. It can acidify the body temporarily, but the acids are dispelled easily and Candida doesn’t like acidity (I wonder how many people will feel the need to check on this fact). Obviously, you want a slightly alkaline body for health, but Candida is not one of the ones that like acidic environments. The bottle says to do 15 (5×3) and I recommend moving up in dosage if need be, depending on the die-off symptoms. Take it until Candida symptoms are gone, and then have it on hand to compensate future indulgences with poor food or drink choices. I usually take 20 when I eat at a restaurant.
Berberine
Goldenseal (Hydrastis canadensis), barberry (Berberis vulgaris), Oregon grape (Berberis aquifolium), and goldthread (Coptis chinensis) contain the broad-spectrum antibiotic alkaloid berberine. Berberine is effective against pathogens including bacteria, protozoa, and fungi. Berberine has been proven in some studies to be stronger than many common antibiotics.
How to Take Berberine
Take it separately from probiotics, and follow the instructions. I tend to always take twice as much as they recommend, but I also weight 220 pounds. There should not be a need for high doses while taking the other supplements.
Oil of Oregano
Oil of Oregano is one of nature’s most powerful antibiotic supplements, but I don’t think it’s all that great against Candida. Plus, it works so well that the body can’t maintain healthy bacteria. It’s a great supplement to have on hand, but it is one I reserve for the acutest cases where killing the bad guys is the primary and urgent focus.
Probiotics
Often touted as the cure everything supplement for the well-informed, probiotics are something most everyone is familiar with these days. What most do not know is that the vast majority of probiotic supplements on the market are ineffectual at best, and many actually feed yeast. How the probiotics are processed and preserved make all the difference. It’s not an easy task to produce good probiotics; our stomach acid is designed to kill it. Two of my favorite are FloraMend and Bio-K (the latter is not available in our store, but it is at most health food stores and Whole Foods). I don’t recommend taking a probiotic with antimicrobials. A really good probiotic should come out on top, but you are reducing its effectiveness when you combine it with compounds that kill. For instance, I would take SF722 all day and a probiotic at night and early morning, or vice versa, where I take the probiotic with food and the SF722 late and early. Different digestive issues can favor one over the other so try both ways and see what works for you.
How to Take Probiotics
Don’t take them with antimicrobials, and make sure they are high-quality supplements. Anyone without an appendix should take a probiotic every day with every major meal for the rest of their life. Your appendix secretes out beneficial bacteria when you don’t have enough.
One antimicrobial you can take with probiotics is Olive Leaf Extract. It’s great for maintenance but it’s not a yeast serial-killer like SF722 (otherwise it would damage the probiotic). It’s a fine supplement, but it’s not going to do much of anything all by itself.
Systemic Enzymes
I am in love with a fairly new supplement called Abzorb. It’s one of the only four I regularly take (I’ll mention the other three as well in a moment).
As we age, our pancreas produces fewer enzymes for the body. We need enzymes to survive. We need enzymes to do everything, not just break down proteins. If you are healthy, you have an abundance of healthy enzymatic activity. When enzymatic production yields are low enough, the body will break down within hours with a heart attack or a stroke. They are the catalyst for almost anything the happens at a molecular level in the body. Without enzymes, we would not be able to do anything with our vitamins and minerals.
Enzymes break down proteins. They do this with foreign proteins (which those with Candida issue have in abundance) and fibrin, the protein that makes up scar tissue. Fibrin feeds Candida and other pathogens if you didn’t skip all that ecology knowledge up above. These enzymes also reduce toxins in the blood and help balance cholesterol. Our body produces fibrin in response to trauma and enzymes help take it away in time. Anyone working in a morgue can tell you that one of the most obvious differences between a young body and an old body is that the older person has lots of fibrin all over the inside of their body. Strokes, heart attacks, aneurysms, and other often deadly ailments can be attributed directly to this.
Inside the gut, if food is not digested, it rots and feeds pathogens (ever notice how when things rot they smell sickly-sweet?), and Candida makes it hard to digest food properly.
The more enzymes we have to break down food, the better we digest and use the nutrition. Digestive enzymes help digest food in the stomach. Systemic enzymes don’t break open until they reach the gut. So, taken on an empty stomach, the systemic enzymes will go to work to repair the body and kill some viruses while they’re at it (I forgot to mention that enzymes kill viruses).
On the other hand, if you take a systemic enzyme with food, the enzyme will go to work to digest the food inside the gut.
And this brings me to Abzorb. It’s a probiotic and systemic enzyme. If you take it with food it will help you digest the food, and it works very well for this, much better than just taking one or the other. And while the product is more affordable than some of my other favorite probiotics, I find this probiotic is just as effective at colonizing in the gut. Usually, you need to spend considerable money on probiotics and enzymes for quality, but Abzorb is affordable. It is very effective, and you get two very important and synergistic supplements in one.
How to Take Systemic Enzymes
Take them on an empty stomach as noted or with food to help digest food inside the gut. I recommend mixing it up each day, but I do recommend caution when taking systemic enzymes. Too many systemic enzymes can cause issues, they can start to eat away at the body, so I don’t just grab a big handful like I do with SF722. I personally take 4-6 a day on an empty stomach, and I take more with food as needed.
Magnesium
The byproducts of Candida albicans include ethanol, uric acid and ammonia, acetaldehyde, and about 75 other toxic gases we know of. The big one on the list is acetaldehyde.12 Acetaldehyde is also produced when you drink alcohol, smoke, or breathe in car exhaust. It’s in large part responsible for the “hungover” feeling we get after a night of debauchery.13 Magnesium is required to break down acetaldehyde. It’s unclear if magnesium deficiency can cause more Candida growth in any way, but a lack of this mineral does exacerbate the problems associated with Candida. Without enough magnesium, the body will sustain a lot more damage, which feeds the Candida overgrowth cycle. Candida causes magnesium deficiencies too, and anyone who has Candida overgrowth is low in magnesium.
How to Take Magnesium with Candida Issues
Candida causes the body to require more magnesium than the recommended daily dose of 400mg. Often a Candida cleanse can cause the magnesium levels to become dangerously low, and then the individual may suffer from sluggish bowels which just compounds the symptoms of Candida die-off further.
Biotin
Like Magnesium, B vitamins are always low in those dealing with Candida overgrowth. Candida makes it very difficult for good bacteria to give us the b vitamins we need to make good decisions. Impulse control is severely hampered when there aren’t enough Bs. Too much fungi = not enough good bacteria = not enough b vitamins = poor food choices.
But biotin has a trick up its sleeve that causes it to make this list. Biotin is a coenzyme and a B vitamin. It is also known as vitamin H and vitamin B7. Because biotin is present in so many different kinds of foods, a serious deficiency is rare. But those who have had health issue due to Candida for a long enough period of time are likely going to be low in all Bs including B7. And B7 actually inhibits Candida from transforming into its mycelial, pathogenic form.
How to Take Biotin
With B vitamins it’s usually best to take a complex, not a single B. If one takes too much of one B vitamins it can inhibit the assimilation of other Bs and throw all the vitamins out of whack. Another option is chlorella, which has lots of B vitamins, including biotin, and it kills Candida in some other ways too.
I wanted to keep this article a bit more specific and focused. But the reality is, if you suffer from an abundance of Candida, you also suffer from many other pathogens. And the aforementioned salads can take care of the vitamin and mineral need. For people who need to heal their gut, I recommend a healthy diet void of refined and processed foods, salads every day, and the following supplements:
The first three should be plenty for most people, but for really prominent fungal issues or for impatient people with a bigger budget I’d recommend all of them. For more on diet, including salad recipes, check out:
Total Nutrition Formula is my multi-vitamin/mineral formula. I take it once a week, but I used took it every day with smoothies. Now I eat enough salads I don’t feel the need for it as much. It has chlorella and spirulina and lots of other good stuff. Spirulina isn’t a big Candida killer but it goes hand-in-hand with chlorella, so I figured I’d add it in. A study in 2001 found that spirulina supports our beneficial microflora which leads to less Candida,13 and an experiment from 2010 shows that spirulina enhances immune system response to Candida and other pathogens. 14 It’s said that chlorella does a similar number on Candida, and it’s rich in B vitamins including biotin, and I also read somewhere about how chlorella can break down the cell walls of fungi, but I cannot find that anywhere.
I always have SF722 on hand but I don’t take it very often. I take Abzorb in the mornings on an empty stomach, 3-4, and I take 1-2 with every cooked meal I have when I remember. I also take Liquid Light every now and then, just when I have a feeling I need a mineral boost.
When I was smoking marijuana I constantly sipped on Mother Earth Cider. It kept me from getting sick. Now I just sip once or twice a day. Just read the ingredients and you’ll see why. This is by far my favorite supplement on the market, but it’s not here as a Candida fighter. I’m sure it does a little, but not like the aforementioned.
Conclusion
Two other big causes of Candida overgrowth that we did not touch include vaccines and amalgams. The damage these medical products cause will feed Candida indefinitely. If you have heavy metal toxicity, the only thing I would do differently in this protocol is to add the Total Nutrition Formula and take additional chlorella and spirulina daily. It’s hard to eat too much of these seaweeds, and they have tons and tons of benefits, so get them in you any way you can. I think they’re disgusting so I prefer tablets or strong smoothie concoctions to bury the taste.
CBD Oil – A Comprehensive Guide To Cannabidiol
Cannabis, marijuana, weed, pot — no matter what you call it — it contains CBD. Although it won’t get you high, this plant compound can take your health to the next level.
What is CBD and CBD Oil?
Cannabidiol, commonly referred to as CBD, is one of over 60 compounds called cannabinoids that are most commonly found in the cannabis plant. Most cannabis plants contain less than 4% CBD, so the only way to get a good amount of this cannabinoid is from pure CBD oil. Most CBD oil is extracted from industrial hemp, which usually has a higher CBD content than marijuana. After extraction, the CBD is added to a carrier oil and sold at many different potencies to be used in a variety of different ways.
However, before we go deeper into the uses of CBD oil, we need a better understanding of what sets it apart from other cannabinoids. For example, you might already be familiar with another popular cannabinoid found in cannabis called THC. THC is infamous for being the reason why we get high when we smoke or consume “edibles,” but it also has a non-psychoactive form called THCA that is present when cannabis is in its raw form. CBD, on the other hand, plays many different roles in the body and never gets you high regardless of how much you smoke it.
The Difference Between THCA, THC, and CBD
Industrial hemp (a popular variety of the cannabis plant) tests out at less than 0.3% THC. THC rich cannabis in its raw form is non-psychoactive. “Raw” THC is actually THCA. What we call “Marijuana” is cannabis that tests out with THCA between 5 and 35%.
THCA is beginning to demonstrate immense therapeutic qualities. Some people add THCA-rich cannabis leaves and flowers to their salads and smoothies, others consume with a tincture.
THCA becomes the psychoactive THC through a chemical process called decarboxylation, which occurs with heat and time. The delivery methods for THC are smoking, vaporizing, and consuming “edibles.” Drying and curing cannabis will cause some decarboxylation to occur. Cured cannabis flowers will often test for small amounts of THC along with THCA. THC is fat soluble (and not water soluble). THC infused cooking, from pesto to chocolate, is made by heating ground up THCA rich cannabis with oil at 220 degrees Fahrenheit (104 Celsius) for 30 to 45 minutes. THC rich treats are commonly referred to as “edibles,” and they typically have massive amounts of sugar btw!
THCA’s Therapeutic Properties
THCA is the most abundant cannabinoid in a plant, depending on the time at when it is tested. THCA has been seen to have many benefits in a limited number of studies. Studies have found THCA to be anti-inflammatory, neuro-protective, anti-emetic, and anti-proliferative. There is plenty more this compound can do, and there are other cannabinoids, like the many varieties of terpenes and THCV, all proving to have some similar and some very different effects, and many of which are proving to be medical viable in very different ways.
The science on all of these other cannabinoids is in its infancy. The cannabinoids that we know most about, however, are CBD and THC.
The Relationship Between CBD and THC
In particular, the effect that CBD can have when ingested with THC has garnered significant interest. What research has found so far is fascinating.
For example, when active THC is ingested alone, it increases pulse rate, disturbs time tasks, and induces strong psychological reactions in some people, but when CBD is ingested with the THC, it blocks most of these adverse effects.
CBD also has been found to decrease the anxiety component of a THC “high” in such a way that the study subjects reported more pleasurable effects when CBD was included with the THC. This evidence suggests that it is better for our health to have a higher percentage of CBD in or with our cannabis if we decide to ingest the plant in any form.
The Dark Side of Cannabis
It is an even better idea, however, to rarely consume THC unless you have a medical condition that has been proven to be helped by a combination of THC and CBD. When we look through the research, you will see why I am making such a cautionary statement about THC.
In a scientific paper on the current state of cannabinoid research, the authors found that the current trend for preferring higher THC content in cannabis carries significant health risks, particularly to those who are susceptible to its harmful effects. For example, Morgan and colleagues carried out a study on 120 current cannabis users, which included 66 daily and 54 recreational users, whose hair analyses revealed their THC and CBD amounts. The study found that higher THC levels in the hair of the daily users were associated with increased depression and anxiety, as well as weaker performance on memory tasks. On the other hand, higher CBD levels in the hair were associated with lower psychosis-like symptoms and better memory.
Epidemiological studies also point toward an association between the use of cannabis and the increased risk of developing a psychotic illness, in a dose-dependent manner. In other words, what this study found is that you are more likely to develop a mental disorder as your THC consumption increases. On top of that, they also found that increased cannabis use is often accompanied by symptoms of depression and anxiety.
However, this is only epidemiological evidence, so it should only be used to inform further experimentation on THC’s effects. The truth is that only a small minority develop a full-blown psychotic illness in the form of schizophrenia or bipolar disorder. The majority of cannabis users, ranging from 15% to 50%, will only experience transient psychotic symptoms of brief duration, for a couple of hours to up to a week, and will usually recover without requiring any intervention.
These “transient psychotic symptoms” may be experienced in the form of an auditory hallucination like hearing voices or by having increased anxiety or paranoia for hours to days after the THC high wears off.
Whether you experience unpleasant side effects from THC use or not, it is best for anyone who has a family history of psychosis or anyone who has had symptoms of psychosis in the past to avoid THC altogether. On the other hand, CBD rarely causes side effects, and when it does, they are relatively minor.
The Side Effects of CBD oil
CBD oil is well tolerated by most people, but there are some potential side effects — especially at higher doses. According to a review in Cannabis and Cannabinoid Research, the most common side effects include:
tiredness
diarrhea
changes in appetite
weight gain or weight loss
Another review of the potential side effects in humans found that CBD rarely causes issues with dosages of up to 1500 mg/day (orally). The good news is that most people won’t even need to take half that dose to reap the benefits of CBD.
The Benefits of CBD Oil
Although the research regarding CBD’s effects on the body is in its early stages, it has already been found to affect the body in various ways.
Preliminary evidence suggests that CBD oil:
modulates the immune system
reduces inflammation
decreases seizures
relieves muscle tension and stress
improves mental health
protects brain cells from damage and inflammation
prevents nausea and vomiting
regulates bowel motility
lowers heart rate
decreases blood pressure
has anti-cancer properties against gliomas and lung cancer
To follow up on these promising effects, researchers conducted more studies. As a result, we now have relatively convincing data that backs up these following benefits of CBD oil:
Anxiety Reduction
Both animal and human studies indicate that CBD has anti-anxiety properties. In fact, in a recent double-blind study carried out on patients with generalized social anxiety disorder, it was found that CBD significantly reduced their anxiety.
As we discovered earlier, CBD can actually decrease the psychotic effects that THC can have on the body. Without the presence of THC, CBD can further help reduce symptoms of psychosis.
Decreased Inflammation
CBD has potent anti-inflammatory properties throughout the body and brain. In fact, it is such a powerful inflammation reducing agent that one study suggests that CBD may decrease inflammation too much in some people. This could put the body at a higher risk of illness and infection. However, when CBD is used at lower doses or in people who have chronic inflammation, it can be highly effective at improving immune system function.
Cancer Growth Inhibitor
CBD has been found to slow the growth of lung cancer, as well as trigger apoptosis (cell death) in brain and spinal cord tumors. This makes CBD oil a promising supplementary treatment for certain types of cancer. Hopefully, it will garner enough evidence to become the first line of treatment for cancer.
Helps Reduce Seizures
Both THC and CBD have been found to reduce the severity and frequency of seizures, but CBD is clearly a better option. This because it has shown better results than THC, and it doesn’t seem to negatively influence the brain in any way.
Arthritis Pain Reduction
A study in the European Journal of Pain used an animal model to see if CBD could help people with arthritis manage their pain. Researchers applied a topical gel containing CBD to rats with arthritis for four days.
Their research found a significant drop in inflammation and signs of pain, without additional side effects. This indicates that people using CBD oil for arthritis may find relief from their pain, but more human studies need to be done to confirm these findings.
Improved Quality of Life for People with Multiple Sclerosis
Multiple sclerosis is an autoimmune disease that affects the entire body through the nerves and brain.
Muscle spasms are one of the most common symptoms of Multiple Sclerosis. Studies have found that short-term use of CBD oil can reduce the spasms.
The results are modest, but many people reported a reduction in symptoms. More human studies are needed to verify these results.
Pain Relief
CBD can also be used for general chronic pain. After compiling the results of dozens of trials and studies, researchers concluded that there is substantial evidence that cannabis is an effective treatment for chronic pain in adults.
Research has found CBD to be more effective than a common insomnia drug at improving the length of sleep. This finding suggests that CBD can be helpful for people with sleep disorders like insomnia.
How CBD Works — The Endocannabinoid System
At this point, you may be thinking that CBD sounds too good to be true. How could a random little plant compound have all of these seemingly unrelated effects on the body? Well — you can thank your endocannabinoid system for that.
Each one of us has an endocannabinoid system that receives and translates signals it receives from cannabinoids in the body. Unfortunately for many cannabis consumers out there, we do not have this system because we’ve evolved to smoke weed every day. The purpose of the endocannabinoid system is to regulate various systems throughout your body with the cannabinoids that your body manufactures.
Even though our knowledge about the role of the endocannabinoid system is still evolving, the available evidence indicates that this system has multiple regulatory roles in neuronal, vascular, metabolic, immune and reproductive systems. Because of its involvement these systems, endocannabinoids affect functions such as cognition, memory, motor movements, pain perception, inflammation, body weight regulation, cardiovascular health, stress response, appetite, and sleep.
How CBD and THC Interact with Our Endocannabinoid System
Cannabinoids from plants like THC and CBD have such a massive impact on our bodies because they mimic the cannabinoids that we make inside our bodies. For example, when we get “high” from THC it is because that cannabinoid is interacting directly with cannabinoid receptors in our cells that end up triggering the experience of feeling “high.”
As you might have alright assumed, CBD interacts a bit differently with our endocannabinoid system than THC. Instead of acting directly on the receptors, CBD activates or inhibits other compounds in the endocannabinoid system.
For example, CBD stops the body from absorbing anandamide, an endocannabinoid in our body that is associated with regulating pain. Increased levels of anandamide in the bloodstream may reduce the amount of pain a person feels.
The distribution of the endocannabinoid system in the brain is also something to take note of. If you look closely at the brain cells in areas of the brain that go awry in various mental disorders, you will find endocannabinoid receptors. This points us in the direction of a mechanism that explains why THC is linked with psychosis and why CBD mitigates these effects. Perhaps CBD prevents THC or our own cannabinoids from triggering mental health issues.
This is a fascinating hypothesis, but it is beyond the scope of this article. Instead, let’s take our discussion to a practical place to find out what dose we need to experience the benefits of CBD.
How Much CBD Oil Should You Take?
Below are some general CBD dosage guidelines:
General Health: start small at 2.5-15mg CBD by mouth daily and increase until you feel positive effects
To treat anxiety disorders: oral doses ranging from 300 to 600 mg (supported by multiple studies)
To treat chronic pain: 2.5-20 mg CBD by mouth daily (anecdotal suggestion)
To treat epilepsy: 200-300 mg CBD by mouth daily with antiepileptic medication (backed by research)
To treat sleep disorders like insomnia: 160 mg CBD by mouth daily (supported by multiple studies)
The right dose of CBD varies from person to person. Generally speaking, larger individuals may prefer a higher dose of CBD than smaller people.
If you are not sure how much to take, then start with a smaller dose and scale it up a few milligrams at a time to meet your personal needs. Also, those that have a medical condition should always consult with their healthcare professional before consuming CBD.
Other Considerations When Taking CBD Oil
Using CBD oil can make the medications that you may be taking more or less effective. For example, CBD may improve the effectiveness of antiepileptic drugs such as valproate and clobazam, while being negatively impacted by other antiepileptic drugs like carbamazepine and phenytoin. For this reason and because of how little we know about how CBD interacts with different medications, it is crucial that you discuss CBD oil supplementation with your healthcare professional and make adjustments to your dosages in small increments.
Another thing to consider is the long-term effects that CBD has on hormones and other aspects of health. To this day, there are no studies that examine how CBD oil supplementation impacts the body over extended periods of time. However, current studies suggest that CBD oil is safe at the dosages recommended above in the short and long term.
It should also be noted that all of the studies we explored in this article were performed using either adults or animals. The safety of CBD oil in children and pregnant women is not well understood. We do know, however, that the endocannabinoid system is an active player in the placenta, impacting fetal development. Future research may find that CBD oil can help improve the health of the mother and the fetus during pregnancy, but at this point, there is no evidence to back up that assumption.
Key Takeaways & Recommended CBD Oil Sources
Although the research on CBD oil is scarce, there is plenty of evidence to suggest that it can help a wide range of people with a variety conditions.
Research indicates that CBD can help people with:
anxiety disorders
insomnia
psychosis
chronic pain
arthritis
epilepsy
chronic inflammation
cancer
multiple sclerosis
Even if you don’t have one of these conditions, CBD can be helpful for improving general health by reducing stress, pain, and inflammation. Just make sure you get your CBD oil from a trustworthy source because CBD oil — like every other supplement — is not well-regulated.
Should You Be on the Ketogenic Diet? The Pros and Cons of Limiting Carbs
There is a ton of hype surrounding the ketogenic diet. Some researchers swear that it is the best diet for most people to be on, while others can provide us with plenty of evidence that it is just another fad diet.
To some degree, both sides of the spectrum are right. There isn’t one perfect diet for everyone or every condition, regardless of how many people “believe” in it. The ketogenic diet is no exception to this rule.
However, there is also plenty of solid research backing up its benefits. In fact, it has been found to be better than many diets at helping people with:
Epilepsy
Type 2 Diabetes
Type 1 Diabetes
High Blood Pressure
Alzheimer’s disease
Parkinson’s disease
Chronic Inflammation
Obesity
Heart Disease
Polycystic Ovary Syndrome
Fatty Liver Disease
Cancer
Migraines
Even if you are not at risk from any of these conditions, restricting your carbohydrate consumption may be helpful for you too. Some of the benefits that most people experience are:
Better brain function
A decrease in inflammation
An increase in energy
Improved body composition
As you can see, the ketogenic diet has a wide array of benefits, but is it any better than other diets?
The Calorie Conundrum
Many researchers argue that ketosis (burning ketones for fuel) and carbohydrate restriction only play a minor role in the benefits of the ketogenic diet. Their argument is that people tend to eat fewer calories on the ketogenic diet, and this is the main reason for its benefits. The two most important selling points of the ketogenic diet, ketosis and carbohydrate restriction, may just be a red herring.
It is true that people on the ketogenic diet tend to eat less because of how satiating eating a high-fat moderate-protein diet like the ketogenic is for us. It is also true that less calorie consumption leads to improved health and weight loss. These two statements are backed up by plenty of research, but there is something that many researchers don’t consider.
The ketogenic diet elicits many mechanisms in the body and cells that are nonexistent in other diets. These unique mechanisms explain the benefits of the ketogenic diet that eating fewer calories cannot.
Frist, let’s see what happens inside of the cells in our body during the ketogenic diet:
Ketones are produced, which burn more efficiently than sugar.
Burning ketones creates much less reactive oxygen species than sugar, which decreases inflammation.
Carbohydrate restriction triggers autophagy (cellular cleaning) and anti-inflammatory processes.
Mitochondrial function and production are enhanced, making our cell’s more efficient at using ketones and fat for fuel.
And here’s what happens in the body on a larger scale:
Insulin levels decrease because dietary carbohydrate isn’t stimulating its release.
Stored fat is burned because the body needs to use alternative fuel sources.
Inflammation is reduced because inflammatory fat levels decrease and less reactive oxygen species are formed.
The combination of the cellular and bodily effects of the ketogenic diet provides us with a basis for why they may be more useful than other diets in the treatment of many of the conditions we mentioned earlier.
Who Would Benefit Most From The Ketogenic Diet?
There is convincing evidence supporting that the ketogenic diet can reduce the severity of epilepsy, type 2 diabetes, type 1 diabetes (especially if dairy is eliminated), Alzheimer’s disease, Parkinson’s disease, obesity, heart disease, polycystic ovary syndrome, fatty liver disease, migraines, and certain types of cancer. However, it is important to keep in mind that plant-based whole food diets are also useful in helping people with most of these issues as well.
The primary issues that the ketogenic diet may help with more than a plant-based diet are probably neurological conditions like Parkinson’s, Alzheimer’s, and epilepsy. This is due to how efficient ketones are as a source of fuel for the brain. Some studies also indicate that ketogenic diet may be best for people with type 1 and type 2 diabetes and for people with certain types of cancer that cannot survive without sugar.
Who Shouldn’t Be On a Ketogenic Diet?
Although the ketogenic diet can help with a plethora of conditions, it can also deteriorate the health of others. For example, people with thyroid or adrenal issues and many women will struggle with carbohydrate restriction. This is because carbohydrates help regulate thyroid function, adrenal function, and fertility.
If you are already having issues with one or all of these things, then the limiting carbohydrates may make your health worse. This why it is important to have your lipid, blood sugar, and hormone levels checked before and during a profound dietary change like the ketogenic diet. Everything you do is an experiment on yourself. Just because someone else swears by a certain diet doesn’t mean it will work for you too.
The Takeaway — Should YOU be on the Ketogenic Diet?
Who would benefit the most from going keto? People who have:
Epilepsy
Parkinson’s disease
Alzheimer’s disease
Type 1 diabetes
Type 2 diabetes
Certain types of cancer that cannot survive without sugar
Who shouldn’t restrict carbohydrate intake?
People with adrenal issues
People with thyroid issues
Some women
So, what do you make of this information?
In general, eating more whole foods and less processed foods is what will give you the most bang for your buck. The simplest way to do this is by giving yourself an unbreakable rule like “eat less than 35 grams of carbs per day” (ketogenic diet) or “eliminate added sugar and limit animal product consumption” (plant-based diet). Both of these rules will help you consume more whole foods and less processed foods, which results in fewer calories consumed, less inflammation, less disease, and better health.
Choose whatever rule you think you can stick too and adjust your diet from there based on how your body reacts. It’s that simple. Well, at least it is that simple if you only care about your own health.
The Long-Term Effects of The Ketogenic Diet vs. a Plant-Based Diet
If you have some form of diabetes, a neurological issue, a carb-reliant form of cancer or want to lose weight rapidly, the ketogenic diet may be the best diet for you — at least for the short term (less than six months). Although many research studies have found that the ketogenic diet has no adverse long-term effects and is perfectly safe (for most of the people that were studied), we must consider the impact that this diet has on the environment as well.
Animal products like meat, eggs, and dairy make up the bulk of calories on the ketogenic diets. These animal products are commonly sourced from controlled animal feeding operations that pollute the environment, destroy our soil, torture the animals, and produce nutritionally inferior food. With each purchase of mass-produced, unnaturally-raised animal products, we cast a vote for animal abuse, depleted soil that can’t grow crops, and climate change.
This is why it is best to stick to the rule of “eat whole plant foods and eliminate processed foods” rather than “limit carbohydrates.” If, however, you want to experiment with ketones or the ketogenic diet to see how it affects your health, keep reading below.
The Healthiest Way to Approach the Ketogenic Diet for You and The Environment
There are a couple of ways to get the benefits of the ketogenic diet while improving the environment.
Source all of your produce from local, biodynamic farms. This cuts down on transportation costs and supports local farmers that work with the environment rather than against it.
Supplement your diet with ketone boosting supplements. Ketone salts and MCT oil will put your body into ketosis quickly and provide you will most of the benefits of the ketogenic diet. (I personally prefer MCT oil because it is easy to add to salads, sauces, and smoothies, and doesn’t give me any weird side effects like ketone salts do.)
Include intermittent fasting in your daily schedule. By skipping one or two meals a day or fasting for the whole day, you can activate many of the health-promoting mechanisms that are commonly experienced by ketogenic dieters.
Do a strict environmentally-friendly ketogenic diet for 6 to 12 weeks. Think of the ketogenic diet as a short-term strategy to help improve specific health conditions. After about 6 to 12 weeks, your body will be keto-adapted and you’ll be ready to slowly increase your carbohydrate consumption by eating more whole plant foods.
Try a vegan or vegetarian ketogenic diet for 6 to 12 weeks. Eat plenty of low carb vegetables, coconut oil, olive oil, avocado, and nuts. Pasture-raised eggs are also an environmentally friendly option (if you are an ovo-vegetarian).
By following one or all of these strategies, you will experience the benefits of ketosis for yourself. The easiest way to do so is by combining intermittent fasting with MCT oil supplementation.
On the other hand, If you want to experience all of the effects of being keto-adapted, then it’s best to do a strict ketogenic diet for 6 to 12 weeks. This is enough time to see if the ketogenic diet works for you.
Whether or not you decide to try these suggestions, it is important to keep one thing in mind — there is no magical diet that works for everyone. Nutrition is so complicated that gurus, researchers, and health professionals will argue about it for centuries to come.
There is, however, one healthy eating rule that most people can agree on:
Eat food. Not too much. Mostly plants.” – Michael Pollan
Minimalism – How to Change Your Life When Everything is a Mess
Sometimes it feels like our world is falling completely apart. We just don’t feel like we were born to succeed. We look around and wonder if anyone else feels like this big of a mess. Our money is scarce, our house unkempt, our health not looking too good and our relationships going down the drain. So we can’t help but think:
“What the hell is wrong with me!?”
But you mustn’t feel so bad; It’s not all your fault!
It’s the Consumerism Sabotage
Since a young age, you had your googly eyes wide open as you were out and about processing as much information as possible and figuring out how life worked. Everything you experienced in your home, at school, or anywhere you were until this day has served as the main guidance for you to arrive where you are now.
So where did it all go wrong?
Think of yourself as a computer system. It started with our system (us) suffering a series of virus attacks (brainwashing).
For example, TV commercials told us that if we want to look beautiful, we must have their brand of clothing, that the most attractive folks would buy this line of fragrance, or even that their magic pills can make you thin in very little time.
Imagine our system didn’t have an anti-virus (awareness). As a result, the virus would seep in and reprogram your system to add new files (new watches, clothing, jewelry, etc.) at random times on its own (impulse purchases).
Now imagine what happens when you keep ignoring the signs that you need an antivirus (debt, having too much stuff, etc.). You keep making impulse buys until your life collapses under the chaos.
It’s time to install the antivirus before that happens. What’s the best antivirus? Minimalism.
The What, Why and How of Minimalism
What is minimalism?
As I interviewed my friend Matthew Romanchick about minimalism, he gave me what I found to be the best definition yet: “Removing the stuff that sucks you dry in favor of the things that bring you life.” So that includes removing material things, people, and old thought patterns from your life that suck you dry instead of making you a better person (This doesn’t include friends that give you constructive criticism you may not want to hear every once in a while).
Why should we become minimalists?
Consumerism is reaching new heights, and it’s a serious thing. It has become normal to spend money you don´t have, on things you don´t need. According to nerdwallet.com’s 2016 statistics report, the average household owed $137,063 in debts including credit cards, mortgage, auto loans, etc. and the worst news is that after you are in debt, it continues to cost you money to stay in debt. $1,292 per year to be exact – that is the cost of yearly interest for credit card debt alone. As a result of this, more and more people are becoming homeless and depressed in the US. In a single night in 2016 there were 549,928 people experiencing homelessness. Minimalism is the perfect way to combat this craze and help bring peace and fulfillment to people´s lives.
How can minimalism help bring peace and fulfillment?
By reducing your consumption to what is essential, your life is filled with peace. Minimalism will give you the money, time, and freedom to breathe and enjoy a low maintenance, stress-free and abundant life, instead of falling into the false illusion that one day you will have all the material things you need to finally be happy.
Here is how it works
Minimalizing equals having less — Fewer responsibilities, less debt, less guilt, less stress and less wish to buy.
Minimalizing, however, also equals having more — More savings, a more clear conscience, a more pleasant night’s sleep, and a more joyful and intentional life which in turn equals to a happier life.
Does this mean a minimalist’s life is easy? Well, I can guarantee you that it´s simpler and more efficient than most!
I take pride in getting ready in 15 minutes and looking great for the day ahead of me. But imagine that all of the sudden you could have more time for reading books or being with friends, more mental clarity to accomplish your daily goals, having renewed confidence to give dating another shot, or for some, rekindling that romance with your loved one. Imagine looking at your bank account and realizing you have the money saved up for going on trips or investing on something just for you. Minimalizing makes all of this and so much more possible!
Now if you are wondering when is the best time to start this process, I have a straightforward technique to determine that. But first, we must figure out what we need to minimalize most.
What you can minimalize
This list is to give you a better idea of where you can start.
Make sure you prepare your own personal list of what you want to get rid of or adapt to serve you better.
Your home – Check out my article on these revolutionizing traveling tiny homes. Are they amazing or what? TINY HOMES — THE BIGGEST LIFE HACK
Relationships/People – ” Show me your friends and I will show you your future.” That about sums it up.
Harmful thought patterns – When did feeling guilty for something you did 12 years ago solve anything? Think instead how you can make things better today. Other examples of harmful thought patterns that limit your success are fear, anxiety, feelings of unworthiness, etc.
Shoes – Do you really need 20 pairs of shoes for one pair of feet?
Memory box – Take pictures of the things and store on a hard drive instead. They will last you forever and save space.
Make-up – Did you know the average woman spends $200k on make-up in the span of a lifetime? You could buy five amazing tiny homes with that money. How crazy is that?
Cars – Imagine how much more gas, money, and health you would save by bike riding or walking down to the market to get those two things you need?
Now that you have a clearer picture of what to minimalize, below are eight practical steps to guide your decluttering journey.
Let´s Get Down and Dirty
Here is where we finally minimalize.
Remember that you can go at your own pace because it’s not a race, it’s a beautiful life-changing journey.
STEP 1. Make a list of what you want to minimalize.
I suggest choosing one area of your home to declutter at a time, and if you are having a harder time detaching, you can start a bit smaller and declutter a section of a room of choice every weekend like for example, the kitchen cabinets this weekend, and the bathroom the next, etc.
STEP 2. Take 4 boxes and label: Trash/Donation/Sell/Unsure.
Although these are mostly self-explanatory, I’d like to elaborate on the trash box (you could also just fill up a trash bag instead). You should only trash the item if it is broken, with defects, a product with very little content or that is unusable. Also trash personal things such as letters or things that bring you negative emotions – You are beginning a fresh new phase of your life, possibly one of the best yet, why keep these things that take away your joy?
STEP 3. The checklist.
Ask yourself the questions from the minimalist checklist below for each item you own, and whatever you do, always use this list when you think of acquiring something new.
Minimalist check off list
Do I love it?
Do I need it?
Do I have multiples?
Does it represent me well?
Have I used it in the past six months?
STEP 4. Place each item in the appropriate box.
If you answered “no” to one or more of these questions (except for #3), then you should probably sell, donate or trash the item.
STEP 5. Give special attention to items with emotional attachments
This is usually intense and makes you feel like a loser at being a minimalist at first, but it’s really just part of the journey. You are going to have items you are not going to want to part with because no matter how much you dislike it, it was your grandma that gave it to you. No matter how much you resent that cheating ex from high school, you can’t bring yourself to throw away the love letter he wrote you.
What you need to do is run it through the minimalist checklist. If it turns out it doesn’t logically make sense to keep a certain item, then take a picture of it and store that instead. But if you’re really unsure about letting it go, keep it on the unsure pile.
STEP 6. The one in, one out rule.
One day you will find yourself in love with something you saw somewhere, and you are going to feel like you need to have it. A very efficient method of knowing if this item is superfluous or not is to utilize the one in one out rule. For this, you must get rid of one item you already own in exchange for the new one you wish to get. So before you buy it, make sure you have in mind the item that’s going to go (Don´t use this method while grocery shopping).
STEP 7. Have a place for seasonal items.
Example: If you’re in the summer, keep those winter clothes inside a suitcase under your bed or stored in your area of preference. When winter arrives, switch them out with your current summer clothes you won’t be needing like shorts, bikinis, crop tops, etc. Do this for every season if you find it necessary.
STEP 8. Keep the cycle going.
It is important to maintain and reorganize every so often. The reason for that is that it’s easy for things to pile up again if you’re not attentive and strict enough, so make sure to do that occasional cleaning and recycling to freshen up your wardrobe, looks, and home. I like to reassess my belongings every weekend as I clean my closet.
That’s it — these are the basic steps to minimalizing. Make sure to check out minimalist bloggers and explore different methods. There is a world of wonderful minimalists overflowing wisdom and talent out there on the web. But hold on, before you go, there is still one last thing we must address.
Minimizing Minimalist Misconceptions
I love clothes and shoes. I can’t be a minimalist.
If you love clothes and shoes (or anything else), that just means you should spend your time with the ones that deserve your time, a selection of the best and nothing less! And let me tell you, this will allow you to look and feel 100x better.
Minimalism is extreme
As much as living with all that you need and not running to the mall to shop for superfluous things as soon as you get your paycheck tends to be considered extreme, we like to think that a life of consumerism that brings every day countless people to homelessness, as extreme.
Minimalism is for plain/simple women
That’s a plain “no”… As a minimalist, you can be as bright and bold as ever. The only difference is that you won´t go broke, nuts or in debt because of it.
There is a specific amount of items you need to have as a minimalist
Each individual is in charge of finding out what is “minimal” to them. There isn´t a set rule though some people like to challenge themselves by cutting down their belongings by 288,55 or even 33 pieces of items or less.
Minimalists are cheap and don’t own nice things
False statement. Since minimalists have fewer expenses, they can afford to invest more money on items of better quality that will last them longer and look better.
New Beginnings
I hope this article has helped you on your journey and that you fall in love with minimalism like I and countless others have.
Minimalism has come as a lifestyle and gift in which to change the lives of those who struggle as a result of a consumerist life, that only takes life from our lives and never gives back. Don’t you worry — the fulfillment that you thought you would get from that item will not be lost. You can create fulfillment within yourself by minimalizing your life and maximizing the pleasant, guilt-free, and memorable moments in it.
Ladies, you are filled with pure potential to mold yourselves into the woman you have always longed to be, and the reason for that is: you’re human, you’re unique, and you are destined for greatness, no matter who you are. It is up to you to follow the path that is leading you towards a bright new beginning. So, say yes!
Triglycerides – Optimize The Most Important Biomarker That Most Doctors Ignore
Hey, just wanted to let you know that your triglycerides are probably a bit high. Three out of every ten people in the United States have above normal triglyceride levels.
This sounds like the beginning of a drug commercial, but don’t worry — this problem has a simple and natural solution.
However, before we find the solution, we must properly identify the problem.
The Problem With High Triglyceride Levels
In the shadow of our cholesterol numbers are our — often overlooked — triglyceride levels. Your doctor may tell you that “your triglycerides are a little high,” but what does this really mean? Does it really matter?
First, let’s clear up what having “high triglycerides” actually means. According to the American Heart Association, here is how our triglyceride levels are categorized:
Optimal
Less than 100 milligrams per deciliter (mg/dL)
Normal
Less than 150 mg/dL
Borderline-high
150 to 199 mg/dL
High
200 to 499 mg/dL
Very high
500 mg/dL or higher
You won’t experience any symptoms if you have borderline-high or high triglycerides, which is why many doctors will just shrug it off. However, it is important to know that triglyceride levels that are even just “a little high” are associated with:
Heart Disease
Studies suggest that high triglyceride levels impair cholesterol levels, increasing the amount of atherogenic (plaque forming) cholesterol particles in the blood.
Obesity
Obesity and high triglyceride levels are intimately linked. One study found that approximately 80% of people who are obese or overweight had triglyceride levels ≥150 mg/dL.
Metabolic Syndrome
The prevalence of triglyceride levels ≥150 mg/dL is nearly twice as high in people who have metabolic syndrome. Metabolic syndrome is a condition that is commonly diagnosed when the person has high blood pressure, high blood sugar, excess body fat around the waist, and abnormal cholesterol levels.
Excess Visceral Fat (fat around the organs)
Excess body fat is associated with elevated triglyceride levels, but visceral fat is a greater contributor than subcutaneous fat (fat that is found under the skin rather than near vital organs).
Type 2 Diabetes
Around 35% of people with type 2 diabetes have high fasting triglyceride levels. This suggests that blood sugar and triglyceride levels are intimately linked (more on that later).
Hypothyroidism
When the levels of thyroid hormone are low, cholesterol and triglycerides stay in the blood for a longer period of time, which increases the likelihood of heart disease and fatty plaque build-up in the arteries.
Kidney Disease
Triglyceride levels of >200 mg/dL are present in about half of those with chronic kidney disease, which is commonly caused by diabetes and high blood pressure.
All of this seems worrisome at first — especially if you have high triglycerides — but there is some good news. Actually, it’s great news.
Knowing what conditions high triglyceride levels are associated with provides us with important clues. Clues that give us a clearer picture of what causes high triglyceride levels and how to optimize them. First, let’s figure out what they are.
Triglycerides are the most potent fuel source that is stored in your body. They are so energy-dense that stored that these molecules can keep the body running for about a month.
Where exactly are triglycerides stored in your body? Well, you already know. You just call it “fat” instead of “stored triglycerides.”
Yes, that’s right — triglycerides are those things that are being stored in your fat cells. While we are fasting, restricting carbohydrates, or limiting calories, these triglycerides are liberated from our fat cells to provide us with energy. This process is what helps us lose fat and reduce our triglyceride levels. However, one big problem arises if we live in westernized societies — there is an overabundance of processed food at all times.
Why Do You Have High Triglycerides?
If you are reading this right now, you probably live in an area where many different varieties of food are always available. In this abundant food environment, it is easy for our emotional and instinctual desires to override all logical sense, so most of us end up eating more calories and sugar than we actually need.
In response to the massive influx in calories, the cells become stuffed with so much energy that they reject the signal to take in more energy that they receive from insulin (an energy storage hormone that is stimulated the most by carbohydrate consumption). This is otherwise known as insulin resistance, and it causes a cascade of hormonal changes that increase blood sugar and triglyceride levels. On top of that, sugar consumption (especially the consumption of fructose) stimulates the creation of fat in the liver.
What all of this means is that eating excess calories increases your triglyceride levels and eating too much sugar increases your triglyceride levels even more, especially if that sugar is mostly composed of fructose.
Hold on. What about the fat?
After all, we are talking about triglycerides — a type of fat. How could I talk about calories and sugar and neglect to mention fat as a contributor to high triglyceride levels as well? Well, there is a good reason for that.
It would only make sense for dietary fat to increase triglycerides more than carbs, but the science shows us that just the opposite is true.
In one study, people with high triglycerides and normal triglycerides were put on a 15% fat, whole-food diet after eating a high-fat diet (35%). After only one meal of the low-fat diet, their triglyceride levels were elevated for higher and longer than during the high-fat diet.
By the end of the diet the low-fat group’s fasting triglyceride concentrations increased by 60% and the production of atherogenic LDL cholesterol increased as well. This occurred in people with normal and high triglycerides in response to a whole-food based low-fat diet. (Imagine what would happen if the diet contained more simple sugars!)
So, What Is The Best Triglyceride Lowering Diet?
Let’s start by comparing two ends of the dietary spectrum — Low-carb versus low-fat.
A recent meta-analysis of randomized controlled trials found significantly greater reductions in triglyceride levels on the low-carb diet. This meta-analysis of the literature confirms what we discovered above.
Eat more carbohydrates and less fat, and you’ll increase your triglyceride levels. Eat fewer carbs and more fat, and the opposite will occur. In fact, researchers found that for every 5% decrease in total fat, triglyceride level was predicted to increase by 6% and HDL cholesterol (the “good” cholesterol) to decrease by 2.2%. More specifically, for every 1% isoenergetic replacement with saturated fat, monounsaturated fat, and polyunsaturated fat, there was a reduction in triglycerides by 1.9 mg/dL, 1.7 mg/dL, and 2.3 mg/dL, respectively.
These findings suggest that replacing all carbohydrates with fat will get your triglycerides to optimal levels the quickest. However, when we look closer at the research, a different pattern emerges.
Which is Better? The Low-Carb Diet vs. The Mediterranean Diet
In a randomized controlled trial, the effects of a Mediterranean-style weight-loss diet were compared with a low-carbohydrate diet. After six months, triglyceride levels were reduced the most in the low-carb diet group. However, after 12 months, the Mediterranean-style diet showed similar reductions in triglycerides as the low carbohydrate diet.
These results show us that there may be a limit to how much restricting your carbohydrates can reduce triglycerides. So, instead of counting your carbs, it may be best to follow the eating principle that both the low-carbohydrate and Mediterranean diets follow: eliminate the crap and eat more whole foods.
The Most Important Crap to Eliminate to Optimize Your Triglycerides
Avoid these triglyceride train wrecks, to ensure optimal triglyceride levels:
1. Alcohol
Based on the data from many studies on alcohol consumption and triglycerides, it is estimated that the ingestion of 1 oz of alcohol per day corresponds to a 5% to 10% higher triglyceride concentration than found in nondrinkers. If you have high triglycerides or if you want to have flawless triglyceride levels, it is best to abstain from alcohol completely.
2. Trans Fats
Trans fatty acids are found in all partially and fully hydrogenated oils. They consistently cause significant increases in triglycerides and atherogenic LDL cholesterol levels, which increases cardiovascular disease risk dramatically. Stick to natural fats from nuts, olives, avocado, fish, meat, and dairy.
3. Added Sugar
Studies have found that each additional daily serving of sugar-sweetened beverages is associated with a 2.25 mg/dL increase in triglyceride levels, as well as increases in insulin resistance, LDL cholesterol, and systolic blood pressure and a decrease in HDL cholesterol. It is best to avoid sugar completely and most of your carbohydrates from vegetables, legumes, and nuts for best results.
The Takeaway — The Best Triglyceride Lowering Diet
By cutting out all processed foods and eating a whole food diet, you will naturally cut down on the carbs, calories, and sugars. This way of eating will lower your triglycerides and improve your health dramatically.
To get you started, follow these guidelines:
Every meal should consist primarily of local, beyond organic, or bio-dynamic vegetables.
“Garnish” each meal with high-quality fish, meat, eggs, or dairy.
Have a handful of nuts, seeds, and/or berries with each meal.
Don’t eat any sugar-sweetened beverages, added sugars, processed meat, refined grains, refined oils, hydregonated fats, and other highly processed foods.
Limit your alcohol intake.
Follow the suggestions for lowering triglycerides and cholesterol in this article.
However, even if you implement the triglyceride lowering diet flawlessly, you can only verify if it worked by getting a blood test.
How To Know If Your Triglyceride Levels Are Optimal
All you have to do is set up an appointment with your doctor to get a standard blood lipid panel test done. Ask your doctor to print the results for you, and track your progress at after appointment.
Where do you fall in these categories?
Optimal
Less than 100 milligrams per deciliter (mg/dL)
Normal
Less than 150 mg/dL
Borderline-high
150 to 199 mg/dL
High
200 to 499 mg/dL
Very high
500 mg/dL or higher
Aim for optimal triglyceride levels, but don’t forget about cholesterol and blood sugar levels as well.
To see if you have healthier cholesterol levels, check your total-to-HDL cholesterol ratio. A ratio between 3 and 4 indicates that you have healthy cholesterol levels. Your fasting blood sugar levels should be below 100 mg/dl for optimal health.
It is also important to take note of your posture before you get your blood drawn. For example, different positions, like sitting, standing, and laying down, can cause triglycerides to vary significantly. Because of this, the American Heart Association recommends that you sit for at least 5 minutes in the same position each time you get your blood drawn to minimize variability in triglyceride measurements.
After you implement our suggestions, please comment with your results to inspire others to take their health into their own hands.
We weren’t built to poop on a chair. We were built to poop from a squat. You can either squat in the woods or improvise. The knowledge that a squatting position is best for elimination is not news (I learned about it more than 40 years ago). But the idea is gaining in popularity to the point that posture aids, called squatting potties or toilet stools, are now readily available for purchase. Basically, these are footstools designed to raise your feet when you sit on the toilet and slide back out of the way when not in use.
