Posts Tagged ‘Plant-based nutrition’
Sunday, March 17th, 2013
You know your lungs are vital for breathing. Think of them also as a point of exchange between you and your environment. What are you bringing into your body?
Give a Wide Berth to These Four Enemies of Air Quality
Your lungs are an entryway to your body, a site where you literally take in your environment. Millions of tiny air sacs in your lungs have walls only one cell thick. The oxygen necessary to life diffuses into your blood across this cell layer, and carbon dioxide, a waste product of metabolism, diffuses out to be eliminated from your body. This exquisite design is fundamental to life, and blocking it for only a few minutes will result in death.
Modern indoor and outdoor air pollutants are intruders hijacking this process, leading to premature death, disability, and damage that crosses generations. Microscopic pollutant particles and gases can cross the one cell layer of your air exchange sacs and enter your blood, from there carried throughout your body to cause widespread damage.
Other particles remain lodged deep in your lungs, provoking serious respiratory inflammation and harming your ability to get the oxygen needed for survival. Your lungs are structured to function in clean air, so don’t (more…)
Tags: air pollutants, air quality, barbecue, cancer, cardiovascular disease, diabetes, environmental degradation, fragrance, getting healthy, grilling, PAH, particulate matter, Plant-based nutrition, polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons, secondhand smoke, traffic exhaust, whole foods plant-based diet
Posted in Health | Comments Off on Which Air Pollutants Are Worst For Your Health?
Sunday, March 3rd, 2013
Dave’s Killer Bread, fresh out of the oven. Every time I see this picture, I want to grab a loaf.
Bob’s Red Mill and Dave’s Killer Bread Take Whole Grains From Field to Your Lunch
Unlike the political capitol of the US, impressive health flows from Milwaukie, Oregon, the whole grain capitol of food fans. Or at least this food fan. What are whole grains? Simply the seeds of certain grasses. Whole grains, a key part of whole foods, plant-based diets, lower your risk of diabetes and cardiovascular disease and help you stay thin. Ridiculous denials of extensive scientific research by animal foods industries and advocates do not change the basic biological facts.
I was in whole grain heaven the day I visited the headquarters of Bob’s Red Mill and Dave’s Killer Bread. Their two facilities, only minutes apart in Milwaukie (near Portland), are united by (more…)
Tags: Bob's Red Mill, cardiovascular disease, Dave's Killer Bread, diabetes, lose weight, Plant-based nutrition, Sin Dawgs, whole foods plant-based diet, whole grains
Posted in Health | Comments Off on Where Do You Find the Best Whole Grain Foods?
Sunday, February 3rd, 2013
You no longer need to wonder whether the chicken or the egg came first. They are interchangeable. An egg is a disassembled baby bird just waiting to form into a miraculous being.
It’s Not Just the Cholesterol That Scrambles Your Health
One of my most stomach-churning childhood experiences was cracking an egg for cooking and finding a partially formed chick fetus inside. I screamed in horror and threw it in the trash. No one else was in the kitchen with me. I learned at that point that it’s pointless to ask “which came first, the chicken or the egg?”
In fact, chickens and eggs are interchangeable. An egg is a disassembled chick, since everything needed to form the baby bird is inside the egg. The shell forms (more…)
Tags: cardiovascular disease, cholesterol, diabetes, eggs, getting healthy, lose weight, nutrition facts, Plant-based nutrition, salmonella, whole foods plant-based diet
Posted in Plant-based nutrition | Comments Off on Seven Dangers of Eating Eggs
Friday, January 11th, 2013
Julie Simon shares how to end emotional eating permanently
Julie Simon Shows You How to End Compulsive Eating and the Diet Mentality
Do you struggle with compulsive emotional eating, including binge eating when you’re not really hungry or frequently reaching for junk food instead of nourishing choices? If so, you may have developed a love/hate relationship with eating.
On the one hand, food is always there for you, and can entertain and soothe you. But at the same time, you feel out-of-control and so unhappy after stuffing down more than you need. You have probably tried many diets and maybe even emptied your wallet on an unsuccessful quest for an easy, trendy fix. Yet you find yourself with weight ups-and-downs (more up than down) and a painful struggle between “I want” and “I should,” with guilt never far away.
I know, I lived these conflicts myself through my early adult years. My friend Julie Simon, a psychotherapist and life coach, also struggled with these same issues. Lucky for us, Julie developed an approach to put a permanent end to unhealthy eating driven by addictions, body imbalances, and painful emotions.
Julie’s book, The Emotional Eater’s Repair Manual: A Practical Mind-Body-Spirit Guide for Putting an End to Overeating and Dieting, shares her discoveries. She articulates how to end (more…)
Tags: binge eating, compulsive eating, emotional eating, Julie Simon, lose weight, Plant-based nutrition, The Emotional Eaters Repair Manual, weight loss, whole foods plant-based diet
Posted in weight loss | Comments Off on How To Stop Emotional Eating For Good
Sunday, December 16th, 2012
Your choices significantly determine whether you will go over the health cliff that fills so many lives with pain and limitations
The Health Cliff Is Way More Treacherous Than Any Fiscal Politics
The drama of the “fiscal cliff” is riveting the country. Even when a political deal stops the threat of abrupt tax hikes and deep spending cuts, more battles over finances are sure to rock Congress for years to come, so the core issues will remain hot long after January 1, 2013.
While the fiscal issues are major news, the media spends little time focusing on the health cliff, which is a looming catastrophe for most Americans. You have the choice to make this most personal drama play out (more…)
Tags: cancer, cardiovascular disease, diabetes, fiscal cliff, Forks Over Knives, getting healthy, health cliff, Perfect Formula Diet, Plant-based nutrition, reverse chronic disease, The China Study, Vegucated, whole foods plant-based diet
Posted in Health | Comments Off on How To Avoid Your Own Personal Health Cliff
Saturday, December 1st, 2012
Your liver is a vital organ that is essential for health – and for survival. Drinking to excess can injure and eventually destroy your liver.
Wine and Cheese May Be a Particularly Toxic Combination
Drinking too much over a period of years is even more deadly than smoking. Alcohol can damage your brain, liver, digestive system, and other body systems. A recent study found that death rates were twice as high for alcohol-dependent men and almost five times as high for alcohol-dependent women, compared to the general population. Some studies have found small amounts of alcoholic drinks to be protective of heart health, although this may be due to beneficial phytochemicals in the plants the drinks were made from.
You should consult your physician to determine the amount of alcohol (if any) it’s best to set your limits at. The information in this article is educational and not intended to tell you whether you should drink or (if you do) how much; only a licensed health care professional who is familiar with your health history can do that.
Whatever your choice on consuming alcohol, you should know that that animal foods, such as meat and cheese, may boost the normal dangers of drinking by accelerating (more…)
Tags: alcohol, antioxidants, getting healthy, liver disease, nonalcoholic fatty liver disease, nutrition facts, Plant-based nutrition, vegetables, whole foods, whole foods plant-based diet
Posted in Health | 1 Comment »
Friday, November 2nd, 2012
Dr. Don Wagner broadcasts 5 days a week for an hour each day with top-notch guests. You can hear him anywhere with the show archives on the web.
Dr. Don Wagner Heeded “Physician Heal Thyself,” and Now Guides Patients with a Whole Foods, Plant-Based Diet Plan
Childhood was a health disaster for Don Wagner. Born with cardiac issues, including a hole in his heart and arrhythmias, he started life on medications and hospitalizations.
At age 4, he tumbled off a three story balcony in New York City, his childhood home. Paralyzed on his left side, he spent 6 months in a hospital with doctors helpless to get him to recover. Finally, still unable to move the left side of his body, (more…)
Tags: Bullhead Urgent Care Center, cardiovascular disease, diabetes, Dr. Caldwell Esselstyn, Dr. Don Show, Dr. Don Wagner, getting healthy, Plant-based nutrition, reverse chronic disease, vegan radio show, vegetables, whole foods plant-based diet
Posted in Plant-based nutrition | Comments Off on The Physician Who Sends You to the Food Store, Not the Drugstore
Thursday, October 25th, 2012
Fuyu persimmons are such a pretty color and shape
This Delightful Fruit Will Make You Glad That It’s Fall
There are two kinds of people in the world: those who love Fuyu persimmons, and those who have never tried this amazing treat. I was category two for most of my life. But when I adopted a whole foods, plant-based diet, I became more adventurous and had to try this new food that seemed so exotic. The first bite left me wondering at the attraction of this novel fruit, but I quickly advanced to category one, so happy to have discovered an autumn treasure to cushion the end of summer.
Persimmons are an orange fruit that stars in the fall, when you are primed to love orange as the color of the season. The taste of Fuyus is quite mild and somewhat sweet, yet also strangely addictive. Or maybe it is the satisfying crunch, (more…)
Tags: carotenoids, Fuyu persimmon, phytochemicals, Plant-based nutrition, whole foods plant-based diet
Posted in Plant-based nutrition | 1 Comment »
Saturday, September 15th, 2012
Early cave men did not look like this, and they did not eat the Paleo diet either. But good myths are hard to get rid of.
Still Another “High-Protein” Diet Threatens Your Health
The Paleo Diet can hook you with its story. This “cave man” diet promises to reunite you with your ancestors from 2.5 million years ago through the simple act of eating meat. In this complex era of busy lives and disconnected community, this is an appealing picture. Agriculture, which began 10,000 years ago, is the story’s villain, supposedly leading people away from the hunt to an unnatural diet.
Loren Cordain, PhD and professor at Colorado State, launched the Paleo Diet with his book of the same name. This restrictive eating plan forbids all grains, potatoes and legumes (peas, lentils, beans) as well as dairy and processed foods (including processed meats). You eat all you want of meat, fish, vegetables, and fruit. Bone marrow, animal organs, and meat from wild animals are all on the menu.
The book represents that you can cure just about any chronic illness, from heart disease to cancer, by eating this way because it would match the way your distant ancestors ate for over two million years. You are also supposed to (more…)
Tags: African savannah, cardiovascular disease, cave man diet, diabetes, human evolution, lose weight, nutrition facts, Paleo diet, Paleo diet dangers, Plant-based nutrition, Smithsonian, whole foods plant-based diet
Posted in Plant-based nutrition | 3 Comments »
Thursday, August 23rd, 2012
Whole grains are lovely as they grow. You can clearly see in this picture that the grains of wheat are seeds that form in a cluster on a grassy plant.
A Seed by Any Other Name is Still a Seed
Real world studies of what people eat show, over and over again, that if you consume whole grains you will be healthier and thinner. Yet outlandish statements in the popular media, and even “nutrition” books, may keep you from enjoying and benefitting from these most basic of all foods. When you know the facts, you won’t deprive yourself.
Whole grains are seeds. You might hear silly statements such as “Whole grains are not healthy, but quinoa is because it’s a seed.” If you hear anything like this, you know whoever is telling you knows zero about plants or nutrition, and you can boost your health by tuning out.
Another mundane myth is that people did not start to eat whole grains until these plants were domesticated about 10,000 years ago. Why would people have gone to all the trouble of deliberately cultivating a plant that they never ate before? Were our ancestors that misguided? The truth is that people ate wild grain seeds long before they started to plant them. In some parts of the world, wild grains still (more…)
Tags: barley, cardiovascular disease, corn, diabetes, fiber, getting healthy, lose weight, nutrition facts, oats, phytochemicals, Plant-based nutrition, quinoa, reverse chronic disease, rice, weight loss, whole foods, whole foods plant-based diet, whole grains, whole wheat
Posted in Plant-based nutrition | Comments Off on The Truth About Whole Grains
